At Home in Europe [EN]

Wilders in Rome (2): Crumbling foundations of Euro-supremacist ideology

2011-03-29T01:35:00.000+02:00

Edward Gibbon by Henry WaltonMarch 26, 2011, Mr. Wilders continued (see first part) his remarkable horror story in front of a Roman public by referring to Edward Gibbon, a great 18th century British historian, whose "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" (1776-1789, 6 vol.) was a first exhaustive study into the fragility of empires.

Inevitably, Wilders (or his ghost writer, for Mr. Wilders did not study at an University) concentrates on a 402 AD (or 401 or 405 AD) event. Some Germanic [and Slavic, HR] peoples crossed the Rhine river and started an invasion into the Roman Gaul lands. Which lead, finally, to plundering of the City of Rome in 406 AD (or 410 AD). Gibbon's source is Jerome in Bethlehem, who was observing from a large distance in space and time what had happened to the Western part of the Roman Empire. The event is not central to Edward Gibbon's theory about the way and causes of the Roman downfall. But Jerome was one of the few written sources he could access. Historiography has much progressed since then. But Mr. Wilders needed a source to underline his anti-islamic world vision and his idée-fixe about Christian supremacy. So he said:

In the 5th century, the Roman Empire fell to the Germanic Barbarians. There is no doubt that the Roman civilization was far superior to that of the Barbarians. And yet, Rome fell. Rome fell because it had suffered a loss of belief in its own civilization. It had lost the will to stand up and fight for survival.

Rome did not fall overnight. Rome fell gradually. The Romans scarcely noticed what was happening. They did not perceive the immigration of the Barbarians as a threat until it was too late. For decades, Germanic Barbarians, attracted by the prosperity of the Empire, had been crossing the border.

At first, the attraction of the Empire on newcomers could be seen as a sign of the cultural, political and economic superiority of Rome. People came to find a better life which their own culture could not provide. But then, on December 31st in the year 406, the Rhine froze and tens of thousands of Germanic Barbarians, crossed the river, flooded the Empire and went on a rampage, destroying every city they passed. In 410, Rome was sacked.

This intrusion from the North was neither the first, nor the last one that happened during the Migration Period. From the third century on, Roman emperors had been hiring German and Slavic tribesmen as soldiers, allowing them to settle in different parts of the Empire and using them to keep away new peoples coming from the East and the North. During the time we speak of, the East Roman Emperor in Constantinople was engaging Germans to attack his Western Roman rivals. Due, amongst others to climate change (!), the largely Romanized peoples in the transdanubian and transrhenanian area, were driven from the colder regions to warmer climates. A large part of the Vandals ended up in North Africa, where their state subsisted for centuries. The Visigoths (from Sweden) settled in Spain. The Franks in France.

And, you'll ask, what has Christianism to do with this? For, in Wilders' opinion, Rome was "superior' because of it's "judeo-christian roots". Well, you are in for a big surprise! Those "barbarians" were Christians, too! A quick look by the ghostwriters into the Wiki would have been enough, to make their master less ridiculous. (Wikipedia about Vandals &c):

Around this time, the Hasdingi [one of the two Vandal tribes, HR] had already been Christianized. During the Emperor Valens's reign (364–78) the Vandals accepted, much like the Goths earlier, Arianism, a belief that was in opposition to that of Nicene orthodoxy [Concilium of Nicaea, 323, HR] of the Roman Empire. Yet there were also some scattered orthodox Vandals, among whom was the famous magister militum Stilicho, the chief minister of the [Roman] Emperor Honorius [in Constantinople, HR].
In 400 or 401, possibly because of attacks by the Huns, the Vandals, under kingGodigisel, along with their allies (the Sarmatian Alans and Germanic Suebians) moved westwards into Roman territory. Some of the Silingi [the other Vandal tribe, HR] joined them later. Vandals raided the Roman province of Raetia in the winter of 401/402.

Oh, my God! Those "barbarians" crossing the Rhine, they were ... Arian Christians! It was a match between Christians, not between believers and non-believers! Like it happens always in war, barbaric acts were perpetrated on both sides. Fellow (orthodox) Christians manipulated Arian Christians to attack Roman Christians. And, believe me, Jews and humanistic polytheists, they were discriminated against and chased away by all three of the Christian sects!

If you read Edward Gibbon, even superficially, you'll find, that he attributes the decline and fall of the Roman Empire to imperial militarist authoritarianism, in particular the use of hired soldiers in the Praetorian Guard, who acted like sectarian militias in the way of the "stadscommandos" (the city vigilantes) the PVV is proposing now for more "security" in the Dutch cities. Rome's decline and fall came from within, if you follow Edward Gibbon's reasoning.

From within Christianity, not from the outside.

When Wilders needs a dramatic point, he always comes up with Winston Churchill. Florida synagogue audiences hailed him as the "new Churchill" who will save Europe from Barbary. So, it is time for old Winston, to make his appearance in Wilders' apocalyptic speech:

The fall of Rome was a traumatic experience. Numerous books have been written about the cataclysmal event and Europeans were warned not to make the same mistake again. In 1899, in his book ‘The River War,’ Winston Churchill warned that Islam is threatening Europe in the same way as the Barbarians once threatened Rome. “Mohammedanism,” Churchill wrote – I quote – “is a militant and proselytizing faith. No stronger retrograde force exists in the World. […] The civilization of modern Europe might fall, as fell the civilization of ancient Rome.” End of quote.

Winston Churchill was in 1899 writing as a young reporter about the Fashoda Incident in Sudan, stressing the need for Great Britain to secure a North-South corridor in Africa and exaggerating the "danger" of the Sudanese Mahdi movement, in order to get an excuse to occupy those regions before the French would do so. "Mohammedanism" was certainly not Winston Churchill's main concern. Which was proven only one year later, when he participated in the British genocide (the first concentration camps!) against the very Christian South African Boers, in spite of their firm Dutch roots. And it was under Churchill's reign, later on, that Muslim Palestinians and Jordanians were encouraged to fight Jewish immigration into Palestine. Mr. Wilders certainly has a gift. The gift of choosing examples that illustrate the opposite of what he wanted to prove.

Mr. Wilders is not interested in facts that contradict his Manichean beliefs. Christians are always good, or 'superior' at least. Outsiders, in particular Muslims, are always bad, or 'inferior, backward'. A more realistic view on mankind is condemned as "Multiculturalism", in spite of the fact that there are no other civilizations than multicultural ones.

... if Europe falls, it will fall because, like ancient Rome, it no longer believes in the superiority of its own civilization. It will fall because it foolishly believes that all cultures are equal and that, consequently, there is no reason why we should fight for our own culture in order to preserve it.
This failure to defend our own culture has turned immigration into the most dangerous threat that can be used against the West. Multiculturalism has made us so tolerant that we tolerate the intolerant.

These are the rantings of a man, possessed by Angst. If Wilders had an idea of the wealth, the riches and the strength of Western civilization and it's multi-layered cultural content, he would not be afraid of a possible "fall" of our civilization. But he is an uncultured demagogue, who, as a politician, should look out for solutions to the frictions caused by ever increasing globalism.

But, like so many christian, jewish, muslim, buddhist, communist and fascist authoritarians before him, he creates horrible myths about the stranger, whose only concern, he says, is destruction of our society.

In the third part of this series, we'll have a more close look into Wilders' remedies against multiculturalists with "weak knees" and the supposed worldwide Islamic conjuration they would be sponsoring.

The first part was also published in At Home in Europe.

Geert Wilders in Rome (1): White Supremacism, wild mythology

2011-03-27T05:14:00.000+02:00

March 25 (26), Mr. Geert Wilders, Dutch MP and leader of an authoritarian movement (no membership, one leader), called the 'Freedom Party' (PVV), spoke at a meeting in Rome, Italy.
In addition to what Mr. Wilders will have to say himself about his actual position and perspectives in Holland and elsewhere, we'd like to mention, that his hosts (the Italian Magna Carta Foundation) are closely linked to media tycoon and much criticized populist head of Government Silvio Berlusconi as well as to the American Enterprise Institute (AEI). The AEI, as is well known, are under neo-conservative influence.
But, actually, neither the AEI, nor the main neocon publication (The Weekly Standard, Washington DC) seem to be much in favor of a crusade against Islam as such. The US Neoconservatives consider religion, Christian or not, as an efficient disciplining tool for the masses. That is, why AEI and WS scarcely mention the Dutch peroxyd blond verbal crusader against Islam. They prefer a more subtle approach.
Wilders is trying to establish an international federation of anti-Islam movements. He has already a name for it: 'Geert Wilders International Freedom Association' (GWIFA). GWIFA should be established in the US. But, alas for him, large egos like Robert Spencer, Pamela Geller and Daniel Pipes, are not in a mood to leave the stage and put up a wooden shoe loon as their mascot.

Wilders' GWIFA effort limits itself, up to now, to an association with a remarkably un-sexy ex-christian democrat from Berlin, Mr. Stadtkewitz. Other potential allies, like the Flemish VB and the Austrian FPÖ are, for the moment, under Geert's ban because of their too close association with an anti-semitic past.
Wilders' invitation by the Italian foundation can only be explained by the presence, as it's international secretary, of Anita Friedman. Friedman is head of an association "We'll Meet in Jerusalem" and she comes from an active Zionist American family.
I do not know yet, if Wilders' speech (see below) had any impact in Rome or in Italy. But, whatever it did, or didn't, it helps us to study the actual level of folly, idiocy and despicable hate-mongering that Mr. Wilders and his American-Israeli funders try to make us believe at this point of time.

The Failure of Multiculturalism and How to Turn the Tide
Signore e signori, ladies and gentlemen, dear friends of the Magna Carta Foundation, molte grazie. Thank you for inviting me to Rome. It is great to be here in this beautiful city which for many centuries was the capital and the centre of Europe’s Judeo-Christian culture.

Wilders speaks of a "Judean-Christian culture", leaving out the "humanistic", "rationalistic" or "laic" component he always features. That is remarkable. The city of Rome was for a long time opposed to the introduction by 4th century emperors like Constantine of Christianity as a state-religion. It sticked to its centuries-old tradition of polytheïstic and rational philosophy. Even now, a self-conscious Roman upper class loathes the Vatican and it's pretensions.
1st-4rd Century Jews were confined to a poor ghetto that existed already under Nero (Year 20-40). Christians were considered a Jewish sect. Persecuted by all emperors up to Diocletian (300) as well as the Jews proper. Until deep into the 6th century, the Bishop of Rome struggled to be recognized as head of the Western Roman Catholic Church. The Byzantine colleague had much more power.
Rome, on the brink of the Middle Ages, was neither Jewish, nor a Christian centre.

Together with Jerusalem and Athens, Rome is the cradle of our Western civilization – the most advanced and superior civilization the world has ever known.

Nothing against mentioning of Athens an Jerusalem. But Wilders' classification of the civilization (culture?) of Rome as "the most advanced and superior civilization the world has ever known.", when speaking of early medieval Rome that is, at best, an exaggeration. Jews were mostly exiled to the upper Rhine valley. Theological thinking and renovation came from North Africa (Augustinus), from Egypt, Syria and Babylon, not to speak of Constantinople. And the Islamic renovation had yet to start
As Westerners, we share the same Judeo-Christian culture. I am from the Netherlands and you are from Italy. Our national cultures are branches of the same tree. We do not belong to multiple cultures, but to different branches of one single culture. This is why when we come to Rome, we all come home in a sense. We belong here, as we also belong in Athens and in Jerusalem. And the Islamic renovation had yet to start.

It is important that we know where our roots are. If we lose them we become deracinated. We become men and women without a culture.

So, now we know where "our" roots are. In a small, uncultured and ailing city in Italy. Goats were herded between the ruins of the Roman Forum. Roman bishops were people who could not write or read. There are stories, that one Roman bishop even was a ... woman! It is a favor of History, that Babylonian and Spanish Jews and Muslims rediscovered Greek Philosophy, translated Plato and Aristoteles into Arabic, so that (much) later on, those texts could be read in Latin, as the Renaissance imposed itself upon stubborn stupidity and superstition.

I am here today to talk about multiculturalism. This term has a number of different meanings. I use the term to refer to a specific political ideology. It advocates that all cultures are equal. If they are equal it follows that the state is not allowed to promote any specific cultural values as central and dominant. In other words: multiculturalism holds that the state should not promote a leitkultur, which immigrants have to accept if they want to live in our midst.

We are only at the 4th paragraph of Mr. Geert Wilders' Philippica, and many are to follow. But he gives us already the root of all of his reasoning: The existence of a so-called "leitkultur". And, as if that were not enough, Mr. Wilders assumes, that "the State" has to maintain that "Kultur". Not the Church, not the Philosophers, nor Sociologists or Psychiatrists, no, the State.
Of course, he does not speak of common people. Of voters and members of social organizations. No, no, for Mr. Wilders, it is the "State" that is reponsible for maintaining something that he defines als "Leitkultur".
Traditional Liberals, or Conservatives like Burke, are full out against any state-intervention into the beliefs and thoughts of citizens. Wilders sides with authoritarians like Bismarck ("Kulturkampf" against Catholics and Social Democrats) and even less palatable ideologies of the 20th century.

Intermediate conclusion: Mr. Wilders invents a "judeo-christian" myth, connected to the city of Rome. It's "culture" is "superior", right from the start, to all other "cultures" in the world. Not the Church or the Philosopher, but the "State" must impose that culture on it's citizens, old and new. It has to reject everything new that comes from outside it's cultural sphere.

This may seem already outlandish and retrograde. But madness has no limits. You'll have to get used to more and worse. Accompany us into the fairy world of a paranoiac! You'll have to see why wrong roots produce inevitably the wrong people. (Geert Wilders in Rome (2)).

Major pro-Israel giver funds ‘Jihad Watch’ and Wilders' hate-trip to New York

2010-09-06T02:20:00.000+02:00

Geller, Wilders, celebrating in LA, 2009

My God, when even the Jerusalem Post is questioning the funding and the motives of the planned 9-11 meeting against the Islamic Center's new premises in Lower Manhattan, why should I refrain then, from mentioning again the scandal of Mr. Geert Wilders' participation in it?

The JP says (September 4) in nits article Major pro-Israel-giver funds ‘Jihad Watch’:

Jihad Watch, the group that is organizing a rally against the planned Islamic center timed for the ninth anniversary of the Sept. 11 2001 attacks, is funded by Freedom Center, a conservative group based in Los Angeles.

An investigative report appearing on the online version of Politico on Saturday says that it has confirmed that the 'lion's share' of the $920,000 funneled through Freedom Center to Jihad Watch over the last three years originated with Joyce Chernick.

The JP mentions a flurry of US Jewish lobbying- and anti-Islamic groups that have been funded by Chernick and the "Freedom Center".

A number of these groups, including the Investigative Project, the ADL and the ZOA, have positioned themselves as opposed to the Islamic center. Other Jewish groups, led by the Reform movement, have been outspoken in supporting the center.

Jihad Watch, founded by Robert Spencer, has in recent months taken on board Pamela Geller, the New York-based blogger who launched efforts to stop the center's building.

Jihad Watch and Wilders claim that Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf would be a "radical" and "being funded" by Islamic fundamentalists.
The funding smear was exposed as utterly ridiculous, when it was revealed that the main Saudi investor in the Center is a major shareholder of hate-mongering Fox News as well. Look at: Amerikaanse Wilders-vrienden schieten in eigen voet! [NL] (comment in Dutch, video in English).

Even if you are a (Sufi!) Muslim who loves your country and its institutions, it seems near to impossible to escape the lies and accusations coming from people like Robert Spencer and Pamela Geller:

Rauf has spoken overseas on behalf of the U.S. State Department, under the Obama and Bush administrations, and has described the United States as a nation whose freedoms benefit Muslims.
He also eulogized Daniel Pearl, the Jewish journalist murdered in 2002 by Pakistani Islamists, by saying that such victims demand a response from Muslims that they, too, are Jews.

But the mere fact that Rauf is a Muslim, is enough for the agitators to depict him as a very dangerous foe of the USA. ("The so-called moderate Muslims are the most dangerous" - Ajaan Hirsi Ali)
We understand very well, that Geert Wilders shares those ideas. They are his daily mantra in Holland and Europe. He is going to say things about President Obama at Ground Zero on 9-11, that even Spencer and Geller do not dare to say. That might be the very reason why they pay with money from innocent Jewish contributors for his flight to New York.
The Jerusalem Post concludes with this remark:

The Islamic center's opponents, led by Jihad Watch, have demanded an accounting of the proposed center's donors, although Rauf has of yet barely raised funds for the center.

And YES: Where does the MONEY come from? It will be somewhat difficult for Geert Wilders to support just this one demand. Wilders himself hides in Holland the sources of the funding of his organization, of which he is the one and only member. A political party organized like a mafia: At least, that would be unthinkable under US Law.

But, alas, our hysterical anti-Islam agitators are not afraid of living in paradoxes and incompatibilities.
For they are not held to account by the men and women we elected to protect our state of law.

Which is at this point of time one of the main roots of European and American troubles.

Wertheim: Modern-day Racism: A Mixture That Calls for Some Clarification | Informed Comment

2010-08-31T20:26:00.006+02:00

In front of the tsunami of discrimination and hate-mongering against foreigners and their families, that invades Europe here and now, too few are the voices of intellectuals and scientists, who master the courage to say what they know is the truth: Modern-day hate-mongering is following the same road as recent waves of hate, discrimination, pogroms, ethnic cleansing and mass-extermination rode, just before they burst into collective aggression, war and death.

In Germany, recently, a team of sociologists, historians and media-experts scrupulously researched the stunning parallels between the genesis of European antisemitism after the emancipation of Jews thanks to the French Revolution during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and modern anti-Islamism. I published an authorized summary of it in HUIBSLOG: Antisemitismus und Islamophobie – Neue Feindbilder, alte Muster [DE] in June 2010. In French (and mostly translated into English), similar studies by Olivier Roy: La sainte ignorance. Le temps de la religion sans culture. (2008).

University Of Michigan Professor (History) Juan Cole publishes a Blog (Informed Comment) since 2002. He is a fine expert of the Muslim world, its history and its diversity. Two of his most recent books are here:

Engaging the Muslim World (2009) sets a possible course for the new Obama administration, doing away with the neocon-inspired Bush "war against evil states".

Napoleon's Egypt: Invading the Middle East (2007) develops a historic parallel between Napoleon's disastrous invasion of Egypt in 1797-99 and the 2003 Bush war against Iraq.

Cole generates a daily stream of posts that deal with the real developments "on the ground" in the Middle East and Asia and intervenes into US debates, learned and less learned, that develop around those issues.

Now and then, Cole publishes a "guest editorial" by another expert. Amsterdam-based retired journalist and writer Anne-Ruth Wertheim develops her father²)'s analysis of the different types of racism here, inspired by the rise of Mr. Wilders' political career, based on discrimination and hate-mongering. Wilders' ideas are racist, in her view. She explains, what mixture of racisme we have to to do with, here.

²) (Prof. Wertheim, Amsterdam University, one of my teachers there during the Sixties)

Ruth Wertheim is announced as follows at Informed Comment (IC):

Anne-Ruth Wertheim is a journalist and the author of various books including De gans eet het brood van de eenden op, mijn kindertijd in een Jappenkamp op Java (The Goose Snatches the Bread from the Ducks, My Childhood in a Japanese Prison Camp on Java, 1994). An Indonesian translation of the book was published in March 2008.She works with the concepts of exploitation/colonial racism (contempt or condescension) and cultural/competition racism (envy and distrust).

Wertheim: Modern-day Racism: A Mixture That Calls for Some Clarification | Informed Comment:
Posted on August 30, 2010

Anne-Ruth Wertheim writes a guest editorial for Informed Comment:

Propagators of modern-day racism, which is often called Islamophobia in an effort to take off the edge, claim that all they are doing is warning people about what they see as the danger of Islam, and that it has nothing to do with racism. But it is a misconception to think that racism only pertains to the physical features people are born with. Throughout history, cultural characteristics that people develop in the course of their lives have also been grounds for maligning and excluding certain groups. The competition racism that mercantile minorities all across the globe have been, and still are, confronted with, as well as the anti-Semitism in pre-WWII Europe, were imbued with cultural prejudices, and never failed to include the item of religion.

Nonetheless it is understandable that people feel confused. Modern-day racism is a mixture of two types of racism, exploitation or colonial racism and cultural or competition racism. Thus, while focusing primarily on a cultural aspect of the group, such as Islam, their religion, there still exists a focus on the group’s physical features. I will try to explain this in my article.

I was born in Indonesia when it was still a Dutch colony. I lived in a beautiful house with my parents and my little brother and sister. Like any child, I looked at the world as something that was just there. There were always Indonesian servants around who were quick to pick up anything I dropped. They would take my dirty clothes and give them back clean and neatly ironed. At breakfast every morning, my mother would sit at the table and talk to Kokki about what she would cook that day, Kokki squatting on the ground as they spoke. And when I was allowed to go along shopping, I would see Chinese proprietors bossing around Indonesians who swept the floors.

My view of the world consisted of three layers, with us white Dutchmen on top, the Indonesians at the bottom, and the Chinese in between.

From one day to the next my view of the world turned upside down when I was seven. World War II was raging in the Pacific and the Japanese occupied the Dutch East Indies. They set up a cruel regime that was to last for three and a half years and sent us and everyone else who was white to internment camps. We hardly had anything to eat, not much of anything else either, and were kept in line with a show of physical force. Our camp was guarded by Indonesian soldiers who were beaten just as hard by the Japanese as we were, though they were fed a lot better.

Now the Japanese were on top and we were at the bottom with the Indonesians in between.

Halfway through the war, the Japanese, who were allies of Nazi Germany, started to follow its example and separate Jews from non-Jews. My father, who was at an internment camp for men, was Jewish, but my mother, who was with me and my brother and sister at the women’s camp, was not. So we three children were half-Jewish and the Japanese threatened to separate us by force from our mother. To keep that from happening, my mother decided to register as Jewish herself and all four of us went to the Jewish camp together.*

After the war our family returned to the Netherlands and I discovered that my father’s Jewish family had been almost entirely killed and my Jewish grandparents had committed suicide the day the Dutch capitulated to the German army.

Shortly before and during the war, both of my parents were gradually convinced of the legitimacy of the Indonesian people’s struggle for independence. As outsiders among other Dutch people, who still felt and thought in a very colonial way, our family had to endure a lot of aggression, which of course had great impact on me as a high school student.

So by that time I had experienced quite a bit of racism and violence and all kinds of images were tangled up in my mind. It was not until much later that I started to untangle the chaos of images. One of the people I learned from was my father, a sociologist of Southeast Asia, W. F. Wertheim. He drew a distinction between two types of racism:

1. Exploitation or colonial racism towards colonized peoples and blacks during slavery and Apartheid. They were considered stupid and lazy and unable to govern themselves, but good enough to do the heavy labour for the ruling white minority.

2. Competition or cultural racism towards mercantile minorities all across the globe who compete with the established majorities. The Chinese in Indonesia and Jews in pre-WWII Europe were considered sly and cunning and accused of wanting to rule the world.

Continuing in my father’s footsteps, I discovered a shift here in Europe and thus also in the Netherlands. The first guest workers from Turkey and Morocco were confronted with the familiar old-style colonial racism and they were looked down upon. As is witnessed by the numerous references in modern-day racism to the alleged inabilities of immigrants, this tendency to look down on these people is still very much in evidence. But now that their children and grandchildren are better able to compete, the racism is starting to exhibit more elements of competition racism and to focus more on their cultural features. It is turning against Muslims and in essence all non-Western immigrants.

So, at the moment, a shift can be observed from the colonial, exploitation type of racism that focuses on physical features to the cultural type of racism that focuses on cultural features such as religion. Being somewhere in the middle of this shift we now have to do with a mixture which combines elements from both types of racism.

This modern-day mixture is nicely illustrated by the language the extreme right-wing Dutch politician Geert Wilders uses, slyly intertwining looking down on people with inspiring fear of them.**

In this chart I show exactly where the differences lie between the two types of racism. To start with, they apply to totally different groups. This is directly linked to the kind of work they do and their economic position. In this connection, there is also a difference in the prejudices that are put into circulation. In colonial racism, the prejudices have to do with contempt and disdain and focus mainly on physical features, and in cultural racism they evoke fear and mainly focus on cultural features. The intentions behind the prejudices are completely in line with what they are supposed to justify, in one case exploitation, in the other exclusion.

When I write and talk about these two types of racism, something that always strikes me is how much more familiar the exploitation type of racism is to people than the competition type. Racism that pertains to groups that are forced to do the heavy work and are considered to be stupid and lazy, is widely known, and the human damage caused by colonial and post-colonial procedures is recognized manifold. But the other type of racism that pertains groups that are competitive and for that reason accused of being dangerous and striving for total domination, is amazingly unknown. Nevertheless this last type has also caused and still causes much damage in the world – ranging from pogroms on Chinese mercantile minorities everywhere in Asia, to the expulsion of the Indian- and Pakistani mercantile minority from Uganda, to what happened to the Jews in Europe.

It is also interesting to see what makes people believe in prejudices that they nonetheless prefer to keep to themselves. No one is about to admit how much they like feeling superior to another group. And in our competition-ridden society, envy and jealousy are frowned upon; anyone who has less than someone else has only himself to blame. This capitalistic ideology was aptly stated recently by Dutch right-wing politician Mark Rutte when he sardonically referred to a higher tax for the rich as jealousy tax. So it is no wonder people would rather not admit their envy towards the competitiveness of immigrants and prefer to be carried away by cheerleaders for the fear of Islam.

Lastly, the violence – be it extremely diverse – that accompanies each type of racism. In the case of exploitation racism, only a few rebellious individuals are publicly punished to keep everyone else in their place. The group as a whole, after all, has to remain healthy enough to do the hard work. But the intention of cultural racism is to exterminate an entire group or expel them from the country. History has shown that this kind of mass violence is set in motion once the epithets that really scare people have been uttered long and systematically enough about a specific group. It is not without reason that people who commit these acts of violence so often say that they had no choice, that it was self-defence. And in every case, the outbreak of violence was preceded by a sharper outlining of the group, accompanied by allusions to expulsion, and a stronger emphasis on recognizing members of the group.

With their seemingly purely economic question about the costs of all the non-Western immigrants and their children and their children’s children, the propagators of modern-day racism in the Netherlands recently put a group in the spotlight that everyone can recognize by the colour of their skin. This is going to mean trouble. But there is still time. Time for more and more people to understand the mechanisms that are in motion and opt for a future of peaceful coexistence.

* I tell this story in The Goose Snatches the Bread from the Ducks. My Childhood in a Japanese Prison Camp on the Isle of Java, which can be ordered on DVD or downloaded via this site.

** See This Link to my earlier essay at IC (Wilders' Lethal Words)
----------------------
Anne-Ruth Wertheim beloofde me vandaag een Nederlandse vertaling, die onmiddellijk zal worden opgenomen.
(Update 1/9/10: NL versie is gepubliceerd in Huibslog: Anne-Ruth Wertheim: Hedendaags racisme, een mengvorm die verheldering verlangt [NL] en in De Lage Landen, plus Krapuul: Nuttig essay van Anne-Ruth Wertheim: Wilders’ koloniaal- en concurrentie-racisme)
Eerdere versies van bovenstaand artikel van Ruth Wertheim verschenen op Republiek Allochtonië en Weblog Anja Meulenbelt.

Worst imaginable scenario in Holland: The right negotiates an anti-social minority government , dependent on Wilders' votes

2010-08-24T02:39:00.000+02:00

SP party cartoon: Wilders calls the shots...

