My column with some video is up at PJM here.

Bruce Bawer's column, Europe's Champion of Liberty, is here.

UPDATE: For the Dutch-speaking contingent, here is an interview with Fortuyn recorded five years after his death. It is both amazing and accurate. Of course, these sort of recordings reflect the 'what if' and 'we miss him' sentiments, which are still very present in Dutch society.

A survey on national freedom and security conducted by the National Committee 4 and 5 May (referring to the dates the Dutch remember the death and celebrate the end of Nazi occupation respectively) has revealed what many have speculated about for a while. The Dutch feel that their much vaunted freedom is under pressure:

Freedom is seen as an important value to Dutch democracy. Residents value the freedom of speech particularly highly, the survey showed.

Respondents felt this freedom was certainly under pressure: almost 40 percent said that you cannot always freely express your opinion, especially in the debate on the multicultural society, respondents said.

"Evidently this debate has become so polarised that people feel they cannot always say what they like," the report reads.

And this reflects individuals responding, more crucially it would be interesting to see the numbers - much harder to get no doubt - that inidicate to what extent self-censorship has permeated the media.

Quite revealing and also highly indicative of the overall mood is the fact that the survey reports that the Dutch would be quite willing to trade freedom for security. And how can we interpret this finding? Give the government blanket authority to fight terror, no matter what the cost? Or is this evidence of an omnipresent willingness to stay quiet in order to preserve the peace? Whatever the answer, it says an awful lot of how much importance the Dutch really attach to their freedom. In my mind, it is under pressure from more sides than just one.

As opposed to “Give me your tired, your poor” many jurisdictions in the new world have discovered that the disgruntled Dutch are anything but tired and poor. They’re young, affluent, well-educated, entrepreneurial, fluent in English and smart enough to have figured that the time has come to get out as the future can no longer be found at home.

My latest column is up over at Pajamas Media, read the rest here.

There was another Dutch election yesterday, the provinical one to be precise. Although quite important as the 'provincial states' elect the Dutch Senate or upper house, the turn-out for these events is usually quite low and yesterday's was no exception. The results were not shocking and reflected the trend set during the general election last November:

The coalition parties managed to hold on to their majority in the senate, despite a loss for the Labour PvdA and Christian democrat CDA in yesterday's elections for the provincial states.

Thanks to a gain of two seats for the ChristenUnie, the government coalition can count on 41 of the 75 seats in the new senate.

As in the general elections in November, the big winner in Thursday's elections was the Socialist Party (SP). Jan Marijnissen's party has tripled the number of seats it will hold in the senate, from 4 to 12 seats. After its debut in the lower house of Parliament in November last year, the Party for the Animals has also secured a seat in the senate now.

Noteworthy is the fact that Geert Wilders' Party for Freedom did not participate in this election. Opinion polls indicated he could have done quite well had he participated following the recent political fireworks over cabinet members' dual nationality.

Was sworn in by the Queen today. The new left-of-center coalition ends four turbulent years where the Dutch were governed from the right. Yet, there are no indications that the turbulence is over, so expect regular updates.

Next week a new Dutch left-of-center coalition government will formally be inaugurated, ending a period characterized by instability and sometimes deep political and social rifts. I am working on a longer piece trying to condense all developments into one coherent narrative, trying to figure out if the Dutch are now entering into calmer waters. Somehow I doubt it.

The changeover is best captured by the fact that the immigration portfolio loses its ministerial status and will now be handled by a deputy minister or a State Secretary as the Dutch call it. That means a farewell to controversial Rita Verdonk whose sometimes draconian policies went as far as laying the groundwork for the early departure of her fellow party member Ayaan Hirsi Ali. This highly charged portfolio will now go Nebahat Albayrak, a member of parliament for Labour and a daughter of Turkish immigrants.

Albayrak found herself in the middle of some political fireworks yesterday when questions were raised about her and other deputy minister candidate Ahmed Aboutaleb’s loyalty as dual passport holders. A motion that sought to bar both candidates from joining the new cabinet did not make it to the parliamentary floor, but the discussion underlines once more the contentious nature of immigration in the Dutch political landscape.

Albayrak in the meantime made it clear how she will deal with her portfolio by arguing that the way her predecessor handled the immigration file often lacked a “human approach”, but that she would apply the letter of the law:

“People that are allowed to stay have to integrate fast, people that have to leave, will have to leave the country fast”

And that does not appear to be all that different from Verdonk’s approach.

