Recent Appearances...

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Recent Appearances...

Europe

Huge protest in The Hague demands Dutch government draw ‘red line’ on Gaza war

2025-05-19

Literal Red Shirts demonstrating their heartfelt impotence and Jew hate.

[IsraelTimes] Organizers say 100,000 attend demonstration, calling it the Netherlands’ biggest protest in two decades, as new Israeli military offensive begins in war against Hamas terror group

Tens of thousands of red-clad protesters marched through the Dutch capital on Sunday to demand that their government do more to halt Israel’s campaign in Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with a rusty iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about oppression and disproportionate response...
, in what organizers called the country’s biggest demonstration in two decades.

Human rights groups and aid agencies — including Amnesty International, Save the Children and Doctors Without Borders — estimated the crowd at more than 100,000 people.

The protest came as Israel launched the first stage of a new offensive in the Strip, dubbed "Gideon’s Chariots," aiming to "seize strategic areas" of the enclave. Hamas
Hamas

..one of the armed feet of the Moslem Brüderbund millipede,...
-linked officials, who don’t distinguish between civilians and fighters, have reported over 100 people killed over the last 24 hours.

"We hope this is a wake-up call for the government," said teacher Roos Lingbeek, attending the march with her husband and their 12-week-old daughter, Dido, who slept in a carrier as her parents brandished a sign simply reading: "STOP."

David Prins, whose yarmulke was printed with the image of a watermelon — which shares the colors of the Paleostinian flag — told The News Agency that Dare Not be Named he was attending the protest "to speak out against the atrocities." The 64-year-old was standing across the street from the synagogue he attended growing up, which overlooks the field where the demonstration began.

Protesters walked a 3-mile (5-kilometer) loop around the city center of The Hague, to symbolically create the red line they said the government has failed to set.

Videos of the protest captured crowds chanting "From the river to the sea, Paleostine will be free!" — a phrase often interpreted as calling for the elimination of Israel altogether — as well as "Free, free Paleostine." Crowds also chanted, "Starving people is a crime."

The Hague is the site of both the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court, both of which have seen cases in which Israel and its leaders are accused of violating international law, including by intentionally starving the Gazook population, during the campaign against Hamas.

Israel denies the allegations, pointing to its efforts to avoid civilian casualties, and, for much of the war, to facilitate the flow of aid into the enclave. Israel also points to Hamas’s practice of embedding itself among civilian infrastructure, including hospitals, schools and mosques.

Marjon Rozema, of Amnesty International, told the AP on Sunday, "We are calling on the government to stop political, economic and military support to Israel," while the country continues to block humanitarian aid

to Gaza.

Aid hasn’t entered Gaza since March 1, with Israel arguing that sufficient humanitarian assistance entered the Strip during a six-week ceasefire and that Hamas had been stealing much of that aid.

In recent weeks, though, some officials in the IDF have begun warning the political echelon that the enclave is on the brink of starvation. Israel has been involved in creating a new body — the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation — to distribute aid in the Strip. The GHF said it would begin to operate in the Strip by the end of the month, though Israel has yet to confirm this.

Dutch policy toward Israel is just one of many issues causing splits in the Netherlands’ fragile coalition government. Hard-right leader Geert Wilders is staunchly pro-Israel and his anti-immigrant Party for Freedom holds the largest number of seats in the country’s parliament.

Last week, however, foreign affairs minister Caspar Veldkamp of the minority center-right VVD party urged the European Union
...the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, only without the Hapsburgs and the nifty uniforms and the dancing...
to review a trade agreement with Israel, arguing that its blockade of humanitarian aid violated international law. Wilders hit back, denouncing the call as an "affront to cabinet policy."

The war in Gaza began October 7, 2023, when some 5,000 Hamas-led bully boyz invaded southern Israel from the Strip, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages. Fifty-eight captives remain — including 20 who are believed to be alive, and three about whom the government has grave concerns —and 35 who have been confirmed dead by the military.

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Europe

Dutch Jews decry courts, media, politics as mild verdicts handed down for Nov. ‘Jew hunt’

2025-03-20

[IsraelTimes] 4 receive light sentences for roles in last year’s Amsterdam riots after soccer match with Maccabi Tel Aviv; critics note prosecutors didn’t charge perpetrators with antisemitism

A criminal court in Amsterdam on Wednesday sentenced four perpetrators of a "Jew hunt" in November to prison terms ranging from 11 days to three months. The four defendants were part of a group of as many as several hundred rioters who attacked Israeli supporters of the Maccabi Tel Aviv soccer club after its match against local club Ajax on November 7.

In response to the sentences, Gidi Markuszower, a Jewish parliamentarian for Geert Wilders’s right-wing, pro-Israel Freedom Party, said of the prosecutors and judges: "They made one thing very clear: ’Dutch Jews, you can run, but you can’t hide.’"

The "hit-and-run" style attacks lasted through the early hours of November 8, leaving 10 injured, according to Israel’s Foreign Ministry, while hundreds were unable to emerge from their hotels.

Organized through WhatsApp groups, local Arab and Moslem gangs attacked Israeli soccer fans and searched and demanded identification from passersby to check if they were Israelis or Dutch Jews. In their WhatsApp conversations, the rioters themselves spoke of a "Jew hunt." Amsterdam Mayor Femke Halsema labeled the attacks a "pogrom" before retracting the comment days later, after political blowback.

Cenk D., considered one of the central figures in the attacks, was sentenced to three months incarceration, one month more than the public prosecutor’s office had asked for — an atypical occurrence. (In Dutch court cases, only the first letter of a defendant’s surname is used in communication with the media.) Three other defendants received lower sentences.

In a WhatsApp group called "Buurthuis 2," or "Community Center 2," Cenk D. had shared the location of Jewish soccer fans with 1,000 other members, calling on them to go on the attack: "A dead Jew is better than a living Jew."

