2nd Largest Netherlands City Falls to Muslim Mayor~Video

The slow suicide of the West continues. Muslim communities are forming across the Netherlands, and Sharia Law is slowly taking hold.



None of this apparently matters though, as the government has appointed a Muslim mayor.

Unifying Dutch city falls to Muslim mayor
In Rotterdam, where cultural and social divides are apparent, the burden of bridging them now belongs to Morocco-born Ahmed Aboutaleb. How he fares could matter beyond his city's borders.

Reporting from Rotterdam, Netherlands - The veiled women clutch their children's hands as they scurry past the liquor store, ignoring rows of vodka bottles on their way to the Muslim butcher's next door.

Across the street, male customers emerge from the Climax sex shop with their purchases and quickly stride away without a second glance at the Turkish kebab restaurant just opening for lunch.

The conservative and liberal, religious and secular, Dutch and foreign stand side by side here in Rotterdam, in a contrasting and at times uneasy coexistence where social and cultural middle ground can be elusive.

The job of finding that middle ground has now fallen onto the shoulders of a thoughtful Moroccan-born Muslim who arrived in Rotterdam just nine months ago. His address: the mayor's office.

Ahmed Aboutaleb is the first Muslim immigrant to lead a major Dutch city. The son of an imam, he was appointed mayor of Rotterdam late last year and in January became the official face of the Netherlands' second-largest city.

SNIP

Right-wing politicians demanded that Aboutaleb demonstrate his loyalty by giving up his Moroccan passport (he holds dual nationality). Geert Wilders, the country's most inflammatory public figure, declared that Aboutaleb's appointment was "as ridiculous as appointing a Dutchman as mayor of Mecca."

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But there have been missteps. Critics questioned an official trip Aboutaleb took to Morocco in June, during which he met the country's foreign minister and appeared to step on the toes of the Dutch central government.

In August, a dance party for thousands of beachgoers devolved into pandemonium and brawls in which one man was killed. The mayor, criticized for not assigning enough police officers to patrol the event, ordered a two-year ban on such parties.

SNIP

"My job is to build bridges, and Rotterdam is a good place to do that," he said.

Muslims are great at building bridges, they build them for themselves in an attempt to move towards more land to conquer.


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Netherlands~Arabs Charged Over Anti-Jewish Dutch Cartoon

We all saw how Muslims across the world were calling for the head of the author of the Dutch Mohammad cartoons. Now the tables have been turned on them in the Netherlands and of course they are playing the victim card.

Hat tip to the Wrath.

Arabs charged over Dutch cartoon

An Arab organisation is to be put on trial in the Netherlands over its publication of a cartoon deemed offensive to Jews, prosecutors say.

The cartoon, published by the Arab European League (AEL) on its website, questions the Holocaust.

It said the decision to prosecute illustrated bias against Muslims.

It said the same standards were not applied to the Dutch MP Geert Wilders, who made a film including cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad.

Last month prosecutors said they would not put the far-right MP on trial for distributing the controversial Danish cartoons, which caused a storm of protest after their publication in 2005.

However, he is still being investigated separately for inciting hatred against Muslims by making statements comparing Islam to Nazism.

But Dutch prosecutors said the AEL cartoon was "discriminatory" and "offensive to Jews as a group... because it offends Jews on the basis of their race and/or religion".

The cartoon shows two men standing near a pile of bones at "Auswitch" (sic). One says "I don't think they're Jews".

The other replies: "We have to get to the six million somehow."

A spokeswoman for the prosecuting authority said the group could be fined up to 4,700 euros (£4,100), though in theory a prison sentence was also possible.

'Perverse'

AEL chairman Abdoulmouthalib Bouzerda said the charges proved "what Muslims have been saying for decades".

"Freedom of expression is only a pretext to make life bitter for Muslims... and if [they] try to bring this hypocrisy to light, that right is denied them."

The AEL says it does not deny the facts of the Holocaust but posted the cartoon as an "act of civil disobedience".