Watch the videos here and here.

It's weird in a sense to see the Hirsi Ali avalanche and the excited media reactions to it, but for the Dutch and those who have been following her amazing journey it is hardly new. What also strikes me as noteworthy is the fairly superficial way in which Hirsi Ali is questioned by various media outlets, it is all about her departure from Islam and her present security situation. There is a lot more that warrants some critical examination from the press - and I mean this in a positive way - so that North American audiences can get a better handle on what Hirsi Ali actually experienced in both her native and adopted homelands. There is lots in the Peaktalk vaults about this, the entire collection is here, but given the appetite everyone has for this subject I would like to highlight in particular:

The questions that were raised in the Dutch press about the likelihood that security arrangements around Hirsi Ali were in actual fact being used to put her in political isolation.

Her farewell speech after resigning from Dutch parliament.

The political hit job by some media and rival politicians which triggered her inevitable departure from The Netherlands;

Her relationship with Theo van Gogh and how attempts to wage a debate over Islam in The Netherlands encountered many roadblocks.

Ayaan's dismissal from The Netherlands was most likely prompted first by the disgraceful way in which some of her neighbors managed to evict her from her appartment by successfully suing the flat's owners.

And the note that propelled AEI's rising star to international fame: Al-Zarqawi on Clogs.

That's original content from this site, but you may also want to take a look at Christopher Hitchens' Holland's Shameful Treatment of Ayaan Hirsi Ali and her meeting with George Will where the term 'Europe, the invertebrate' was coined.

The Dutch are not increasingly secular according to this interesting piece from Joshua Livestro in the Weekly Standard, rather secularization in the lowlands peaked in the 1990s and faith is making a steady comeback, albeit in a different format:

Apart from being a herald of potential change from secular to post-secular society, youth churches are also an indicator of another significant development, namely the move away from the church of bricks and mortar to a less clearly recognizable, more informal setting. Youth churches seem to meet anywhere but in traditional church buildings: cultural centers, sports halls, school assembly rooms, parking lots, even in night clubs. The idea is that something that less resembles a traditional church might prove more welcoming to potential new believers.

[ … ]

The question, though, is whether Christianity is best placed to profit from this development. For better or for worse, Dutch Christianity is now largely an underground phenomenon. If an average Dutchman has any picture of Christianity, it is of empty pews and derelict church buildings.

As with the impending demographic bust, the jury is still out on this particular phenomenon and it may be a while before we can confidently claim that secularization was a late 20th century fluke.

There are however a number of remarkable indicators that God is not exactly ‘out’. As Livestro notes, for all the Muslim immigrants arriving in The Netherlands there is also a significant Christian influx - think of the droves of Catholic Poles for instance – that contribute to this phenomenon. Furthermore, during the last general election, the parties with a Christian background did surprisingly well, the small Christian Union will for the first time in its history form part of a coalition government. And lastly, I do think there is a natural tendency in atheist and individualistic western societies to somehow re-connect with spirituality and community. The question of course is if that urge is channeled in the right direction as I can think of many other houses of worship that would make continued secularization a far more preferable option.

Islam however is according to Livestro not all that well-positioned:

Even the most optimistic estimates of Dutch Muslim organizations put the number of converts to Islam at no more than a few hundred a year. With immigration from Islamic countries grinding to a halt and birth rates among the Muslim community further approximating average Dutch birthrates with each new generation, it seems unlikely to say the least that visions of a caliphate in Holland will come to pass in this century--or the next, for that matter.

Speculation of course, but the notion that birth rates will overtime fall into line with the local breeding rate – often a function of economics – is correct as noted here and here before.

The centre-left coalition consisting of Christian-Democrats, Labour and the Christian Union is almost there, but a number of issues need to be ironed out:

Labour PvdA leader Wouter Bos is expected to be appointed finance minister and deputy prime minister in the new coalition cabinet despite the fact he has not yet made a decision.

[ ... ]

Bos said in the election campaign that he would not serve as deputy prime minister under Christian Democrat CDA leader Jan Peter Balkenende. But he started refusing to answer such questions just days after the November election.