Cenk D. also sent pictures of Anne Frank, which the court considered downplaying the Holocaust, a criminal offense in the Netherlands.

Taxi driver Mounir M. was sentenced to six weeks, minus 26 days for time served during the investigation. Mounir M. used the same WhatsApp group to tell the rioters where they could find Jews and how to evade the police that night.

Kamal I., another taxi driver, received one month with the same deduction; prosecutors had asked for a year of jail time. However,
it was a brave man who first ate an oyster...
even though Kamal I. had videos of some of the assaults on his phone, the court did not see enough proof to conclude that he had personally participated in the violence.

Mohammed B. was convicted of assault and received a sentence of 11 days. He will not have to go to prison, since the sentence is the same as the number of days he had already spent in jail. The mild sentence was given despite Mohammed B.’s previous record of ~~violent~~ mostly peaceful offenses, and Dutch newspaper Het Parool wrote that Mohammed B. had been seen at other anti-Israel rallies, including one at the Amsterdam Central Train Station on the night before his sentencing.

Victor Loonstein, a lawyer for 35 of the Israeli victims, said the sentences were in line with Dutch guidelines. He noted, however, that the court took several ostensibly mitigating circumstances into account, such as the part Maccabi fans allegedly played in the violence, and in the cases of Paleostinian suspects, their "trauma" since the start of the war in Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with a rusty iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about oppression and disproportionate response...
in October 2023.

Loonstein blamed local politics for the changing narrative since last November.

"Where at first the riots were labeled a ’Jew hunt,’ this quickly changed under the influence of politicians and pro-Paleostinian organizations," he said. "Suddenly, the events had to be viewed in a different context, and we were supposed to understand the motives of the perpetrators. I call this the ’October 7 mechanism.’"

Loonstein pointed out the refusal of the public prosecutor’s office to charge the rioters with an antisemitic motive, which carries heavier penalties in the Netherlands, despite numerous references to "hunting Jews," not "Israelis," both in their communications on WhatsApp and in videos of the assaults that were put on the internet the same night.

"The penalties are low, but unfortunately that is a part of the Dutch legal system," said Naomi Mestrum, director of the Center for Information and Documentation on Israel. "Only last week, the Upper Chamber of Parliament in The Hague approved a new law that gives harsher punishment for crimes of a discriminatory nature like antisemitism. We hope and expect that in future cases these aggravating circumstances are weighed in the sentencing."

In total, the Amsterdam police are eyeing some 120 suspects for the violence, of whom allegedly 10 are Israeli. Last week, police showed unblurred footage of another 22 suspects of the November attacks who have not yet been identified.

"The prison terms of the sentences are so mild that the Dutch legal system actually incentivizes the ’Jew hunters’ for another round of hunting," said Markuszower. "It’s very clear that mainstream media and mainly politicians from the left are more comfortable providing cover for their fellow antisemites than protecting the Jews in our country."

Loonstein agreed to a certain point with Markuszower’s view on the role of the Dutch media.

"Dutch public television now calls it the Maccabi riots. It’s the world upside down," he said.

Tofik Dibi, a former politician and now a high-ranking civil servant of the city of Amsterdam, last week spoke on state television
... and if you can't believe state television who can you believe?
of an "Arab hunt" by Maccabi fans — a conspiracy theory that has been debunked by many eyewitnesses — without being countered by anyone on the program.

Dibi has justified the November riots and has often toed the line between anti-Zionism and antisemitism, calling for an intifada, wishing disease upon politicians attending a pro-Israel rally, and seemingly comparing Israel supporters to cockroaches — though Halsema, a member of the same left-wing political party as Dibi, has not initiated any action as a result.

"Immediately after the Ajax-Maccabi match, many false narratives were started," said Mestrum. "It was claimed that Maccabi fans started the fighting. Later, it was proven that the attacks were planned days ahead."

Still, Dutch media is afraid to give an unbiased account of what happened that night, said Mestrum.

"It is now treated as ’normal’ violence around a football match, which tends to receive less media attention," she said. "This is sad since we know it was a premeditated and carefully organized attack. The football element is now used as an excuse."

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International-UN-NGOs

Dutch parliament pulls invite to UN investigator for the Palestinians

2025-02-12

[IsraelTimes] The Dutch parliament withdraws an invitation to the UN special rapporteur for the Palestinians, Francesca Albanese.

Albanese has a history of antisemitic remarks and has caused repeated controversy for her anti-Israel vitriol.

The Dutch political party SGP says Albanese’s invitation to address lawmakers has been withdrawn. Albanese was scheduled to speak with members of parliament on Thursday.

Hillel Neuer, the director of UN Watch, a pro-Israel group that campaigned against Albanese’s visit, says the decision is made by the Dutch government’s foreign affairs committee.

Albanese, an Italian, is on a tour of northern Europe for a series of talks on international law and the Palestinians, she said last week.

Link

Europe

Pro-Palestinian event in Denmark axes speaker from group that files war crimes complaints on IDF soldiers

2025-01-12

[IsraelTimes] A Pro-Paleostinian conference in Denmark cancels the participation of an anti-Israel group that works to file complaints against IDF soldiers for alleged war crimes.

In a post on X, the Hind Rajab Foundation

…the foundation is a project launched last October by the March 30 Movement, itself named in memory of the Palestinian general strike on that date in 1976 in the West Bank against the Israeli government, since referred to as Land Day. Both groups are lawfare boiler rooms generating endless laswsuits against Israelis and those who support Israel in Western Europe and elsewhere, and between times propagandizing against Israel using the currently fashionable far left shibboleths. March 30 appears to be the hobby of lawyer Haroon Raza, and appeared on the scene at the end of 2023, but at bottom it’s a Hezbollah front founded by Dyab Abou Jahjah (Dyab Abu Jahjah), a serial founder of Hezbollah fronts — his first, the Arab European League, was stirring up trouble between Moslem colonists and native Europeans since 2002……

says its representative was already in Copenhagen to attend the European Paleostinian Network Conference, where he was set to join a panel discussion.