It said it had agreed to remove it from its site, but reversed that decision to protest over the failure to prosecute Geert Wilders.

"Double standards are being applied," it said in a statement.

But Jewish groups said it was not reasonable for the group to express its opposition to alleged bias against Muslims, by attacking Jews.

Ronny Naftaniel of the Center for Documentation on Israel, said: "Imagine if Dutch Jews insulted Muslims every time they heard an anti-Semitic remark. What kind of perverse world would we be living in?"

Tensions over the Netherlands' Muslim population have increased in recent years, notably since the killing of a controversial film-maker by a Muslim extremist in 2004.

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Muslim Woman in Netherlands:Sharia Taking Hold

This article presents two opposing viewpoints on whether the Netherlands should allow Sharia Courts like the UK has. The person against the courts is a Muslim woman, while the person in favor of them is non-Muslim Maurits Berger, a so called expert on Sharia. I believe that Mr. Berger should mind his own business here. Things with Islam in the Netherlands are bad enough already.

Hat tip to Matty.

Help Muslims escape the tyranny of sharia law
10 July 2009
Would it be such a terrible thing if sharia courts existed in the Netherlands? Yes, says Nahed Selim, we have to stop giving in to the Islamic fundamentalists. No, says Maurits Berger, we already have Jewish and Catholic 'courts'.

By Nahed Selim
Sharia law in the Netherlands may not be practised in an actual 'sharia court', but that makes little difference. The point is that Islamic rules about marriage, divorce, custody, parental authority, alimony and inheritance are being implemented according to the sharia, and that these contradict Dutch law.

The clearest example of this is polygamy. Marriages are made and dissolved in mosques in the Netherlands, including polygamous marriages. On September 19, 2008, newspaper De Telegraaf reported that 173 men in Amsterdam are registered as having two legal wives, two men even have three wives. A spokesperson for the city of Rotterdam admitted in NRC Handelsblad last year that polygamous marriages are being registered in that city on an almost weekly basis.

It's a pity that the national statistics bureau automatically rejects these marriages because it thinks they're mistakes. Because of this there are no national data about polygamy in the Netherlands. (Non-registered polygamy is probably even much wider-spread.)

The same goes for marriages with underage girls. They are mostly not registered, but sometimes they are. Either way, according to the national statistics bureau they don't exist.

In a way, we already have two parallel legal systems: some things are illegal for non-Muslims but not for Muslims. This is typical of the Dutch attitude towards the Islamisation of Dutch society. Things are happening that the government doesn't know about or doesn't want to know about. They just throw away the statistics, case closed.

Verdicts by imams should not be tolerated by Dutch society even if they happen in the backrooms of mosques. That Catholics and Jews do the same thing, as Berger says, is up to them. Presumably their 'courts' do not impose decapitation for heretics or homosexuals, or condone disobedient wives being beaten up by their husbands.

For everything in sharia law is discriminatory against women: marrying a non-Muslim is not allowed, divorce is not allowed unless the husband agrees to it. The man, for his part, can disown his wife whenever he wants. (A sharia court in Malaysia has ruled that a text message saying 'I disown you' suffices.) If he changes his mind within three months, he can take his wife back. He can do this up to three times. Custody always goes to the father: the mother may raise the children, but he always has the final word.

There are thousands of divorce cases in Islamic countries waiting for a ruling by a sharia court. Needless to say, these are divorces instigated by women. Men don't need the approval of a court in most Islamic countries.

For all these reasons I oppose sharia law in the Netherlands. According to sharia law, a woman is worth only half a man. When she inherits she gets only half what her brother gets. In a court case, her testimony is worth half that of a man.

We can't let this happen in the Netherlands. Mosques practising sharia law should be closed down. The minister claims there is no legal ground to do so, but there is: the European court in Strasbourg on February 13, 2003 ruled that sharia law violates the principles of democracy. The ruling came as a result of an appeals case brought by the banned Turkish Refah party against the Turkish state.

