European far right courts Israel in stepped-up anti-Islam drive
Far-right political parties in Europe are stepping up their anti-Muslim rhetoric and forging ties across borders, even going so far as to visit Israel to hail the Jewish state as a bulwark against militant Islam.
Marine Le Pen of France’s National Front has shocked the French political elite in recent days by comparing Muslims who pray outside crowded mosques — a common sight especially during the holy month of Ramadan — to the World War Two Nazi occupation. Oskar Freysinger, a champion of the Swiss ban on minarets, warned a far-right meeting in Paris on Saturday against “the demographic, sociological and psychological Islamisation of Europe”. German and Belgian activists also addressed the crowd.
Geert Wilders, whose populist far-right party supports the Dutch minority government, told Reuters last week he was organising an “international freedom alliance” to link grass-roots groups active in “the fight against Islam”. Earlier this month, Wilders visited Israel and backed its West Bank settlements, saying Palestinians there should move to Jordan. Like-minded German, Austrian, Belgian, Swedish and other far-rightists were on their own Israel tour at the same time. “Our culture is based on Christianity, Judaism and humanism and (the Israelis) are fighting our fight,” Wilders said. “If Jerusalem falls, Amsterdam and New York will be next.”
Campaigns aimed at Muslims have been gaining ground in Europe, most notably with the Swiss minaret ban last year and France’s law this year against full facial veils in public, which Wilders said the Netherlands should copy next year. Support for these steps has spread beyond anti-immigrant parties and towards the political centre as globalisation and the ageing of Europe’s population fuel voters’ concerns about national sovereignty, according to leading French analyst Dominique Reynié.
Dutch may introduce burqa ban as early as 2011
The Netherlands could ban full face veils worn by some Muslim women,as soon as next year, Dutch anti-Islam politician Geert Wilders told Reuters in an interview on Thursday. Wilders’ populist Freedom Party is the third largest in parliament and provides crucial support to the minority ruling coalition in exchange for the government taking a tougher line on Islam and immigration from non-Western countries.
His party has grown in popularity largely because of his outspoken criticism of Islam, which he describes as “a violent ideology.” He has been charged with inciting hatred against Muslims for comparing Islam to Nazism. The case is due to start over again following a request for new judges.
“We are not a single issue party but the fight against a fascist ideology Islam is for us of the utmost importance,” said Wilders, who argues his comments about Islam are protected by freedom of speech.
Wilders said immigration from Muslim countries “is very dangerous to the Netherlands. We believe our country is based on Christianity, on Judaism, on humanism, and we believe the more Islam we get, the more it will not only threaten our culture and our own identity but also our values and our freedom.”
The burqa ban, which his party agreed as part of a pact with the minority coalition, is due to come into force within four years and possibly as soon as next year or 2012, he said.
One might argue that this burqa ban is long overdue and that this outfit symbolises non-interaction, non-integration and distance. One must find it impossible to start an introduction to someone whose eyes are hardly visible and if the eyes are visible it’s the outfit that stifles any introduction let alone conversation and friendship. This is precisely what some old gentleman used to say from years ago; ‘it’s not the West one should watch out for; they won’t take your land and freedom … but it is Islam, a political and religious stand which is altogether different from what everyone had known that one should worry about’. And now it seems Geert Wilders must have seen the light, so to speak for no one like him have said that Islam is ‘incompatible with freedom of discussion and speech’ even though politicians are witnessing and seeing the obvious.
Wilders’s anti-Islam film screened in Dutch court
The hate trial of Dutch anti-Islamist politician Geert Wilders, who will have a powerful shadow role in the Dutch government, resumed on Wednesday with a showing of his controversial film that criticises the Koran.
The screening in court of Wilders’s 2008 film “Fitna,” which accuses the Koran of inciting violence, threatened to interrupt the trial for a second time in a week when defence lawyer Bram Moszkowicz objected to comments from presiding judge Jan Moors.
When one complainant said she did not wish to see the film, which accuses the Koran of inciting violence, Moors said: “I can understand that” — prompting a sharp response from Moszkowicz who said such a remark is simply not allowed. Moors stressed he was not expressing any judgement over the film.
Monday’s proceedings had to be halted when Wilders, after invoking his right to remain silent, accused judges of “scandalous” bias and demanded they be replaced. The court rejected the claims on Tuesday, the same day that Dutch Christian Democrat MPs approved a coalition pact with the Liberals that relies on support from Wilders’s anti-Islam Freedom Party.
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Dutch anti-Islam lawmaker Wilders challenges judges at hate speech trial
Dutch anti-Islam politician Geert Wilders, a key player in efforts to form a new government, has accused judges trying him on charges of inciting hatred of scandalous bias and demanded they be replaced.
Wilders, who has 24-hour police guard because of death threats, went on trial Monday over comments including a comparison he made between the Islamic faith and Nazism.