"Mr. Haroon Raza traveled to Copenhagen to represent the HRF, but moments ago, the organization informed him that the Hind Rajab Foundation’s participation was canceled due to information disseminated in the Israeli press, falsely linking us to resistance movements in Leb
Leb

...The Leb civil war, between 1975 and 1990, lasted a little over 145 years and produced 120,000 fatalities. The average length of a ceasefire was measured in seconds. Only one of those statements is an exaggeration....
and Paleostine," the group writes.

There is no official statement from the conference organizers on the cancellation.

The organization, which proclaims in the post that its "sole mission remains the pursuit of justice and accountability for the victims and perpetrators of this ongoing genocide," is named after six-year-old Hind Rajab, who was killed in Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with a rusty iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about oppression and disproportionate response...
in January.

Her death was blamed on the IDF, but an initial probe conducted by the army said that there were no troops in the area at the time.

Hebrew media reported this week that Israeli authorities are aware of at least 12 such cases in which complaints have been filed abroad against IDF soldiers accusing them of war crimes in Gaza.

Link

Europe

Far-right leader tasked with forming Austria government pledges to ‘govern honestly’

2025-01-08

One nation’s people after another is choosing leadership from the populist right — leaders who appear to love the people instead of despising them.

[IsraelTimes] Herbert Kickl – whose Freedom Party won September election, but was initially shunned by other factions – says he is prepared for new elections if coalition talks fail

Austrian far-right leader Herbert Kickl said Tuesday, in his first comments after being tasked to form a new government, that he aspires to "govern Austria honestly," as he prepared for talks on a potential coalition with conservatives who criticized him sharply in the past.

Kickl said he is prepared for new elections if they fail.

His Russia-friendly, anti-immigration, euroskeptic Freedom Party won Austria’s parliamentary election in September, but was initially shunned by other parties. Their efforts to put together a coalition without it failed.

On Monday, Kickl received a mandate to try to form what would be the first national government led by the far right since World War II. That came after the conservative Austrian People’s Party of outgoing Chancellor Karl Nehammer, who announced his resignation Saturday, made an abrupt U-turn on its previous refusal to contemplate working with the Freedom Party under Kickl.

Kickl — a 56-year-old with a provocative style — made clear he has not forgotten past friction with the People’s Party. Nehammer has described him as a "security risk." The party’s interim leader, Christian Stocker, said during the election campaign that anyone voting for Kickl "is voting for five years of high risk with radical ideas."

"Our country was driven into the wall in the past five years," Kickl said, pointing in particular to Austria’s large budget deficit and what he said was "a massive trust deficit" accumulated by mainstream parties. He said he has "a very, very simple aim, and that is to govern Austria honestly."

Kickl said he is reaching out to Stocker, "and you can believe me, that isn’t easy for me either. We have an interesting past together — but it is honest."

Kickl added he has clear expectations, including "an awareness of who won the election, and who finished second and isn’t the winner." He also demanded "an understanding of who is responsible for the mistakes of the past" and a partner with stable and consistent leadership.

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"If this isn’t assured... I can say that’s it," Kickl said. "Then there will be new elections — we are prepared for that."

The Freedom Party won 28.8% of the vote in September. That was a nearly 13-point gain from five years earlier, when the party was punished by voters following the collapse of a conservative-led government in which it was the junior partner at a time of scandal surrounding the Freedom Party’s then-leader.

The Austrian People’s Party came in second with 26.3% and the center-left Social Democrats

...every time you hear the phrase white people, white supremacy, white anything but paint, you're listening to a Democrat. Ask him/her/it to reimagine something for you; they do that a lot, though not well. They can hear a dog whistle a mile or two away. They invented the spoils system and Tammany Hall, and inspired the addition of the word (Thomas) Nasty to the English language. They want to stop continental drift and repeal the law of unintended side effects...
, post-war Austria’s other traditional big party, were third, with 21.1%.

The Freedom Party’s poll ratings have risen since the election as its rivals struggled and failed to find common ground. Surveys published in December put its support at between 35% and 37%.

Kickl did not address any specific policies for Austria, which is a member of the European Union
...the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, only without the Hapsburgs and the nifty uniforms and the dancing...
but not of NATO
...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. It's headquartered in Belgium. That sez it all....
, in his lengthy statement to news hounds. He took no questions.

The Freedom Party is part of a right-wing populist alliance in the European Parliament, Patriots for Europe, which includes the parties of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and of the Netherlands’ Geert Wilders, whose party dominates the Netherlands’ new government.

Nehammer has said he will step down on Friday. It is not clear who will serve as interim chancellor while Kickl explores a possible coalition.

Link

Europe

Taqiyya: the West should know better

2024-12-27

[Giulio Meotti, Arutz 7] Anyone who went to a European Christmas market in the 1990s and early 2000s would never have thought that their life could be in danger. Those days are gone.

In October we discovered that the killer who murdered the children in Southport, England, was not a slightly crazy Rwandan Christian refugee, as the English government and all the mainstream media had assured us, but a terrorist with an Al Qaeda manual in his house and chemical material to make a bomb.

That was the work of Axel Rudakubana —more fully Axel Muganwa Rudakubana — the Wales-born, Moslem son of Christian immigrants from Rwanda who fell prey to previously undiagnosed Sudden Jihad Syndrome and attacked a girls’ Taylor Swift dance party in Southport with a knife …

For four months they kept the truth hidden. Why?