I have been wrong. Wilders' one-man PVV "party", a mafioso construction controlling 24 out of 150 parliamentarians in the Dutch administrative capital The Hague is not excluded, no, it it calling the shots, for the moment.

Election-winner VVD (conservatives, 31/150) and election-loser CDA (Christian-Democrats, 21/150) agreed with the false-blond populist (PVV, 24/150) on August 9, 2010, to negotiate a coalition government program, to be implemented by a VVD-CDA team of Ministers, with the support of Wilders' acolytes, who will not participate personally in that Government. If nobody from the participating parties disagrees, that would provide a tiny second-chamber majority of 76/150, but a minority in the first chamber, the senate, where it would master a minority of 35/75.

The right is hoping for a landslide at the regional (provincial) elections in March, 2011, for the provincial parliaments who nominate the senate members.

The VVD and CDA agree on a 18 billion euro spending-cut program, without compensation by way of charging the wealthy and the banks who provoked the recent financial crisis. Wilders, who had himself elected on promises of no-cuts on pensions and welfare, agrees however, in so far as his program of apartheid and discrimination of immigrants, as well as his security proposals are honored by the two other parties.

What we see, is a devilish scenario. Wilders remains free, to develop his provocations and to terminate his collaboration with the Right at any moment that suits him. The Dutch welfare state is deconstructed by the thatcherite conservative VVD, while the CDA, I presume, will limit itself to protecting the corporatist structures it planted in Dutch society from the Fifties onwards.

Wilders already gave in on the retirement pension issue. Although he declared, before elections, that maintaining the retirement age at 65 years, was a "breaking point" for him and the PVV, three hours after closure of the ballot boxes in June, he said on television, that he was ready to accept a 67 year limit.

In an artistic move, Wilders created a national and international discussion about the pros and cons of his appearance at the SIOA meeting in New York on September 11 against the Park 51 inter-religious centre, where an Islamic worship room is planned. The public debate shifted as planned, from the barbarous cuts to "freedom of speech" with the US ultra-right.

We got a preview of the way in which an eventual minority rightist government will deal with that kind of provocations, as CDA-leader and acting foreign minister Verhagen timidly asked Mr. Wilders "to please consider the consequences of his deeds" for the international position of the Netherlands and its business interests.

Meanwhile, the not-right political side, kept quiet. Intimidated by Wilders' rhetoric and inapt to mobilize the majority of Dutch citizens who are staunchly against apartheid and discrimination on their doorsteps, they are waiting for a miraculous end to the Fortuyn-Wilders nightmare, hiding away in silence and hoping that somebody else than themselves, will take upon them the dirty task to tell the bare truth about Wilders' gliding to (neo-)fascism.

Yesterday, a relatively minor social-democrat eminence, senate-member Frans Leijnse, also professor at the respected Leyden University, finally crossed the border of silence and wrote an article for a nationwide daily, demonstrating that Wilders' party, the PVV, is to be considered as neo-fascist.

Too little, too late. The hate-poison has spread itself to wide proportions of the public. About Islam, anything goes, actually. People feel themselves abandoned, left alone. Lone rider Wilders has their sympathy. Attacking Wilders equals high treason.

The only solution, I see, is a grassroots campaign in the twelve Dutch regions (provinces) that shows how patient and democratic action creates a better life for all inhabitants of f.i. an urban neighborhood, without discrimination of newcomers. That shows, that the acolytes of Geert Wilders are empty-headed and supremacist. That makes clear, that the democratic left is not your enemy, but your ally.

Such a campaign will have to deal with the outrageous accusations from Wilders and his far-right Israeli and US allies, that the Left is part of a world-wide conspiracy that allies itself with Islamists in order to stay in power. Likewise, it will have to deal with religious fanatics, who reject any accommodation with western society. But why wouldn't it be feasible? It must be the right way to deal with 21st century problems. Common sense will accept credibility of peaceful social solutions. The democratic Left should take their own destiny in their hands and go forward.

There is no way back.
Anymore.

Painful Delivery of a new Dutch Government

2010-07-14T01:56:00.001+02:00

Sunday night in Johannesburg, South Africa, one Spanish goal killed the orange coloured Dutch dreams about its Soccer World championship. Frustrating, but not really disastrous. For the Dutch found, like the French in 1998 and the Spanish today, an irrational but very real national, popular unity that includes every marginalised category in their society. This Tuesday night, a million people are expected in Amsterdam to celebrate their national team. A small half of the players are immigrants or sons of immigrants. Some of them, like Boularouch, have even roots in Islamic countries.
The orange national hysteria is a slap in the face of hate-mongerer Wilders. The message of the local, spontaneous manifestations is: "We are all together!" The institutionalised distinctions between people who have "roots" in Judeo-Christian culture and those who have not, that Wilders' PVV party wrote into its election program, are as redundant as can be, at this moment.
Like we predicted here on June 9, election eve, Wilders' party, that got 24 out of 150 seats in the Dutch Parliament, is as of now not a part of coalition negotiations for a new majority Government. The conservative liberal VVD party, who carried the elections with 31/150 seats, just before the Social-Democrats of the PvdA (30/150), could not avoid some days of negotiations with Wilders, just after the elections, with the objective of a right wing Government that needed the support of the big loser of the elections, the Christian-Democrats of the CDA (22/150). Such a combination would have controlled 76 out of 150 seats in the Lower House, but only a minority in the Upper House.
Even while the fundamentalist protestant SGP party (2/150) offered it's support for such a combination, the new CDA leader, foreign minister Maxime Verhagen (who stands in for long-time MP Balkenende, who dismissed after his defeat), made an unheard-of move when asked to join the negotiations with VVD and PVV. First, he uninvited himself, saying that he preferred to wait for an eventual compromise between VVD and PVV. Then, provoked in a parliamentary debate, he stated clearly, that, in his opinion, a number of core ideas of Wilders were not compatible with the Dutch constitution and the rule of Law.
Verhagen mentioned specifically Wilders' idea of "war against Islam" as "the center of Dutch foreign policy", Wilders' 'kopvoddentax" idea (= making pay a tax by Islamic women who cover their heads) and their propositions for "ethnic registration" of all Dutch citizens.
Wilders, as is his way, avoided a direct debate about those points in Parliament and started "demonizing" the CDA leader, saying that he was playing into the hands of the "treacherous left". Even when VVD-leader Mark Rutte invited Wilders to start direct negotiations with him, Wilders said "no". Thus showing, that he is not really wishing to participate as a minority party in a Government, even if it is right-wing.
A quick and efficient reaction followed from the queen and her main adviser, Mr. Tjeenk Willink. The latter, as "informateur", analysed the situation and convinced everybody but Wilders, that the conservatives had to negotiate with the PvdA and its left-liberal allies of D66 and the Greens. Wilders was furious and demanded that Tjeenk be sent away.
But he was royally ignored and since last week, a VVD-PvdA dual team of "informateurs" is chairing daily meetings of VVD, PvdA and the two smaller parties.
To me, it is unclear, if these negotiations will succeed. An alternative, more centrist, VVD-PvdA-CDA, is explicitly NOT excluded.
Anyhow: Wilders is far from his announced role as PM or vice-PM. Maybe, Wilders has never seriously considered being part of a government at this point of time. Maybe, he is really disappointed. Difficult to know.
At this moment, Wilders is playing the card of "being excluded" by the traditional political caste. He may convince many people with that Calimero tactic. But I see also signs, that people are beginning to get tired of those histrionics. A majority of the Dutch support the effort the make a VVD-PvdA-coalition (Blue-Red-Plus).
Wilders'victory at the elections that got him 23 co-parliamentarians, might also prove a disaster in disguise. At best, his new colleagues are former parliamentary assistants, who never had to fight for a mandate, but who know the parliamentary dealings and wheelings. Most of them, however, are political nitwits, who range from Israeli agents and lobbyists, to religious fanatics of the "rapture" kind.
This whole situation could have been avoided, if more parliamentarians than the D66 and GroenLinks ones, would have spoken out more clearly from the beginning. Many democrats have been (and are still) intimidated by the Wilders speak. They feel (unjustly) responsible for the islamist threats against Wilders. As many among them have no real connections to the people, they tend to believe, that Joe and Johanna are really daily afraid of the Muslims.
It is no wonder, that, in a developed and civilized state as Holland is, the failure of politics is beginning to be compensated by the intervention of Justice (the hate-mongering procedure against Wilders in Amsterdam) and by the highest state councils (Raad Van State President -after the Queen- Tjeenk Willink). But, this odd country has also a very developed civil society. The Dutch are used to mend their own affairs. From ancient times on. Polders were managed by their inhabitants. Church consistories in the same way. Urban neighbourhoods with socio-economic difficulties develop their own solutions.
In the long run, I am sure, nobody will need Wilders' "Israeli" fantasies any more...
Least of all, Israel itself!

Dutch PVV MP Raymond de Roon condemns Iran opposition, because ... they are muslims!

2010-06-16T02:10:00.000+02:00

November 2009. Dutch Parliament in The Hague. A meeting of the Commission for international relations. Discussion about solidarity with the democratic Iranian opposition, that braved a few months ago the brutal suppression by the Iranian Government and its militias.
Mr. Raymond de Roon, MP for Mr. Wilders' PVV party has the floor.

About Raymond De Roon and his affiliations
Mr. De Roon is, up to now, one of the most educated members of what is commonly called the Wilders "gang" or "mafia" (for his party has no members and is led dictatorially by Geert Wilders). He has a fundamentalist Protestant background, was State-Prosecutor at several locations, and, as a student in the Seventies, joined a militia linked to the Gladio Network, that had as its objective to spread terrorism against Governments that were (in the Gladio vision) leaning too much to the left. Until his father forbade it.
Gladio is (or was) a network of former right-wing anti-Nazis and their kinsfolk in Europe, that, supported by NATO and CIA, infiltrated the Brigate Rosse in Italy, the RAF in Germany and the CCC in Belgium. All in the name of anti-Communism. So far, so good.

But Gladio started also to manipulate those terrorist organizations, for instance in 1977, when the Brigate Rosse took hostage and killed the president of the Italian Christian Democrats who was preparing a "historical compromise" with the big Communist Party of Italy for sharing Government responsibility. And more: During the left-leaning Den Uyl Government in Holland, the Dutch air force staged a Gladio-inspired intimidating overfly of the Parliament opening ceremony in The Hague (1975). And worse: It is commonly assumed that terrorist attacks against innocent civilians in Belgium (the Delhaize murders) and in Italy (the Milan and Bologna bombs, 1977) were also the work of De Roon's friends in the Gladio network and its associates.

The young Raymond was no more associated with Gladio at that point. He finished his studies and joined a fundamentalist protestant party in Holland (Wiki), became a party official, but quit his work as a prosecutor and his positions in the religious party in order to become an associate of Geert Wilders.
I say "associate", for, as it must be known by now, Geert Wilders' PVV "party" has no members, except Mr. W. himself. This particularity is not against the actual Dutch Law. It is the responsibility of former Dutch parliaments, that they have not established normal rules of accountability and transparency for parties that intend to participate in elections. Several European authorities have warned the Dutch, that this is not acceptable. Nevertheless, the European Parliament has since 2009, 9 Dutch PVV-members, who are not legitimately elected (Europeanly speaking) and make it their daily work to sabotage the European construction, sending the excess of their remunerations to the Wilders fund.

We return to November 23, in the Dutch Parliament at The Hague. The video is provided by Samerspace, who have made a series of odd PVV-interventions.

0:20 Raymond de Roon (RdR) The Government assumes incorrectly that a mitigated Islam is in existence.
And that there would be a peaceful Islam. Mr. President, there is NO such a thing as a peaceful Islam. Government would be well advised, when they would make that a central issue of their intervention in international fora.
0;45 Thus, not only condemn the suppression of the opposition in Iran, but also condemn the religion, the Islam, that inspires that suppression.
1:01 Another member of Parliament asks Mr. De Roon: But shouldn't we support those opposants?
And Mr. De Roon answers: "But they are also muslims. Yes, we should "facilitate" their actions. But nobody can guarantee, that they are not muslims...
1:47 RdR: Are they really engaged in overthrowing the Islamic Government, or are they only opposed to certain manifestations of it at this moment?"
1:53 RdR: I have seen few people who say: I am a Muslim and I want that in Iran there will be complete freedom.
2:02 Heckler: "You have seen few people, but you have seen them. Conclusion: They exist!"
RdR: That was an understatement. I did not see them!
2:22: (Opponent is outraged and stresses his point, that people, out of their creed (Islam) have risked their lives, that all this has been on TV over the whole world.)
2:47: RdR: Of course, I have seen those outrages of the regime. But I have not heard anybody of them (opposants) say, that they would like to leave Islam, that oppressive political ideology.
3:05: RdR: It is simply an affair of Muslims who are fighting amongst themselves.
3:12: RdR: I support, of course their resistance. But that does not mean, that I am trusting them. Finally, they may have fought for another shape of Islamic suppression. Iran will not be a modern, free, western society in that way.
3:27 (Opponent repeats, that people have been fighting for freedom and liberty to celebrate their religion in the way they want.)
3:44 RdR: I am not opposed to support Iranian people who fight against that despicable regime, but I am not convinced, that they would convert themselves and reject that despicable fascist ideology of Islam, that only gives birth to violence and terror.

I have not translated the interlaced comments from Samerspace.
I hope, you will understand, that Mr. Wilders' enterprise is inspired by hatred and supremacism.
Mr. Raymond De Roon is a staggering example for the loony-ism that Islamophobia generates.
Enjoy and think!
Is this the Europe you want?

Belgium Upside Down

2010-04-28T02:03:00.001+02:00

In surrealist-minded Belgium, a stupid error may easily turn into a wise comment.
French TF1 Television channel was going to inform their public, yesterday night, about the actual political turmoil in the neighbouring country. A map was needed, to indicate where Belgium is, and how it is divided in three regions.
Here is the map. Please, find the TWO biggest errors:

You saw it!
The French speaking Walloons are living in the Southern part of Belgium and the Dutch speaking Flanders people live in the North. That is the first error. The second one is less evident for everybody who is not Belgian. The third Belgian region is the Brussels agglomeration. It lies just some Kilometers north of Wallonia and not in the middle of Flanders. An informed French blogger jubilated ironically: ‘This is a final solution to the Belgian mess! French speaking Brussels in the middle of Wallonia, in stead of being surrounded by frustrated Flemish.’ Only the mutual ethnic cleaning between North and South, would be somewhat onerous…
Why is that turning upside-down of the Belgian crisis so funny?
You should know, that the division of the country into regions is language-based. Dutch-speaking Belgians were overlorded by French-speaking elites since Belgian independence (1830, from Holland). A cultural, regional and political upsurge of the Flemish since the end of the 19th century, forced the Brussels and Walloon bourgeois to accept equality of the two main national languages first, and subsequently a series of state-reforms that leaves Belgium as it is now: a country governed by the two main (linguistic) regions, each jealously guarding its prerogatives. Even international trading has become a regional matter!
(Imagine the Chinese, receiving a Belgian economic mission, that is split up between Flemish, Walloons and representatives of the separate Brussels region! This really happened a few years ago. I’m told, that the Chinese are still laughing…)
Most problems about frontiers are about asymmetry. In Belgium, we have an asymmetry between language and soil. If you divide a country along linguistic lines, you have to take into account, that there are areas of mixed language that do not fit into your scheme.
This is, where the capital, Brussels comes in.
Brussels
A long time ago, Brussels was a Flemish city. We are speaking about the early Middle Ages. Then the Bourguignons came in and attached the whole of the Low Countries (the actual Benelux) to their powerful French duchy. Court- and bureaucratic language became French, the Church turned French. Later on, the Spanish Habsburgs were masters of the country, speaking French. Next (beginning 18th century) came the Austrian Habsburgs, guarding the country against the Dutch, the French and the English and fighting many wars on its soil. The last 18th century war, the one against the French Revolution, they lost. The French sansculottes occupied Belgium and Brussels. Napoleon I even made Belgium part of the French ‘nation’, splitting it up into French Départements. The Vienna arrangements of 1815 gave the Austrian Low countries to the new Dutch king. William I did not bother much about language. His latest spouse was a member of the French speaking Belgian nobility. The Belgian revolution of 1830 was made in Brussels by the new higher middle class of traders and industrialists, closely tied to mighty Great-Britain.
That is why the city (or: region) of Brussels became, in majority, a French speaking city. It has in some neighbourhoods still authentically Flemish speaking citizens and in some places, people mix up both languages in a creative potpourri. There are no Flemish or French neighbourhoods, anybody can live everywhere. So, Brussels could not fit into the linguistic definitions of the ‘State-Reforms’. And it would not, either, for it has a mission of being a capital, as well for the 60% Flemish majority, as for the 40% French speaking minority in Belgium.
If you consider Brussels as an exception, you have to allow that it is a BIG exception. Brussels bilingual region has 1,2 million inhabitants. Greater Brussels (the agglomeration and surroundings) can claim 2 millions out of a total of 11 million Belgians.
The frontiers between the linguistic regions have been fixed in 1962. After half a century, you may assume, that there have been some changes to the linguistical composition of some areas next to the “frontiers”. This is of course more than true for the growing Brussels agglomeration. To cut it short: Some rural communities around Brussels receive an influx of French-speaking inhabitants, and, as the EU develops, also of many Eurocrats, who do not speak French, maybe, but certainly not Dutch, in most cases.
As an immigrant into Brussels since twenty years, I admire the loose way in which common citizens in the city as well as in the rural communities around it, cope with the linguistical problems in day-to-day life. “Les Belges se débrouillent” - the Belgians find a way out. That is the result of many centuries of foreign occupation, I think. The Belgians let their politicians do and find their own solutions among themselves. In that respect, I see no distinction between Walloons, Flemish or ‘Brusseleers’.
The aloofness of my new compatriots has its merits. But it is also responsible for a surrealistically complicated government, that is the playing ground of regional politicians who are unable to swallow the compromises that inevitably have to be made for the survival of the Belgian contraption.
As I told on several occasions before this, the irresponsible politics of Flemish separatists and Walloon regionalists, are suffocating the city of Brussels, which, on its own, provides 20% of the economic strength of the country. The last citizens rebellion of Brussels (against the Burgundian aristocracy) dates from the 1511 carnival. Will 2011 see a repeat of it?
I must confess: I hope so!

Urban Legends abour Muslims are a Disaster for the Dutch international Standing (1)

2010-04-19T22:03:00.001+02:00

How the Dutch extreme-right wing exploitation of islamophobia is really bad for The Netherlands' international reputation...

Today, three examples of the international echo in English of the actual Dutch obsession with urban legends about Muslims.

1. The US Loonwatch site about Tariq Ramadan.
Ramadan, a Geneva-based Islamic scholar, was engaged by Rotterdam city to teach 'Integration' at the Rotterdam University and to advise the Rotterdam City about how to deal with its immigrants from Islamic countries. Ramadan was controversial at the time of this engagement. The US had banned his entry into the States (2005).

Four years it took the successors of Pim Fortuyn (still an important party in the local council), to find finally a "stick to beat the dog". Tariq Ramadan commented on an Iranian website on Israel. What he said, was not in the least belligerent or out of place. No, the FACT that Ramadan co-operated with an Iranian programme was sufficient. He was sent away by both the local authority and the University.

Tariq Ramadan is a theoretician. Not a civil servant. His family may have ties with the original Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, which was an Arabic intellectual movement for modernization of the Islam. The actual fundamentalist Muslim Brothers are in favor of the contrary: Back to the Roots! They are not in favor of Saudi Wahhabism, but (too) often, they link up with it.

The original Muslim Brotherhood took its inspiration from the Enlightenment. The founders were in narrow contact with the European Freemasons. I.e. the people who helped Christianism to become rational and who invented the Separation of State and Religion. Just like the Founders of the United States of America, when they signed the Declaration of Independence.

That is, what I hear, when I listen to Tariq Ramadan. And that is, what I think, should be the message, our Muslim immigrants will have to understand. You can preserve the whole richness of your religion and culture, provided, you become a decent citizen (if you aren't already) of the Western society that is receiving you in its midst.
It can be argued, that Ramadan's message is too intellectual, too abstract, for Moroccan (Berber) farmers from the Rif region, who constitute the bulk of Rotterdam city's Muslim immigrants. That is not Tariq's fault. For their way of thinking and perceiving, there exist other strategies, that may help to calm the problematic relations with the other cultures that are to be found in the City of Rotterdam. The mayor and his aldermen should have thought about that, five years ago.

Like Ajaan Hirsi Ali, ironically, Tariq Ramadan was ousted by the Dutch, to find a refuge in ... the US. While Ajaan was (during the Bush reign) welcomed by the Neocons of the American Enterprise Institute, Ramadan is going to teach at a Catholic University in the Midwest.

The New York Times, today, has an article about President Obama's tranquil way, to engage American Muslims, after their marginalization and the mistrust they are exposed to, due to the Bush demagogy. Engaging Ramadan, is part of it.

It is a shame to the Dutch, that their country, formerly known as a refuge for original thinkers like Spinoza, Descartes, etc., is sending them away now, tarnishing their reputation.

Like Dutch entrepreneurs and tycoons said before (and who are we, to contradict them on this point?): Mr. Wilders and his supporters are doing a big disfavor to the country.
The country they say they love so much more than us, the "cultural relativists" who continue to open up to new and old contributions to our society.

Here is the first one we'd like to show to you:

Posted at loonwatch.com on 16 April 2010: "Tariq Ramadan, “stealth jihadist,” exposed!"

Tariq Ramadan

As you know, Dr. Tariq Ramadan - Muslim scholar, writer, and thinker - has had his visa to enter the country reinstated, and he used this to his advantage: speaking at various engagements across the United States. We here at LoonWatch alerted our fellow citizens of the arrival of the “stealth jihadist,” coining the terminology of Robert Spencer. Yet, we didn’t want to stop just there. We wanted to report on what this man was saying."

Loonwatch.com had a stealth observer at Tariq Ramadan's Chicago annual banquet speech for CAIR.
The man reported that Ramadan concluded his speech with the following dangerous incitement:

His final words were this: Never forget that you Muslims are American. He urged them to speak about Iraq, Afghanistan, and Palestine, and do so as Americans, not Muslims. Moreover, Muslims need to institutionalize their presence in America: Muslims need institutions, and they must work with all people. The key is confidence and humility: be confident about your position, but be humble at the same time.

Part 2 and 3 will feature the urban legends that are rocking Holland and Wilders' stealthy way of associating with racist persons and websites.

Godless Europeans, are they being punished economically? (Fox news)

2010-04-17T01:16:00.000+02:00

Fox News knows best - We, Europeans are a bunch of godless and hapless idiots!
(Thanks to Politblogger.eu - Dietmar Näher, Germany)

No, the following video is not a fake. Fox news is serious about the causes of Europe's economic problems: It is "Secularity" and "abandoning God", that cause our "decline".

This is an illustrationn of the growing cultural gap between (part of) the US and Europe.

Personally, I do not believe in that gap. The fundamental values of the US Constitution are part of the European Enlightenment. Europe is being nurtured by American contributions to our common culture, civilization, economy and philosophy. From more than a hundred years on. A fertile exchange.

The eternal urge, however, to build up an enemy corresponding to one's own image, has been let loose. The Nazis under Hitler built an "East Coast" enemy, the Jewish capitalist. Turning the mirrors at a 180° degree, Fox News constructs an European "pagan" enemy who is disturbing the otherwise paradisaic world of US free market capitalism. We, Europeans, became pagans, and God is punishing us with economic disasters!

I am in favor of developing an European common identity. But not at the price of hate and mistrust of US-American culture. Nor of any other cultural identity. That would be stupid and counter-productive. Neither US-American thinking, nor Islamic thinking can be severed from Europe.

Europe is rich enough in itself. It should welcome any possible contribution and ponder it.
Provided, we do so together!

L.A., May 1st: Spencer and Geller Celebrate St. Geert Wilders, a Loony Prophet from Holland

2010-03-22T23:46:00.004+01:00

Pamela Geller* (Atlas Shrugs) and Robert Spencer ** (Jihad Watch), are not the kind of people, Geert Wilders likes to show himself off with. In Europe, that is.
On May 1st, in Los Angeles, he will do, what he avoids doing in Europe: Associate openly with 100% racist loonies, suprematists and war-mongerers.

(Wilders and Pamela, Spencer, Los Angeles, May 2009)

Again. For Wilders' outrageous and hollow hate-speech (I have no time to give you a link) against Muslims, Obama and Liberals in May last year in the same LA, has left his US adorators longing for more. They have produced a one-hour long movie "Islam Rising", featuring Geert Wilders as "the Winston Churchill Of Our Times (Pamela)".
In Europe, Wilders is accepting and cashing passively support, money, adoration, celebration and flattery from nazist, revanchist, ultra-zionist and racist personalities and groups, like

the Vlaams Belang (former Dutch-speaking Nazi-associates in Belgium, getting about 20% of the vote in their region),
the French Front National of Mr. Le Pen (ultra-nationalist, anti-arabian revanchists, 17% at the last French elections),
British and Danish white suprematist groups like SIEO,as well as rightist anti-European movements like UKIP in Britain and a similar party in Denmark,
German Nazi-Nostalgics from the NPD, but also "modern" German, Swiss and Austrian racists, who say that they are inspired by the actual Israeli politics, such as the "Politically Incorrect" hate blog and others.

But Wilders NEVER acknowledges their support and, at the same time, NEVER explicitly dissociates himself from those (hidden) anti-semites, either.
He thinks that he can get away with Likud and Israel Beteinu support, for the Dutch feel guilty about the huge number of Jews, carried away 1940-45 from Holland to Auschwitz with the active and passive help from many among them, and they will not dare to discuss Holocaust.
He also thinks, that he can get away with Daniel Pipes, whom he invited as an "expert" to his Dutch hate-mongering trial. In fact, I think, that Wilders is completely dependent on Israeli-US financing of his agitation. That is why, for instance, he announced his solidarity with an ethnic cleansing of Palestinians (muslim AND christian) from Palestine, NOT in Dutch Parliament, but in Copenhague, so as to satisfy his Israeli-American sponsorers, without provoking an upsurge among the Dutch, who oppose of course nearly all such an outrage.

Enjoy (above) the trailer of the Spencer-Geller movie celebrating the clown Wilders!

*) Pamela Geller, the looniest blogger ever, her site and her evaluation at Loonwatch.com
**) Robert Spencer, his site and his evaluation at Loonwatch.com
-----
Please, join us at the LA information campaign, against anti-semitism, against anti-muslimism and against anti-Holland agitation, at a meeting on May 1st in Los Angeles, time and location to be announced soon!

Clinton and Ashton: US-EU Girl Power Made Netanyahu Climb Down

2010-03-19T17:31:00.000+01:00

The three "40+ breakthroughs"

Hillary Clinton spent 40+ minutes on the telephone with Israeli PM Binjamin Netanyahu, making it perfectly clear that, this time, the Obama Administration would not accept "No" for an answer to its demands that Israel puts an end to its provocations.
In a first show of which impact a united European stand can have on Washington's capacity to effectively change its policies in the Obama way, Catherine Ashton braved Israeli objections and visited Hamas-governed Gaza Strip on a 40+ hours' mission.
Combined US and European action made the overconfident rightwing Netanyahu-Lieberman Government give in within another 40+ hours.