“I have said what I have said and I will not take one word back, but that doesn’t mean I’ve said everything attributed to me,” Wilders said before invoking his right to remain silent. That stance prompted the presiding judge to say that Wilders had been accused by others of making statements while avoiding debate and that it appeared he was doing the same in court.
“I find it … inappropriate, improper and even scandalous that the chairman of the court interprets this and commentates on it,” Wilders said at a separate hearing hastily held to discuss concerns raised by his lawyer Bram Moszkowicz about the impartiality of the judges. “The appearance of bias … has been invoked. A fair process is no longer possible.”
Judges adjourned the trial and will decide at about 1200 GMT Tuesday on the issue of the judges’ impartiality. If the court rules in favor of the defence’s objections, new judges must be imposed, delaying the trial for months.
“Burqa bans”: First France, then the Netherlands – who’s next?
First the French banned Muslim face veils, now the Dutch have decided to follow suit. With debates about outlawing burqas and niqabs spreading across Europe, a third ban — perhaps even more — may not be far behind.
Only a small minority of Muslim women in Europe cover their faces, but their veils have become ominous symbols for Europeans troubled by problems such as the economic crisis, immigration and Muslim integration.
With Europe’s political mood moving to the right, low-cost, high-symbolism measures such as veil bans have become a rallying cry for far-right parties knocking at the door of power. Their appeal also resonates with those worried by possible security threats from masked people or offended by the blow to gender equality they see when a covered woman walks by.
Raffaele Simone, whose book “The Meek Monster: why the West is not going left” has aroused debate in Italy and France, said the rightward drift fits an individualistic and globalized consumer society that Europe’s left-wing failed to understand. “In aging European populations, modernity has generated a worrying and chaotic jumble of threats and fears only the right and the far right seem able to respond to now,” Simone, a Rome university linguistics professor, told the Paris newspaper Le Monde.
Calls for a “burqa ban” are now heard across Europe, with local politics influencing how close it gets to becoming law. Read the full story here.
There is little doubt that the burqa and niqab is a symbol of gender inequality,the tyranny of men over women.It conjures up stories of “honor killings,” and female genital mutilation.The most despicable of human vices is,in my opinion,the desire of one human being to have control of another,justified more often than not by some perversion of an ideal,usually religious.I congratulate the Dutch,a continuous beacon of reason for centuries.My own family hid Jews from the Nazis in Holland during the occupation,another form of the same dreadful evil.
Dutch government pact sealed with ban on “burqas” to win Wilders support
Two centre-right parties agreed on Thursday to ban full face veils in the Netherlands as the price for parliamentary support from the anti-Islam Freedom party for their planned minority government.
The Netherlands would become the second European Union country to ban Muslim veils — known collectively as burqas in many European countries — after France, in what many see as a shift to the right which has dented the bloc’s reputation for tolerance and may increase security risks.
The draft agreement tightens the rules on immigration and boosts the number of police officers in a concession to far-right Freedom Party leader Geert Wilders, who is on trial for inciting hatred against Muslims.
In return Wilders would support the new coalition’s plans for 18 billion euros ($24 billion) in budget cuts and to bring the deficit within European Union limits by 2013.
“We want to stop the Islamisation (of the Netherlands),” Wilders told a news conference, adding that the measures would cut non-Western immigration by half.
Dutch agree coalition with support from anti-Islam party of Geert Wilders
Two Dutch parties have agreed to form a minority government coalition, with support from a far-right party whose leader Geert Wilders is on trial for inciting hatred against Muslims.
The parliamentary leaders of the VVD Liberal Party and CDA Christian Democrats reached agreement on Tuesday to form the minority government, the first in the Netherlands since 1939, with support in parliament from the anti-Islam PVV Freedom Party. Read the full story here.
The VVD and the CDA plan to govern with support in parliament from the PVV, which has called Islam a backwards religion and said the ‘islamisation’ of the Netherlands needs to be stopped. Christian Democrat unease over support by an anti-Islam party is casting a shadow over the deal.
Wilders, who has compared the Koran to Adolf Hitler’s book “Mein Kampf”, is on trial on charges of inciting hatred and discrimination against Muslims. The case will resume Monday.
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The whole world is waiting and watching and praying for Mr Wilders….even ex-pats from England and Europe, who are currently living in Australia and New Zealand. We know the horrific forces that seek to destroy the world and they are not just hatefilled Muslims!!! Yet, there are their share of haters in that community and all loving souls of any background should support this courageous knight at this time. Take your rightful place real males of Europe, at the helm, and your women will follow you. Let the show trial begin.
Dutch concerns over Islam, globalisation drive Wilders’ support
After scoring gains in local elections, Dutch anti-immigration politician Geert Wilders is now primed to make waves in a national poll in June by tapping into discontent over Islam and globalisation.
In the first test of public opinion since the collapse of Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende’s coalition government last month, Wilders’ Freedom Party (PVV) became the largest party in the city of Almere and came second in The Hague on Wednesday.