And who remembers the "Christian kamikaze", Emad Al Swealmeen, the name of the Liverpool attacker? "Enzo Almeni," as his friends called him, was an asylum seeker with a Syrian father and Iraqi mother who had changed his name to sound "more Western" and had faked a conversion to Christianity to hide his identity and motives. He wanted to attack the cathedral.

Instead, the Mother of Satan (TATP) and ball bearing bomb that he’d worked on for seven months went off while he was locked in a taxi outside a Liverpool maternity hospital, the quick-witted cab driver having jumped out when he realized the thing was about to kaboom.

Now we have the Saudi doctor who killed 5 people at a Christmas market in the city of Magdeburg, central Germany.

There is now discussion about the identity of the attacker, a Saudi doctor who claimed to have abandoned Islam, Taleb Al Abdulmohsen. And so the morning after the massacre we woke up to a sea of idiocies based on his statements that he is a "former Muslim". Why an attack on a Christmas market in Magdeburg against Christians?

The dear doctor was pro-Hamas. Many former Muslims who knew him assure us that he never gave up Islam and that he cheated the West to be given asylum.

Did he practice taqiya, which is an Islamic practice that allows believers to deceive the enemy, pretend to be something else, in order to carry out Jihad?

The Saudis had warned the Germans that Taleb was dangerous.

A few months ago in Annecy, France, a man from Syria terrorized a park by stabbing several children. An asylum seeker who was first accepted as such in Sweden ten years ago pretending to be an atheist, Christian or homosexual to obtain asylum is a common phenomenon. The attacker in Annecy with the knife claimed to be Christian and was wearing a cross. The Syrian was in fact a former member of Bashar al-Assad's army who then joined ISIS before seeking and obtaining political asylum in Europe.

He went by Abdelmasih Hanoun — "Abdelmasih" means "Slave of Christ” — and had lived for a decade in Sweden with official refugee status and a Swedish wife, but left when his citizenship application was denied and his wife divorced him. France denied his asylum application days before the attack because he was already approved in Sweden. He was subsequently identified as Selwan Majd, a Moslem refugee from Hasakah, Syria.

Everyone knew that no Christian could blow himself up inside a cathedral, just as no Christian would stab children at random in a dance class and no ex-Muslim would attack a Christmas market in Magdeburg.

So my greatest fear is that taqiya has made incredible and chilling progress in the West.

In August it came out that one of the terrorists who wanted to carry out a massacre at the Taylor Swift concert in Vienna worked for a company that provides services at concerts.

In England they have just arrested a police officer for supporting Hamas.

In the Netherlands, police officers are no longer required to enforce laws protecting Jews, or to provide them equal treatment. So some stand by when Jews or their property are attacked; some join in.

Mickaël Harpon, the perpetrator of the massacre at the Paris Prefecture that cost the lives of four police officers, was a police officer in charge of anti-terrorism in one of the most protected places in France. The computer 007 was was hired by a department whose priorities included the fight against "terrorism, particularly radical Islamism." Harpon had secretly converted to Islam.

Joined the police in 2003, converted to Islam in 2008, upset colleagues by defending the Al Qaeda Charlie Hebdo massacre in 2015. He and his wife exchanged almost three dozen Islamist text messages shortly before he ran amok with two knives. The wife was released without charge after questioning in the gallant French way.

Jean-Baptiste Salvaing, deputy commander of the judicial police, and his partner Jessica Schneider, a secretary at a police station, were killed in their home in Magnanville by an Islamist. Some time later, police investigating a woman for suspected links to ISIS made a shocking discovery: the woman had a USB that contained the personal details of thousands of French police officers.

Like the sensational news that the bodyguard assigned to Geert Wilders had been completely replaced after a police officer of Muslim origin, Faris, had passed sensitive information on the Dutch politician to gangs.

Remember how US Army Major Nidal Hasan, shouting "Allahu Akbar," killed 13 colleagues at the Fort Hood base in Texas? Who suspected him?

Numerous people reported his suspicious utterances. The chain of command somehow managed to be shocked when he tried to kill everyone.

The loss of border control is being followed by the loss of internal control. But worse still is the loss of control over one’s own identity. One thing is clear: parallel societies are growing in Europe. The authorities and the public have no idea.

The sooner we come to terms with our false conscience and reassuring lies, the sooner we will know how to defend ourselves. Alternatively, we can only say a prayer for the dead, dead because of the recklessness of a Western political and cultural class that every year doubles the stakes in a crazy experiment that can only end in a suicide.

Link

Europe

Pro-Palestinian group files war crimes complaint against new IDF attaché in Brussels

2024-12-04

[IsraelTimes] Belgium-based Hind Rajab Foundation claims Col. Moshe Tetro implemented policy of starvation as head of COGAT in Gaza; IDF rejects allegations, says ‘Tetro is highly respected’

A pro-Paleostinian, anti-Israel group in Belgium reportedly filed a complaint to the Belgian government against Israel’s new military attaché in Brussels, accusing him of war crimes.

Belgium’s Phlegmish-language De Morgen newspaper reported on Tuesday that the Brussels-based Hind Rajab Foundation

…named after a six year old child who died in Gaza City, for which the organization blames the IDF. The foundation is a project launched in two months ago by the March 30 Movement, itself named in memory of the Palestinian general strike on that date in 1976 in the West Bank against the Israeli government, since referred to as Land Day. Both groups are lawfare boiler rooms generating endless laswsuits against Israelis and those who support Israel in Western Europe and elsewhere, and between times propagandizing against Israel using the currently fashionable far left shibboleths. The March 30 appear to be the work of lawyer Haroon Raza, and appeared on the scene at the end of 2023…

claimed that in his previous position, Col. Moshe Tetro was responsible for implementing a policy of starvation in Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with a rusty iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about oppression and disproportionate response...
Other foreign news outlets reported that the pro-Paleostinian organization also referred Tetro to the International Criminal Court, which filed arrest warrants for Prime Minster Benjamin Netanyahu and former defense minister Yoav Gallant.