This verdict should provide plenty of legal ground for the Dutch authorities to close down mosques that have effectively introduced sharia law. The European ruling takes precedence over Dutch courts.

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Wilders Party Finishes Second in Dutch Vote!

While we have politicians like Mitt Romney making ignorant statements such as jihad not being part of Islam, Geert Wilder who speaks the truth about Islam has lead his party to a strong second place finish in the Netherlands. The tide is turning.

Poll: Right-wing party second in Dutch Euro vote
By MIKE CORDER

THE HAGUE, Netherlands – A right-wing, stridently anti-Islam Dutch lawmaker's party won more than 15 percent of votes in the country's European Parliament elections Thursday, according to the national broadcaster's exit poll.

The NOS poll predicted the Freedom Party of Geert Wilders will win four of the 25 Dutch seats in the European assembly, one behind the Christian Democrats of Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende.

The exit poll supported pre-vote predictions that right-wing and fringe parties would make gains in many countries, where the economic downturn, cynicism over the union's eastward expansion and worries about relations between Muslims and non-Muslims were expected to fuel a voter backlash against mainstream politicians.

Wilders' party was second only to the Christian Democrats, which got nearly 20 percent of votes, according to the poll.

At a rowdy celebration, he said his party's success was a vote against a sprawling and costly EU — and against the incumbent Dutch coalition led by Balkenende and Labor Party leader Wouter Bos.

"People have had enough of Europe as it is now — a big Europe with Turkey possibly joining — that we spend billions on each year," he said. "I think some people have also had enough of the Balkenende and Bos Cabinet."

Wilders, whose party was contesting European elections for the first time, won support from Protestant and Catholic voters disenchanted with what's perceived as the growing influence of the nation's 800,000 Muslims, many of them immigrants from Morocco and Turkey.

Wilders, creator of a short film that criticizes the Quran as a "fascist book," had urged voters to reject EU involvement in immigration policy and said Turkey should not join the 27-nation bloc.

"Turkey as (an) Islamic country should never be in the EU, not in 10 years, not in a million years," Wilders said after voting.

But Dutch IT manager Olivier van der Post, 40, rejected Wilders' vision.

"I didn't vote for Wilders ... History has shown that if you want prosperity you must open your borders, not close them," he said after voting in Voorburg, a leafy village on the outskirts of The Hague.

Voting was under way in Britain as well, where the far-right British National Party, which bars nonwhite members, was slated to win its first seat. The anti-European United Kingdom Independence Party was also expected to benefit from voter anger at the economic crisis and recent revelations that lawmakers sought public reimbursement for items ranging from horse manure to swimming-pool repairs.

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Geert Wilders Loses Appeal, Will be Prosecuted

Geert Wilders who is the only politician in Europe brave enough to take on Islam is going to trial for speaking the truth about Islam. In the meantime the Netherlands is slowly falling to Islam.

Hat tip to Shona.

Dutch Anti-Islam Lawmaker Loses Bid To Stop Hate Speech Trial

THE HAGUE (AFP)--Far-right Dutch lawmaker Geert Wilders lost a legal bid Wednesday to stop his pending trial for inciting hatred and discrimination against Muslims.

"The attorney general is of the opinion that there are no grounds" for a further appeal, the Dutch Supreme Court said in a statement.

Lawyers for Wilders had sought to overturn a ruling by the Amsterdam Court of Appeals in January that he should be prosecuted for a series of public anti- Muslim statements, particularly for comparing Islam to Nazism.

"It is a political process," Wilders responded in a statement on the Web site of his Freedom Party, or PVV, which has nine out of 150 seats in parliament.

"I am being prosecuted for saying about Islam what millions of Dutch think. Freedom of expression is at risk of being offered at the altar of Islam."

The January appeals court judgment had followed numerous complaints from citizens over the Public Prosecution Service's initial refusal to press charges against Wilders.