It is an old trick to let someone from the left manage the books as it facilitates an encounter of spending instincts with fiscal realities. It has worked before. Bos, who was state secretary at finance before, is shrewd enough to take on this portfolio, but also clever enough to understand that it may eventually alienate him from his base on the left. Developing.

Iron Rita is on her way out, but she is making a sure that there is more than enough to talk about after her departure:

The Netherlands needs to wake up and take action to reduce rising ethnic tension between different groups of youths, a senior government advisor warned on Wednesday. Dick Corporaal, charged with monitoring youth flash-points by integration minister Rita Verdonk, said that if the country is not careful, things could get out of control.

‘We will have a situation like France,’ he told NOS radio, referring to riots in the Paris suburbs last year.

Those who remember the 'root cause' debate after the torching of the banlieues will recall that it was often the moribund French economy that got the blame for failing to absorb the rioting youngsters into its workforce. This Dutch government advisory report seems to indicate that even in a very different and more flexible economy first and second generation immigrants may revert to the same kind behaviour as in France. So maybe we should look beyond purely economic indicators to explain car torching? Religion anyone? What is also somewhat alarming is the notion of violence "between different groups of youths" whereas in France it was as I recall just youth vs. police.

Still, the more disturbing piece of this report was not the above, but this:

Later in the day, Verdonk said the Netherlands needs a Minister for Youth to coordinate activities and ‘make sure something actually happens.’ Divisions between various ministries must be broken down and cooperation improved, she said. Seven ministries are currently responsible for different aspects of youth policy.

Which makes you wonder how much potential rioting can actually be neutralized if some sort of efficient bureaucracy was actually dealing with this issue in a pro-active manner.

Another Dutch crisis. To recap:

• The Dutch government fell in June over the Hirsi Ali affair, which prompted fresh general elections;

• This implied that the sitting cabinet under prime minister Balkenende was formally demissionair or 'without a mission’ which means it was reduced to being a caretaker government;

• On November 22 a new election took place, where the Balkenende government failed to get a majority, however it continued acting in its caretaker capacity until a new coalition government would be formed;

• One week after the election the new parliament (with a marginal majority for the left-of-center parties) was inaugurated and as its first point of action adopted a motion calling on Immigration Minister Verdonk to suspend her deportations of illegal aliens;

• Verdonk refused arguing that executing the motion represented a major policy shift that would have to wait until a new coalition would have taken over affairs from the caretaker government.

• The opposition then forced through a motion which essentially demanded Verdonk to resign, one which was again denied by the Balkenende caretaker team.

The last point created an unprecedented crisis, in which both sides initially refused to budge. To Michael van der Galien this affair underlined the descent of his beloved home country into a banana republic; I would be a bit milder and term it a constitutional crisis.

Last night, after a long negotiation a compromise was reached where certain deportations are halted and where Verdonk was forced to give up the immigration part of her portfolio for the remaining months she is in office. In offering up that part of her responsibilities she signaled her disagreement with being forced to carry out a motion that negated her own policies.

Since there was no historical precedent it came down to balancing Verdonk’s correct argument about being unable to fundamentally shift a policy based on her own caretaker status against the moral imperative of a parliamentary majority. The latter won and many illegal immigrants who had exhausted - and lost – all legally available procedures can now stay for likely an indefinite period. Critics have argued that this reversal will open the door to many other illegal aliens and that the new majority on the left has acted a little overzealously in making a political point while failing to oversee its long-term implications. That sentiment is correct and that is why Balkenende probably tried to support Verdonk for as long as he could.

The more salient part of course is that Balkenende was engaged by an opposition with whom he will have to form a new coalition to replace his own right-of-center coalition. The recent election result gives him no other option, but this affair will not have exactly created a lot of good faith between the parties that will have to govern the Dutch nation going forward.

And Verdonk? Her hardline ‘rules are rules’ – remember how she also vigorously applied them to Hirsi Ali - has made her a highly controversial politician. Yet, her un-Dutch principled stance has attracted votes; at the last election she even outpolled the leader of her own party by a significant margin.

The Dutch have in recent years indicated that they’re more than willing to gamble on a no-nonsense anti-establishment politician and Iron Rita may well capitalize on that sentiment down the road. Given the current atmosphere I would not rule out another early election and bruising Rita is far too ambitious to let such a good opportunity pass. If only to rehabilitate herself, and her policies.