Israeli Government gives in and works at damage-control
This morning's Guardian brings a first evaluation: Israel's Binyamin Netanyahu in climbdown over US demands for peace.
The key issue of the clash between the US and Israel was the provocatively announced construction of 1.600 Jewish flats in the contested East Jerusalem area. The Guardian:

He [Netanyahu] did not announce, as the US had demanded, a freeze on the construction of Jewish homes in Ramat Shlomo, in East Jerusalem, the key point at issue.
But diplomats in Washington, Moscow and Jerusalem said Netanyahu had given a private promise that there will be a temporary freeze on any new construction. The work, while not cancelled, is to be postponed for several years.

Substantial negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians are still far away. But this could be a turning point. The Guardian points out, that:

Obama and Clinton stand to gain from the Israeli retreat, which will heighten their reputation among the Palestinians and in the Arab world. Obama and Clinton were left looking weak after a similar stand-off with Israel last September when peace talks failed to get under way.

The EU as a whole is in an awkward position concerning the Middle East. They have big security interests at stake, much more important than those of the US.
During the G.W.Bush administrations, a divided Europe had to remain powerless at the side-lines, when its vital interests were put in danger by the 2003 Iraq invasion, by the Bush-supported killing of the remains of the Oslo arrangements, by the ill-inspired Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 2006 and, last but not least, the Cheney-handcrafted 2008 Georgian disaster (where Israeli "advisers" to the Georgian army played a key role).
A story of exacerbated European divisions
Most of the time, Europe was divided. In 2002/2003, divisions between the Blair-led UK and the other bigger EU powers France and Germany, were even exacerbated, as Blair harangued most fresh Eastern European EU-members and, to a still undisclosed measure, Balkenende's Holland, at the side of the US Neocon Iraq scheme. A lasting European rift was avoided, thanks to the stupidity of US post invasion policies in Iraq, that brought soon striking evidence of the underlying fraud and made it clear, how much the Iraq adventure was and is contrary to every possible European interest.
As part of the big powers' Oslo Quartet, the EU did not weigh much upon the steady dismantling of the two-state solution. As a "useful idiot", the EU furnished and still furnishes, the bulk of the international financial support to the Palestinian Authority, only to see its investments repeatedly destroyed by Israeli bombs (harbour, airport).
And Tony Blair again: As a Quartet appointed facilitator of negotiations in the region, what has he done?

During the 2006 Lebanon invasion, the EU found more of a common stand than before. It helped and helps, thanks to the wisdom of many Lebanese leaders, to maintain a shaky cease-fire at the Northern border of Israel. But proposals by the German Foreign Secretary Fischer, to extend the EU peace operation to areas of conflict between Israel and Palestine, fell on deaf ears.
Another result of the US failures, their pro-Likud stubbornness and their open contempt of the NATO allies, has been, now and then, a revival of outdated particular claims in the Middle East from former European colonizers and mandate-holders. France saw an opportunity, for instance, after the murder of Hariri in Lebanon, to reassert some of its former influence there, as the US hopelessly failed in understanding the particular dynamics of that multicultural society. That did not help to forge a common European stand, either.

Georgia: A turning point in retrospect
But Sarkozy's unique and rapid intervention (as he happened to be president of the EU in 2008) in the Georgian conflict, showed for the first time, that the EU can deal independently with its own interests in the wider region, if it acts quick and undivided.
While Cheney himself was desperately stoking conflict in defeated Tbilissi, France made for the EU an honorable compromise with Moscow that the Bush administration had to bow to.
This was exceptionally possible because of the halfheartedness of the US intrigue in Georgia.
For, in a general way, it is a hard fact, that the EU only can progress in its international security policy, if it is not going against the US and/or Russia's.
A united stand of the EU, even at this moment of the still fledgling Ashton mission, will also influence US and Russian positions, like it seems to me, that has happened now by way of the surprising Gaza initiative of the EU's Ashton.

Let us give the two-girls power a chance!

Obama Health Care Reform is at a Tipping Point. For Europe, too

2010-03-17T00:38:00.000+01:00

The historical struggle in Washington about Health Care Reform went mostly under the horizon of the European mainstream press, lastly.

One understands why. The procedure got stuck, last autumn, in the dark alleyways of US decision-making on the federal level.
For it is complicated to understand, why a Senate and a House of Representatives, both with a comfortable 50%+ majority of Democrats, cannot agree on a set of arrangements that are, since dozens of years, part of the civilization of most EU countries: Collective insurance, guaranteeing access to health care for every citizen.

Most European countries have adopted a mixed system, where state guarantees and tax measures facilitate commercial insurance companies as well as non-profit co-operatives in providing basic health care to every citizen (and, in many instances: even to non-citizen inhabitants). Paradoxically, Great Britain, champion of privatization, is an exception: It has a completely state-governed NHC system. Even Ms. Margaret Thatcher proved unable to change things there...

What the Obama team is proposing in the United States, is nothing more than a first step into a world, where the 20% not-assured- and the 25% insufficiently protected citizens, will get access to a compulsory (yes!) basic protection against being left behind, when they fall ill.

The conservative-Democrat and Republican foes of the Reform, are divided as for their motives:

loss of profit for private insurance companies (representatives sponsored by insurance comps and medicine producers)
too much state (federal) intrusion into private citizen responsibilities (libertarians and their ilk)
angst for state constraint on decisions on life and death, on abortion and on church-prohibited matters - imagining local "death committees", repayment of abortion charges, advantages for illegal immigrants and making God-abiding citizens pay for other people's sins while caring AIDS patients, for instance (here we find the fundamental Christian Right together with the Libertarians).

President Obama is not only a fine expert of the American Constitution and its guarantee for all citizens to be able to struggle for happiness, but he is also influenced by the Chicago School of Community Development. This School has adopted the view, that (local) emancipation of people in disadvantaged situations is best served, when their aspirations are coupled with advantages for the men and women in power. The result is a, you could say, rather cynical and resolutely NON ideological approach to empowerment. New coalitions are to be built around every step forward to emancipation and more equality.
That is why, in my opinion, President Obama has spent so much effort and time in building a large and diversified majority for his health care plans, leaving behind, under way, many principles of it, in exchange for support from people of whom he hoped that they would find more (immediate) profit in supporting the laws, than in refuting them.
As the American economy and the American private-public relations are different from the same, when you are dealing with a difficult urban neighborhood, this strategy did not work. Even a provisionally Senate-adopted set of laws, full of "pork"*), could not pass the hurdle of a 60% majority in the Senate.
So, to my relief, Obama changed recently his strategy and decided to use legal means at the disposal of the Presidency and the Democrat majorities in House and Senate. There is nothing revolutionary in that. Former president G. W. Bush made his outrageous tax-cuts for the rich also into law in that way. And he had a smaller majority than Obama.
This Rooseveltian (regulating the cisis-ridden economy during the 30's) and Johnsonian (social system and race equality) Obama-operation, is nearing its completion, these days. It is more than due. Liberal support is withering away, and "tea-party" like demagogy is not only on the move in the US, but also in Europe and in Israel.
In Europe, a Wilders does not hide his contempt for Obama (Copenhague and recently in London), an Ulfkotte spreads his venom on German websites, etc. The Israeli Government humiliated the Obama administration with its continuing colonizing policy.
As of March 15, it seems, when we believe Slate magazine, that the Health Care Bill will be rightly and legally forced on Congress:

March 15, 2010: "I have no intention of not passing this bill," says Speaker Pelosi. She doesn't have the votes, as her own whip, James Clyburn, said yesterday on Meet the Press. But pro-life Democrat Bart Stupak told National Review late Friday, "they've been able to peel one or two of my 12," and he sounds discouraged: "It's almost like some right-to-life members don't want to be bothered." That sounds more like five or six. Fox News calculates Pelosi has 211 of the required 216, with many still undecided, while Nate Silver guesses she'll get "between 216 and 218." Nobody has a clue, but the mood is upbeat. Chance of passage: 55 percent.

Slate's Whipometer: How many vote-switchers does the pope have?

Slate's "Whipometer" indicates a small but real opportunity that the bill will pass later this month.
The European Stake
The European stake in this titanic fight is big. If Obama looses, he will be weakened in all possible fields where Europeans need the support of the US for policies that differ from those that were pursued by the Bush-Cheney administration: Iran, Israel-Palestinian peace, world-wide regulation of hedge funds and credit swaps, Afghanistan, engaging Russia, engaging the Muslim world, nuclear disarmament and also climate change policies.

More so, a continuous divergence between the US- and European(-Canadian) social systems, would kill the necessary harmonization and cooperation in the globalized world economic and financial field. Only if, what I cannot bring over myself to imagine, Europe would abandon its "aquis" in the social field, a harmonization the other way around, would set the conditions for a (doomed) Atlantic supremacist "white 21st century".

There is much at stake in Washington for Europe, the next weeks!

A Wise Man sets the Course for Europe in the World

2010-03-13T12:55:00.001+01:00

Due to my travelling to meet Central and East European friends in order to discuss with them the problems of redeveloping urban neighbourhoods in crisis, I missed the newly elected European Council President Herman van Rompuy's historical intervention at the Bruges European Academy.
Here follows a part of it (in English):
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Herman van Rompuy speaking at the Bruges Europe College, March 6, 2010.

Van Rompuy is very well aware of his powerlessness. He was chosen by the Sarkozies, the Merkels and the Browns just because of his lack of sex-appeal and supposed lack of ambition, over candidates like Holland's J.P.Balkenende or Letlands former president.
One thing is sure, read my lips, the man is terribly UNDERestimated.
Listen to his Jesuit-, finely tuned-, rebuttal of sarkozist and insular British policies.
Even Eurosceptic Tony Barber of the London Financial Times admitted graciously, that the Van Rompuy speech had class and substance, compared to the voidness of the actions and words of baroness Catherine Ashton, EU foreign secretary.
A full analysis of Van Rompuy's words is under review.
Please, download and read the full text of the Van Rompuy opinion at Consilium Presidential Service in Brussels (English).
.

Holocaust education is to encourage reflection, not to encourage a taboo.

2010-03-10T06:34:00.001+01:00

Nuremberg U-Bahn station "Walther-Rathenau-Platz, 6 März 2010 Photo: tofoto

About the prohibition on thinking, avoiding the taboo of comparisons, see:
Holy Adolf. Is it possible to compare Bush with Hitler?;
An analogy is no comparison;
Comparisons with the Nazis; Uri Avnery;
Comparison, based on any knowledge

T: I: S, (Steinberg Recherche, March 8, 2010.

(All in German)

With thanks to Claudia Karas, the indefatigable Mailerin. And Steinberg, a monument of -often too- Critical Criticism)

Walther Rathenau was a philosopher, businessman and minister of foreign affairs in the early Weimar Republic. He was also a Jew.He would now be classified as a Liberal Conservative or a right Social Democrat. All the same, many reasons for revanchists, anti-Semites, PI-ler, Mafiosis und Ulfkotte-people to hate him. So much so that he was murdered in 1922 by three so-called Fememörderern with a hand grenade.

He makes the difference between predetermined conclusions from superficial analogies from history (or the collective memories) on one hand and, on the other hand, the enlightened thinking, not the based upon stories attached to prejudice, but engaged to comparison with what is now happening. Stating:

Denken heißt Vergleichen In short: To think is to compare

What we get to hear now too often in the debates about the supposedly necessary exclusion of potential terrorists and enemies of the Enlightenment in "our West", are the prejudiced conclusions of "the" History.
But, THE history does not exist. Only stories do exist. Narratives that communicate what people think or thought that woul be important.

One can make two things out of stories.

To use them, to support any ideas or theories;
To study them, in order to, in comparison with perceptions of current or historical events, create a better analysis.

The first leads to ideological immobility. It will just be instructions for maintaining the taboo of other interpretations than the predetermined ones.

Teaching about the Holocaust is often understood as a canonization of all this, what is said in the name of Judaism and the actual Israeli Government. But real Holocaust Education not only speaks of the suffering of millions of murdered Jews, but informs just as much about the construction of the will to genocide. Thus, of the tendency of acting by irritation and xenophobia.

Stories about it are from all ages. The Holocaust story is "just" its translation into the industrial age of former pogroms and primitive ethnic cleansings. The First World War sacrificed millions instead of tens of thousands, as we were used to before, as it was an expression of the new industrial age.

The second leads to free thinking about the ways, exclusion develops.It may be helpful to understand today's exclusion and their reasons. Good Holocaust education thus helps to understand how ideas about genocide do devlop themselves within a non-violent society..

That is why I think that critical historical studies are of importance. Also for Muslim immigrant children in Germany, Switzerland and Austria. They will understand that the Holocaust story is not about a so-called collective guilt of Germans and Muslims, but see it as awarning, never to follow extremists.

And take seriously the warnings of the day.

Wilders' Money to remain hidden to you and me, but open to CIA?

2010-02-09T08:52:00.002+01:00

The European Parliament will have to decide, this week, if it allows American authorities to data-mine your and mine international euro-transfers by way of copying the SWIFT data.
Swift services banks in Europe and elsewhere. For instance, when I send some of my Dutch retirement money to my Belgian account, the ING bank warns me, that this may be monitored by American authorities.
I have no problem with that. If the CIA wants to know, that I live in Brussels and that I buy my shrimps there at Delhaize, good riddance, OK with me.
But the EP has a point, when it says, that American authorities have to have a reason, when they ask for Swift data. Any European nation allows prosecution to scrutinize my financial data, or listen to my private communications, only, when there is a probable link to crime or terrorism. If there is no one, I can trust my bank, that it protects my privacy.
So, why does the CIA not trust my national European secret services?
That is a long, difficult and complicated story.
I will tell you another time. For a considerable part, they may be right. For who believes, for instance, our Italian secret service Mafiosos?
So, please, CIA, NSA, search for bank transfers linked to Al-Qaeda! I couldn't agree more.
And, do not forget to tell us about Mr. Wilders, from Holland, who gets millions of dollars from US accounts for destabilization of European nations.
Pardon me, if I watch the Dutch representatives from he PVV "party" in the EP.
What are they up to?
Will they vote for a going Dutch alone, as their program states? Or will they vote for transparency to the CIA, while Dutch public opinion remains left in the dark?
Hey, Mr. Wilders, your credibility is at stake!

Geert Wilders' difficult choice: Being Immigrant or Exigrant?

2010-02-05T05:01:00.003+01:00

Geert Wilders' international actions are made of European-Union bashing, advocating the most right-wing Israeli views and collecting money from rich, but scared, American Jewish elder people in Florida.

Not counting the -officially- unsolicited money that may be got from "allies" like:

the post-fascist Belgian Vlaams Belang movement,
the racist German "Politically Incorrect" Website
the so-called European, but in reality American, website "Gates Of Vienna"
and Daniel PIPES' blog of hatred against Islam, a real Wilders' fan,
etc.

I do not like it, when the Judges intrude into freedom of speech. I accept limits to that freedom, but I think that a fair and open discussion between responsible people will be able to solve any misunderstanding that might occur. Not so with Mr. Wilders. He avoids any confrontation with Muslims or with people who favor an open mind to culture. That is, why I have, reluctantly, to admit that the only solution to the Wilders' hate agitation lies in a condemnation in Court of Geert Wilders.
In 1917, my grandfather-in-law, Henk Sneevliet, was condemned in a Dutch-Indonesian Court for "hate-mongering". He was banned to go to Holland, leaving alone his friends from the Indonesian Nationalist Movement, who were inspired by the Russian February Revolution.
In 1933, again, he was in Court in Amsterdam, for having greeted the "Seven Provinces" rebellion of seamen, who were despatched at suppressing an Atjeh rebellion against the Dutch. After some months in jail, he was elected to Parliament under the slogan: "Sneevliet, from jail to Parliament"!
You'll see, why I think that Geert Wilders will be able to profit from his indictment before a Court, as a "victim" of Justice. But I have no choice. As an elected member of Parliament, only the other elected members of Parliament could have stopped him. They did not. Out of fear, out of calculation, they let him do.
Wilders is of mixed Dutch/German-Indonesian descent. One of his grandparents was Jewish. Out of that multicultural mix, he choose to be Jewish. I repect that. But I do not allow somebody to negate altogether his/her roots. The "Indos", of mixed Dutch-Indonesian descent, choose in 1948/9, when it became clear that the Indonesian nationalists under Sukarno would get the upper hand in Djakarta, in majorty to go to Holland. They "integrated" successfully. Only, when during the eighties a virtual ban was proclaimed on foreign immigrants, their brown skin and their black hair got them unawares as "foreigners". Most assumed. Few, like Wilders, hid under, for example, a blond wig.

How the Wilders Hysteria is Linked to Holland. Who exploits it. And how it can be ended. (4, Solutions)

2010-02-02T02:43:00.000+01:00

How will it be overcome, the Wilders agitation and its sisters in many European countries?
My friends say: By understanding the fears of men and women who live in marginalized urban neighborhoods. Elder people, who lost their references, when their children and the local baker left their street. And were replaced by, mostly gentle, Turkish families and their daily providers of vegetables and fruit. For you and me, they say, it is easy and even thrilling, when the local snackbar is replaced by a Japanese Sushi Bar. But imagine, you are old, you have a small pension and little money to spend...
Well, that is how people get scared. The new shop-owners are friendly, no problem. Their vegetables are good. Bur the street becomes a foreign country, with young men claiming their space. As young men have always done. In the fifties, when we were young, we claimed our room as 'rockers', we did so ourselves. In the sixties, we could live with the 'provos' and the 'hippies', for we could understand them, while we did not agree.
But now, our home is enveloped in foreign country. We never asked for being 'integrated' with people who speak Arabic and Turkish. If you like that, take those people with you, in your neighborhoods.
"We want our country back!"
In Holland, from the seventies on, conservative governments left them alone, those people. I know for myself, as I were a Government agent for "urban neighborhood redevelopment". As long as there was no urgent problem, money for integration solutions, was held back. Only when security problems came up, the State got itself involved.
No wonder, that (semi-) criminal groups learnt to profit from that. No wonder, that fundamentalists exploited that situation. Mohammed Boujeri, Van Gogh's murderer, was a product of that dealing and wheeling among authorities and maffiosos.
Restoring the dignity of original habitants as well of that of the newly arrived immigrants, it seems impossible. But it is not!
Mixing the traditions of old immigrants and the richness of the traditions of new immigrants, it is possible! I refer to my experiences in France. In the community of Chatenay-Malabry, in the Île de France region of Paris, an intervention of a theater-group solved the alienation-problem. In the North of France, in the Roubaix-Tourcoing region, a flemish-moroccan jardinage project opened many roads to live together, sing together and ask successfully help from regional authorities.
It is all about understanding people who are on the edge. Make people understand that the Turkish vegetable shop is not something that tramples upon you, but the only solution to have a shop near you.
Have young Moroccans understand, that their fathers' knowledge about trees is essential to the neighborhood. It will show on the central square!
Well, this is how I worked in many parts of Europe. And every time, when we were near to our goal, the project was called off. For there were no more threats to security, for instance.
That is why I like so much my friend Ewoud Butter's posting about the "better party" Wilders' followers should get: A political party that cares as well for the old who suffer under small pensions and isolation within urban relegation. They are left alone. Is that the immigrants' fault? NO! The immigrants are being left alone as well!
That is why I believe, that a better future is possible. Not by giving in to fundamentalism. Not by letting go. But by respecting the practical contribution anyone can give to a common project.

The Dutch Wilders Hysteria. Who exploits it. And how it will be Overcome. (3, The Funders)

2010-01-27T05:11:00.000+01:00

Who are exploiting the Dutch crisis? And How? Follow the Money!
1. A loophole in Dutch legislation.
While most developed ("judeo-christian") democracies have laws and rules that block organizations with foreign funding and/or no democratic structure, from participating in elections, the Kingdom of The Netherlands makes a notable exception.
In Germany, in France and even in countries like Belgium, Spain and Portugal, political parties are subjected to rules, based upon Law, that guarantee their democratic (membership) structure and the transparency of their revenues.
For instance, former German Chancellor, Mr. Kohl, was sued in Court for black financing of his CDU party. In Belgium, each locally elected representative is screened by Justice, and if he or she has published his/her name or image in local official publications within a three-month period in advance of elections, he or she is punished.
But in Holland, any body can participate in elections. As far as I know, Mr. Wilders is the first person to go it entirely alone. Geert and Geert alone, selects candidates for Parliament, for the European Parliament and for local elections.
2. Populist maffia leaders have to go "whoring"
Before the year 1917, in Holland, members of Parliament were chosen locally in conscriptions, like in Great Britain. After 1917/1918 big "pillar" parties, with their membership structure, took over. There was never a real need to discipline parties. They cared for themselves. Until, at the end of the Nineties, Mr. Pim Fortuyn started to organize his following under a "List Fortuyn". (LPF: List Pim Fortuyn).
Fortuyn himself described his meetings with potential funders as "whoring". He met marginal traders in real estate, who promised funding in exchange for liberty of speculation within the Rotterdam social housing sector. Eventually, the funders even took over the whole LPF party, after Fortuyn's death in 2002. The Rotterdam social housing was for a large part sold to real estate speculators. The motivation: "Raise rents, so that people with low income will have to leave and be replaced by young gentry." People with low incomes are, of course, mainly (muslim, but also Surinam and Antillean,) immigrants. (See: Rotterdam weert arme Nieuwkomers (February 2006, Dutch, in my blog "In Europa Thuis").
Likewise, Ms. Verdonk, a former Conservative Liberal Minister of Immigration, funded her party 'Trots Op Nederland', TON (Proud of Holland'), with donations from marginal personalities and real estate speculators.
3. The Wilders construction
Geert WILDERS must have decided at an early stage, that, if he wanted to keep his independence, he could neither count upon eventual members of his PVV party, nor on Dutch private funders. At first, Wilders hoped, that the bulk of his money would come from the US Neoconservatives. In 2005/6, Mr. Bart Jan Spruyt wrote a Reaganite programme for Wilders' new party and did some headhunting among the neocon followers in the Netherlands. Geert Wilders, who was then sitting alone in Parliament as a dissident of the conservative liberal VVD party, was transported into the States, where he met the Neocon pundits, who were just then at the apex of their power under the presidency of George W. Bush.
But the neocon cabal was not sufficiently amused by the peroxide blond loon. Wilders is a (rabiate) critic of religion in general, although exclusively haunted by the Islam, while the Neocons, who are not religious themselves, as former Trotskyites, consider religion (for the masses) as a necessary antidote to social action. Even if some Neocons made a visit to Holland under Wilders' patronage, their alliance did never materialize. I wrote about the neoconservative strategy of engaging fundamentalist Christians into their action in: Paul Wolfowitz and neocon Morals (June 6, 2007). And the Spruyt-inspired neocon American Enterprise Institute's excursion to Rotterdam was a failure. In the neocon Weekly Standard, Spruyt was relegated to the cultural and book review section.
It was soon afterwards, that Wilders broke his relation with Mr. Spruyt. He was to go it "alone". But not so much alone as that. Fundraising trips to Israel and the US started to fill Wilders' war treasure.
4. The Likud-US connection
While the Neoconservative American Enterprise Institute (where his former friend Ajaan Hirsi Ali is engaged as a researcher since 2005) kept its purse closed, the president of the American Peace (!) Initiative, nominated by Bush in 2002, Daniel Pipes, came to the rescue. Pipes, who is firmly linked to Likud in Israel and to the powerful AIPAC pro-Israel lobby in the US, channeled American taxpayer funds to Wilders, as well as private contributions from US sources, collected through websites like "Gates Of Vienna" e.a.

John Tyler, blogger at the Dutch world service radio "Wereldomroep (RNW)", sorted it out. The RNW site is not just a loony dhimmi playground, but an independent blogging platform hosted by the Dutch state-financed worldwide information service by radio:

An important source of funding for his legal defence comes from supporters in the United States. He has travelled there frequently: showing his anti-Islam film Fitna, giving speeches, accepting awards. And raising money.
Neither Mr Wilders nor many of those involved in organizing fundraisers for him are prepared to indicate how much money he has raised.
Daniel Pipes, director of the Middle East Forum, has raised money for Geert Wilders’ legal defence through The Legal Project. “The Legal Project engages in various efforts for individuals who talk about this bundle of issues: Muslims and Islam. Wilders is one of those that we have helped both financially and in other ways. I have helped him in terms of law and in terms of fundraising. But I can’t tell you amounts… It’s not my concern.”
Although Mr Pipes is not prepared to talk in more detail about money raised for Wilders, he has told a Dutch magazine that Wilders raised a six-figure amount during a recent US trip.

In June 2007, at the Californian Pepperdine Conference about the looming 'Collapse Of Europe', Pipes set the agenda already, with his proposals to support "advocacy" against Muslims, denying them the building of Mosques, wearing headscarves and attacking "leftist" anti-racists in Court. That is what the "Legal project" is about. The Legal Project and other advocacy initiatives were dealt with in a closed session, following the public one. Now we get a peep into what it boils down to. Tyler, again:

Readers are asked to send money to a bank account of the Friends of the Freedom Party Foundation. This is the same foundation which funds Freedom Party (= PVV, HR) activities. Apparently, Mr Wilders has not set up a separate foundation for his legal defence. According to Dutch daily de Volkskrant, Mr Wilders instead re-wrote the statute of the existing Freedom Party foundation to include his legal defence. This would mean there is no division between donations for Mr Wilders’ personal legal defence and the Freedom Party’s political activities.

As Wilders keeps his financial resources hidden, and says: "Where I get my money and from whom is nobody’s business”, it is difficult to prove exactly, how much of the spenders' money is used for legal defence, and what part is devoted to party campaigns. Tyler:

According to Dutch daily de Volkskrant, Mr Wilders instead re-wrote the statute of the existing Freedom Party foundation to include his legal defence. This would mean there is no division between donations for Mr Wilders’ personal legal defence and the Freedom Party’s political activities.

5. The European dimension. Mccarthyism returns?
As we saw in the preceding article in this series, Dutch Law governing funding for political parties is quite lax. A new law is being prepared at the Ministry of the Interior, but two of the three bigger political parties, the liberal-conservative VVD and the Christian-Democrat CDA are used to get their funding for a large part from big business. However, says Tyler:

Greco, an anti-corruption body and part of The Council of Europe, reprimanded the Netherlands in 2007 for the lack of transparency regarding political donations. A new law governing political parties and how they are financed is in the making. But as it now stands, Geert Wilders and his Freedom Party have very few limits on how and where they can raise money. And he has no obligation to reveal his money sources.

I remember the McCarthyist US policies during the Fifties. Funding was channeled to anti-Communist organizations. Neutral youth- and students-organizations were being infiltrated. Let me add, that this reflected similar policies that originated in Moscow. But that doesn't make it any better.

Racist anti-islamic websites like "Politically Incorrect" (PI) in Germany are being funded and even hosted in the US. The CIA sponsored (if we may believe the German security- and anti-islam expert, Dr. Udo Ulfkotte) a huge anti-Eurabia conference in Brussels, November 2007, hosted by the separatist and post-fascist Vlaams Belang Party, outlawed by all other Belgian political parties. Ms. Bat Ye'or and her husband, as well as the enigmatic white supremacist "Fjordman" and Dutch "Arabist" Hans Jansen, converted from anti-Zionist to anti-Islam agitator (we will come back to him!), came together and studied, how hate-mongering against Islam and Muslims could be promoted. Wilders himself never mingles directly or openly with the far right as assembled in Brussels. But their money is apparently welcome.