Tetro previously served as head of COGAT’s Coordination and Liaison Administration to Gaza, the IDF unit responsible for coordinating aid into the Strip.

"Here we are dealing with a key figure in the implementation of Israeli policy toward hospitals and the strategy of famine and thirst as a weapon of war," Dyab Abou Jahjah, chairman of the Hind Rajab Foundation, told De Morgen.

Israel denies accusations of limiting aid to Gaza and says shortages are due to the inability of international organizations to distribute aid and looting by Hamas
Hamas

..not a terrorist organization, even though it kidnaps people, holds hostages, and tries to negotiate by executing them,...
and armed gangs.

Israeli Ambassador to Belgium Idit Rosenzweig-Abu told De Morgen that Israel rejects the accusations. "Israel acts according to international law," she said.

She also said Tetro is a decorated and respected officer and noted that Belgium had no problem accepting him as military attaché.

According to the Kan public broadcaster, an Israeli source said that the Hind Rajab Foundation is "obsessive" and has filed "dozens of complaints against officers in The Hague, Brussels, and other places around the world. The head of the organization, Diab Abu Gajjah, is Lebanese, and has previously justified the September 11 attacks."

The source added that Israel’s military attaché has diplomatic immunity in Belgium.

The IDF’s Spokesperson’s Unit said that "Colonel Moshe Tetro is a highly respected and distinguished officer," and that "as with every mission and assignment, the IDF takes all necessary steps to ensure the safety and security of its personnel and officers."

"The IDF strongly rejects allegations of war crimes and reiterates that the IDF’s activities are carried out in accordance with the instructions of the political echelon and in compliance with international law," the military added.

Israel has repeatedly rejected accusations that a policy of starvation is being implemented in Gaza, claiming it has allowed hundreds of thousands of tons of aid, including food, into the enclave.

Link

Europe

Despite threats and a ban, 2000 Christians and Jews celebrate Israel in Amsterdam

2024-11-30

[IsraelTimes] Some 2,000 pro-Israel protesters gathered outside Amsterdam’s city hall on Thursday night after Mayor Femke Halsema nixed the originally planned rally in the capital’s Dam Square, reportedly concerned that the site could not be properly secured.

The central Dam Square is where pro-Paleostinian and anti-Israel demonstrations have taken place with greater frequency over the last few weeks following the ~~violent~~ mostly peaceful attacks on Maccabi Tel Aviv supporters on November 7 — though with far fewer attendees than Thursday evening’s pro-Israel crowd.

"This is how ’never again’ becomes ’yet again,’ by taking rights away from Jews bit by bit," said Jewish former politician Rob Oudkerk. "’Yet again’ is Mayor Halsema, who bans us from Dam Square."

Several speakers bitterly complained of what they called Halsema’s unwillingness to protect Jews in the heart of the city.

The city’s "security triangle" — consisting of the mayor, the local chief of police and Amsterdam’s chief public prosecutor — had banned the gathering, saying that the safety of the pro-Israel protesters could not be guaranteed after antisemitic riots earlier this month.

Israeli officials said 10 people were maimed in the November 7 violence, perpetrated by Arab and Moslem gangs against visiting and local fans of the Maccabi Tel Aviv soccer club after a match against Amsterdam’s Ajax. Hundreds more Israelis huddled in their hotels for hours, fearing they could be attacked. Many said that Dutch security forces were nowhere to be found as the Israeli tourists were ambushed by gangs of masked assailants who shouted pro-Paleostinian and anti-Israel slogans while they hunted, beat and harassed them.

Led by Christians For Israel, some 20 Protestant and Jewish organizations at first rejected the security triangle’s decision to prohibit pro-Israel demonstrators from gathering at Dam Square, but finally agreed on the alternative location.

Solidarity with Israel and Dutch Jews was shown in a celebratory fashion by the protesters next to the "Stopera" (Amsterdam’s city hall doubles as an opera house), a stone’s throw away from a large statue of Baruch Spinoza, Holland’s most influential philosopher.

Small groups of counter-protesters — not more than a few dozen — were kept away from the largely Christian crowd that had come to the Dutch capital mainly from small and mid-sized towns in what is known as Holland’s Bible belt. There they were joined by Jewish citizens from Amsterdam and other sympathizers.

"My savior [Jesus Christ] was a Jew, the apostles were Jews, the Bible is a Jewish book. Antisemitism and anti-Zionism are deeply anti-Christian," said Protestant minister Klaas-Jelle Kaptein, from the island fishing town of Urk.

In a speech, Yanki Jacobs, a local Chabad rabbi, asked if there was a future for Dutch Jews in light of recent events. "My answer is, if there is a future for the Netherlands, there is a future for Jews in the Netherlands," he said. "If Dutch society has enough strength to fight hatred, my answer is a resounding ’yes.’ But we need people who speak out."

Addressing the crowd directly, Jacobs said, "That is what you are doing and I am grateful to you."

The crowd was a sea of Israeli flags and signs saying "Never again." One banner read "Stop Jew hunters," referring to the phrase "Jew hunt" used in social media groups by some perpetrators of the November 7 attacks here.

A group from Urk carried a banner saying, "Benjamin Netanyahu, welcome on Urk," mocking a statement by Dutch Foreign Affairs Minister Casper Veldkamp in which he announced that the Netherlands would comply with the recently issued ICC warrant against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for alleged war crimes and arrest him were he to land on Dutch soil.

Veldkamp, a former ambassador in Tel Aviv, was then harshly criticized when a day later he received and shook hands with Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi.