Yes, I owe you a Dutch politics update. The outcome of last month's election was less than appealing from the perspective of forming a workable coalition government, but it appears the first hurdle has been taken:

The Socialist SP, the big winners from last month's elections, dropped out of talks to form a new coalition government on Thursday.

[ ... ]

" ... it had become clear in recent days that the differences between the CDA and SP were "numerous, serious and on some points, fundamental".

No surprises here, but the pressure will now be on Labour to negotiate a deal with the CDA that will please their supporters. Any perceived sell-out will strengthen the Socialist Party's hand further and result in the left further drifting away from the center.

Still, I expect a lengthy negotiation effort (Labour and CDA will need a small party to obtain a parliamentary majority) that could easily collapse and lead to yet another election.

Ayaan Hirsi’s tainted relationship with her adoptive homeland. The latest:

The [Dutch] cabinet has denied that it put Ayaan Hirsi Ali in political isolation following the terrorist murder of Theo van Gogh. Justice Minister Ernst Hirsch Ballin rejects suggestions that Hirsi Ali was sent to the US to prevent her unleashing more Islamic violence with her sharp tongue.

Columnists Afshin Ellian and Leon de Winter wrote in an article in newspaper De Volkskrant in October that the government decided to send Hirsi Ali temporarily to the US following the 2 November 2004 murder of her friend and filmmaker Van Gogh. A Muslim cut his throat on the street in Amsterdam and on his body, stuck a knife with a letter saying Hirsi Ali would be the next victim.

In her biography – English version to be released in February 2007 – Ayaan Hirsi Ali devotes some twenty-four pages to her bizarre adventures following Van Gogh’s murder. The Dutch security services arranged, as a precautionary measure, for her to disappear from the public scene, which resulted in two separate overseas stays in the northeastern US and a brief sojourn in Germany. The levels of security as well as the various actions of the justice apparatus appeared to be overzealous and at times even illogical.

Hirsi Ali describes that initially she was barred from phone and internet access, allegedly to avoid her being tracked down by would-be assassins. A curious approach as I can’t imagine any jihadist monitoring internet activity would instantly conclude that someone googling ‘Van Gogh murder’ in a Best Western in Portland, Maine would pinpoint that as the secret location of the infamous Dutch parliamentarian of Somali descent. At the same time her security detail went to the extreme lengths to avoid her being recognized, but when a Turkish hotel proprietor in Germany identified her correctly as that Dutch-Somali parliamentarian “whose friend had been murdered” Ayaan was told it was late, not that big a deal and asked to stay in the said hotel where she consequently spent a restless night.

It is beyond the scope of this post to summarize the whole two month adventure, but in view of the news above and what Hirsi Ali says in her book, I believe the claim that she was ‘neutralized’ in the immediate aftermath of the Van Gogh murder is credible. What is also evident to me is that this was not a deliberate move by Dutch authorities, but that its potential became evident during the process of securing Hirsi Ali. She was moved around a lot the first few days and security levels went up steadily, while at the same time the reactions to the murder in Dutch society accelerated to levels where the outcome was increasingly unpredictable. The Dutch government had an obligation to protect Hirsi Ali, but in doing so realized it had the perfect means to silence her too. And surely, that is something that will never be formally acknowledged.

Hirsi Ali herself won’t speak out on this either, and for good reasons by the way. Although she has moved to the Washington, DC area, her security is still partly provided by the Dutch government and it would be rather counterproductive and ungrateful to question their work based on what essentially is a theory of some of her friends. That by the way should also be taken to heart by journalists who can’t resist asking her about her security. Hirsi Ali can’t and won’t answer these questions not because she needs to remain tactful towards her minders, but because her life remains on the line for as long as she lives.

After reading the Dutch emigration update, a reader wonders:

" ... the overarching question, however, remains unasked and therefore unanswered. Why? In my lengthy experience in the Netherlands and with the Dutch, I can honestly state that I have never met a more family-orientated culture or a more nationalistic (this is not intended to be a negative in any way) society. Families are close in The Netherlands, closer than they have probably ever been in the United States. I have seen friends suffer great distress when a family member moves beyond walking distance, a local bus ride or a short drive. There is something in the Netherlands that has revived that wanderlust in the Dutch that I had thought (until very recently) died along with Stuyvesant. I would be very interested to know what it is.