6. Couldn't we get some information about the secret Wilders funding, out of the anti-terrorist legislation's monitoring of bank transfers?
I believed, that some forty years ago, we put an end to this kind of shameless intrusion into our political life. When Nixon had to step down in shame, at that point of time, more or less. But I was wrong. American authorities, as says my bank every month, when I transfer some money from Holland to Belgium, from my retirement pension, register what I do. I hope, they will catch Al-Qaeda transfers timely, in that way. But what about secret transfers of money from the States to people who undermine democracy and freedom in Europe and who are in Court for hate-mongering and discrimination?
If Pipes and Wilders cannot be forced to reveal their financial dealings, perhaps the post-9/11 anti-terrorist legislation and rules could be of help for once, for the necessary transparency!

Photos: 1. Jihadwatch, USA. Wilders and Robert Spencer. 2. Hoeiboei Blog: Arabist Jansen.

Technorati Tags: Bart Jan Spruyt, American Enterprise Institute, Geert Wilders, Daniel Pipes, Neoconservatives, Robert Spencer, Hans Jansen, Party Funding

Please, comment at: At Home in Europe-Euractiv.

How the Wilders Hysteria is Linked to Holland. Who exploits it. And how it can be ended. (2, Dutch society)

2010-01-22T06:06:00.002+01:00

Wilders is NOT about Islam. Any foreign intrusion would have done. He is about xenophobia and hate-mongering.
In the first part of this series, we talked about the transnational effects of the Dutch Wilders hysteria against Muslims. And how it is exploited and financed by foreign sources like the Advocacy Project of Daniel Pipes in the U.S.A. and Israel. We will have to return to the international financing problem as well as to the ongoing European contamination, in one of the next instances.
"Geert Akbar": The some 200 activists who supported Wilders on January 20 at his Amsterdam court appearance, were not without some humour...

Our subject here, in the second part, is the typical Dutch background of the hysterical Wilders upsurge. The Wilders phenomenon has nothing to do, in our opinion, with the Islam. Any religious, ethnic or cultural intrusion into the dream of a peaceful and quiet Dutch society, could have done the job. Wilders is not about Islam. It is about xenophobia. And hate-mongering.
Redundant workers are left alone
As many researchers and thinkers nowadays understand, the globalization of economy, trade and culture are felt as an intrusion into their daily life, by the men and women who live in marginalized parts of Western cities. Structurally, they are no more needed for production of goods. (See my articles about the rise and downfall of the need for urban workers at the e-urban site: Les quartiers relégués... (FR), Missbrauch der Geographie des Armuts.. (DE).
Foreign, mostly Muslim, immigrants take the jobs of the former local (former generation) immigrant workers. And the new immigrants are in their turn put aside, as their wages get too high, compared to those in, for instance, China. But China is over their horizon. The local inhabitants only see their immigrant neighbours.
And that is hard. Welfare State has, since a century, taken responsibility for the citizens' well-being, their security and their peaceful life, taking the place of the Church and the heads of the village communities. And it is felt, that the State fails. Nobody is really left alone. But life has become pointless. Strangers are coming in. They take our houses, our schools, our local shops. The State does nothing against it. Frustration becomes aggression against the newcomers and their children: headscarves, minarets, halal slaughtering are symbolical targets.
How is it possible, that an open, tolerant, society like the Dutch, reacts so strongly against the newcomers?
The Dutch tolerance is an "empty tolerance" as in: "De Lege Tolerantie", a book, published in 2007 by a number of Dutch thinkers and writers. It is empty, for it is in fact a way of hiding within one's own community.

It was developed during Middle Age and the early Modern Times. As a small country, the Dutch republic, in its summit of power, received the Flemish refugees from Antwerp and made them the top of Lowlands' culture (notably Joost van den Vondel, poet). Sepharade refugees from the Iberic countries were welcomed, as new traders on the world markets. Baruch d'Espinoza, one of them, was condemned to isolation, by the Sepharade court, confirmed by Dutch justice. The Jews had to manage their own problems.

As long as immigrants did not endanger Dutch elites' relations to England or to France, they were welcome. Not in the countryside, but in the cities. When the 18th century was nearing its end, Dutch "Patriots" demanded a Democracy in Holland. Second-class citizenship rules for Jews were to be abolished. But, finally, full-fledged discrimination was reestablished under the "Restoration" regime, which lasted from 1814 to 1830.
In the second half of the 19th century, the country accumulated its riches from its colonial possessions, the Netherlands Indies, i.e: Indonesia. Typical Dutch "tolerance" was developed into an ideology of "inspraak", "giving your opinion", imposed upon Indonesian leaders. "Inspraak" is not about real policies. It deals exclusively with social issues. It was a check on how far Dutch authorities could go in their exploitation of Indonesia.
The imperial illusion
While the British left the Indonesian wealth to their Dutch clients, those last ones lived with the illusion of an imperium. Holland considered itself both as a world player and as a small reserve of peace and civilization. It did not take part in the First World war, it only profited largely from trade with both sides. The German Nazi occupation in 1940 was a shock, but was relegated into shameful oblivion afterwards.
Dutch society reacts to foreign arrivals with tolerance. But what does Dutch tolerance mean? It is not about accepting, but about leaving alone. Leave us alone. Manage yourselves. The well-known "pillar" structure of the Dutch nation is its outcome: catholics, protestants, conservatives and social-democrats have each their own "pillar" under the state. It consists of social, educational, cultural and political organizations, whose tops negotiate all the time compromises with the other pillars, in order to keep the state going.
The emptiness of Dutch tolerance
Secularization, death of ideologies, dealt a mortal blow to that system from the sixties on. So mortal, that there can be no question of a new Dutch "islamic" pillar now, at the start of the 21st century. Which leaves Dutch society with a fundamental destabilization. The "inspraak"-strategy, so successful with the Indonesian elites, doesn't work with the new immigrants. Denial, until the middle of the nineties a favored attitude among the political elite of the country, became impossible after the tumultuous passage of Pim Fortuyn, murdered in May 2002.
In short: Dutch society is without a clue. Traditional elites are either hiding behind their pillar walls, or expecting the fall-out of Fortuyn- and Wilders-like racist movements to fall into their laps. That is why Parliament and traditional parties (for the most part) let Wilders do his thing. Hoping, that somebody would dare to come forward and put him in the right place. At this moment, it is a part of the Dutch judiciary system, who are coming forward against Wilders' hate-mongering. There is little or no support from the political side. Everybody is commenting as if it were a match between two foreign soccer teams.
Strangers to the new European community
The structure of the European Union, a hybrid hesitating between a common civilization and a loose union of independent nations, does not help. Dutch citizens, in their majority, do not feel responsible for the European common good. As the traditional parties do not work to engage citizens with an European project in the world, demagogues like Wilders, find an ample room to play with the illusion of a Dutch "Alleingang", as if the country were still an imperial power. Wilders copies the model of the ex-maoist populist Dutch "Socialist Party" in the European Parliament, who sabotaged during many years all European construction.
A commenter on this blog, rightly said, that a Wilders movement would not be possible in the bigger European countries like Britain, France, or Germany. But, as the EU is composed, now, of 27 countries, a destabilization of one or more of the smaller ones, like Poland, Denmark, Ireland, Italy, Greece or Holland, could contaminate the whole process of European unification.
2007, a financial support for the Irish movement against the Lisbon Treaty, channeled through a military contract with the US State of Georgia, and managed by the American Heritage Foundation, succeeded in endangering the whole project. The US funders behind Wilders may have the same intention.
That is why not only the Dutch, but all people of the EU should be worried about the fragility of democracy, as illustrated by the destructive Wilders phenomenon in Holland, and its hidden sponsors from abroad.

(From At Home in Europe (EN) and Huibslog)

Please; comment at: At Home in Europe - Euractiv, where this post is republished!

Why Wilders Hysterics happen in Holland. Who exploits it. And How it will Disappear. (1, Daniel Pipes)

2010-01-21T22:04:00.005+01:00

Ritual slaughter, normal in Jewish and Muslim traditions, is attacked at right-wing pro-Wilders manifestation in Amsterdam, Jan. 20, 2010.

In the USA, loonies like Mr. Geert Wilders, just appear in the shape of hysteric bloggers, or television priests, or talkshow-pundits. (Making an exception for Ms. Sarah Palin. That is another story.)
Even so, it is bad enough. But in Holland, a small country in Western Europe, those loonies can even become statesmen, or, as things are at this point, statesmen-hopeful.
Daniel Pipes, January 19 2010, consecrates Geert Wilders' ambitions on his blog: Why I stand with Geert Wilders. More on Daniel Pipes at Loonwatch, USA.

Pipes doesn't hide his admiration for the peroxide blond Lowlands Messiah:

Who is the most important European alive today? I nominate the Dutch politician Geert Wilders. I do so because he is best placed to deal with the Islamic challenge facing the continent. He has the potential to emerge as a world-historical figure.

Pipes and Wilders, 2006

Well, well. Mr. Wilders has no proposals for economy, social issues, culture, education, etc., other than eliminating immigrants of Muslim descent from Dutch society. He has no ideas about foreign policy, other than debilitating the European Union (we'll come to this later) and following the Likud - and even more right-wing policies, of Israel (idem).
Pipes:

In addition, Wilders is a charismatic, savvy, principled, and outspoken leader who has rapidly become the most dynamic political force in the Netherlands. While he opines on the full range of topics, Islam and Muslims constitute his signature issue. Overcoming the tendency of Dutch politicians to play it safe, he calls Muhammad a devil and demands that Muslims "tear out half of the Koran if they wish to stay in the Netherlands." More broadly, he sees Islam itself as the problem, not just a virulent version of it called Islamism.

"A full range of topics"? - When Dutch Parliament debated measures to counter the banking crisis, Wilders and his 8 colleague-parliamentarians left the meeting. Playing victims of majority dictates, but in reality, because they have no answers to the economic challenges of the crisis. No, the one-member Wilders party (Wilders himself is the only member, financing is hidden from the public, see my analysis of Wilders-finances later), waited and diverted the discussion to xenophobic issues later on.

Pipes ends the eulogy about Wilders in this way:

The Netherlands' fractured political scene means the PVV must either find willing partners to form a governing coalition (a difficult task, given how leftists and Muslims have demonized Wilders as a "right-wing extremist") or win a majority of the seats in parliament (a distant prospect).

Wilders must also overcome his opponents' dirty tactics. Most notably, they have finally, after 2½ years of preliminary skirmishes, succeeded in dragging him to court on charges of hate speech and incitement to hatred. The public prosecutor's case against Wilders opens in Amsterdam on January 20; if convicted, Wilders faces a fine of up to US$ 14,000 or as many as 16 months in jail.
Remember, he is his country's leading politician. Plus, due to threats against his life, he always travels with bodyguards and incessantly changes safe houses. Who exactly, one wonders, is the victim of incitement?

Confronting Wilders' agitprop, is that a "dirty tactic"? We are talking of freedom of opinion here! I regret that Dutch politicians did not confront Wilders with the means they have at their disposal under parliamentary democracy.
They ducked away. That is, why the Dutch Justice system was forced into action. The Amsterdam High Court rejected a lame response of the prosecutors to a number of complaints about Wilders' agitation and decided to go forward in challenging him to Court on the issue of hate-mongering against groups.
The City of Amsterdam has a libertarian tradition. February 1941, a mass strike occurred against the beginning Nazi elimination of Jews, who made 10% of its population of nearly a million. It has been a heroic action against the Nazi occupier. Many strikers lost their lives under SS-fire and in concentration camps afterwards.

The Amsterdam heroic tradition of struggle against anti-semitism
The city of Amsterdam and its major, Mr. Job Cohen and its assistant major Asscher, and its former assistant-major Ahmed Aboutaleb, now government-appointed major of the city of Rotterdam, have consistently avoided discriminatory action against its Muslim inhabitants. Wilders and his provincial followers are all the time trying to represent those politicians as "capitulators" in front of the so-called "Islamic Tsunami". As "dhimmis", shortly. I always am questioning myself about how it can be possible that Cohen and Asscher, of Jewish descent, could be diabolized by an Israel-friend as Mr. Wilders. And, indirectly, by Mr. Pipes...
But no, Daniel Pipes is not completely in tune with Geert Wilders:

Although I disagree with Wilders about Islam (I respect the religion but fight Islamists with all I have), we stand shoulder-to-shoulder against the lawsuit. I reject the criminalization of political differences, particularly attempts to thwart a grassroots political movement via the courts. Accordingly, the Middle East Forum's Legal Project has worked on Wilders' behalf, raising substantial funds for his defense and helping in other ways. We do so convinced of the paramount importance to talk freely in public during time of war about the nature of the enemy.

And yes, Pipes' "legal project", or, in other words: "advocacy against Islam", financed by the US taxpayer under the G.W.Bush presidency, has sent much money to the falsely-blond agitator. So much, that he has not to submit to the rules of party-financing transparency in Holland. Wilders' one-member "party" can afford to refuse government subsidies, thus avoiding being scrutinized on its revenues!
This is a typical "failed state" issue, that must have some consequences on the EU level. The European Parliament should not accept non-democratic maffias as members. (About the consequences of the Wilders intrusion into the EP, another time.)

As opinion-polls stand now, Mr. Wilders' fake party could master a 30% score at national elections (at the latest in 2011), become the biggest one in Parliament and get a claim to the post of Prime Minister. With the Christian-Democrat and the Conservative Liberal Party as junior partners in a coalition (as both big parties mentioned here, have not excluded that sort of coalition up to now), Wilders could effectively become Prime Minister of the Netherlands.

This would not be as disastrous as it looks now, if the Netherlands were on a Pacific island, with a small, self-sufficient, economy. But the country is among the world's twenty biggest economies and a middle-size member of the European Union, as well as a core NATO-ally.
The world has changed into a global village. Small countries may exert a disproportional impact on world affairs. The big European Union Three (Great Britain, France and Germany) are, at this moment, stable and responsible players in world politics. That was illustrated at the occasion of the 2006 "Danish anti-Islam cartoon crisis". All three managed to remain neutral and not add to the world outrage, nor to the provocations by anti-Islam people. The new members of the European Union in the East are, with the notable exception of Poland, too small to transmit their eventual instability to the European Union as a whole.

How did Mr. Geert Wilders get such a large following in a country, formerly known for its tolerance and stability?
That is the subject of the next article in this series.
Keep an eye on us.

Published also in HUIBSLOG and At Home in Europe - Euractiv.
Please, comment at At Home in Europe - Euractiv, where this post has been republished!

Dutch Justice publishes an Anti-Fitna, as Wilders has to appear in Court on 20/1

2010-01-20T08:15:00.001+01:00

Somebody within the Dutch Justice bureaucracy must have had a great idea. "Let's make a YouTube Video to counter Geert Wilders! He did his "Fitna" thing in March 2008. We do our Justice thing in January 2010! And it worked! A simple device helped Dutch legal people to becole cool.
This day, 20 january 2010, the Amsterdam High Court, is to listen to Mr. Geert Wilders' defense against the multiple accusations for hate-mongering and incitement to racial hate against Muslims, Mr. Wilders is accused of in the Dutch Court. An official prosecution YouTube is on the air:

Translation:

00:00 (NL-Nu Journalist:) January 20, Geert Wilders will have to appear before the Amsterdam Court.
00:06 He is indicted for offense of groups, hate-mongering and incitement to discrimination.
00:10 The incriminated statements were made in an interview with (Dutch daily) De Volkskrant and in his video release "Fitna".
00:17 (Interviewer:) What has been said and written by Mr. Wilders, that has provoked his indictment?
00:21 (Answer by the Amsterdam Court Press Officer, Mr. Otto Van Der Bijl): In the indictment gainst Mr. Wilders, you'll find a great number of examples, of which I'll mention here some.
00:26 (Wilders in De Volkskrant, August 8, 2007): "The core of the problem is the fascist Islam, the sick ideology of Allah and Mohammed, as it has been written down in the Islamic "Mein Kampf", i.e.: the Quran."
00:35 And also: "We have plenty things we want to happen: Closing the frontiers, no more Muslims entering the Netherlands, and many Muslims have to leave Holland." (Geert Wilders in: De Pers - Online daily. March 27, 2007).
00:44 And Mr. Wilders is also indicted because of a number of statements in his well-known video "Fitna"".
00:50 (Interviewer): What punishment could Mr. Wilders get?
00:53 "For hate-mongering and discrimination, Mr. Wilders can be condemned to one year maximum in jail and a fine of next to 8.000 Euros, and the same punishment is provided by law for offense of groups, which is another part of the indictment. But the issue of the procedure is in the first place a reply to the question, if Mr. Wilders is punishable under Law. The secundary issue is what punishment he will eventually get.
01:14 Freedom of speech is an important civil liberty. But that liberty has its limits. One of them is offense and incitement to hate and discrimination.
01:27 And the Judge in this procedure, will have to decide, if Mr. Wilders has gone beyond those limits.
01:31 (Interviewer): January 20, Mr. Wilders will appear in Court. What do we have to expect that day?
01:35 The january 20 day in Court is an introductory session. Court will decide afterwards, how the process will be handled. The Prosecution will also adopt a definitive opinion only after this session. We expect, that the procedure will be concluded at the end of this year (2010) and the Prosecution will take a stand only at that point of time.
02:02 (Nu-Nl Journalist): Some days ago, Wilders objected to his indictments, but the Court rejected his complaints.

Of course, we are sceptical about the outcome of all this. But, let us be generous, and believe, hope, with me, that justice will prevail.
And will Dutch Parliament have the courage, to exclude one-man parties from participating n elections?
I doubt it. And will struggle to the end.
Whatever the End may be!

Muslims At Home in Europe. Soros Says So. It was always my idea, too.

2009-12-22T02:48:00.001+01:00

I do not claim exclusivity for the name "At Home in Europe". In 1993, some time before George Soros engaged into bringing democracy and moral integrity into Central and Eastern Europe, I embraced, together with my colleagues and friends from France, Germany and Great-Britain, in the small create!europe network, that challenging slogan. We were all working at urban neighbourhood emancipation through local integrated projects. Most of us, including me, still are.
George Soros became famous, when he speculated successfully against the British Pound (£) in 1992, forcing it out of the European currency "slang". Much of the money he got out of this disastrous (for Europe) move, was invested, later on, into a series of private initiatives for democracy and civil society in countries like Bosnia, Hungary, Serbia and the Ukraine. Showing, how you can throw bad money to good causes.
The New York based George Soros institute OSI (Open Society Institute) issues a report about Muslims in Europe, focussing on 11 European cities. It is produced by the OSI At Home in Europe Project , and covers:

the experiences of Muslim communities in select neighborhoods in Amsterdam and Rotterdam, Antwerp, Berlin and Hamburg, Copenhagen, Leicester and Waltham Forest–London, Marseille and Paris, and Stockholm.

This report is as much about "being At home in Europe" for ALL its inhabitants, as we imagined it then. Going aganst the popular US and European Muslim-bashing trend, it delves into the kitchen table realities in some neighbourhoods, and depicts a completely different image of daily life, challenges and results than that which the scaremongers to make us believe.
The house is as the people who inhabit it. There is no mythical everlasting cultural "Heimat", defined by the soil upon which it stands.
In order to be at home in Europe, Muslim immigrants, each in function of his/her background (for coming from Morocco or from Turkey, from the province or from the city, makes quite a difference), creates his own form of integration, which is a new, mixed way of life. Like immigrants in the US did successfully in the nineteenth and twentieth century.
Does that mean, that there are no problems? That is another myth about us, "Gutmenschen", i.e., people who try to attack in fact the facts of ethnic cohabitation. Of course, there are huge problems, for the immigrants themselves as well as for the original inhabitants of the area.
The report shows, that, with good will from both sides and much help from the local authority, those problems can be solved, and, astonishingly, even turned into advantages!
How this last, seemingly improbable, magic trick can be made in the course of time, is explained (among others) in my professional website E-Urban, about urban area-oriented policies in Europe.
This is a summary of the report's contents:

Muslims in Europe: A Report on 11 EU Cities

Date: December 2009, Source: OSI

The Open Society Institute Muslims in Europe report series constitutes the comparative analysis of data from 11 cities in seven European countries. It points out common trends and offers recommendations at the local, national, and international levels, including to the European Union and to international organizations. While not representative of the situation of all Muslims in these cities, this report does capture a snapshot of the experiences of Muslim communities in select neighborhoods in Amsterdam and Rotterdam, Antwerp, Berlin and Hamburg, Copenhagen, Leicester and Waltham Forest–London, Marseille and Paris, and Stockholm.
This body of work comes in response to major trends with regards to Muslims living in Europe: whether citizens or migrants, native born or newly-arrived, Muslims are a growing and varied population that presents Europe with one of its greatest challenges, namely how to ensure equal rights and opportunities for all in a climate of rapidly expanding diversity.
The following overview report includes:
Executive Summary
Policy Context
Cohesion, Belonging, Discrimination and Interactions
Education
Employment
Neighborhood and Housing
Health Care
Policing and Security
Civic and Political Participation
Media
Recommendations
The publication is available for download below, in its entirety or by chapter.

(For downloading, go to the OSI At Home in Europe Project).

From the conclusions of the report:

“The OSI research suggests that religious discrimination against Muslims remains a critical barrier to full and equal participation in society.The findings of this report are consistent with other research and suggest that levels of religious discrimination directed towards Muslims are widespread and have increased in the past five years.
European-born Muslims, particularly women, were more likely to perceive higher levels of religious discrimination than Muslims born abroad. European-born Muslim men identify the police as a key source of unfair treatment and discrimination. For Muslims, the persistence of discrimination and prejudice affects their sense of national belonging."

(Hat tip to Dagmar and Mario, Germany).

There report is based on more than 2.000 interviews of inhabitants of the eleven European cities.

"Too many Europeans believe, that the religious identity would somehow hinder the integration [of Muslims], allthough a majority of the Muslims who have been interviewed, identify to a high degree with the city and with the country in which they live. The role of the City is essential, as well in the struggle against discrimination, as well as in the opening of roads to the integration of foreigners",

said Nazia Hussain (London), who managed the project "At Home in Europe".

A useful antidote against the "Atlas der Wut" (Map of Rage) that Mr. Ulfkotte distilled recently from another US source...

Technorati Tags: Islam, Europe, discrimination, cities, Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Antwerp, Berlin, Hamburg, Copenhagen, Leicester , London, Marseille, Paris, Stockholm

Minaret Moment 8/12 [EN]

2009-12-08T04:58:00.003+01:00

I know, how difficult it is, to reply to self-conscious US opinionmakers when Europe is at stake.

Yesterday, the liberal New York Times published an opinion, called Europe's Minaret Moment, by somebody called Ross Douthat. He has read Christopher Caldwell, and thinks that he knows Europe. Comparing the genesis of the US to Europe's birth, he observes, that "a more perfect union" is far away from the manipulation by European "élites" to get a clean and workable constitution for the European Union. He couldn't be more right, when he chastises the European elites' disinterest in the difficulties that non-elite Europeans suffer at the actual economic season.

Douthat:

If the more perfect union promised by the Lisbon Treaty is the European elite’s greatest triumph, the failure to successfully integrate millions of Muslim immigrants represents its greatest failure. And the two are intertwined: they’re both the fruits of the high-handed, often undemocratic approach to politics that Europe’s leaders have cultivated in their quest for unity.

Oh, how much you are right, Mister Right! I am sure, not any member of the European elite has seen the problems coming. Nor any member of the non-elite. We choose to treat the problem NOT as you treated the Indians, relegating them to reserves and poisoning them with alcohol and diseases. We choose to help them integrate into our societies. Most of the Muslims did. A tiny minority doesn't. Like some Muslims in the USA, if I am well informed. Your easy condemnation of an Europe that is just defining itself, doesn't help at all.
Sometimes I think that people like you and Mark Steyn (America Alone) are just loading upon Europe, what you feel to be missing in the US. Historically, your propositions are completely erroneous.

On what it takes, to get a more perfect union
For: Pardon me, Mr. Bouthat, how many years were spoiled, before John Adams was able to convince Americans, that a "more perfect union" were attainable, only if Americans accepted to live together with "foreigners"?
Bouthat attacks an European elite, who imposed a peaceful Europe upon a population who would love to get rid of an immigant group, (Muslims), who seem to want independence and, finally, domination.
I am not convinced at all. I believe, that muslim immigrants in Europe will become "European", while safeguarding their own specificities. That is difficult for the people who have to live next to them, and I agree, that much more has to be done for those last mentioned. The European elites are aware of that. Much money and energy is invested.

European elites are not as stupid as you think...
Is it enough? Is it efficient? No! But it is much more, than American "elites" did for Polish, Italian and Greek immigrants a century ago. Nevertheless, those populations integrated fully into the US society. Accidents on the road, like the Swiss Minaret ban, seem to block any solution to the European immigration problem. But European unity and peace are prevalent upon short term issues like the Swiss Minaret ban initiative. One, like me, may have a minority opinion on Muslim integration in Europe, without being a member of the "European elites". That is democracy, Mr. Bouthat!
More or less like the US solved their problem with the "unintegrated" blacks in the sixties, the European Union will go forward, tentatively, with its programs for integration. And it will succeed. In the end. Each racial clash has its solution.

Europe-bashing does not help
Bouthat's opinion joins a conservative trend that makes the European Union responsible for a sort of giving ib to terrorists. I see no reason for that. Switzerland is not a member of the EU. The OECD, of which the US is a member-state, will surely condemn an eventual Swiss minaret ban. The US are not only indebted to the Founding Fathers of 1787, but also to the winners of the Civil War of 1865. No slavery, no second-class citizens!
Anti-Islamic surges will take their toll. Roma and other minorities will suffer discrimination. But I guess that the people's commitment to liberty and equality, will take the upper hand, when it comes to decide about liberty and democracy. If political elites work to create the right conditions for that, they are doing what should be expected from them.

Technorati Tags: US, European Union, New York Times, Imigration, Islam

London must allow Wilders' racist Agitation?

2009-10-14T05:12:00.004+02:00

February 2009, British Government did the right thing. They did not allow Geert Wilders to come on British soil in order to spread his venomous ideas under the umbrella of the anti-European UKIP party.

Blocking an elected representative from a befriended country is indeed exceptional. But in my view, British Government set an example of integrity, ashaming Dutch Parliament, that allows a no-membership "party" to agitate on racial issues. Most parties in Holland, exception made for the left liberal D66 group as well as for the "Green-Left", are stuck like rabbits in the headlights of a Mercedes, not knowing what to do about this utterly un-Dutch Wilders movement.

Wilders is jubilating

The London Immigration Court, in condemning yesterday the UK Government decision concerning Wilders' dangerous upsetting of public order, put itself on the accommodating Chamberlain (1938) line. I hope that the UK Government will oppose that decision and continue in a more Churchillian line, blocking continental follies and preserving democracy and humanism in Europe as a whole.

But, for the moment, Wilders is jubilating. "Esther", editor of "Islam in Europe", gives Wilders full steam, in citing The Guardian:

The far-right Dutch politician Geert Wilders intends to travel to London next week after an immigration tribunal ruling overturned a ban on visiting Britain.

The Home Office said it was disappointed after the tribunal rejected its claim that his presence could "inflame community tensions and lead to inter-faith violence".

The Freedom party leader immediately announced his intention to meet Ukip's Lord Pearson of Rannoch to discuss a showing of his anti-Islamic film Fitna later this month in the House of Lords.

Judge CMG Ockelton, who chaired the tribunal, said that Wilders's opinions were expressed strongly and in a way that was bound to cause offence but that the right of freedom of expression was important in a democratic society.

"Substantial evidence of actual harm would be needed before it would be proper for a government to prevent the expression and discussion of matters that might form the opinions of legislators, policy makers and voters," he said.