Last week, a planned trip to Israel by Veldkamp was canceled in "mutual agreement" with the Israeli government, according to the Dutch Foreign Affairs Ministry in The Hague. But Jerusalem maintains that Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar unilaterally canceled the trip after Veldkamp’s endorsement of the ICC warrant.

Geert Wilders, leader of the largest coalition party, the far-right Party for Freedom, said Veldkamp’s meeting with Araghchi while "Netanyahu is taboo" was "hypocritical."

Notably, at Thursday evening’s protest against antisemitism, many Persian flags were flown by opponents of the Islamist regime in Tehran who expressed their solidarity with Israel.

The most emotional speech of the night came from Holocaust survivor Deborah Maarsen-Laufer. Born in February 1942, she was the youngest survivor of the Ravensbruck Nazi concentration camp.

"Borrie," as Maarsen is affectionately known in the Dutch Jewish community, referred to the three minutes of speaking time the organizers had given her.

"A lot can happen in three minutes. Three minutes were enough for the Nazis to take my parents, my sisters and me from our house 80 years ago. On October 7, three minutes were enough to turn a place where young people danced into hell. And three minutes were also enough for youths on scooters to hunt for Jews in our Mokum," she said, using the traditional nickname for Amsterdam that has roots in the Hebrew word "makom," meaning place.

"In these historic antisemitic times in which part of the people assume a passive-aggressive attitude [to Jews] or looks away, it is priceless that another part refuses to do so and shows its unreserved affection," Lenny Kuhr, the Dutch Jewish winner of the 1969 Eurovision contest, told The Times of Israel.

Kuhr has become a more and more vocal defender of Israel after a theater in the city of Leiden banned her from performing in March, claiming that "people like her openly support genocide." The performer, whose two daughters live in Israel with their families, sang part of her recently written song "Light" for the crowd.

A group of some 15 keffiyeh-wearing and mostly masked counter-protesters yelled "Zionism down" from the other side of the River Amstel that gives the Dutch capital its name, trying to reach the protest by claiming to coppers that they were part of it "as vehement opponents of antisemitism."

Police, some on horseback, quickly surrounded and later dispersed the group, as they did with other small anti-Israel groups and individuals at the beginning of the demonstration. Halsema had banned a larger counter-protest after far left and Moslem youths attacked pro-Israeli Christians at a commemoration of the October 7, 2023 massacre in Israel.

Groups of Moslem youths were not seen at the site of the protest, however, and confrontations between far-left counter-protesters and police remained mostly non~~violent~~ mostly peaceful. The pro-Israel crowd was largely well-behaved, and hundreds thanked coppers as they left for the busses that waited in Amsterdam’s outskirts to take them back to their towns.

As two men wearing Israeli flags left the square in front of the Stopera, one told The Times of Israel he was a refugee from Aleppo, Syria. David, born Dawud, said he converted to Christianity after arriving in the Netherlands in 2014.

"I am here to support Jewish people, they are the nation of God," David said, adding one message for the citizens of Israel’s neighbor states: "Love, not hate!"

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Europe

The world has gone mad. I am proud to meet my friend @netanyahu soon in Israel

2024-11-23

[X]

Imagine you lead a democratic nation heavily under attack, facing an existential threat.

Many of your people are slaughtered and raped and taken hostage by Islamic terrorists.

You defend your nation and people and rightfully try to eradicate the barbaric terrorists - who hide…
— Geert Wilders (@geertwilderspvv) November 22, 2024

…who hide in hospitals and schools - to never let it happen again.

And instead of receiving international understanding and support you are confronted with an arrest warrant.

The world has gone mad.

I am proud to meet my friend
@netanyahu
soon in Israel.

Link

Europe

Dutch PM Dick Schoof: Prosecute Jew Hunters as terrorists, antisemitism justifies stripping Dutch citizenship

2024-11-19

Geert Wilders is celebrating today's major victory, announcing that Prime Minister Dick Schoof has confirmed the Public Prosecution Service can now prosecute those responsible for the “Jew Hunt” in Amsterdam as terrorists. This means that upon conviction, these jihadis can be… pic.twitter.com/0hG9M7Zw56
— The Jewish Voice (@TJVNEWS) November 17, 2024

…these jihadis can be stripped of their Dutch citizenship, and no new law is required. But it gets even better. The government is now considering adding antisemitism as a direct, specific reason to revoke nationality. (Jihadis across the Netherlands are panicking) Wilders calls this “fantastic news,” as it directly supports his unwavering push for harsher consequences—including deportation and revocation of citizenship of dual nationals —for those hunting Jews in the Netherlands.

Above Geert Wilders Demands Removal of Dutch Passports for Moroccan 'Jew-Hunting' Rioters: 'This is Terror, Plain and Simple'

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Europe

Who attacked Israelis in Amsterdam? Some Dutch politicians can’t bring themselves to say

2024-11-18

[IsraelTimes] Victims, Israeli officials, some Dutch leaders blamed local Arab and Muslim gangs; others in Holland refer to ‘youths on scooters’ and ‘taxi drivers,’ highlight Israeli hooliganism

As the controversy over references to the religion and ethnicity of the scores of mostly young people who attacked Maccabi Tel Aviv soccer fans in Amsterdam on November 7 rocks the nation and even threatened to bring down the ruling coalition on Friday, two political debates on the subject were held in the past few days — one in the capital and one in the seat of parliament.

The first debate, dominated by left-wing parties, was held in the Amsterdam city council on Tuesday. The other took place the following day in the Second Chamber, the main body of the Dutch national parliament in The Hague.

In Amsterdam’s city hall (dubbed the Stopera, since it doubles as an opera house), with the help of center-left, far-left, and Islamist parties, Mayor Femke Halsema easily survived a no-confidence vote requested by right-wing opposition party JA21.