I don't think Dutch wanderlust ever died, it has been reignited. And there is not just one reason for that, although the deteriorating quality of life which encomapsses everything for immgirants to crime to environment is probably the most important one. The key accelerator is - much like the 17th century - globalization and wealth.

The Dutch economy has by necessity always been focused on trade and cross-border services. The vast growth of opportunities in an open Europe and a booming Asia - a familiar arena for the Dutch - have made overseas settlement much easier. And, as opposed to Stuyvesant's age, this is no longer the privilege of the upper class. The Dutch with their strong work ethic and broad language skills are a natural fit for the international job market. And, wealth has trickled down the classes too, buying property overseas or just taking the gamble by packing up and go is no longer that disruptive, at least from a financial perspective. The strong family ties and the generous welfare arrangments back home serve as a tangible insurance policy on which any adventurer can always fall back. I have seen many take advantage of it when the going overseas got a little too tough.

Well, here is the hallmark of a free society. If the government plans to outlaw your habitual garb, you can protest it:

About two dozen Muslim women protested Thursday outside the Dutch parliament against a proposed ban on the burqa, the head-to-toe Islamic robe.

Several protesters wore long robes and veils exposing only their eyes, known as a niqab.

"We live in a free country and the government cannot tell us what to do with our religion," protest organizer Ayse Bayrak told The Associated Press. "We don't live in a dictatorship. We don't live under the Taliban, which oppresses women."

Apart from the impressive turn-out, the utilization of the Taliban as an argument in favor of wearing a burqa can only lead to hilarious situations. Luckily, a reporter with a brilliant sense of humour went out to find them, and here is his video report, in Dutch. And while the protesting burqas did not exactly share his wit, one lonely hijab wearer at the scene broke down in laughter at the suggestion she looked like a whore.

Once more, a ban on burqas is ridiculous and any free society to propose it should be embarrassed. At the same time the burqa-wearing protestations over ‘free choice’ and ‘respect’ sound highly suspicious, but at the very least a free society gives these ladies a constitutional option to take it off. That choice is usually not offered by the Taliban.

As we increasingly hear that demographics are determining the future of Europe and that droves are leaving the old continent, The Netherlands is always brought up in particular as an example of this phenomenon. Somehow, I’ve always felt that these statements were embellished by various commentators and thankfully the CBS (Dutch Bureau for Statistics) released a sort of interim report last month. And yes, this may indeed be the last year in quite some time to come that the Dutch are adding a net surplus to their population. And with the lowest number of babies born in twenty years, a marginal one of only 13,000 new Dutchies (on a population of 16.3 million) for the first 9 months of this year.

According to this CBS news release, emigration from The Netherlands is expected to be 130,000 for 2006, a record number and an increase of about 12% on the previous year. But half of that number is not Dutch in the first place. That group consists of Turkish immigrants returning home and refugees and asylum seekers who have not managed to obtain the status to legally reside in The Netherlands.

Even so, a large number of Dutch people are leaving and the question now is where are they off too? Well, it may be surprising but the top three of destinations is still European, and a few notable pillars of old continent decay at that. Germany, Belgium and the UK are taking in some 18,000 Dutch emigrants, with Spain and France – often equally described as futureless – taking a respectable 6th and 7th slot on the emigration destination top ten. Canada came in 5th and the USA 10th, and since they’re not listed I suspect that Australia and New Zealand probably come in somewhere in between.

There are a number of reasons for this ‘old continent popularity’. Germany and Belgium offer lower real estate prices, in Spain the weather is nicer while the job market in the UK offers a bit more excitement and earnings potential. On top of that, intra-European moves guarantee you the ability to stay close to home, a prospect that is especially interesting for the retirees who constitute some 10% of all the emigrants.

So, not exactly the massive and desperate journey across the ocean in search for a better life, but a more pragmatic approach to relocating. Still, if you net out those that stay in Europe and take account of immigrant-returnees, we see a remarkable trend to go elsewhere. And if it persists the Dutch population will start to decrease in the years to come.