The ruling said there had been no evidence of public order problems or damage to community relations as a result of a previous visit by Wilders to Britain.

"It was more important to allow free speech than to take restrictive action speculatively," said Ockelton.

The judgment goes further, saying that even if there were evidence that Wilders posed a threat to public order it would still not have been necessary to ban him because the police would have been able to ensure no disorder took place and remove him if there was trouble.

The decision to ban Wilders was taken under regulations introduced in 2006 which allow the exclusion of those who represent "a genuine, present and sufficiently serious threat affecting one of the fundamental interests of society".

Wilders, who faces trial in the Netherlands for discrimination and inciting hatred, was turned back at Heathrow in February when the then home secretary, Jacqui Smith, banned him from entering Britain. He had been coming for a screening in the Lords of his film which calls the Qur'an a "fascist book". Smith said his presence had the potential to "threaten community harmony and therefore public safety".

Wilders said the ruling was a victory for freedom of expression and claimed Smith's decision had been politically motivated.

The politician was represented in the case by a British Muslim barrister, Arfan Khan, and the costs of just under £10,000 were funded by the Birkenhead Society, which "encourages free speech" and marks British Empire Memorial Day.

The Home Office said it would decide whether to appeal in due course.

The problem is Dutch, and, more specifically, political, not juridical

The weak and accommodating stand of the Dutch parliamentarian majority does not help at all. In January 2010 an Amsterdam high court, on its own initiative, will decide, if Wilders' actions are "hate-mongering" or not. This is a task, Parliament itself should have undertaken. The Social-Democrats, labeled by Wilders as "Sharia-Socialists", should have taken him to court immediately. For Wilders stated unambiguously in his "Fitna" movie, that in his view, the Sharia is fascist.

But no mainstream political party in Holland dares to move. With the Christian Democrat main Government Party it is still worse: It keeps open the possibility of governing with the undemocratic Wilders club.

The debilitating consequences of letting an odd maverick steal the elections

Wilders participated in the June European elections. Only to send a delegation to Strasbourg and Brussels, that has no mission at all. He stole a third of the Dutch representation in the EP, weakening the impact of his country on crucial European issues, crucial for the Netherlands, too, only to cash the money that he cannot have from membership fees, as his "party" has no members except himself.

Like all developed EU-members, Holland should make democratic rules for the internal organization and the financing of parties allowed to participate in the vote. Minister of the Interior Guusje Ter Horst has done nothing, so far. Wilders is getting money from neo conservative sources in the US. He could upset the whole European process, like the Irish tycoon Decan X did last year, provoking an Irish "No" to the Lisbon Treaty. I am sad at the idea, that Holland could be mobilized against the European construction, like Chechia, Poland, and other American-sponsored entities are.

To conclude: Of Course, the final solution of the Dutch identity crisis is not with a London Court. Dutch democratic, anti-authoritarian, traditions should be mobilized against the populist danger.

But, who dares to face the challenge in the Low Countries?

Bulgaria: A political earthquake not to be neglected by Europe

2009-07-10T06:36:00.002+02:00

For the third time since 1989, Bulgarian voters have inflicted a massive "no" to their political class.
The GERB party (a Bulgarian language shortcut for "Citizens for an European Development of Bulgaria") got 116 of the available 240 seats in the one-cameral parliament of Sofia. Their nearly 40% of the more than 60% vote, propelled the vociferous major of the capital Sofia, Boiko Borissof, into the seat of prime minister.
(Borissov, the virtually nominated prime minister, said on July 9, 2009: I have a program of support to the legal officers who are charged with corruption cases, we are going to invest massively into infrastructure and in European cooperation ... [Photo: Sofia Echo, Krassimir Yuskesseliev])

At the European elections of last month it was already impossible to deny, that Borissovs party was going to carry the national elections, scheduled for July 5.
The high level of participation in the election helped to justify the GERB victory, in spite of frequent vote-buying, an ethnic Turkish vote and "election tourism" on an unprecented scale.

In 1990, Bulgarian voters chased the historic Todor Zhivkov gerontocracy. In 2001, they invested their hopes in the former king Simeon. Every time, they were disappointed. Will the Borissov landslide of 2009 be their ultimate revenge?

Will the third Bulgarian electoral revolution finally bring peace and progress?
In recent years, I had the opportunity to spend some time in the country. My engagement with urban solutions had me relate to a variety of local actors. As I did not know much about the country, like too many ofe to confess the European decision makers who should, I have to confess, that I only have learned about what I do NOT know about Bulgaria. My opinions should be evaluated accordingly. I share, nevertheless, four observations with you, if you'll permit me:

The astounding resistance of Bulgarian identity to foreign dominance,
the dumbing effects of Stalinist and post-Stalinist repression during 45 years,
the economic and strategic trump cards of the country,
and how the European Union could catch the opportunities for itself and for the Bulgarian people.

1. The unfinished Bulgarian Renaissance
In the second half of the 19th century, a seemingly unimportant province of the Ottoman empire woke up. The decline of the Ottoman Empire was certainly of much help. But the emancipation of inhabitants of remote villages, of virtual serfs to absenteist Turkish landowners and of artisans working in the few cities that existed, could not have been imagined without the intervention of an European educated elite of former university students and freemasons. Like the 18th century enlightened intellectuals in France and elsewhere, they concentrated on popular education. It is by force of that drive, that a new Bulgarian nation came into existence on the vague memories of mediaeval culture. It was a very real Renaissance. The Bulgarian Renaissance.
The European big powers of the epoch adopted a double approach. Insofar as the Bulgarian upheaval weakened the Turkish "sick man", they were helpful. But when the Bulgarian independence threatened to offer an entrance to the Mediterranean to the Russian Czars, they blocked.
Bulgarian independence was OK, as long as it did not hinder Austrian plans with Serbia, Bosnia and Macedonia. It should not endanger Greek ambitions in the Northern Aegean either. The Balkan Wars of the early Twentieth century learned a disappointing lesson to upcoming Bulgaria.
That explains why the country choose the wrong side at the start of the two great wars.
Bulgaria was confined from the South by Greece, from the East by Turkey, from the West by Serbia and from the North by Rumania. In spite of all that, the country thrived between the two wars. Its natural resources helped very much to keep international crisis and depression away.
Until about the year 1940, a national entity with half a century of independence, existed. But its existence was fragile: Wrong choices and geopolitical compromises (Yalta, 1944) changed its destination and brought it under Soviet dominance until 1990.
2. The years of emptiness
I spoke with a young woman student, at the start of this year. She won a grade in classical philosophy at Sofia University. I told her, that I was confident, that out of the actual mess of Bulgarian culture, something new and vigourous would develop. But she cut me short. She explained to me, examples at hand, that the nearly half a century cultural desert and all the repression that went with it, killed any hope for creativity and free intellectual life. I was dumbfounded. Who am I, to deny the artistic and cultural disaster that manifests itself daily in Bulgarian television, in the shows of the unexplainable Aziz?
Of course: The classic treasures of Greek and Roman civilization are being preserved. Precious artisanship survives in the valleys of the Balkan mountains. The Rila monasteries receive hundreds of visitors a day. But where is the young generation of artists, writers and thinkers one should expect to havAe established itself after the Big Change of 1990?
I had to admit: It is not there.
How could the energy, the unexploited energy, come back and manifest itself?
The only workable solution, I see, is a new cross-fertilization with Europe. Like hundred, two hundred years ago.
Engish, French and German cultural missions do still exist. French secundary education in a number of cities, has survived the Soviet era. The Borissov program suggests an intensification of those exchanges. Europe has to decide. Leave them alone, let the Americans do their thing, or redevelop and intensify cultural and educational exchange.
It is urgent. Cultural void means negative perception of minority cultures. In the Bulgarian case, that means: suppression of Roma and Turkish identities. Europe should help Bulgarians to get confidence again in their own culture. That is a precondition for respect of others. When you feel safe, you do not envy others.
3. Unexploited economic and strategic opportunities
Bulgaria is a rich country. Without the riches in agriculture and men, Alexander the Great, in the fourth century before Christ, could not have spread Hellenism in the East. He came from the City of his father Philip, Philippople, the actual Plovdiv. At the end of the First century, Trajanus, the Roman emperor, would not have built a road from the Mediterranean to Dacia, if the environment wouldn't have been safe and abundant. Bulgaria is potentially a great crossroad between the East and the West, and: between the North and the South.
The East-West connection is the first to have been reestablished. Turkish trailers circulate by the hundreds between West and East. The EU helps with road construction, but has frozen its subsidies because of Bulgarian maffiose dealings with contracts. The new government wishes to end this and reclaim imediately the lost money.
Iaccompanied by hundreds of Turkish and other trailerst is very important. On the road between Istanbul and Budapest, I am accompanied by hundreds of Turkish and other trailers. We loose many hours in queues and with burocratic rules.
The North-South links are virtually non-existant. It is true, that you can go by modern road from Thessaloniki to Sofia. But what next? A good road that connects northern Greece via the Rhodopes Mountains through central Thrakia with the Balkan throughways ti the danube valley and Rumenia is only vaguely under construction. However, its strategic role is evident: Avoid the Dardanelles and arrive directly in the Ukraine, in the Krim, etc.
Well, if I may give my largely uninformed opinion: We should not consider Bulgaria uniquely as a problem to the EU, but as an opportunity in the first place. An opportunity to get a hold on the difficult situation at the South-Eastern end of the EU ...
4. How to engage the new Bulgarian leadership?
A regional strategy, alas, is not an EU priority. The USA established a giant military base in Blagoevgrad, next to the Greek and Turkish borders. An American university in that city completes the deployment.
But the EU has also its unique qualities. Cofinancing big investments. Giving a hand in education. "The soft dorces will prevail in the end", said a great Dutch poet once.
Bulgaria needs fast trains, reliable motorways, a thriving agriculture. The EU can give that. And more. It is a vision, a global vision, that is not present.
Even if it is reasonable, to keep one's distances with the actual new Bulgarian government, because of it's populism, it should be deemed good policy to encourage the European orientation of Borissov and give him, as long as possible, the benefit of the doubt.
In my experience, local projects that engage local actors, and represent a genuine mutual confidence, will do a great part of the job. That is how the "soft forces" will win.
In the End.

Copenhague: Dutch parliamentarian Geert Wilders reveals himself as an ethnic cleanser...

2009-06-16T01:06:00.005+02:00

Dutch parliamentarian Geert Wilders was interviewed in Danish television last Sunday.

What he says, boils down to a call for an ethnic cleansing of Europe. Listen to his statements here:

In short: There are too many people from Muslim descent in Europe and they have more children than others. Muslims have been contaminated with "a criminal ideology" (Islam). That is why there are so many criminals among them. They have to be sent away immediately. But that is not enough: Anybody who starts "thinking about Sharia and Jihad" or "Caliphate" should be deported too.

"Muslims want to take over our culture" and "change it fundamentally". That is why we have to start deportations to the countries of origin (of their parents).

Like every ethnic cleanser, Wilders adopts a salami tactic: First isolate a part of the ethnic group and earmark them (and their families) for harsher treatment than foreseen in the Law. And in the Denmark interview, Wilders is already targeting a second, larger category: "those who THINK about jihad and sharia". For Muslims, there is not only no freedom of expression any more, but even no more freedom of thinking. Logical conclusion: As you cannot know what a person thinks, every Muslim (or person from Muslim descent) is a potential danger. That is why he is ranting about "tens of millions" of people to be deported from Europe.

Wilders is no more your daily oddball. He has a large constituency in Holland. And more and more admirers in the US, in Israel and in European countries. He has to be taken seriously. Like we should have done, for instance, with that oddball poet Karadzic around the year 1990, when he prepared the ethnic cleansing and mass murder of non-serbian Bosniaks.

The UN The Hague Inernational Court is at this very moment constructing its case against Karadzic, digging into his agitation from before the Yugoslav Civil War.

If we prefer to avoid ethnic cleansing operations in the future, it is there, in the new International Court, where Wilders belongs.

Who has the guts to indict him?

Afghanistan Conference in The Hague: A Turning Point?

2009-03-30T23:06:00.003+02:00

Tomorrow, something new will happen in the windy Dutch government seat at the North Sea. All, I repeat: ALL, possible players in the Afghan drama will come together and talk. Will it be THE turning point, or will it only be a significant step forward?

Obama delivers. A completely new US approach to the world is taking shape. No more imperialist 1000 years' dreams like those in the "American Century" documents of the neoconservatives. A more realistic view takes into account the interests of the Afghan people in all their diversity, and, also, those of the neighbouring countries, as well as those of the world players: the US, Europe, Russia, China, India.

This, in itself, is already a major turning point. But will it materialize into something sensible?

The subject is extremely complicated. Afghanistan is divided in itself along ethnic, cultural and religiuous lines. The Northern neighbours are interested in halting the fundamentalist infiltrations. Pakistan has been considering the country as its backyard, providing a strategic depth against arch enemy India. Iran has a religious (the Shiite Hazaris) and cultural (the large Persian speaking minorities) stake. At the oil and gas producing end, Iran, Turkmenistan and others, as well as Pakistan and India (and China?) at the potential receiving end have an interest in Afghanistan as a necessary transit country. the whole world has an interest in stopping or limiting the poppy (heroine) production. I would like to add the interest the whole world should have in rolling back the safe havens for terrorist fundamentalism.

It is my innermost conviction, that only the Afghan people themselves may find a solution to the problems mentioned above and to others that I did not mention (yet). The Obama-Clinton first measures (reigning in the Pakistan ISI, look for an arrangement with authentic local forces in Afghanistan) and proposals, would possibly create the necessary room for an Afghan awakening taking place.

Many people are critical of the pressure, Obama is putting on Pakistan. I am not. Before 2001, the US were blindly following the Pakistani Secret Service ISI's manipulations in Afghanistan (and Pakistan/Kashmir). Under G.W.Bush this did not change. A decisive key to a solution in Afghanistan, is cutting out the ISI's support to Islamist fundamentalism. It created and maintained in power (with Saudi help) the Afghan Taliban. Facilitated their resurrection after 2002. And let them also develop in Pakistan itself (the Northwest Territories).

Dealing with Pakistan, a country with a huge population, nuclear bombs, and a fierce frustration gainst India, is extremely difficult. Obama's carrot (7,5 billion dollars help) and stick (US intrusions into the Territories, chasing Al Qaeda) is, if I may judge, the only possible way to make things move into the right direction.

Iran has a number of stakes here in common with the US, Russia and Europe. It would like to stop fundamentalist anti-Shiite Sunni rule in Afghanistan. It has an interest in a pacified Afghanistan as a transit country for its oil and gas to the east. It doesn't like Pakistani, nor American, nor Russian, nor European military too close to its eastern borders.

Summa summarum: There are some chances, that the new realistic configuration that has been put in place by the new US Government, will produce a turning point at The Hague. As I said long before this, a counter-guerilla war in Afghanistan by NATO armies is as hopeless as the British (XIXth century) efforts at a "Great Game" and the Russian ones after 1979 were from the beginning. Poor dead and wounded soldiers from Canada, the UK and othe NATO countries have fallen for a chimera. I do not understand, what the US extra-NATO forces have been doing all the way from 2002 to now. They sabotaged objectively the pacification and community-building efforts of the NATO allies. Like tomorrow's host country the Netherlands in Uruzgan. They did not crush Al Qaeda, nor capture its chief. And I regret their vain casualties, too.

The remnants of the neoconservative movement are complaining. Tonight, on Dutch television, Iranian refugee turned Dutch Professor of ethnic integration, Afshin Ellian, criticized sternly and repeatedly Obama's praise for the greatness of the Iranian civilization. As if respect for the Iranian people, holding out against a world wide boycott since 1979 (30 years!), would be a crime! Should we be taking Ellian for a guide, Ellian, who was for years a Tudeh (Iranian Communist Party) propagandist in a Kabul exile under the Soviets?

Other voices from Iran, also shown on Dutch television, tell another tale. A woman refugee fro.m Iran sais, she was moved by the respect Obama finally showed in the name of the American people, for Iranian culture and civilization. Looking at that woman, I thought: She will be able to deal herself, together with her friends, with retrograde mollahs. That is not our task.

Give people room to make their own communities. In dignity. And in their own way. Our democracy is superb. We developed it all by ourselves. in blolod and with much trial and error. Genuine democracy is not imported by force from elsewhere. it is obtained democratically - by the people themselves.

A reading suggestion about "La démocratie des autres" (Amartya Sen): Democracy and its global Roots (2003).

Ms. Verdonk accused of theft

2009-03-03T20:26:00.003+01:00

Ed Sinke, the former Rotterdam agent of Ms. Rita Verdonk, former Dutch Minister of Immigration, has informed Dutch Justice of possible inappropriate appropriation of funds by his former employer.
Rita Verdonk tried to get 4.000 Euros still in the political account of her movement, but that are not her propriety.
Poor Rita is in dire straights.
But rules are rules.
She should know.
Bye, Rita, you were lovely.
Another racist gone down.
She rests in peace.

Dutch hate-mongerer Wilders turned into hero by Rupert Murdoch [EN]

2009-01-23T04:34:00.001+01:00

The New York Wall Street Journal (WSJ), owned by Rupert Murdoch, is known for its heroic struggle against anyone who it deems guilty of blasphemy of the free market, the stock exchange, composite investment vehicles and US moral superiority in the world.
It is so busy with its crusade and its inquisition against men and women who make use of their right to free speech on these subjects, that, alas, it neglected recently its core business, that is, if I am not mistaken, to inform the public, specifically the financial world, about the upcoming financial crisis, about the Ponzi schemes and about the fraudulent balances of main financial institutions.

You and I would expect, that the WSJ, like the London Financial Times, would be doing some self-critical introspection at this point of time.
The opinion makers at WSJ, could, for instance, reflect upon the billions of dollars the US are pumping every year into the Saudi Kingdom, enabling it to maintain a barbaric internal police regime and, worse still, financing fundamentalist and retrograde, even terrorist, institutions abroad.

I have seen nothing of that in WSJ. On the contrary. Not unlike Saudi Mollahs, it identifies Satan as exclusively coming from abroad.
WSJ featured heavily, for instance, the lying demagogue Mark Steyn (America Alone), also known as a Canadian humorist. Steyn specialises in Canada- and Europe-bashing. Collective health care, feminism, birth control, so he says, produce countries that are already lost to (Islamic) barbary. America alone, has to do the job. With crackpot wisdom, for instance, about the Istanbul Aya Sofia, that should be unislamized, he reaches a vast audience. Only a pity, that since 1939 the Aya Sofia building has been desacralized by the Turkish Parliament, and is a Museum now, with exhibits that illustrate the Christian as well as the Muslim history of the 5th Century edifice.
Another Europe-basher (when she is not trying to return to Europe) is Ajaan Hirsi Ali, a former Dutch parliamentarian of Somali origin, who is employed by the neoconservative American Enterprise Institute in Washington since 2006. She, or Daniel Pipes, could well have been the author of the WSJ-opinion under the heading:

"Silencing Islam's Critics - A Dutch Court Imports Saudi Blasphemy Norms to Europe."

It appeared two days after the inauguration of Barack Obama as the 44th US president, who stated that in the US there has to be a just place for Christians, Muslims, Buddhists and Non-believers. Its conclusion:

The [Amsterdam] court yesterday overruled this decision [i.e: the August 2008 Prosecutor's decision NOT to prosecute Mr. Wilders, HR], arguing that the lawmaker should be prosecuted for "inciting hatred and discrimination" and also "for insulting Muslim worshippers because of comparisons between Islam and Nazism."
This is no small victory for Islamic regimes seeking to export their censorship laws to wherever Muslims reside. But the successful integration of Muslims in Europe will require that
immigrants adapt to Western norms, not vice versa.
Limiting the Dutch debate of Islam to standards acceptable in, say, Saudi Arabia, will only shore up support for Mr. Wilders's argument that Muslim immigration is eroding traditional Dutch liberties.

Well, the point is, that Mr. Wilders is not seriously criticizing Islam as a religion, but that he is all the time targeting all Muslims, representing them as a permanent danger. He summarily rejects any perspective of "working together for a more perfect union", even systematically refusing proposals for dialogue, made to him by Muslim groups.

Mr. Wilders has had all freedom of speech he could wish for. Now he has to bear the consequences of what he has been saying. The Dutch juridical system is not unlike any other in the Western world. On the issue of blasphemy, it is more liberal than the American practice. It is not of "blasphemy" that Wilders is accused, but of hate-mongering ("haatzaaien"). A nation that is committed to a peaceful togetherness of its citizens and to equality between gender, religion and ethnicity, has to protect itself against systematic hate-mongering.
It is as if the WSJ forgets, that US law is imposed upon the Ku Klux Klan racist hate-mongerers, and rightly so. No "freedom of expression" for them. And people who deny the Holocaust, should we give them "freedom of expression"? In France, Mr. Le Pen, also a parliamentarian and party leader, has been condemned more than once for hate-mongering against Jews and against immigrants from Africa. A former French Communist leader, turned Muslim, denied the Holocaust and was condemned in court, in spite of his old age. That is what a civilized society does. In Europe as well as in the US.

So, it is not about blasphemy, but about systematic racist agitation. And it is not about freedom of expression, but about hate-mongering by someone who knows that he is lying. Or, maybe, he doesn't know, but then a psychiatric team has to be called in.

Back to the WSJ and its tendency to find European (Canadian) giving in ("appeasement", "capitulation"), to the Enemy (in an earlier phase, it was: "soft on Communism"), as a main cause for the actual woes in Wall Street.

As always, its explanation comes from inner policy.
Murdoch and his WSJ team cannot (yet) attack openly the new course of president Obama, who pleads for American-European dialogue, with the approval of a large majority in the US. Therefore, it is being done by the way of a bit of misinformation about an event, most Americans do know near to nothing about.

It all boils down to a cowards' intrigue, to sabotage the new American foreign policy, an offense to a Democracy that defends itself (the contrary to "appeasement"!) and to the integrity of Dutch justice. (Which might come handy in, where the The Hague International Courts for genocide and war crimes are concerned, that are boycotted by the US, and that will have a role in prosecuting war criminals from recent conflicts.)

Well, and if the WSJ is so concerned about Saudi "norms" (which it should be), what about an oil boycott against that regime?

Technorati Tags: Wall Street Journal, Europe, Netherlands, Wilders, Hirsi Ali, Daniel Pipes, Islam, Racism, Mark Steyn

European English Bookshop on HUIBSLOG

2008-09-23T00:00:00.002+02:00

HUIBSLOG and the dedicated Blogs, like this one: At Home in Europe, are about reflexion. Going back and forth between the news and its backgrounds. Looking for integrity in reasoning and in research. This cannot be done without BOOKS.
Nothing beats a monograph. Prefer the original to the translation. Read, study and think for yourself. Avoid compilations with many authors. Trust your language skills. Get to the Original as close as you can!
English reading suggestions and an overview of English book reviews in Huibslog are on the Books in English Page.

For our European English readers, we have preferred amazon.co.uk as our partner. Why? Simple: Delivery costs are so much lower in Europe!
At NO extra cost for you, every purchase by way of the Online-shopping links in HUIBSLOG, helps it to survive.

Ethnic cleansing made the violence fall in Iraq

2008-09-08T01:03:00.002+02:00

Why was the "Iraq Surge" a "success"?
Juan Cole explains it once again:

A crucial element in the fall of violence from the catastrophic levels of summer,2006, was the ethnic cleansing of Baghdad of its Sunnis. I wrote in mid-July:

"As best I can piece it together, what actually seems to have happened was that the escalation troops began by disarming the Sunni Arabs in Baghdad. Once these Sunnis were left helpless, the Shiite militias came in at night and ethnically cleansed them. Shaab district near Adhamiya had been a mixed neighborhood. It ended up with almost no Sunnis. Baghdad in the course of 2007 went from 65% Shiite to at least 75% Shiite and maybe more. My thesis would be that the US inadvertently allowed the chasing of hundreds of thousands of Sunni Arabs out of Baghdad (and many of them had to go all the way to Syria for refuge). Rates of violence declined once the ethnic cleansing was far advanced, just because there were fewer mixed neighborhoods. Newsrack was among the first to make this argument, though I was tracking the ethnic cleansing at my blog throughout 2007. See also Karen DeYoung of the Washington Post on this issue.". . .

As Think Progress pointed out,the Washington Post illustrated Karen DeYoung's important article with a clear ethnic map showing the ethnic cleansing:

The point is not that there are no Sunni enclaves left in Baghdad, only that there are many fewer such enclaves, and that many formerly mixed neighborhoods are now entirely Shiite. In fact, this ethnic cleansing is among the major reason that the some 4 million Iraqis displaced internally and externally by Bush's war refuse to return. They have nothing to return to. The mixed or Sunni neighborhoods from which the Sunnis among them escaped no longer exist. A fourth of the Iraqi refugees in Jordan have, moreover, had a child kidnapped. Even if the child was returned, the family is not going to risk returning.

The Americans built walls in the city, isolating neighbourhoods, with Israeli help. Now, the Sunni exode is worrying the US, and it prepares to crush the Shia. Starting with the Sadr movement. But Sadr hides his fighters among the population. A clash with mainstream Shia politicians and - paramilitary bands is looming.

In my earlier post, I also quoted this:

"As Think Progress quoted CNN correspondent Michael Ware:
' The sectarian cleansing of Baghdad has been — albeit tragic — one of the key elements to the drop in sectarian violence in the capital. […] It’s a very simple concept: Baghdad has been divided; segregated into Sunni and Shia enclaves. The days of mixed neighborhoods are gone. […] If anyone is telling you that the cleansing of Baghdad has not contributed to the fall in violence, then they either simply do not understand Baghdad or they are lying to you.'
"

McCain and ideologues such as Fred Kagan must deny or ignore the ethnic cleansing of Baghdad and other areas, and ignore the millions of Iraqis now living abroad or in other provinces, many of them in dire straits, because their Rambo complex forces them to insist that an extra 30,000 US troops, inserted for 16 months, made all the difference.

McCain's Rambo foreign policy sets him on a course of confrontation with Russia, which he has not forgiven for its aid to Vietnam in the old days, and with Shiite Iran, which his party's propaganda continues to confuse with Sunni radicalism of al-Qaeda.

One of those slick films shown at the convention on Thursday commemorating the victims of 9/11 actually asserted that "it began in 1979" with the taking of US embassy personnel hostage in Tehran. The film then skipped over to the Sunni radicals. I can't understand what the Iranian hostage crisis has to do with 9/11. This conflating of all Muslim movements, in which McCain frequently engages, is just another Big Lie. Iranians were upset by 9/11 and sympathetic to the US, holding candlelight vigils. President Khatami spoke heartwarmingly against the terrorism that had struck the US, explaining that Iran had also suffered grievously from terrorism.

I guess, that, whatever McCain says, the Iraqis will NOT accept a (semi-) permanent American military presence in their country. Much trouble ahead.
Where is the European solution to this danger at our borders?

Technorati Tags: Iraq, USA, Shia, Sunni

Akte Islam bans Fjordman as a "CIA-agent" and finds refuge with local Islam-bashers

2008-05-19T04:25:00.001+02:00

Akte Islam Fjordman
Originally uploaded by huibriethof

This statement comes from "Akte Islam", November 2007. The German 'Pax-Europa' movement, founded by Secret-Services freak Dr. Udo Ulfkotte in 2006 in order to promote European values, like tolerance, Enlightenent and judeo-christian heritage, limits it's action to vulgar Muslim-bashing.