Wilders is the maker of a 17-minute film, "Fitna," which has been called " offensively anti-Islamic" by U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.

The screening of the film in the Netherlands last year prompted protests in much of the Muslim world, including Afghanistan, Indonesia, Iran and Pakistan.

Wilders has called for the banning of the Koran in the Netherlands, calling it "fascist."

In June last year, the prosecutor's office said "Fitna," though offensive to Muslims, didn't give rise to a punishable offense.

It dismissed dozens of complaints received from around the country, saying Wilders' utterances were made in the context of public debate.

But the appeals court ruled six months later that politicians, given their special responsibility, ought not to be permitted to make "statements which create hate and grief," and ordered the prosecution to put Wilders on trial.

(END) Dow Jones Newswires
05-20-090911ET

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‘Fitna’ Producer Attacks Dutch Diplomat Over Islam Lecture

Unwavering anti-Islam Dutch politician Geert Wilders is not only going after Islam. He has now gone after and exposed a fellow politician who is pro-Islamic. Hopefully more will follow.

‘Fitna’ producer attacks Dutch diplomat over Islam lecture
Ary Hermawan

Geert Wilders, the controversial Dutch politician who caused an uproar in the Muslim world for his deliberately provocative film Fitna, is now targeting fellow countryman, Dutch Ambassador to Indonesia Nikolaos van Dam, for delivering a “pro-Islam speech” in Jakarta.

“While speaking to an audience at the Institute for Quranic [sic] Studies in Jakarta, Mr. van Dam acted as an advocate of Islam, rather than a representative of the Netherlands,” said the firebrand Freedom Party chairman, in a press release available at islamiswar.org.

“In doing this, he has lost all credibility. Instead of trying to defend Islam, Mr. van Dam should be defending universal human rights and be committed to improving the situation of the Christian minority in Indonesia.”

The ambassador gave a lecture entitled “The Global Political Trend and the Role of Islam: The Academic Responsibility of Muslim Scholars” during a graduation ceremony at the Institute for Koranic Studies, or PTIQ, at the Jakarta Convention Center on April 29.

Part of the speech was published in The Jakarta Post’s opinion page on May 1.

Wilders and party colleague Barry Madlener had sent written questions – available in Dutch on the Freedom Party website – to Dutch Foreign Minister Maxim Verhagen demanding van Dam’s resignation.

They questioned the ambassador’s attendance at the graduation ceremony, saying he should instead have worked to push the Indonesian government to improve the condition of non-Muslims in the predominantly Muslim country.

They also criticized van Dam for referring to Turkey as a European country. In his speech, the ambassador said, “Turkey is seen by some as the crossroads between Europe and Asia, between the Christian and Muslim world.”

A Dutch Embassy official in Jakarta said the Dutch foreign minister, not the ambassador, according to Dutch parliamentary procedure, would respond to Wilders’s questions.

Van Dam, a former lecturer in Middle Eastern history at Amsterdam University, speaks fluent Arabic and Indonesian, and spent most of his diplomatic career in Baghdad, Ankara, Cairo and Germany before coming to Jakarta.

He has built a good relationship with moderate Indonesian Muslim leaders and managed to tone down the resentment of Muslims here over Wilders’s film Fitna.

Noted Muslim scholar Azyumardi Azra praised van Dam for significantly improving diplomatic relations between Indonesia and the Netherlands, suggesting the Dutch government pay no heed to Wilders’s demand.

“I think he is the most successful Dutch ambassador to Indonesia,” he said, acknowledging van Dam’s understanding of Islam and its adherents.

The PTIQ is a higher educational institute under the supervision of the ministries of national education and religious affairs. It was set up by the late Indonesian tycoon Ibnu Sutowo and is currently led by progressive Muslim thinker Nasaruddin Umar, who campaigned for gender equality in Islam.

Azra said he was not surprised by Wilders’s statement, adding, “He’s a Dutch anti-Islam politician, but he does not represent his country as a whole.”

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