Found buried on page 12 Friday

[southsider2k5]

As I was reading the weekend papers to catch up on the days I didn't have time last week I came accross something interesting. I have seen the arguement made that if they hate our freedom, why aren't they attacking people like the Dutch who argueably have more freedom than we do. Well guess what, Al Qaeda is alive and well there too. Government officials are on hit lists, mosques are getting torched, threats are being made, terror attacks are being planned, freedom is in danger, people are scared, and its all in Holland.

 

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationw...,1,212669.story

 

Islamic radicalism touches nerve in easygoing Dutch

Lawmakers on hit lists; mosques, churches attacked; 150 suspected jihadists at large under the justice system--it's life after the death of Theo van Gogh

 

By Sebastian Rotella

Tribune Newspapers: Los Angeles Times

Published November 26, 2004

 

AMSTERDAM -- Geert Wilders is on the run.

 

He can't go home. He doesn't show his face in public. Six police officers track his every step.

 

Wilders is not a fugitive but a prominent Dutch legislator. The threat of assassination by Islamic extremists has forced him and several other politicians into hiding, while about 150 men identified by police as hard-core jihadists remain free.

 

"I have stayed in five different safe houses," Wilders said recently. "It's a life you don't wish on your worst enemy. Meanwhile, they are still walking the streets of the Netherlands because the police can't arrest them. There is not enough evidence.

 

"I say that those who choose to kill our democracy with radical, fascistic Islamic ideas don't deserve the rights of our democracy. Once again we will have to wait until something else terrible happens before we do anything."

 

The Nov. 2 killing of director Theo van Gogh, whose latest film had denounced mistreatment of women in Muslim communities, set off a wave of arson attacks against mosques and churches. Police rounded up an accused terrorist cell whose youthful members trained in Pakistan and planned to kill Dutch leaders, including Wilders and feminist legislator Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the writer of van Gogh's film.

 

In a society built on consensus, permissiveness and generous social policy, the turmoil has been "un-Dutch," in the words of Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende. And as Europe struggles with change driven by immigration, Islam and demographics, it is a hint of potential strife ahead.

 

The attack and its aftermath have fed a widespread sentiment that the Dutch have been too soft for too long. But Muslim advocates blame rising radicalism on reluctance to accept them--especially young men of Moroccan descent--as true Dutch citizens.

 

"It's amazing that these kinds of things escalated as they have," said Ayham Tonca, 40, a Turkish immigrant leader. "There is a great fear of Islam in Holland. But on the other side, the Muslim community is also afraid. You have two groups who are afraid and who don't speak to each other. And that's not good for the society."

 

Police in other countries worry about a spillover effect. The van Gogh plotters allegedly had ties to the Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group, an Al Qaeda-linked movement trying to unleash jihad in Europe while sending fighters to Iraq.

 

The slaying connects to suicide bombings in Casablanca, Morocco, last year; train bombings that killed 191 people in Madrid in March; and a plot to attack Spain's anti-terrorist court that was foiled last month, investigators say.

 

Young and violent

 

The youth and ferocity of the Dutch-born suspects stunned this tranquil society. During a daylong standoff Nov. 10 that shut down a neighborhood in The Hague, Ismail Akhnikh and Jason Walters allegedly barricaded themselves in an apartment and hurled a grenade that wounded three police officers. A SWAT team captured them after shooting Walters in the shoulder.

 

Walters is 19. His brother, Jermaine, who also was jailed, is 17. Born to a black military man from South Carolina and his Dutch wife, they grew up here and converted to Islam.

 

Jason Walters and Akhnikh trained to be terrorists last year at a secret camp in Pakistan, investigators say, positing that the existence of the camp shows that Islamic networks are recovering from the loss of Al Qaeda camps that drew thousands of recruits to Afghanistan.

 

The radicalized teenagers combine primitive fundamentalism with a kind of street-gang swagger that makes them especially volatile, investigators say.

 

"There's no age limit," an investigator said. "If they feel the need to go for jihad, they go. We know there are camps in Pakistan, and people are going to them."

 

The raw recruits were allegedly molded into a cell by an experienced jihadist named Redouan Issar, 43, now a fugitive. Issar is a military veteran and a Syrian, like many clerics who have influenced the Moroccan network.