After the flopping of a pan-European anti-Eurabia manifestation on September 11 in Brussels, with Danish-English SIOE and the Vlaams Belang, Ulfkotte bans right-wing extremists and CIA-inspired people like Spencer and Bat Ye'or and their stooges (notably the so-called 'Fjordman') from collaborating with his ailing Pax Europa movement.

Yesterday, Ulfkotte fusioned his Pax Europa club with the German 'Association of Citizen Movements', in order to get "observer status" with the EU, the European Council and, as if that weren't enough, with the UN too.

We wish the new couple a happy honeymoon and we are eagerly expecting the inevitable clash between President Ulfkotte and CEO Schwend.
Technorati Tags: Germany, Ulfkotte, Europe, Islam

Lebanon: The Clash, so long announced and feared.

2008-05-09T22:29:00.001+02:00

Juan Cole follows hour after hour developments in Lebanon. The armed clash, involving Hizbollah and the Lebanese Army, the one the US and so many others longed for, and the same one that so many others (including me) hoped could be avoided, happens these days.

... 2006: young Lebanese visit Beirut neighborhood where their apartment stood, after Israeli bombings ....

An informed observer is cited on Cole's Informed Comment Blog (9.5.08):

An informed observer writes from Beirut:

Beirut Ramping Up

Yesterday afternoon the political fight came to a head, turning to armed conflict throughout key neighborhoods in Beirut. Loud explosions, automatic machine gun fire, rocket propelled grenade, and pistol shots resounded throughout the night.

The fight moved from a vicinity of half a kilometer from . . . Sodeco around 5pm, outwards throughout the city. In the middle of the night, the sound was drowned out by a thunder storm which unexpectedly set in as quickly as the fight which broke out.

Although, the sky was clear in the day, and the temperature cool, the unusual storm caught many of the inhabitants off guard. The loud thunder drowned out the explosions, the downpour took over and things seem to quiet down until 5 this morning.

"Things were quiet in the neighborhood until about 5 and then it went off", explains an AUB student living in the neighborhood of Hamra.

A foreign journalist living in Hamra explained that clashes have been ongoing since this morning, and the streets have reportedly come under control of the members of the opposition forces Hezbollah and Amal militia despite ongoing exchange of gunfire being resounding throughout the neighborhood.

Television pictures this morning reveal and predominantly deserted Beirut. Shops are closed, no cars on the street. Damage so far: bullet holes in cars, shattered shop fronts, freshly pockmarked buildings, and some smoke out of Hariri's Moustaqbal Newspaper headquarters.

Reports of dead are varying between 7 and 15, but a tally will probably be difficult to track unless the fighting factions announce the numbers.

The city yesterday was at 60% blocked, making moving between neighborhoods very difficult. The percentage today is rising although there are no firm numbers. Moving between East and West Beirut has become even more difficult as announcement of the sea road being cut off by opposition Amal forces.

At 3pm yesterday . . . [a] political advisor . . . received a call in the car announcing the opposition's plan to besiege the government seat in the Serrail. This morning, this unconfirmed rumor seems to be becoming a reality, as reports are saying the Serrail is surround[ed] by opposition forces. Unconfirmed reports are saying that the security forces of the Serrail have handed over their weapons, who knows.

On a wider scale, there are reports of fighting in the northern city of Tripoli as well as fighting in the Bekaa valley.

Although the fight which has broken out is predominantly political, it is difficult to separate the sectarian aspect of the conflict whereby so far the greatest clashes are occurring between Sunni and Shia groups. Despite the political wording in both Nasrallah's and Hariri's, the undertone was such that if you are not with us you are against us, and so bring it on... The night clashes echoed the stances.

Also, something to track is the wider regional Arab response. Depending on today's local political positions and regional positions may help the picture of what is to come.

WHAT LED TO THE PRESENT CRISIS:

In the beginning of the week, the Lebanese government removed the head of security from the airport, a government employee who was a supporter of the opposition was sacked, and Hezbollah controlled surveillance cameras were removed from the airport. The impact of the decision has been explosive, yesterday Nasrallah explained in his speech that the decision should be revoked and that anyone tampering with their surveillance system was essentially acting for the benefit of Israel.

The Hariri well, I don't have it under hand, however it would seem that this morning's results mean that what televised offer he made, it was rejected.

SIDE LINE:

ONE NON-OFFICIAL REPORT Describing a TACTIC on the ground

A pro-opposition source called to explained that the tactic on the ground is to take control of key neighborhoods and news outlets of the various loyalist/ or pro-government factions. From here on, it is a matter of time before government seat will fall.

Nobody can win in tribally, religiously and politically divided Lebanon. Everybody will lose. Congratulations to the Bush Government, to Iran and to Israel, who finally succeeded to break the overriding opinion among nearly all Lebanese groups, that they had to stand united, in spite of their differences. An opinion that made them resist, actively and passively, but successfully in the summer of 2006...

The consequences for the European Union are to be studied and put into the Near East EU policies framework. The (mainly EU) peacekeepers at the Southern borders are part of the situation. Will Israel or Syria profit from it?

I will soon write again here about these developments, after having studied reports in other languages than English.

Technorati Tags: Lebanon, Middle East, Beirut, Hizbollah

Holland: Wilders exposed as a lier; former Minister Verdonk starts populist campaign

2008-04-05T01:14:00.003+02:00

Dutch populist politician and producer of the anti-Islam film 'Fitna', Wilders (above), intended to tear off and burn pages of the Koran. Or, at least, show such acts in his propaganda movie. I cannot but justify the countermeasures of Dutch Government, intended to control the damage that would have been done by such a provocation, as it sought international support and condemnation of Wilders' provocations, encouraging Dutch Muslims to appeal to their countries of origin to react calmly. "We are Holland, too", they said. And, generally, it worked. There is no general Muslim upheaval.

The government, and first of all its major participant the christian-democratic party CDA, had it's day on the first of April in the The Hague Parliament, when it exposed, documents at hand, Wilders' blackmail. Wilders had sought to turn public condemnation against the Government, stating (with the help of US-based Ajaan Hirsi Ali), that they had "exaggerated" his intentions, and "capitulated" to world Islam, while his movie was so innocent.

Why the Dutch damage-control was needed and successful - with regrettable exceptions...

In recent days, it became clear, that the severely wounding of three Dutch servicemen in the Afghan province of Uruzgan by roadside bombs, was not (only) caused by American poppy-destruction actions in the region (without the Dutch knowing about it - a scandal in itself), but has to be considered as a revenge of the Taliban against the publication of the Wilders film. A Taliban website claimed so.

At first, Dutch public opinion tended to disbelieve the very impopular Government, but after a second look into the recordings of the parliamentary debate and after having seen Wilders' very infantile reactions, as well as realizing the damage that has been done to the country and to the values it stands for, Wilders is losing rapidly ground. A yesterday poll shows a virtual loss within two days of two of the eleven parliamentary seats of Wilders ' PVV party.

Wilders has nothing against Muslims - if they accept to behave as "Untermenschen"...

Like the German anti-Islam activist Udo Ulfkotte, Wilders claims, that he is only against the Koran (Q'uran) and the Sharia Law, but that he is no racist, for he is not against Muslims as persons. But Muslims should not be allowed to live in Holland, for their religion is incompatible with Dutch values. In so far as it it not possible to make them leave, they should be put under strict supervision and be denied the right to free speech, to having their own organizations, mosques and habeas corpus rights.

In following a 2.000 posts long public discussion thread at the NL. Nu website about Wilders' debate with Government and the other parties, that started in the evening of April 1st and continued through Tuesday 2nd and Wednesday 3rd, I observed this change of perception, from pro-Wilders to anti-Wilders, at the end of the thread.

Wilders weakened - Verdonk carries the struggle forward...

With Wilders considerably weakened, a new phenomenon appeared in the evening of April 3. Former Minister of Immigration, Ms Rita Verdonk, whose harsh anti-immigration- and anti-Muslim policies were disavowed by the newly elected parliament in September 2007, held a well-designed roadshow in an Amsterdam establishment. "Iron Rita", who was instrumental in chasing her "friend" Ajaan Hirsi Ali from Holland to the US in 2006, was excluded from the (conservative) Liberal Party and she runs a one woman show since that moment.

Verdonk rallies her sponsors (Amsterdam, April 3, 2008)

Like Wilders' movement, she has no members or caucuses. People may express their opinions, but Rita decides. The Dutch legislation on party-financing is rather outdated, and that helps Wilders and Verdonk to get themselves money through corporate and other undisclosed institutional donations. Wilders got, at least indirectly, support from Pfizer and from sponsors at the American Enterprise Institute. Verdonk gets her money from the same group of real estate owners and -speculants as the late Pim Fortuyn did.

There is some money-laundering involved, but the main reason for the tycoons to spend some money on her, is, that she guarantees the existing gigantic tax-cuts on loan-repayments for housing that exist in Holland. The European Union is working to harmonize those regulations between the memeber states, which would certainly mean, that prospective buyers of real estate will have less money to spend in the near future.

Verdonk's Xenophobia is larger than Wilders'...

Verdonk's political programme, or the trunks of it, that are known at this moment, is potentially broader than Wilders'. Broader in the sense, that it is more consequently xenophobe. Not only against muslims and immigrants, but also against Europe and any non-Dutch influence.

A poll, held today, gives her 22% of the vote. As parliamentary elections are not expected before 2011, this is of a limited interest. What is more interesting, is the question, if her consumerist/populist approach, will durably seduce such a large part of the voters. A one (wo)man party that steps out of the firm Dutch traditions of consultation, compromise and grassroots democracy, would, if it keeps so much support and sympathy as it gets at this moment, become a major cultural change in Dutch traditions.
Her "movement" is called "Proud of Holland", which touches a sympathetic string in the mind of this blogger. The Dutch have many things, values and people to be proud of, but they tend to be so only in private, while publicly disavowing their country, language and culture. One of our characteristics is our well-developed flexibility and adaptability. That is how we made so much profit in trade, in publishing books that are banned in other countries and in providing prohibited drugs to those who are in need of them.

An undutch proudness...

The Verdonkian proudness doesn't seem to imply those national and typical qualities. Under Verdonk, we, Dutchmen, would also be obliged to hide our proudness of non-Dutch heroes and values from our continent, Europe. Verdonk's proudness has a distinct provincial flavour.

In my opinion, the cultural paradox of "Trots op Nederland", will make itself felt very soon. For instance, she intends to suppress the twelve Dutch Provinces (regions). But our Frisians, who love their own language and traditions, will likely not ne very fond of letting go their own Province, that guarantees many aspects of their distint identity, they are so proud of...

Verdonk's action has to be considered as another blow to the construction of a viable European Union and the values it stands for.

Watch Wilders' Fitna movie here and be ashamed with me

2008-03-28T00:35:00.001+01:00

I wasn't ready yet with reproducing the intelligent comments by Green-Left Leader Femke Halsema about Wilders' manipulation of the media, the Parliament and public opinion about his little anti-Islamic movie on HUIBSLOG [NL], when an alert of the Dutch daily "De Volkskrant" announced, that he had published it on "LiveLeak" today.

I have the "YouTube" version here, that features an English translation of the (sparse) comments in Dutch:

Now I understand, why Mr. Wilders was not very keen on publishing his little movie. It is not shocking at all. We all know, that 9/11 was horrible and that terrorism is despicable. Not only fundamentalist Islamists do it, Christian fundis do the same, als well as anarchists, libertarians, hindus and shintoists. Not all of them: Far from that! Only a tiny minority. The whole movie has nothing to do with the way the overwhelming majority of today's Muslims are in their religion.

I do not see anything else than an opportunistic surge into racism, with the sole intention to frighten the people and to seduce them into accepting a leadership that is undemocratic and beset with violence. If Wilders is not after such an outcome, somebody should make him understand. Not tomorrow, but now.

As we said earlier: A psychiatrist is urgently needed.

As my Dutch friends are saying: "Wilders takes us as his hostages". Our shame about him, shouldn't prevent us from taking decisive action. We are living in a liberal, respectful, democracy, after all.

Technorati Tags: Netherlands, Wilders, Populism, Islam

Christian and Muslim Dreams Of Empire: Turkey and Holland

2008-03-09T01:46:00.006+01:00

Thanks to Google Reader, I found this post in the Fistful Of Euros Blog:

Dreams of empire (plus bleg for our Turkish readers)
from A Fistful Of Euros by Guy La Roche
Via Dutch weblog Sargasso.
Somebody in Turkey posted the following video to YouTube:

This was picked up by Sargasso and one of their Dutch readers posted the following response:

Totally inane, of course, but I think it is rather amusing.
And now my bleg for our Turkish readers. Is the YouTube video Great Türkic State
a spoof or is there something more serious, as in juvenile fantasies,
behind it?
Unfortunately, I cannot read the comments to the vid, hence
the question.
I know of Turkish nationalism, but I cannot believe this
would extend to… China.

Well, Guy, the 15 comments on Sargasso by Dutch readers (updated up to 08.03.08, 18:06) are as reserved, ironic and humoristic as your comment is. #03 "Bismarck" says (07.03.08, 22:01) [translation]: "When I was 10 years old, I had the same kind of fantasies. I extended our territories and made a forceful power (or powers) occupy all territories available." 26 Minutes later (#04), he points to a similar imperial fantasy on YouTube, this time Serbo-Russian.
For readers who are interested in subconscious and half-conscious Dutch imperial dreams, I submit some explanations to the second YouTube video you show. It was submitted to Sargasso by "Ini" (#08) at 8:17 in the morning of the following day (8.3). I presume, Ini has spent the night at its' conception.
During the first 12 seconds of the 30-seconds video, the orange Dutch appropriation of the world starts with Indonesia (until 1949 a Dutch colony). Australia is next. It was discovered by Dutch sailors, notably Abel Tasman (who gave his name to Tasmania), during the 17th century, before the British took possession of it. The same applies to New Zealand (named after the Dutch province of "Zeeland"). Manhattan (New York) was a Dutch trade post that was given to the British at the peace treaty of 1662 in exchange for Surinam. The Caribbean Dutch isles of Curaçao etc. also figure on the map. South Africa and parts of Madagascar and the Dutch possessions in West Africa: The latter became English during the Napoleonic wars. The former, populated with Dutch banned criminals and some shiploads of poor Dutch orphan girls, plus German refugees and French Protestants, were incorporated into the British Commonwealth at the turn of the former centuries, thanks to the "Boer" wars. At the Berlin conference of 1878, Madagascar, with its Indonesian immigrants, was incorporated into the French sphere of influence.
So far for more or less understandable Dutch claims.
The other 18 seconds of the video make the whole European Union Dutch and fill the rest of the whole world with orange. Why orange? - Because of the colours of the Dutch royal family, who was (amongst others) nominally heriditary of the French County named "Orange" in the Rhone valley, until the French Revolution (1789-1791).
The author of the video doesn't explain him(her)self. I presume, that he/she followed the same fantasy as the young princess Wilhelmina (born 1880) did during the nineties of the 19th century, when she drew a Dutch imperium over most of Northern Europe, and adding all (former) Dutch possessions in the world (see above).
The commenters on Sargasso appreciate the little video. They understand that the Turkish claims to (former) Turk or Turkmene territories are as empty as supposedly English claims to Anglian an Saxonic territories on the continent would be.
I liked most a comment on Sargasso (#15, at 08.03.08, 18h06), that said:
"Toch geeft zo’n filmpje een mooi alternatief voor de opname van Turkije in de EU: De opname van de EU in Turkije!"
[Translation: "A little video like that provides a nice alternative for the incorporation of Turkey into the EU: An incorporation of the EU into Turkey!"]
Because of a (temporary?) problem at the Fistful site, I couldn't insert this text into the comments rubrique over there. I'll insert a reference as soon as technically possible.

Technorati Tags: Turkey, Europe, Netherlands, UK, YouTube

And what about our Germans? Shouldn't they adopt torture too?

2008-02-20T03:51:00.001+01:00

Ulfkotte and his works

Well, here we are in the land of Udo Ulfkotte. Mr. U.U., before the 11th of September 2001, was convinced, that terrorist actions were mostly due to covert actions of Israel (Gencode "J"). After that date, he changed dramatically his orientation. Europe is victim to an Islamist conspiracy, and left-leaning authorities are their objective or subjective accomplices. Ulfkotte inspires with his so-called "informations" on Islam a whole community of German nationalists and supremacists, who leave their ideas on the comment pages of "Politically Incorrect" and other Hetzblogs.

Although he is under suspicion in Belgium (Antwerp) and in Holland (Amsterdam) of distributing knowingly false informations about immigrants in those cities and the attitude of communal authorities, he continues to publish false information about those EU partners, and declines to correct them, even if evidence is sent to him.

Ulfkotte did not yet give an opinion on the torture issue. Under US pressure, some German authorities let it be known, that they are in favour of, for instance, waterboarding, as a means to deal with presumed terrorists. We are waiting for Ulfkottes verdict. Can we return to Nazi times, and do with captured people everything we want, or is the German Constitution still upright? As soon as "Akte Islam" pubishes its opinion, we 'll keep you informed.

Sarkozy Plan about European guilt: Adoptions galore!

2008-02-20T03:42:00.003+01:00

Sarkozy and his Holocaust Adoption Plan

I am brooding about a proposal to my French readers, to make 81-91 year old Frenchmen forcibly adopt a Jewish French child who was a victim of the 1941-44 holocaust. In my opinion, that would be much more to the point, than French president Sarkozy's idea to impose such a forced "adoption" non all French children at the age of 11. Our octagenarians were in their twenties and thirties, when they could have done something (more) against the deportation of more than 100.000 Jews from France to the Nazi extermination camps.

Shame

It is their shame, allowing for the positive exceptions, that French railwaymen rode without problem the trains of death to their destinations, it is their problem, that the "rafle" of the vélodrôme d'hiver could happen, it is they who should question themselves, how the Drancy concentration camp could function unhampered in the Paris suburbia. That problem is not solved yet. In stead of charging symbolically innocent children (35% of them from immigrant parents) with that guilt, they should do wise, to end their "refoulement", make peace with their conscience and then, yes, only THEN, talk with their children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren in order to demand them to oppose resolutely and without compromise, without subterfuge, and always, genocide and racial discrimination.

Isn't that a better idea than Sarkozy's? I appeal to Mr. Kouchner, for here we are in an evident situation of "devoir d'intervention". The Government, he is a member of, seems to be going to culpabilise French 11-year olds, for something, they are not reponsible for at all. And, in the case of the 35% immigrant children, even their fathers and grandfathers are completely innocent of. This is a form of state-brainwashing, that cannot stand his high humanitarian principles. I do not imply, that the holocaust history should not be taught to French children. Not at all. More attention than now should be given to it. But, please, do it in a historical context, that children of that age can understand!

Other European Countries should Join!

And, thinking about contexts, why should the French Government limit itself to genocides that were perpetrated under foreign leadership? Why, for instance, not force French who are in their fifties and sixties, to adopt, each individually, an Algerian child, that has been a victim of French torture, rape and blind killing during the colonial war from 1954-1962 in that country? An estimated one MILLION Algerians met their death under French intervention. There are a sufficient number of victims in stock for that age-group. And I, for myself, I wouldn't exclude the Jewish victims of Muslim revenge in Oran or in other cities. Nor the poor pieds-noirs who were forced out of the country after the French defeat.

I do not forget the people in their seventies. For them, a Vietnamese child, victim of the French intervention after 1947, that ended so tragically in the defeat of Dien Bien Phu, is the one to adopt immediately.

Summing up: If the principle of Sarkozy's adoption plan is accepted, there is much work to do. Algerian victims and their torturers have to be identified. The same for the Vietnamese.

Then, after the French setting an European example, the British will adopt massively Indian, Burmese, Boer, Egyptian, Persian, Pakistanese, Sudanese, Chinese, and I do not know who else as adoptive children. I do not forget my Dutch and Belgian contemporaries: The former will adopt each an Indonesian child, victim of the so-called "Police-Actions" 1946-1949, while the latter will tend to a Congolese child, raped and mutilated in the wars, the Belgians helped to bring about in their former royal colony.

And why not the Spanish (republican -and non-republican- victim children from the thirties civil war), the Italians (Ethiopian children, victims of the Mussolini invasion) and the Portugese (from all former colonies under Salazar)?

And the Germans, what do we do with our dear Germans? The elder generations have mostly died. The younger ones are pro-Israelian and pro-American. They do not want a new holocaust, even the most right-wing among them. The Germans, they are against the Turks, or the Islam, generally. Allowing, again, for the notable exceptions. Our advice to the Germans is in the next post...

Kosovo - a Precedent?

2008-02-20T03:34:00.001+01:00

Kosovo - a precedent?

I was against the US-NATO war against Serbia when it was fought, in March-May 1999. It is not that I am a friend of Milosevic, far from that. But restoration of the freedom the Kosovar Albanians had under Tito, could have been realised in many other ways. Launching a war of destruction against the Beograd youth who guarded the bridges over the Duna river, against the automobile workers of Kragujevac and bombing the civil airport of the Montenegrin capital, is certainly not my idea of humanitarian intervention. It was more the style of US interventions under the Monroe doctrine in Latin America.

Europe shouldn't have allowed it. Even if you do NOT condemn the way that war was fought, you cannot be happy with its results, from an European point of view. European states should not be dependent on ethnic homogeneity. it is impossible: Ethnicities are mixed among each other in a pattern that reflects centuries of history. A state is judged by its capacity to guarantee and to implement equality of all its citizens before the law and by how it supports cultural freedom for all groups of people who live within its borders.

That is how Europe deals with Hungarians in Slovakia and Rumenia. That is, what Europe demands from Turkey, when we speak of Kurds and Armenians. That is, what Spain allows the Catalans and what Britain allows the Irish in Northern Ireland. That is, why everybody with a sense of civility, opposes a divided Cyprus. And that is, why dividing Belgium into two states, is so disastrous.

After 1999, with the Serb sovereignty over Kosovo confirmed by the security Council of the UN, there were plenty of opportunities left for the EU, to impose a civil construction upon Kosovars as well as Serbs, that would have preserved a federal Serb state with internationally guaranteed minority rights. But the UN rulers of the occupied province, beginning with the maverick Kouchner (now French foreign secretary under Sarkozy), denied the Serbs and the Balkan nations in general, what was already then accepted European standard. In a not so far away future, Dayton (compromises about Bosnia, 1995) and the independence of Kosova (2008), will be seen as fatal errors that may have caused new wars and ethnic cleansings.

Europe and the Belgian Collapse

2008-02-20T03:25:00.003+01:00

Belgian Collapse?

O
my, how wrong I was, when I wrote last November, that the Belgian surrealist magicians were about to solve the national crisis! (Toto le Psycho: "Plan B s'exécute"). There is no plan. Government Ministers are on permanent strike [NL].

Today's Arte television digs into the stubborn Flemish idea of independence. Some marginal Flemish leftist tells them, that it is simply a Flemish employers' illusion. He says they think they will get more profit when the Walloons are out and the obedient catholic Flemish workforce would be alone to confront them. I hadn't thought at that scenario. It is somehow too fantastic, but I am not convinced that it is completely wrong, any more.

Those Flemish entrepreneurs, do they forget, that without Brussels, which is not Flemish, but not Walloon either, their economic power will be more and more illusionary? I cannot believe that. But how could we explain then, this course to a destruction of the Belgian state, which they do not oppose?

I am a Dutch-European Belgian, of Brussels conviction, to paraphrase a Flemish Brussels intellectual, interviewed by Arte, tonight. I cannot tell my new compatriots how to act. I risked a series of suggestions about my city, Brussels, who is to be the orphan of any possible compromise between Flemish and Walloon provincials. In line with my anti-autoritarian tradition, I proposed last week, that the Brussels people themselves create a full-fledged region-community (the
last one multilingual) and leave the other two quarreling regions alone. (Et si les Bruxellois créaient leur communauté à eux?, Toto Le Psycho [FR]). The Dutch version is here. They earned some not unfavourable comment on Medium4You, the Brussels BloggersBlog.

But there is no new 1830 in view. The Brussels people are not (yet) in a mood to defy their two new egocentric rulers. I do not see, however, another way out.

Late Dutch Revenge for the way, the big Powers made a fool of them in Srebrenica

2008-02-03T15:58:00.001+01:00

Why do the Dutch and the Belgians block an SAA?

A Fistful of Euros wonders, why the Dutch dare (together with the Belgians) to block a Serbian Accession Agreement to the EU. The SAA was intended to help the less extremist Serbian factions to accept (grudgingly) Kosovar independence, and to open a fast track to Serbian inclusion into the EU.

Mladic and Karadzic in 1994/95

For both intentions, it is a lame compromise: Even moderate Serbs will not agree, in a foreseeable future, with the breaking of the 1999 UN guarantee of the territorial integrity of Serbia, including Kosovo. They are supported by Russia and by a number of EU members who fear irredentist claims in their own countries. And, less important, but significant, by a growing cabal of extreme right-wing American/European anti-Islam activists. The latter warn against the creation of another "Islamic" state on European soil, like Ariël Sharon of Israel already did in 1999.

On the other side, there is no argument about the necessity and unavoidability of a Serbian membership in the EU. Neither in the most Eurosceptic circles in the EU, nor in Serbia itself. Serbian EU-membership will come, sooner or later. But not now.

The SAA was a wrong signal:
It will not help more moderate nationalists to win today's presidential elections. Perhaps it would even have weakened Tadic and his followers. Serbian frustration over coming European support for an independent Kosova will anyhow have the upper hand over hopes to be in the EU soon.

A commenter, Ivan Nicolic, on A Fistful of Euros, has quite another view:

So, what do we get? We get that the Dutch are blocking democratic Serbia that had nothing to do with Srebrenica, moreover that was fighting against Milosevic, the same person that was giving assistance to those who are accused to be guilty, and yet, asking from Serbia to be responsible for arresting and delivering those two to the Tribunal in Hague, although they are citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Maybe some argument could be found for Mladic, because for some time he was hiding in Serbia, but for Karadzic there is no basis at all to connecting him to Serbia.

Correction: Former JNA General Mladic is a citizen of Serbia, is living publicly in Belgrade and meets there regularly with old comrades from the Yugoslav Army in public places. From time to time, when there is a surge of pressure for his arrest, he goes into hiding in Montenegro.
Nikolic' conclusion on the Dutch move:

And why? Because the Dutch need to wash them selves in their own eyes, not taking into consideration that they could cause even more damage.

Well, I think, that the Dutch accepted the horrible truth about Srebrenica, too late, but nevertheless some five years ago, when the Report on the Srebrenica mission that was commissioned by the Dutch Government, provoked its downfall (April 2002).

Americans and EU-big powers made a fool of the Dutch Srebrenica batallion
Apart from their own failures (politically and military), another, important, circumstance came then finally into the open: The big powers had intentionally left the Dutch Government in the dark about the arrangements they had made with Milosevic and Karadzic/Mladic, about giving up the UN-protected Muslim enclaves (like Srebrenica) to the Serbian Bosnians as a precondition for the ceasefire that was to end the armed phase of the Bosnian conflict later in 1995.

That is why I took the liberty to comment today on the Fistful-site, as follows:

In my opinion, the Dutch Government is taking revenge for the scandalous way, it was kept uninformed of the big countries’ arrangement with Milosevic/Karadzic in the spring of 1995, i.e., to give the latter green light to do away with the (UN-protected) Muslim “enclaves” in Serbian Bosnia, like Srebrenica.
Frustration about the NATO allies, who did not come forward with the promised air support, is still great in the country.
The whole affair has been documented by Frank Westerman (1996,in Dutch), the 2002 Dutch government-commissioned report by the Amsterdam Institute of War-Documentation (English version at the Dutch Government website) and most recently by Florence Hartmann (Paix et Chatiment, November 2007, French), the former porte parole of Carla Del Ponte (TPIY).