Drawing strength from a savvy public relations machine and a populist anti-immigration stance that plays well with part of the electorate, Wilders also represents a vote against the political elite, political experts say. “He thrives on discontent in society and multiculturalism and he has targeted Islam,” said Nico Landman, an associate professor in Islamic studies at Utrecht University.
Muslims now make up about 6 percent, or 1 million of the 16 million population of the Netherlands. “We need to give an opposing voice and that’s what we want to keep doing and we haven’t done that enough,” said Henny Kreeft, chairman of the Dutch Muslim Party chairman. “Wilders creates fear and reacts to the Islamisation of the Netherlands, but there is no Islamisation of the Netherlands.”
Fight fire with fire, go Geert
Educate the ignorant realists whom are not only destroying the history and culture of their nations, but attacking the fabric of the western values of our priceless Latin heritage.
From your supporters in Australia, sacrifices need to be made.
from UK News:
Geert Wilders – martyr for free speech or public safety threat?
Right-wing Dutch MP Geert Wilders, who is being prosecuted at home for anti-Islam remarks, has been barred from entering Britain.
He had been invited to show the House of Lords his film "Fitna," which argues that the Koran incites violence, but was told his opinions could "threaten community harmony and therefore public safety" and sent back home again when he arrived at Heathrow.
Defending the decision to bar him, Foreign Secretary David Miliband said: "A hate-filled film designed to stir up religious and racial hatred in this country is contrary to our laws."
But Wilders called Gordon Brown the biggest coward in Europe and added: "I think a discussion is always better than barring people or turning people away."
Do you think he should have been allowed in to show his film?
Sidney, I agree with you that he will be ridiculed if he made statements against Jews. But if you have read my past comments, I also defended Bishop Williamson’s right to speak as to the truth of the holocaust. I also made strong comments against those who resort to demonizing and name calling rather than presenting solid arguments against his opinion. I And I will make the same comment on your comments. If I were you sidney, present to us reasonable arguments that will overturn our contentions. Conjectures, name calling and demonizing should not be the tone of your comments. Your behaviour only demonstrates how Muslims deal with their dissenters if indeed you are a Muslim.
Will “The Jewel of Medina” create another Rushdie affair?
Are we headed for another “Rushdie affair” over the yet-to-be-published novel The Jewel of Medina? First an American publisher withdrew its plan to publish the novel about A’isha, the child bride of the Prophet Mohammad, out of fear of a backlash from Islamist radicals. Then a British publisher announced he had bought the rights and would print the “once feared historical novel“. Now comes the news that the publisher’s London office has been the target of an arson attack and police have arrested three men on suspicion of terrorism.
Some early signs are not encouraging. The Daily Telegraph quotes Anjem Choudhary, a radical cleric based in Ilford in east London, as saying: “It is clearly stipulated in Muslim law that any kind of attack on his honour carries the death penalty.” While his unbending interpretation of Muslim law is certainly debatable, his warning that publication of the novel could cause further protests is not.
On the other hand, Muslim Council of Britain spokesman Inayat Bunglawala wrote last week that the mood among British Muslims had changed since they clamoured for Salman Rushdie’s The Satanic Verses to be banned. “Is this rethinking now widespread amongst British Muslims? Yes, my impression is that it certainly is with many now accepting that the Satanic Verses affair served to create (and for others reinforce) the unfortunate view that Muslims were backward, anti-intellectual, prone to violence and saw themselves as being somehow above the law,” he wrote.
“It is painful to admit it, but on the need to uphold the freedom to offend, Rushdie was right. The consequences of not doing so should be apparent by now to Muslims above all. Earlier this year, the leader of the far right Dutch Freedom Party, Geert Wilders, called for the Qur’an to be banned because he found some passages in the book offensive. And there’s the rub. Who is to decide what is offensive or not? What may be offensive to me may be just harmless fun to you and vice versa.”
There’s a lot of political manipulation behind these “spontaneous” outbursts of violence against anyone accused of blaspheming Mohammad (as we saw in the Danish cartoons controversy). There are also ways of trying to counter this. The failure of Wilders’ much-hyped film Fitna to incite anti-Muslim tension in the Netherlands is a case in point. None other than the top Dutch counterterrorism official noted that the debate preceding the film’s premiere helped bring Christian and Muslim groups together to discuss their views and maintain calm when the film was aired.
If The Jewel of Medina is published, protests in the Muslim world (such as the burning of a Rushdie effigy in Pakistan last year pictured above) might be par for the course. The question is whether they will be matched by copy-cat violence in Europe.
London’s highly competitive newspaper market loves blaring headlines and shock quotes. There are bound to be more coming in this story and they may be justified. As this story progresses, I’m curious to see how Muslim groups in Britain and elsewhere in Europe react and whether those defending the principle of free speech get as much coverage as those railing against it.
this book should not be published. Talking about muslim prophets .this book is very offensive to muslims! you dont see muslims writing a book about jesus because we respect other religions
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