 

Police detained Issar, Jason Walters and two others in October 2003 after Spanish police found their names during a raid in Barcelona, Spain. Although one 18-year-old had bombmaking materials, and Spanish authorities warned of a plot in the works, Dutch prosecutors released them for lack of evidence, Spanish investigators say.

 

Suspects scoff at laws

 

This summer, the Dutch also were unable for lack of evidence to hold suspects from Issar's group who were suspected of plotting an attack on the European soccer championships in Portugal.

 

Police wiretaps in Europe have recorded terrorist suspects scoffing that local laws are lax, according to investigators and court documents. Critics say Islamic networks grew in the Netherlands as other countries got tougher after the Sept. 11 attacks in the United States.

 

Dutch anti-terrorist prosecutions, however, have foundered because judges threw out evidence collected by intelligence agents.

 

The government has been criticized for failing to anticipate the actions of van Gogh's accused assassin, Mohammed Bouyeri, who became known to authorities about two years ago. The 26-year-old of Moroccan descent was born in the Netherlands, received good grades in school and even wrote an article in a community publication extolling interfaith brotherhood in 2002. But he allegedly slid into criminal and extremist circles.

 

Spurred by the van Gogh backlash, the government has proposed initiatives to beef up anti-terrorist laws, ban foreign imams and deport extremists. Wilders, who in September left a mainstream center-right party to form his own movement, says his Internet site has received 15,000 supportive e-mails and 200,000 hits, up from 34,000 hits before the assassination. He intends to keep speaking his mind and calling for tougher policies on immigration and Islamic fundamentalism.

 

"It's the end of democracy," he said, "if the answer to argument is bullets and knives."

[mreye]

But I thought it was because of our actions throughout the world. :rolly

[LowerCaseRepublican]

Theo Van Gogh was kind of a douche. He had a book "Allah Knows Best" which was basically mocking Islam throughout the entire book.

 

Van Gogh created the 10-minute movie "Submission". The film is about violence against women in Islamic societies. It shows four abused women, naked under see-through dresses with Qur'anic verses in Arabic unfavourable to women, painted on their bodies. After the movie was released, both van Gogh and Hirsi Ali received death threats. Van Gogh did not take these very seriously and refused any protection.

 

As a newspaper columnist, he was known for being provocative and politically incorrect. He caused resentment in the Moroccan community by consistently referring to them as "geitenneukers" (goatf***ers), and incurred the wrath of leading members of the Jewish community by making comments about, as he saw it, the Jewish preoccupation with Auschwitz. He was also a staunch supporter of President Bush, and the American-led invasion of Iraq.

[southsider2k5]

Theo Van Gogh was kind of a douche.  He had a book "Allah Knows Best" which was basically mocking Islam throughout the entire book.

 

Van Gogh created the 10-minute movie "Submission". The film is about violence against women in Islamic societies. It shows four abused women, naked under see-through dresses with Qur'anic verses in Arabic unfavourable to women, painted on their bodies. After the movie was released, both van Gogh and Hirsi Ali received death threats. Van Gogh did not take these very seriously and refused any protection.

 

As a newspaper columnist, he was known for being provocative and politically incorrect. He caused resentment in the Moroccan community by consistently referring to them as "geitenneukers" (goatf***ers), and incurred the wrath of leading members of the Jewish community by making comments about, as he saw it, the Jewish preoccupation with Auschwitz. He was also a staunch supporter of President Bush, and the American-led invasion of Iraq.

To be honest without seeing much to read about the guy, he seemed kinda like the Dutch Michael Moore/Rush who would say things just to get a reaction. I was definately much more struck by the societal paralells to the US, and the Dutch didn't invade anyone. Yet there they are just as scared and under attack as US citizens.

[LowerCaseRepublican]

To be honest without seeing much to read about the guy, he seemed kinda like the Dutch Michael Moore/Rush who would say things just to get a reaction.  I was definately much more struck by the societal paralells to the US, and the Dutch didn't invade anyone.  Yet there they are just as scared and under attack as US citizens.

Plus the Dutch are part of the "Coalition of the Willing" as well for the Iraq war. So that might go somewhat into explaining why the events happened.