The Dutch, while officially referring to the TPIY procedure, are unofficially saying to the Brits, the French (and the US): “Milosevic died, before he could be brought to confirm the 1994/5 deals with you about Srebrenica at the The Hague Court. Give us Mladic, who you helped to protect for more than 17 years, and who is freely walking around in Belgrade, and we’ll see!”

A slightly different French version of this opinion is on: L'Europe Chez Soi, Toto Le Psycho and HUIBSLOG. The Brussels Medium4You Blog Journal also carries that French version, where it provoked some interesting comments.

Technorati Tags: Serbia, Netherlands, Belgium, Srebrenica, European Union

Bulgaria: Children's Homes and Local libraries

2008-02-01T23:06:00.000+01:00

Children abuse and neglect

Back in Brussels, yesterday night, I set foot in a country, shaken by the reporting (originally by the English BBC, and reissued by the Flemish-language public TV) about one of the Bulgarian "orphanages",where not only poor orphans, but also children with a mental handicap and children from criminal families are being stowed away, subject to abuses and neglect.
The Bulgarian children's home in question happens to be located in the region I visited last week. Like a number of similar ones, it is located in a village or small town. Many children are of Rom (Tzigan)origin.
(Derelict apartment buildings in NE Plovdiv, central Bulgaria - the families of the abanoned children live in houses like those)

I do not know, if the situation was better before the year1989, when In Romania (where the same scandal existed) and in Bulgaria the state-controlled system was replaced by rather rude configurations of capitalism. The Bulgarian "home" in question is located in the southern part, at the feet of the Rhodopes Mountains. Ethnic and cultural minorities live there together.
A small economic upsurge is going on in the region,because of growing tourism and of settling of Western Europeans, who buy properties (very cheaply) there. More and more, the (changing)local population is becoming outraged at those scandalous institutions in their midst. I saw the arrestation of a monitor of one of those homes reported on Bulgarian television. The man was accused of sexual abuse of little Rom girls. I think, that there is some hope, that the combination of foreign and national outrage will help, to do away with the scandal. A Belgian Government delegation is visiting Bulgaria and the homes at this moment. Tonight Bulgarian TV showed the Belgians being received in a model institution, that has nothing in common with the home the reporting was about. (Thanks for the tip to my Plovdiv friends).

What the local libraries could do
Another reason, why I am talking about this, is, that we had to say "no" to an eventual participation of the local libraries system in that Bulgarian region within the network I was speaking of in the preceding Log. The reason for that is possibly as sad as the children's home scandal is. The local library system is so under-equipped, that it should first be helped to put up some very basic infrastructure and training. Only then, could it think of developing the skills and the methods the Network is about. There is not enough staff and they are underpaid. The staff get training in software, but there is virtually no hardware and no internet.

Why is there a link between bad care for marginalized children, located in poor regions, and local libraries? That is what I intend to explain to some local librarians, colleagues of the Bulgarian ones, here in Belgium. It runs like this:

Regenerating communities is done by a transversal approach. Why? It is easy to figure out: If, for instance, you renovate the apartment buildings, after one year they will be again in a bad state, if you do not do something, at the same time,about unemployment, schools, etc. If children are not well fed, if they remain constrained to their beds the whole day long, better schools will not help. Programmes by the local library will help the people concerned, to see these connections. It is not (only) a police or a criminal matter. Ethnic and racial prejudices could block efforts to find solutions. That is why a four-year programme for equipping local cultural centers and their librarians with the tools to do their work, is one of the essential transversal measures to be taken.

My second trip to eastern Europe has left me with at least two huge tasks here in Brussels.

Bush and Blair: Bank-Swapping?

2008-01-10T14:14:00.001+01:00

Two CNN-alerts:

1. Tony Blair to join JP Morgan
01/10/08 02:18 AM, EST
Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, who left Britain's Downing
Street last June, starts work Thursday with one of the best known-banks
on Wall Street.

2. Bush arrives in West Bank to meet with Palestinian leaders
01/10/08 03:16 AM, EST
Pushing a "historic opportunity" to work for Middle East peace, President George Bush arrived in the West Bank Thursday to meet with Palestinian leaders, a day after huddling with their Israeli counterparts.

I thought that Blair was Peace-Envoy for the Quartet to Israel and the Palestinians who live in Gaza and on the West Bank,
while Bush is to go in 2009 to some Middle Eastern Investment Bank in Washington, co-owned by the Family Bush.

A new trend among good friends: Bank-Swapping?

Technorati Tags: Bush, Blair, USA, UK, Palestine, banks, Swapping

Juan Cole on another Invasion of the Middle East: Napoleon in Egypt (1798)

2007-12-10T16:02:00.000+01:00

Readers of this Blog often see my Informed Comment-faves on Iraq and the Middle East in general. Their author, history professor Juan Cole, gets a biographical note below. I borrow the following text from a recent post in the FireDogLake Blog by Swopa.

You should go there and read the interesting discussion of the book between Cole and some readers.

Juan Cole was one of the first and most valuable voices to vault into public attention from the political blogosphere. As America blindly stumbled into Iraq in 2003, Cole's analyses and daily summaries of Arabic-language news at Informed Comment became an essential counterweight to government-dictated propaganda in the U.S. media for tens of thousands of regular readers.
But as an outstanding and experienced historian, Dr. Cole's knowledge ranges far beyond Iraq. In Napoleon's Egypt: Invading the Middle East, Cole provides the same perspective and keen insight regarding a military incursion that occurred two centuries ago -- the French effort, led by then-general Napoleon Bonaparte, to invade and occupy Egypt.

Cole’s fluency in both French and Arabic enabled him to scour and compare contemporaneous sources in each language, and the resulting account gives equal weight to each side of the awkward collision of cultures (including attempts to discern the truth when different retellings conflict). And the tone, although well-informed, is scarcely academic -- because Cole's sources include numerous eyewitness journals, letters, and other firsthand reports, he is able to weave a rich, complex narrative that is as involving as any novel on the subject could be.

Although he almost never makes a direct connection, Cole doesn't have to mention Iraq for several elements of his story to resonate with modern-day news junkies. It's hard not to hear the echoes of neocon self-absorption in Napoleon's efforts to blend Enlightenment philosophy with brutal military conquest, or Iraq quasi-viceroy L. Paul Bremer's clueless egotism in Bonaparte's hamfisted communications with the people of Cairo, or especially the similarly dogged, draining insurgencies that result from a distant nation's attempt to impose its will on millions of people.

The details Cole gleans from his research (some of which he continues to post at a blog devoted to the book), though, make Napoleon's Egypt a unique and personal tale worth reading in its own right. With that, I am delighted to be able to introduce Juan Cole, who is joining us to answer questions about the book.

My appreciation: Juan Cole succeeds in doing two things that, on top of one another, normally are above the forces of a normal human being.

1. He publishes one or more daily inside-informations about what is going on in Iraq, summarily put into the context of his vast knowledge of the Middlke East political, social, economic and historical landscape. Informed, quick and oblective.
2. He continues his in-depth studies, like this one, and plays a role in defending academic freedom against conservative, biased intrusions by the actual US Government, its services and satellite watchdogs, like the AEI & c.

Asked last year, during a brief visit to Holland, how he manages doing so many things in one day, his reply was, that he types very, very quickly on the keyboard... :-)

The Book
The Napoleon book (click on the image to see its Amazon.com page) is reviewed on Amazon by Reed Elsevier as follows:

In July 1798, Napoleon landed an expeditionary force at Alexandria in Egypt, the opening move in a scheme to acquire a new colony for France, administer a sharp rebuff to England and export the values of French republicanism to a remade Middle East.
Cole, a historian of the Middle East at the University of Michigan, traces the first seven months of Napoleon's adventure in Egypt. Relying extensively on firsthand sources for this account of the invasion's early months, Cole focuses on the ideas and belief systems of the French invaders and the Muslims of Egypt.
Cole portrays the French as deeply ignorant of cultural and religious Islam. Claiming an intent to transplant liberty to Egypt, the French rapidly descended to the same barbarism and repression of the Ottomans they sought to replace. I
slamic Egypt, divided by class and ethnic rivalries, offered little resistance to the initial French incursion.
Over time, however, the Egyptians produced an insurgency that, while it couldn't hope to win pitched battles, did erode French domination and French morale. Perplexingly, Cole ends his account in early February 1799, with Napoleon still in control of Egypt but facing increasingly effective opposition. Napoleon's attack on Syria is only mentioned, not detailed, and his return to Cairo and eventual flight to France are omitted altogether.
In a brief epilogue, Cole makes an explicit comparison between Napoleon's adventure in Egypt and the current American occupation of Iraq. Though at times episodic and disorganized, this doesn't detract from the value of Cole's well-researched contribution to Middle Eastern history. Illus. (Aug.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Georg W. Bush is everything opposite to the 1798 Napoleon. He has no enlightenment objectives. Compare the fate of the invaluable objects robbed from the Iraq National Museum in April 2003 under the eyes of the American invaders with the way Napoleon's expedition opened the way, (through the 3-lingual Rosette Pyramid) to understand ancient Egyptian Hieroglyphs.
I stick to my Caligula comparison. Which is sad enough.
But interesting parallels can be found in the disastrous military history of the temporary occupation. It is there, that Cole applies his "micro"-approach (known from his Informed Comments" on Iraq), citing an abundance of letters home from French participants in the expedition.
The book doesn't describe the end of Napoleon's expedition. However, the way Napoleon and the top generals abandoned the thousands of lesser soldiers they brought to the country, when their defeat became apparent, may forebode the way, in which Bush will end his Iraq adventure.

Buy and read the book.
European readers: On Amazon, switch to Amazon.uk, Amazon.de or to Amazon.fr, to get delivery for a more reasonable charge. Belgian and Dutch readers may prefer to try Proxis, that has an excellent English language books store. French translation of this Post to be published on HUIBSLOG and L'Europe Chez Soi.

After some traveling: Back to Business!

2007-12-06T02:09:00.000+01:00

In October and November, I visited Istanbul and the Balkans by car; went to the opposite side of the European area to the Canary Islands and Morocco by plane. It has been some weeks without direct reporting or commenting in English on European affairs.
But in December, we'll see some fruits of those explorations.
Istanbul was the location of a conference on city regeneration in Europe, organised jointly by the world architects and urbanists organisation INTA, a transborder, Italian-led, cities network, and the Anadolu High School, who was host. Multimillion Istanbul agglomeration played no real role in this event. I tried to discover it on my own. My hopes for Turkish integration into the EU were not disappointed. Istanbul is a modern, western city with all the problems and opportunities that go with such a status.
I stopped by in central Bulgaria, where I discovered the ancient city of Plovdiv (Philippople - Philippopolis, ancient Macedonian capital). Presence of an EU agency, charged with seeking solutions for discrepancies with the EU acquis. Problems with Turkish and islamo-slavic minorities as well as with gypsies. And a rich series of unused opportunities: economic, social and cultural.
Driving back home, I revisited the Serbian countryside, where, as long ago as 1962, we helped to build a motorway ("autoput") between Belgrade and Nish. The Velika Plana people occupy still a warm spot in my memory. However, their actions in Bosnian Srebrenica, just over the Drina border, in 1995, when they started to kill over 8.000 Muslim inhabitants under the eyes of a Dutch UN force, were still visible on the Potocari location. Most shocking were the graffitti the Dutch soldiers left behind after their shameful retreat.
Croatia and Slovenia showed much progress in Europeanisation. Slovenia is already a member of the EU and it is using the Euro as currency. A small, industrious and Austria-dominated region, good at delivering services and receiving tourists. Croatia could become a second, and smaller Poland, in the EU. Very catholic, very pro-US, and, if I may believe Ulfkotte on that point , completely subdued by western secret services and their hired companies. Infrastructure very modern and very privatised.
The Canaries are a subtropical outpost of Spain. No effort has been neglected, to make this African archipelago look like a normal Spanish province. Some 100 KMs from the Moroccan Saharian coast, Europe's Florida is thriving. Two million inhabitants. Equipped with everything you would expect in an 21st century western country.
100 KMs away, lies Morocco, or, to be exact, the former Spanish Sahara, that has been claimed and occupied by Morocco. I was there in 1979. A guerilla was then, and still now, being fought by the saharian nomadic people, bleeding the Moroccan army and resources as well as theirs. No solution on the horizon.
In Morocco itself (Casablanca, Meknès, Rabat, Tangier, Marrakesh), I studied the work of urban regeneration colleagues, working in deprived bidonvilles, where islamist groupings steal the show by providing material and medical help. Conditions for a more secularist and emancipation-oriented policy are weak. No money, no urgency on government level. What could the EU do? Most investments under association contracts go to big infrastructural undertakings. My contribution to another policy could be a research into the conditions under which, some decades ago, the European middle classes decided to forge the welfare state. Such conditions, evidently do not exist in 2007 Morocco. Modernisation, as applied by the new king, in matters like more freedom for women, mostly help middle class and upper class people, who have no interest in sharing their wealth with the poor masses.
Moroccan civilization, its rich cultural and intellectual heritage, preserved by the French during their rule from the twenties to the fifties, offer many opportunities for an independent take-off. But it is not happening. It was sad to see, how a potentially rich and thriving society is condemned to serve, again and again as an economic backyard to the North.

Mr. Entenmann threatens Bigberta with murder. A setback for Ulfkotte?

2007-10-15T01:22:00.001+02:00

The German Islamophobes are putting on a higher gear.
In their hate-blogs, writes Jochen Hoff from Berlin, they are threatening publicly to murder another blogger. An example from the Kewil-Blog :

Wilhelm Entenmann / Website (13.10.07 18:34)

"Schickt n'en Fresskorb nach Sonthofen, packt 'ne Schweinhaxe hinzu,
tut auch Methylphenidat kaufen, dann ist vielleicht bald Ruh'."
Translation: "Send a food-basket to Sonthofen, join a pig-ax to it, buy also Methylpenidate, then, maybe, everything will be quiet."

The object of this call or invitation to murder, is Bigberta, who is living in Sonthofen (Southern Bavaria) and who is an active blogger against xenophobia at "Watchblog Islamophobie". Methylphenidate is a drug that is administered to (young) people who suffer from ADHD.

A certain Mr. Wilhelm Entenmann from Mannheim is the author of this prose.
Bigberta tried at first to engage in a debate with this person in the Watchblog.
But when commenters on her blog and on the Kewil Blog started to attack her even more hatefully, she closed the discussion and announced to Mr. Entenmann, that he will be held responsible in Court for his ramblings.

This creates an awful situation for Dr. Udo Ulfkotte. Although there is no direct link between him and Entenmann, as far as we can see, there is certainly one between Entenmann and "Politically Incorrect", the German anti-Islam Blog that was recently removed from the "Google News list'. "PI" is Mr. Ulfkotte's favourite source for his Islam-bashing postings. Entenmann is also a great fan of "PI", as we see on his blog.

Unconscously, Wilhelm Entenmann from Mannheim delivers proof of what Bigberta and the other bloggers who are attacked by Ulfkotte, have always said: Ulfkotte is sowing hate, racist hate, in society. Therefore, he can be called a "racist". And his ways of Islam-bashing provoke poor people like Van Themse in Antwerp and Entenmann in Mannheim, to menace people with murder. And beyond menace: they execute, what the Ulfkottes only dare to suggest...

Will Ulfkotte succeed in strangling freedom of expression on the Web?

2007-10-11T15:43:00.000+02:00

I read a nearly desperate call of one of the bloggers who are persecuted in Germany by Udo Ulfkotte.

The self-appointed Saviour of Europe (from Islam) wastes his time and money on legal quibbling against at least three German bloggers we know of, demanding huge amounts of money as compensation for alleged calumny.

As always, he uses "Pax Europa" as his vehicle to bear the brunt of his expenditure on legal fees and lawyers, as well as the risk of his finally going out empty-handed. (Like in his legal actions against Belgian authorities who forbade the Brussels 9/11 demonstration).

Ulfkotte's legal tactics have for consequence that individual antiracist bloggers are now in danger of being blooded to a financial death by legal invoices (from lawyers as well as from Ulfkotte and his Pax Europa Organization).

It is a cause of principle: Freedom of opinion, freedom of linking to other people's opinions. The Internet is something different from traditional media. It is interactive. People who feel the need to contradict something, can react, either on the site of their "detractor", or on their own site, and link it to the original post.

On the Net, it is no more like in the traditional printed-paper world. Legal provisions to protect individuals and institutions from slandering in the press, have historically been instituted to limit the abuse by mass media of their near-monopoly of the public sphere. This was done to correct a situation of unequal power, unequal access to the public tribune.

The Net, however, is much more democratic: Anybody can publish, react, link, with about equal opportunity to reach the public and the public opinion. Therefore, everybody can, within the limits of the law, more freely vent his or her opinions and participate in the many dialogues that ensue. This is a fundamentally different situation from the one, the old press laws have been made in.

Does this open the way to a so-called "liberty to offend", as claimed by many ideological allies of Dr. Ulfkotte? (Viz. the danish Cartoons debate!). We do not think so. Bloggers should take up their responsibility for consequences that their words and drawings may provoke.

But nobody can upheld, that opening a discussion about racism, or hidden racism, in Dr. Ulfkotte's recent statements and actions, is irresponsible or provocative in the way, the Danish cartoons and similar systematic slandering of other people's deepest convictions are.

But Ulfkotte, undermining the opinions of his allies, also in this matter, goes for exactly the contrary of "freedom to offend". He goes for Internet Censure by the Courts.

The German Courts work with existing laws. Laws that date essentially from the printed-paper area. Laws that in the matter of press rules, have been sharpened after 1945, in order to avoid the kind of abuse, the Nazis made of the media. These laws need urgently an update for the 21st century. The actual legal situation allows anybody who has the financial means for it, to legally strangle other, less wealthy, bloggers, and to bleed them financially white with court fees and amends.

Ulfkotte has started to exploit this loophole in German jurisdiction. He sues other bloggers for "Verleumdung" (defamation), when they call him a "racist". Even if they only link to an article where such things are written!

Even if Udo Ulfkotte does not agree, and invokes "demographic" reasons for his islam-bashing, the opinion, that Ulfkotte's ramblings are of a racist nature, can be perfectly sustained:

In other countries, where legislation is not narrowed by post-1945 fears of nazist revival, an authority on Islam-Western relations like Olivier Roy, has been able to freely characterise as "racist" a maverick French philosopher (Robert Redeker), who wrote a perfectly "ulfkottean" article in the Paris daily 'Le Figaro'. (Olivier Roy in 'Esprit', November 2006 [FR]). That is why Germany urgently should modernize its legislation on the protection of personal integrity in the media, especially ont the internet. And that is why, if the German Courts would follow Ulfkotte's injunctions, an appeal to the European Court of Justice could well turn into a final victory for the attacked bloggers.

That Ulfkotte abuses of these provisions that were originally intended to guard against new Nazism, in order to silence his critics from the antiracist left, is is proven by the fact, that he doesn't undertake anything against those who defame him from the right. (Examples in At Home in Europe, october 3, 2007). Such a behaviour has never been the intention of the legislators! German parliament and Courts should urgently undertake steps to correct the old provisions in order to make them applicable to the internet-epoch.

Those, who stand up so vehemently for "the freedom to offend" (vide Danish Mohammed Cartoons debate, as well as Ajaan Hirsi Ali's statements to that effect), should also take action here against Ulfkotte and his organization. Freedom is indivisible. If Ulfkotte's anti-Islamist allies let him have his way against anti-racist bloggers, their turn will come next.
Ulfkotte's former "SIOE"-allies from Denmark and Britain are already aware of the possibility that Ulfkotte may do his disorganizing and destabilizing work at the service of unknown secret services! (At Home in Europe, September 13)

So, the only thing that is left to do next, is to organise a public action of bloggers (from left and right) to make Ulfkotte and Pax Europa stop their legal advocacy against freedom of expression on the Net. On the 15th of November, in Frankfurt, a provisional hearing by the Court will decide about the procedure to follow.

Time is short. An appeal to the European Court should be envisaged, if German judges choose to follow Dr. Ulfkotte and his Pax Europa Verein.

It is important, that German judges and legislators be aware of what is at stake, before the Frankfurt Court holds its preliminary hearings on November 15 in the first two cases of Ulfkotte advocacy against freedom of expression on the Web!

Imperfections of EU roaming charges victory

2007-10-08T21:17:00.000+02:00

My small contributions (see under 'roaming charges' in my Euroblogs, [EN], [FR], [DE] and [NL]) to the reform of European "roaming charges" (costs for appeals from and to mobile telephones in Europe from and to different countries/providers) have some reason to be celebrated: Finally, on September 30, all providers are obliged to apply the European maximum tariffs of 49 cts p/Minute for calling abroad, and 24 cts p/Minute for receiving an international call (Plus national VAT).

This means a 60% reduction of consumer costs, coming too late for holiday roamings, but nevertheless welcome. The more so, while costs will continue to be capped at lower levels during the coming years.

Imperfections
SMS- and GPRS (internet) roaming have still to be tackled. If providers do not limit themselves, measures have been announced this week in Brussels, to discipline them.
The application of the caps comes also 3 months too late. It could have been applied on July 1st. That was the intention of the Commission and the European Parliament. Somehow, the providers managed to delay it during the three summer months, thus profiting from the consumers needs to call home during holidays.

I myself, being a customer of the Belgian Proximus provider (an affiliate of the giant British Vodafone networks), received today an August bill of € 88.89 (21% Belgian VAT included). International and roaming calls are billed in it for about 0.75 € p/Minute (VAT not included). This in spite of the fact, that I am a member of Vodafone Passport, that allows lower tariffs if I call to or from Vodafone-affiliated networks in Europe. Otherwise, I would have had to pay still more.

During our holidays (the August part), I called from Belgium to France, Spain and the UK; from France to Belgium and the UK; from Spain to Belgium, and the UK. And I received several calls from Holland, Belgium, the UK and Spain in different countries. Always via Vodafone Networks, where the Vodafone Passport is applicable.

Total minutes outgoing European intl calls: 73.43 Minutes
Total Proximus/Vodafone price (without VAT): € 43,1682
Also a middle price p/Minute of: 0,5878, which is 9,878 cts more per minute than it should have been.
Calls received abroad: 2,04 Minutes at 0,8182 € = 0,4011 €.
That is 16,01 cts more p/Minute than should have been billed.

All in all, Proximus/Vodafone stole from me in a petty way (for they could easily have applied the new tariffs by July), in one month:
73.43 x 9.878 + 2.04 x 9.878 = 725,34154 + 20,15112 cts = 745,49266 cts, or 7.45 €, which means: € 9.02 VAT included, or: somewhat more than 10% of my entire bill! Multiply by three months.

This petty manoeuver, during three months, and multiplied by all other consumers' bills (except for corporations, who enjoy preferential tariffs since long), may have paid for the consultants and lobbyists Vodafone hired in 2005-2007, to counter the EU Commission's proposals with literally every possible counter-argumentation. The venerable Financial Times duly reported their ramblings, and was echoed by other media.

We need the EU to protect consumers
All this shows, how necessary (and not at all impossible) it is, to regulate the "free" market with overall European regulations, as long as oligopolists try to profit from the remainders of compartimentalisation by country. (In this case: the fact that licences are being issued by national governments, who receive also the fees).

I celebrate above all this proof of the capability of EU-cooperation, to get provider-consumer relations right on this issue. For the odds were not small: A formal, well financed campaign of big and smaller providers like Vodafone (GB) and France Telecom has been raging. But they did not prevail against Swedish Eurocommissioner Viviane Reding (EUobserver.com, October 2).

This case is a weapon against Euroscepticism. It should be used.

(Parts of this post were originally published at huibslog)

Europe's right-wing extremists show us, how to discuss differences of opinion

2007-10-01T18:57:00.000+02:00

Europe's right-wing extremists show us, how to discuss differences of opinion in a way, compatible with European judeo-christian values. The invectives cited below, are undoubtedly part of the European Christian heritage, particularly that of the years 1922-1945.

No, no: It has not been the popular hate-manifestation that Europe's baldheads hoped for. A mere 200 people gathered on September 11 at the Luxemburg Train Station and the Schuman Square. Most of them were Vlaams Belang activists, who saw the event from their own Flemish perspective: To them, not the "Eurabisation of Europe" was the issue, but the fact, that a socialist, francophone, politician initiated the interdiction. Thus: Yellow lion flags all over! (Photo)
The Anglodanish organisers were not amused at all. But who can forbid freedom of expression on foreign soil? Brethren: You'll have to live with national and regional particularities and sensibilities, if you want to create an Europe of your design...
SIOE not only blames the German maverick politician Udo Ulfkotte for it, bur now also the Flemish extremist party Vlaams Belang.

SIOE website (England), 14.9.07:

SIOE considers that Vlaams Belang played right into Thielemans’s hands, which he must now be rubbing together with glee with an “I told you so” look on his fat face.

Some female Vlaams Belang supporters jokingly wore niqabs in Schumann Square.

Well, if Vlaams Belang doesn’t get its finger out of its political ass pretty damned quick, such women may find themselves compelled to wear niqabs when outdoors, if they are allowed out of the house.

The only way Islamism will be defeated is by fighting it single-mindedly, but you have to have a brain to have a mind, and it’s pretty obvious some leaders of some political parties are brainless.

SIOE-England is good in inventing invectives.
"Single-mindedness" is its trademark.
And, when SIOE burst out into the above philippica, it still had to undergo the treason by Udo Ulfkotte, who retired to Cologne at the last moment.

No wonder, that SIOE-England and -Denmark replied to Ulfkotte's demand to share his costs for juridical action in Brussels, with an email, that Ulfkotte says (on the Pax Europa website), he "regrets not to be able to publish it, because of German laws for protecting identities".

But, maybe, that mail did not only reveal some juicy details about the Pax-Europa/SIOE collaboration, but it may be possible, that it also mentioned Ulfkotte's "ass" as the location where he could stick up his bills...

We demand freedom of speech on the internet! We issue an appeal to SIOE, to publish its mail to Ulfkotte. No backroom dealings between self-appointed leaders! Out in the Open, with it!

We want more of this...

(Updated Oct. 1st, 2007)

Will Ulfkotte sue now his new detractors?

2007-09-17T23:37:00.000+02:00

[Ulfkotte-Images published by SIOE-England on Sept. 7, 2007]

Udo Ulfkotte, during the summer of 2007, sued a number of German Bloggers for qualificating him as a coward, a racist and an opportunist. Conjointly with his organisation "Pax Europa" and its treasurer who is also his spouse, he demands from four or five bloggers more than 200.000 Euros as indemnification. The German Courts have, at first instance, accepted his complaints and have ordered provisional interdictions to the incriminated bloggers.

All those bloggers are from the "left", or, at least, anti racist thinkers and activists.

Now, after his desertion from the Brussels' Sept. 11 demonstration and after his denunciation of the former allies from the Vlaams Blok and from SIOE as "racists" and "extreme right-wing", he is being attacked personally and vehemently by the "right".

Here are some examples of those incriminations from SIOE (England):

Is Udo Ulfkotte exercising dhimmi-status?

(Statement from Anders Gravers and Stephen Gash regarding Udo Ulfkotte’s behaviour.)

"Dhimmi" is a very heavy qualification in Ulfkotte's and SIOE's world. Dhimmis are non-Muslims who, passively or actively, compose with the enemy. Traitors, for short.