At that debate, the religious and ethnic backgrounds of the youths who attacked Israeli fans in the streets of the Dutch capital were mentioned only by a handful of center-right and right-leaning council members. There were frequent references, however, to genocide in Gaza and Islamophobia as causes for the unrest in the capital — though no Muslims were targeted in Amsterdam before, during, or after the attacks.

Israeli officials said 10 people were injured in the November 7 violence carried out by local Arab and Muslim gangs against Maccabi Tel Aviv fans, after a soccer match in the city. Hundreds more Israelis huddled in their hotels for hours, fearing they could be attacked. Many said that Dutch security forces were nowhere to be found, as the Israeli tourists were ambushed by gangs of masked assailants who shouted pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel slogans while they hunted, beat and harassed them.

One councilwoman, Nilad Ahmadi of the far-left and staunchly anti-Zionist party Vonk (meaning “Spark”), blamed Israel’s Mossad intelligence agency for the violence.

Overall, even though some council members warned against open antisemitism and were apprehensive about the fate of Dutch Jews, the blame was squarely shifted toward purported Maccabi Tel Aviv hooligans. This fits the narrative of the country’s major newspapers and television stations in the last few days, as well as remarks by Amsterdam police chief Peter Holla.

Similarly, a preliminary police timeline extensively referred to the “provocations” of Maccabi Tel Aviv supporters — most notably the removal of a Palestinian flag from the façade of a house in Amsterdam’s city center and the chanting of racist slogans including “Fuck the Arabs” on the way to the game versus local club Ajax.

Since the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led massacre in southern Israel and subsequent conflict in Gaza, desecrating Israeli flags at protests has become a common occurrence in the Dutch capital.

Flags for me but not for thee, O Cancer Joooos.

The emphasis on provocations, hate speech, and violence on the Israeli side is in stark contrast with initial reports by the mayor and local law enforcement. These clearly laid the blame on those who were labeled “youths on scooters” and “taxi drivers” who carried out “hit-and-run” attacks on individuals or small groups of Maccabi Tel Aviv supporters.

These terms are widely seen as euphemisms that avoid mentioning the ethnic or religious background of the perpetrators of the violence, or the scale and organization of what many in the Dutch-Jewish community have dubbed a “pogrom.”

“I don’t think their mode of transportation or job description is the defining aspect of these groups,” Kevin Kreuger, a council member for JA21, told The Times of Israel. “There was clearly an Islamic motive behind the attacks.”

Kreuger lamented the unwillingness to name the attackers by their background and motive, which he described as “Jew-hatred driven by Islam.”

“Everybody saw the videos, heard the attackers speak Arabic. It’s like they are a group we need to feel sorry for and protect,” Kreuger said.

MEANWHILE, BACK AT THE HAGUE
The debate in the Dutch parliament concentrated on rising antisemitism within the country’s sizeable Muslim minority and the radical left, as progressive parties blamed “extreme right-wing provocations” for the violence rocking the capital.

Dilan Yesilgoz, leader of the center-right liberal party, brings a unique perspective to the events in Amsterdam. She served as justice and security minister under former prime minister Mark Rutte, fought antisemitism as an MP, and started her political career on the Amsterdam city council.

Yesilgoz was born in Ankara and is the daughter of Turkish immigrants. Like Kreuger, she noticed a tendency among left-leaning parties to avoid mentioning the ethnic or religious background of the attackers of November 7.

“It’s bad enough that Jewish institutions like schools and synagogues need to be protected, but now youths are demanding to see citizens’ papers to check if they are Israeli or Jewish. If they are, they get beaten up,” Yesilgoz told The Times of Israel.

“This is an absolute low point for Amsterdam and an example of bad integration of migrants into Dutch society. The attackers were probably of Moroccan background, and police are investigating this,” she claimed.

Yesilgoz said such tiptoeing around identity has been a frustrating experience throughout her career.

“I can speak freely about antisemitism among the extreme left and right, but as soon as I mention Islam as a motive, everybody freezes up and starts talking about exclusion and Islamophobia,” said Yesilgoz. “But how can you fight the problem if you’re not allowed to talk about it?”

Moroccan-born Nora Achahbar quit on Friday as junior finance minister after prominent ministers accused Dutch youths of Moroccan descent of attacking the Israeli fans, local media NOS cited sources in the cabinet session as saying. “Achahbar reportedly indicated then that she, as a minister, had objections to certain language used by her colleagues,” NOS stated.

The new center-right Dutch government has, however, announced that it wants to treat violent antisemitic assaults as terrorism, which under Dutch law makes it possible to strip the perpetrators of their Dutch citizenship as long as they own a passport from a different country. This can have an impact on the country’s many Moroccan immigrants and even their children and grandchildren.

WHEELS OF JUSTICE BEGIN TO TURN
On Tuesday night, the images of five youths who “committed the most serious violence” during the attacks were shown on Dutch television for the first time — albeit with their faces blurred to give them a chance to come forward on their own. Two were subsequently taken into custody; unblurred pictures of the other three were then made public by the police.

Dutch police said Sunday they were probing 45 people for violent crimes in relation to the attacks, with nine of them already identified and arrested.

It became clear very soon after the attacks that their instigation was to a large extent premeditated, as messages in several WhatsApp groups associated with the attackers instigated violence, even describing a “Jew hunt.”

Even before November 7, street gangs of largely third-generation Moroccan immigrants were notoriously quick to commit acts of violence against police, members of the LGBTQ community, and occasionally what is known in the Netherlands as “visible Jews” (Dutch links). Because there are few ultra-Orthodox Jews in the Netherlands, verbal and physical violence is often directed at rabbis, who can be recognized as Jewish by their mode of dress.