Ulfkotte is also accused of foul play:

This [remaining in contact with SIOE-chiefs, HR] was never the case with Udo Ulfkotte. Although he corresponded with Anders fairly regularly he was never fully forthcoming with any news regarding contacts, for example, or interest shown by the media.
[..]
Ulfkotte is not a team player in our opinion and this has been shown to its extreme over the last few days with him appearing on media outlets, especially in Belgium, saying HE cancelled the demonstration.
[..]
He could not have done a better job of trying to make the court case fail to reach a verdict in our favour and undermine SIOE’s lawyer’s attempts to reinstate the march.

We regard his behaviour as despicable and we both regard Ulfkotte as a Judas to the cause of anti-Islamism.

We regard his conduct to be calculated in making the demonstration fail.

(Some emphasis is mine, HR). Here, Ulfkotte is indicted for treachery, misleading people who were dependent on his informations, and, worst of all, intentionally sabotaging efforts to legalise the demonstration. He is regarded as a "Judas to the cause of anti-Islamism".

Could anything worse be said about our staunch defender of 'judeo-christian European values"?

Yes, it can be. SIOE investigators are currently engaged in researches into Ulfkotte's connections with secret services, who could possibly have directed his actions. Ulfkotte is considered as a stooge of manipulations by "Intelligence Agencies" or as a mere opportunist politician. SIOE says:
Why this is so, we are still investigating. He may be employed by the European Intelligence Agencies, he supposedly acts as a consultant to, or it may be solely due to him selfishly pursuing his own political career.
There may be a more sinister reason, but we don’t actually know because he hasn’t had the guts to tell us.
And then follows a typical SIOE-personal bashing:

Udo Ulfkotte has declared he intends to start and lead a political party to combat Islamism.

We believe he couldn’t lead a starving donkey to grass. He is a director of Pax Europa. Well, we believe he couldn’t direct a drinking straw into a bottle.

A denunciation of the political and personal impotence of Ulfkotte, that should merit another alert of the prosecution by Pax Europa!
And look here, how the old antigermanism resurfaces, because of Ulfkotte. Pax Europa should take its responsibilities and pursue the following contempt of democratic Germany by SIOE:

Once again we say, “If Udo Ulfkotte is the best Germany has, to combat the Islamisation of Germany, then God help Germany!”

[..]
Finally, Ulfkotte is qualified as a "saboteur" and a traitor to the German people. Objectively, he is helping to impose "the sharia" on the Germans. And on all Europeans, too:

He is nothing more than a saboteur who is doing no favours for the people of Germany, let alone Europe.

In our opinion he is a pathetic coward and German people would be best advised to avoid him and his future political party, unless they wish to endure an existence under Sharia law.

Well, Ulfkotte sued people for less. For instance, he wants to fine Watchblog Islamophobie-author "bigberta" with more than 60.000 Euros, merely for linking to a blog, where Ulfkotte was qualified as a "racist".
If Mr. Ulfkotte and his Pax Europa Organisation are interested in giving proof of the fact that their juridical actions are not exclusively oriented at people whom they consider as their political enemies, but that they are seriously engaged in upholding European civilized values on the Internet, they know now what they have to do.
They know, that, if they let pass SIOE's incriminations without reaction, their chances in court against the German bloggers who warned against Ulfkotte, become very tiny.

Trouble in Eurabia House: SIOE against the Vlaams belang.

2007-09-17T23:20:00.000+02:00

No, no: It has not been the popular hate-manifestation that Europe's baldheads hoped for. A mere 200 people gathered on September 11 at the Luxemburg Train Station and the Schuman Square. Most of them were Vlaams Belang activists, who saw the event from their own Flemish perspective: To them, not the "Eurabisation of Europe" was the issue, but the fact, that a socialist, francophone, politician initiated the interdiction. Thus: Yellow lion flags all over! (Photo)
The Anglodanish organisers were not amused at all. But who can forbid freedom of expression on foreign soil? Brethren: You'll have to live with national and regional particularities and sensibilities, if you want to create an Europe of your design...
SIOE not only blames the German maverick politician Udo Ulfkotte for it, bur now also the Flemish extremist party Vlaams Belang.

SIOE website (England), 14.9.07:

SIOE considers that Vlaams Belang played right into Thielemans’s hands, which he must now be rubbing together with glee with an “I told you so” look on his fat face.

Some female Vlaams Belang supporters jokingly wore niqabs in Schumann Square.

Well, if Vlaams Belang doesn’t get its finger out of its political ass pretty damned quick, such women may find themselves compelled to wear niqabs when outdoors, if they are allowed out of the house.

The only way Islamism will be defeated is by fighting it single-mindedly, but you have to have a brain to have a mind, and it’s pretty obvious some leaders of some political parties are brainless.

Oh my! European politics are about national and regional feelings. Some UK activists have to educate themselves somewhat more...

Ulfkotte admits errors and returns to "naive professor" acting

2007-09-11T16:00:00.000+02:00

Interview with Dr. Udo Ulfkotte, four days ago:
Which other errors did he admit during the break near to the end of the movie?
Maybe, he mentioned his expensive and futile lawsuits against German bloggers, who warned the public against him and his "errors"? We will never know.

We found the YouTube film on the excellent "Yelloman" blog ("Extreme Right in Flanders - weblog against hate and racism"). [In Dutch/Flemish]. Yellow is the favourite nationalist Flemish colour. And "yell" indicates the way in which the Vlaams Belang usually prefers to communicate.

Today, the same Blog was extremely quick in posting images of the Vlaams-Belang dominated former Ulfkotte manifestation in Brussels. The announced 20.000, plus 10.000 people from North America and Asia that Ulfkotte announced repeatedly, were shrunken to a mere 200, fifty of whom were arrested. Vlaams Belang leaders Dewinter en vanhecke were among those.

I publish that movie (in Dutch) today in In Europa Thuis.

Ulfkotte defines himself as "Gang" Leader

2007-09-05T15:47:00.000+02:00

"Brussels 9/11 Gang Shop"

Is this a bad joke? Have another "gang" come up to disturb the German Dr. Ulfkotte's peaceful and civilised plans for September 11 in Brussels? Or Cologne? Or both?
Fact is, that Ulfkottes Pax Europa Website links to a Leipzig store, where, under the exclusive responsibility of himself, anti-islamist "gang"-distinctives are being sold for exorbitant prices.

The Web is a jungle. Some hackers could have done, what Ulfkotte's allies like "Pro Köln" and "Vlaams Belang" did, in organising their own parallel demonstrations op 9/11 in Brussels and in Cologne.
Or is it maybe the MOSSAD? In 2001, Ulfkotte published an anti-Mossad book ("Gen-factor 'J'"), where he invents a biologic extermination plot by this Israeli secret service against Europe and the European Union. Since then, Ulfkotte turned tables, and defends "judeo-christian values" against the Islam. But the Mossad doesn't forget, who their enemies are...
Whatever - if it is a joke, it is a good one!

Go with me on some windowshopping in Ulfkotte's 98 pieces devotionalia collection:

Show everyone, that your gang thinks that peaceful Brussels Turks are plotting to impose a sharia that doesn't exist since a long time in their home country:

Messenger Bag

strapazierfähige Tasche aus 100% Polyester
Details
Größe Unisize

Anzahl

Versandfertig: innerhalb 1-2 Werktagen

Article No. 5494094

inkl. MwSt. EU
zzgl. Versand
Preis 19,60 €

You think this is not value for money? Yes, the baggy is expensive. And delivery costs have to be added. But you have to remember, that Pax Europa needs money badly. Their lawyers ask every time for more. For instance, in procedure against a blogger who only linked to a site where Ulfkotte was characterised as a "racist".

The owners of the "Spreadshirt" Firm's website were aware of Dr. Ulfkotte's idea of responsibilities. That is why, on their "Impressum" page, reject any responsibility for the childish provocations of Dr. Ulfkotte. Here is their text:

Für diesen Online-Shop verantwortlich im Sinne des Presserechts ist:

Udo Ulfkotte

Postfach 2249
35532 Wetzlar
Deutschland

harleybike at web.de

Die Verantwortung des oben genannten Shop-Betreibers gilt insbesondere für sämtliche in diesem Shop veröffentlichte Druck-Motive sowie für die optische Gestaltung des Shops.

[Ulfkotte's picture was added by us]

Technische Realisierung:
Dieser Onlineshop wird auf einer von Spreadshirt zur Verfügung gestellten Plattform betrieben. Spreadshirt ist verantwortlich für den technischen Shopbetrieb sowie die Bestellabwicklung, nicht aber für die Inhalte des Shops.
Mit einer Bestellung in diesem Online-Shop geht der Besteller ausschließlich einen Vertrag mit der sprd.net AG [Wer sind das? HR] ein, nicht jedoch mit dem oben stehenden Shop-Betreiber. Für die Bestellung gelten ausschließlich die AGB der sprd.net AG.

End of quote.
Resume:
"In ordering something at this online-shop, the orderer enters only into an agreement with the sprd.net Ltd, and not with the managers and owners of this on-line shop."

We continue our window shopping tour at Dr. Ulfkotte's souvenir shop.

Do you like pins? - Here is one! No, it doesn't show President Bush adoring an oil barrel, stupid!
Dr. Ulfkotte presumably meant a Muslim, praying at a gas dispenser.
But, more subtly, one could subsume a link to Dr. Ulfkotte himself. As an Africa-correspondent for the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung during the nineties, he was accused of accepting bribes from oil-company SHELL. However, this accusation was invalidated, when the FAZ won in court against the accusers.

Ffünf Stück für nur 5.80 €, zzgl Versand!
Die feine Humor des Dr. Ulfkottes (Verantwortlicher für die Gestaltung) ist unwiderstehlich!

The "Gangs" of boys and girls who were to march through the Brussels streets, would have been dressed up by Dr. Ulfkotte and his wife who is treasurer of the Pax Europa Organisation like this:
Kostet 61,40 €!!

And don't forget your umbrella, "bad boys": 13,40 €!

For the girls, no not a headscarf, but this woollen cap: € 13,40!

Oder eine kleine Börse? - Nur € 20,10 (zzgl Versand)?

The same handbag, but now with an inscription against "Freddy" (Thielemans), the Brussels mayor? - Only 20.10 Euros, delivering costs to be added!

Dr. Ulfkotte did not forget about you, beer and wine drinkers! Only 15.90 € apiece!!

Ulfkotte says so himself: I am a "gang"-leader...

"Do I resemble a hooligan?", Udo Ulfkotte asked the journalists, when, on August 17, he was found in Vlaams-Belang-leader Philip Dewinter's parliamentary offices, talking with that extremist in person.
Indeed, the gang leader had dressed as a "Hochschullehrer" (professor) for that occasion.

Brussels: Landmark encounter of Belgian and German extremists Dewinter and Ulfkotte

2007-08-23T12:54:00.000+02:00

Leading Belgian Flemish (Dutch language) daily "De Morgen" had an interesting scoop on Monday August 18, 2007. In the Flemish parliament offices of the Vlaams Belang Party in Brussels, it met it's historical leader Philip Dewinter (on the right in the picture), hosting the German maverick right-wing politician Dr. Udo Ulfkotte (to the left).

("De Morgen" daily, p. 6, 18.8.07)

The meeting was about an appeal to the highest Belgian administrative Court, Ulfkotte intends to make against the refusal of Brussels Mayor Thielemans to allow an Europe-wide "Anti-Eurabia" manifestation, that Ulfkotte had planned for September 11 at the European Parliament buildings. This manifestation was intended to underline Mr. U.'s ambitions for the European Parliament elections, due in 2008. A critical portrait of Dr. Udo Ulfkotte has been published by Dialog International, a German-American blog, on July 31, 2007. That text is also incorporated in Uncontrolled Fallout from the Pepperdine Conference: Udo Ulfkotte, that I published today in Legal Alien @ New York.

A welcome change of battlefield: from streetwise hooligans to the courtroom
As positive response to Mr. Ulfkotte's Brussels manifestation proposal had remained restricted to the usual rightwing mini-formations in different countries, the Brussels interdiction may have been a welcome development to him. His recent identification with "European Judeo-Christian values", to be anchored in a new "Christian-ecological" party that he intends to create, doesn't marry well with the image of some thousand neonazis, baldheads and hooligans, marching through the Brussels streets, provoking indignation with the population and laughter with the counter-demonstrators.

Awkward and embarrassing allies
A public battle in a courtroom, where he might position himself as a protagonist of "free expression" and a staunch defender of Europe against "the Islamic tsunami", suits him better. That is why he accepted the offer of the separatist and racist (condemnation in 2004) Vlaams Belang Party ("quarantained" by all other Belgian parties) to help him out with a very special lawyer: Mr. Hugo Coveliers (his foot is visible in the picture).

Coveliers used to be an Antwerp city council member for the liberal VLD party. At the last communal elections (2007), he created a new rightwing formation (VLOTT) that leaned heavily to- (and upon) the Vlaams Belang. Together with the VB, he lost those elections in Antwerp. At the federal parliamentary Belgian elections in June, he associated completely with the VB, getting a third position on the VB list for the Belgian Senate. Those elections were also unsuccessful for the extremist formations, but Coveliers got his seat. The man is also a lawyer. In the eyes of Dewinter, he must be an ideal person for the job.

Ulfkotte, caught red-handed, pleads naivety and features his nonpoliticalness
But for Ulfkotte? - Dr. Udo was apparently taken by surprise, when the journalists came in. (Did Dewinter play him that nasty trick?) He denied any political cooperation with Dewinter and his party. VB-members were allowed to march with "Pax Europa" in the manifestation, but he had turned away an offer of the VB "Ordedienst" to put up a security and order service for the manifestation. All political symbols and party-flags were to be outlawed in his manifestation.

Ulfkotte positioned himself during that interview as an "unpolitical" person, unbeknown with the Belgian juridical system, just looking for help. "Indeed," said Dewinter ("looking amused", dixit De Morgen), "he is a kind of Pim Fortuyn or Geert Wilders. See for yourself: his statements are totally unpolitical!"

Dewinter lets Ulfkotte ramble and puts forward a murderous comparison
Here we must allow for some appreciation for Dewinter's ironical capacities and for the cunning ways in which he succeeds in enrolling the German Doctor in his ailing movement. For both names of Dutch anti-Islamic activists he mentions, are the names of ... politicians! Fortuyn participated in the 2002 Dutch parliamentary elections with his LPF (Lijst Pim Fortuyn) list and won, days after he was murdered by an extremist animal-protector, more than 20 seats in the 150 strong Dutch parliament. Geert Wilders is leader of a (PVV) party, with an anti-Islamic mission, who won 12 seats in November 2006. Both politicians consider(ed) themselves as "anti-politicians", ready to abuse of the parliamentary system for populist agitation and fear mongering. For some years, Dewinter has been unsuccessfully proposing collaboration to the latter (Wilders). By putting Ulfkotte and Wilders in one sack, he catches two flies in one move: Putting himself in the position of an acceptable ally of non-quarantained movements abroad, and, subtly, defining Ulfkotte as the populist extremist politician he denies being.

Is Dr. Udo Ulfkotte as naive as he pretends?
"We do not collaborate with this [VB] party", says Ulfkotte, drinking his cup of tea or coffee at Dewinter's conference table. "I am completely upset because of that interdiction," he declares. "Do I look like a hooligan? Of course, I accepted readily Dewinter's proposal to arrange a lawyer for our organisation. I don't know anybody here in Brussels, I am completely jammed. How could I find my way in the Belgian juridical system on my own?"
Poor Udo! Somebody (a Moroccan, a Turk?) must have stolen his telephone directory at home. Otherwise, he would have engaged a, preferably francophone, non-socialist Brussels lawyer (Below, we will tell you, why...), without links to politics!

We cannot get rid of the impression, that Dr. Udo, caught red-handed, is desperately excusing himself for the awkward company he keeps. But, if we believe, for a moment, that he is really as naive as he pretends, he would make a poor politician, if ever elected. To let yourself be embarrassed in this way by a second-rank regional extremist, is unforgivable for a man with such far-reaching pretensions as he is.

The manipulator manipulated
In the end, we do not believe, however, that Ulfkotte will succeed in denying his association with a party that has been condemned for racism and forced to change its name and program. As a former foreign editor of the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (1986-2003) and self-appointed "international security expert", boasting about his links with the German Bundesnachrichtendienst, the Israeli Mossad and the British MI6, as well as international oil companies, he cannot but have known, what company he was going to keep. Maybe, he thinks, that in associating with his Flemish ally, exclusively for the sake of a juridical procedure, he can win its sympathy, without having to subscribe to its racist ideology.

Indeed. He needs badly allies who may provide some simulacrum of a mass following. The only "masses" he can summon in Germany, are the "Bürger in Wut" (Outraged Citizens) party in Bremerhaven, a xenophobic and "security"- obsessed local movement, that managed to get some representatives elected in the local council earlier this year. His effort, to make the Flemish separatists and xenophobes abandon their beloved yellow lion-flags and march orderly and exclusively for the election of Dr. Ulfkotte into the EP, seems to have lead to a mini-disaster.

Ulfkotte's collaboration with racists cannot be denied any more
Why? - In July this year, Ulfkotte started a defamation procedure in Germany against a blogger (Jochen Hoff, Berlin), who had qualified him as a "racist". Another blogger, who had merely linked to that blog, was also summoned (bigberta, Watchblog Islamophobie). Betraying his own "freedom of expression" principles, he, together with his organisation "Pax Europa", claims more than 100.000 Euros from the two bloggers. German judges ordered a provisional suppression of the incriminated texts.

Consequences for Ulfkotte's chances in his complaint against German bloggers
But how can Ulfkotte, now that his links with a movement that has been condemned for "racism", have been revealed, maintain that Hoff's qualification was outrageous? Will a German judge disregard a definitive judgment by the highest Belgian court? Not very likely.

Mr. Ulfkotte, who spent already much money on expensive lawyers in that German case, will have to explain to the contributors to the Pax Europe organisation, who thought they were helping the promotion of "European Judeo-Christian Values", how and why he wasted their Euros. Will he have enough money left, to pay for Coveliers in Belgium? Or will he, "jammed" again, resort to financial help or a gift "in natura" (if Coveliers offers free services) from his Flemish friends, with whom he "does not collaborate"?

Ulfkotte's courtroom activities in a wider perspective
As we wrote today in "Legal Alien @ New York" (Uncontrolled Fallout from the Pepperdine Conference: Udo Ulfkotte), the American and European protagonists of the anti-"Eurabia" Pepperdine Conference in Malibu, California, of June 11, 2007, will not be very happy with Mr. Ulfkotte's handling of one of it's main instructions to counter Islam in Europe. That strategy is called "advocacy", and is meant to abuse the juridical system in order to harass Muslims and their property (and anti-racists) by legal and administrative means. Ulfkotte, however, spoils his capital in efforts to take personal revenge on relatively unimportant bloggers and tries to kill freedom of speech.

Stuck in the Belgian communitarian swamp
Now, on top of that, he hands the advocacy issue in Belgium over to classical ("traditional extreme right") and separatist actors, whom they cannot associate with. A good opportunity to nail the social-democrats once again to their supposed "dhimminess" (Brussels Mayor Thielemans is affiliated to the Belgian (French) Socialist Party - Parti Socialiste, PS) is foregone. With VB-man Coveliers as a lawyer, the issue will for sure become part of the eternal Belgian language-community feud, where all French-speaking people will automatically solidarise with the attacked PS, who, as the biggest Walloon party, embody Frenchness in the country.

How Ulfkotte selects his fear-mongering issues
Once again, Mr. Ulfkotte appears as an embarrassing ally to a cause, he chooses to adopt as his own. In an upcoming article, we will study his previous (pre-2001) obsession with the Israeli Mossad as a danger to European security. An obsession, he apparently traded in after September 11, for his actual themas, that contrast remarkably with the former one.

Legal Alien: Pepperdine 2 and 3 Reports: European stooges enter the scene. Pipes underhandedly calls for a pogrom on Mosques.

2007-07-11T03:02:00.000+02:00

Leon de Winter, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Henryk Broder, Andy Bostom, Daniel Pipes and Greg Davis (This photo is merged from two smaller photos. [By Vik Rubenfeld, on whose reporting I draw, HR])

In A Legal Alien in New York I published two new reports about the Pepperdine Conference against 'Eurabia' and Islam.

Pepperdine 2: "Ibn Warraq" tells his tale. (July 7)
Pepperdine 3: European Stooges enter the Scene (July 10).

1: "Ibn Warraq", a Pipes pet and anti-muslim hetzer working under pseudonym in the US, takes a Muslim mother's warning to her children not indulge in stupid commercial "sport" hooliganism, as proof, that Muslims never will integrate into Western society. However, that mother did nothing else than a Christian mother could have done: she referred to religion as a basis of discernment.
Nevertheless, the Pepperdine audience seems convinced, that this is proof of the Islam danger and the dhimmi treason.

2: Ayaan Hirsi Ali introduces a new concept. Suppression of Muslims is no more a Government task, in her eyes. She has 'learned' in the US, that a "popular upsurge" will be a better way. Dutch writer Leon de Winter delivers a vague statement about the Amsterdam situation and confirms that even Calvinists are ready to come into action, as they have "enough" of the Islam intrusion. (If the reporter understood him well, and if I understood the reporter correctly). German prize-winning anti-islamic writer Henryk Broder communicates some German and British anecdotes that should deliver more proof of Islam's evilness and the treacherously weak ('appeasement') reactions of mainstream European politicians.
Finally, the conference initiator, Pepperdine visiting Professor Daniel Pipes, delivers an outrageous statement, calling, underhandedly, for a pogrom-like popular movement against Mosques.

The reporting will be continued in the next days.

London Financial Times Commenter is as disgusted as I am about Pepperdine...

2007-07-10T00:20:00.000+02:00

Ah, I'm not alone in my disgust about the Pepperdine Conference.
Listen to Gideon Rachman of the London Financial Times, who chastizes Mark Steyn and Ajaan Hirsi Ali even more than I did:

The collapse of Europe

If you happen to be passing though Malibu next month, why not pop into an intriguing-sounding conference at Pepperdine University on "The Collapse of Europe". One of the early sessions is entitled - "Eurabia: Is Muslim domination of Europe inevitable?"

My answer to this is "No" it's not inevitable. In fact, given that the Muslim population of Europe is just 4% at the moment, I would say it's highly unlikely. But don't trying telling that to an audience of American conservatives. The idea that Europe is about to be submerged by the Muslim hordes seems to be almost recieved wisdom over there. It is certainly a notion that has launched a great many books. There is “Eurabia: The Euro-Arab Axis” by Bat Ye’or; “While Europe Slept – How Radical Islam is Destroying the West from Within” by Bruce Bawer; “The Death of the West” by Pat Buchanan; and “The Cube and the Cathedral” by George Weigel.

I was depressed to see that Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the Somali-born Dutch politician is taking part in the Pepperdine conference. She is a highly intelligent and courageous woman, so it's a shame to see that she is mixing with buffoons like Mark Steyn, who is giving the keynote address at the conference.

Steyn is the author of the most successful recent book about the alleged Muslim takeover of Europe. “America Alone” earned its author a place in the New York Times best-seller list and praise from President Bush.

Mr Steyn argues that – “Europe has all but succumbed to the dull opiate of multiculturalism.” Indeed “a fearless Muslim advance has penetrated far deeper into Europe than Abd al-Rahman” – a Muslim general who made it to the outskirts of Paris in 732. With apparent relish Mr Steyn predicts a “Eurabian civil war”. The weak-kneed elites will succumb to militant Islam. But an “unreconstructed minority” will turn to “neo-nationalist strongmen”. The poor old Europeans can’t win. It’s either appeasement or fascism.

It is alarming stuff. So it is comforting to recall that Mr Steyn has been disastrously wrong about many things in the past. I've just looked up a piece that he filed from Iraq in June 2003, in which he confidently informed his readers that everything was fine - "a vast number of bureaucrats are running around Iraq with unlimted budgets in search of a human catastrophe that doesn't exist." This is vintage Steyn - jeering, complacent and utterly stupid.

Steyn's Iraq epic ended with him sitting in an Iraqi cafe, watching a BBC television report suggesting that there was a crisis in Baghdad's hospitals. Once again, Steyn knew better. He sneered at:

"the blazing lights of round-the-clock CNN and BBC camera crews filming their reporter yakking away in front of a telegenic moppet whose acute tonsillitis is somehow all Rumsfeld's fault. These days, I always laugh my head off at BBC World reports. And, in that Ramadi cafe, I was touched to find that, even though most of them hadn't a clue what he was going on about, within half a minute, the rest of the crowd was roaring along with me."

Ah Iraq - if only the rest of the world could see the funny side. In fact, I have a suggestion for Mr Steyn. When he has finished lecturing the inmates at Pepperdine, perhaps he could repeat his trip to Iraq and see if it's still as hilarious as the last time.

Nothing to add. My analysis is upcoming...

EU Commission's Response to Mark Steyn: 18 couples coming, together!

2007-07-05T00:22:00.000+02:00

Reproductive Activities...

In A Legal Alien in New York, we quoted Mr. Mark Steyn (11.6.07), a keynote speaker at the "Collapse Of Europe" Conference at Pepperdine University in Malibu last month. In a Wall Street Journal article of January 2006 Steyn resumes his New York Times bestseller "America Alone: The End Of the World as We Know It":

It's the Demography, Stupid
The real reason the West is in danger of extinction.

BY MARK STEYN
Wednesday, January 4, 2006 12:01 a.m. EST

[..]
The challenge for those who reckon Western civilization is on balance better than the alternatives is to figure out a way to save at least some parts of the West.
One obstacle to doing that is that, in the typical election campaign in your advanced industrial democracy, the political platforms of at least one party in the United States and pretty much all parties in the rest of the West are largely about what one would call the secondary impulses of society--
government health care,
government day care (which Canada's thinking of introducing),
government paternity leave (which Britain's just introduced).
We've prioritized the secondary impulse over the primary ones:
national defense,
family,
faith and,
most basic of all, reproductive activity--"Go forth and multiply," because if you don't you won't be able to afford all those secondary-impulse issues, like cradle-to-grave welfare.
Americans sometimes don't understand how far gone most of the rest of the developed world is down this path... [..]

Who could have guessed, that, of all people, the "European Bureaucrats" (as the EU was labeled in all documents of that "scientific" seminar) would come up with such a convincing refutation of Steyn's, Pipes', Hirsi Ali's, Claire Berlinski's, Arnaud Dotézac's accusations, that they are committing high treason to Western values, participating in a conspiracy to keep down the production of white, Christian babies, born in faithful and docile families, as they are promoting abortion, homosexual couples, kindergarten, women's liberation and other horrors.

The movie shows, exclusively white, European couples, engaged in state-sponsored, (the movie features 18 quotes of EU-subsidized movies), reproductive activities by consenting adult heterosexual couples.

It opens up original suggestions about who, where and and how Europeans should f**k against the Turk: Old and young, in toilets and on tables, in varying positions!

Watch this EuTube movie, quoted from the official EU Commission Website!

By July 4th, it had scored (since June 15): Views: 1,872,501 Comments: 530 Favorited: 2133 times. Rating: Four stars out of five by 2217 viewers...

If these are not Steyn's "reproductive activities", what else is?

The EU shows, that it is fully committed to "primary impulsions".

A loud "Hallelujah!" was heard at Pepperdine Churches of Christ University at Malibu, when the students discovered this divinely inspired result of their prayers against 'Eurabia" on the Internet...