Unlike the Islamist perpetrators of terror from earlier in the century — most infamously Mohammed Bouyeri, the murderer of Islam-critic Theo van Gogh — these current street gangs are generally not politically educated or especially religious (Dutch link). Preliminary reports do not indicate any foreign hand in the violence, and it is not expected that investigations will find a sophisticated level of organization or financing for the attacks.

However, the ongoing war in Gaza has likely only increased antisemitism that, according to several research projects (Dutch link) over the last few decades, is much more common in Muslim families than in other Dutch religious and ethnic groups.

Many Moroccan households receive their news on the Israel-Hamas conflict through satellite television stations in North Africa and the Middle East. Teachers in the Netherlands’s bigger cities often find it difficult to speak neutrally about the wars in Gaza and Lebanon to their Muslim students, who in some areas of Amsterdam form a majority in their classrooms.

Although the city was home to the famous young Holocaust diarist Anne Frank before she perished at the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in Germany, history teachers frequently find themselves unable to teach lessons on the Holocaust because of racist and sometimes aggressive reactions by their students.

LOCAL JEWS NEXT?
David Beesemer, chairman of Maccabi Netherlands and Europe, says Dutch Jews are “gravely concerned” that they will be targeted next.

“Now that there are no Israelis to hunt in Amsterdam, what will stop this horde from marching into Buitenveldert?” he asked, referring to an affluent Amsterdam suburb with a large number of Jews.

Beesemer was one of the community leaders who overnight on November 7-8 organized “rescue missions” to evacuate stranded Israelis from the city center and take them to safe houses and the airport, where they were repatriated by planes that were especially sent from Israel.

“Every day we are contacted by scared members of the community who feel like they are living a nightmare,” said Beesemer. “Community leaders are trying to keep a brave face, but the pressure on Dutch Jews is enormous. The day after the ‘hunt,’ hateful protests continued, as did the Gestapo-like ID-checks and assaults.”

Even as late as Wednesday last week, Dutch police detained 281 anti-Israel, pro-Palestinian protesters rallying in central Amsterdam in defiance of a ban imposed after violence against Israeli soccer fans. Dozens of demonstrators, some with Palestinian flags, chanted “Amsterdam is saying no to genocide” and “Free Palestine.”

“It’s a disgrace that the city of Anne Frank has become world news because of violent antisemitism and the city council’s priority seems to be to blame Israelis or the government in The Hague,” said Yesilgoz, leader of the center-right liberal party. “Damn it, I’m a citizen of Amsterdam. Show me you can and want to guarantee my safety. Show us at least that you care.”

Link

Europe

45 people being probed for violent crimes against Israeli soccer fans in Amsterdam

2024-11-18

[IsraelTimes] Dutch police say 9 people have been identified and arrested; number of suspects still expected to increase, based on analysis of security footage

Dutch police said Sunday they were probing 45 people for ~~violent~~ mostly peaceful crimes in relation to violence against Israeli soccer fans following a match in Amsterdam earlier this month, with nine of them already identified and arrested.

"Because of the seriousness of the crimes, but also because of the social impact, we immediately scaled up to a special investigation team," Dutch police chief Janny Knol said in a statement.

Police are "looking at all crimes committed in the run-up to the game and in its aftermath," Knol said after violence in the Dutch capital before and after the Europa League match between Dutch club Ajax Amsterdam and Maccabi Tel Aviv on November 7 shook the country, resulting in several protests and a near-government collapse.

The number of suspects is expected to increase "based in part on the analysis of a large amount of footage," police added.

Israeli officials said 10 people were maimed in the Thursday night violence carried out by local Arab and Moslem gangs against Maccabi Tel Aviv soccer fans.

Hundreds more Israelis huddled in their hotels for hours, fearing they could be attacked. Many said that Dutch security forces were nowhere to be found, as the Israeli tourists were ambushed by gangs of masked assailants who shouted pro-Paleostinian and anti-Israel slogans, while they hunted, beat and harassed them.

After the game, youths on scooters engaged in "hit-and-run" assaults on Maccabi fans, Dutch officials said. Some social media posts had included calls to "hunt Jews," according to police.

Prime Minister Dick Schoof said the attacks amounted to "unadulterated antisemitism."

Amsterdam police chief Peter Holla said that, before the match, Maccabi fans burned a Paleostinian flag, attacked a taxi and chanted anti-Arab slogans. Footage of the incidents was also widely circulated on social media.

"The investigation is in full swing," Knol said on Sunday.

"It goes without saying, but I think it is good to emphasize that we are looking at all crimes committed in the run-up to the game and in its aftermath. Regardless of who the perpetrator or who the victim was," Knoll added.

Moslem rights groups condemned the antisemitism, but have argued that the violence in Amsterdam was not one-sided.

Schoof last week blamed the violence on people with "migrant backgrounds."

On Friday night, Schoof’s right-wing government coalition narrowly avoided collapse with crisis talks after junior minister Nora Achahbar resigned over alleged racist comments made by cabinet colleagues relating to the attacks.

The coalition is led by the anti-Moslem populist PVV of Geert Wilders, which came top in a general election a year ago. It was installed in July after months of tense negotiations.

Wilders has repeatedly said Dutch youth of Moroccan descent were the main attackers of the Israeli fans, although police have given no details about the background of the suspects.

Wilders last Wednesday blamed Moroccans for attacks on Israeli soccer fans, claiming that "we saw Moslems hunting Jews" and added it was fueled by "Moroccans who want to destroy Jews." He said those convicted of involvement should be deported if they have dual nationality.

Schoof strongly denied the allegations.
No, no! Certainly not!
of racism among coalition members and tried to allay concerns following emergency talks.

Addressing "the incidents in Amsterdam last week," Schoof said: "There is a lot of upheaval in the country. It was an emotional week, a heavy week and a lot has been said and a lot happened."

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