Related Posts
More on the Dutch Exodus
Euro Exodus, Now The Farmers
Euro Exodus, Part II
Euro Exodus

The Economist weighs in on the Dutch election and the folly of a burqa ban:

But there is something to learn from America. American laws on freedom of expression and religion are more permissive than those in Europe. Only those who mask their faces explicitly to hide themselves and intimidate others—like the Ku Klux Klan—are forbidden to cover their faces in public forums like marches. A law banning the burqa would be flatly unconstitutional. So, probably, would be a ban on headscarves in schools. And America’s success with its Muslims probably also owes something to the flexible American labour market, which gives minorities of all kinds the hope (if not the reality) of climbing the social ladder.

It's a bit of a broad brush analysis written in a hurry, but the overall sentiment is correct. Europe's integration model has failed and it is time to look for alternative approaches. If the Dutch election result is any guidance however, it may be quite a while before a more American approach is adopted.

Paul Belien analyzes the rise of the new star of Dutch politics, Socialist Party leader Jan Marijnissen. He touches on some very interesting themes, although comparing the former maoist to Pat Buchanan may be somewhat confusing to outsiders. Belien's point is: the left has an equal ability to adopt some of the themes that are usually associated with some of Europe's right. Rejecting the EU, questioning foreign cultures and opting for an outdated form of protectionism can just as well be offered in a 'left' package. And that is also why mainstream parties are losing ground and why a Weimarization of European politics is hardly a far-fetched term.

And yes, religion. One reader - like Belien - has pointed out to me that the Socialist Party cleverly embraced religious themes and that this week's losers all took a secular stance. It may be too early to qualify all this as a decisive anti-establishment vote and a return to more traditional values, but there is a notable shift in attitudes. Depending on the election, it is something that both the new left and the new right are able to successfully plug into.

In random order here are some of the more important conclusions from yesterday's election:

The Establishment Lost - Remember that Fortuyn’s campaign four years ago was launched with a book against the then ruling 'purple' coalition (Labour, VVD, Democrats 66). All of these three parties lost significantly last night.

Fractionalization - In fact all the major players lost and a fringe group from the left (Socialist Party) and the right (Wilders’ Party for Freedom) were able to get serious traction at the ballot box. In addition a number of other smaller parties gained a place at the table, contributing to a process that has fractionalized the Dutch parliament to an unprecedented degree.

Instability - The latter will make governing very, very hard.

Divisions on the Left - Wouter Bos Labour’s party failed essentially because it was not able to unite the hard and more moderate left into one coherent and pragmatic story. Tony Blair is one of the few to have managed that, but the Democrats in the US and the Socialists in France face exactly the same problem. It requires rare political talent and a unique set of circumstances to accomplish it.

And Divisions on the Right - The same applies to the right, although Dutch conservatives have in particular been quite pro-active at ruining their own chances for success. The drama within the VVD (the Rutte vs. Verdonk leadership struggle and the Hirsi Ali debacle) and the inability of the smaller right-of-center players to unite has cost the essence of Fortuyn’s legacy a chance to survive beyond his death, at least for now.

No Americanization - Wilders emphasized that he stands for more than just countering Islamization, but when you add in lower taxes and cracking down harder on crime, it all is just too much of an American deal for the cautious Dutch. They are only prepared to move to the right carefully, without losing the framework built by decades of gentle social-democracy.

Bias to the Left - That was underlined by the after-election reactions. Most parties wasted no time to distance themselves from Wilders as being ‘too radical’, a reaction that inexplicably was not applied to that other equally hard-line outfit, the triumphant Socialist Party.

Challenges Ahead - So the traditional right and left have to go back to the drawing table and seriously think how they will position themselves going forward. The Christian-Democrats in the meantime will be given the unappealing duty to form a government with, most likely, the battered Labour party and one of the untested smaller outfits. By all accounts hardly an appealing perspective.

NOTE: The Washington Post has a pretty good round-up too, if you're interested.

Also, Michael van der Galien at TMV has some worthwhile thoughts.

An Unclear Message and a Leftward Tilt

So, here's the culmination of a few weeks of analysis and poll tracking: election day. We should have a fairly good idea of the end result around 1:00 PM Pacific Time, and I will track developments with lots of links and commentary throughout the morning.

Expectation: the result will confuse all the pundits that have been writing and talking about the 'Dutch right turn', but the outcome will probably give us ample material to keep following the troubled nation for years to come.

Here's a primer for the uninitiated.

7:51 AM Turn-out among immigrants is high (maybe even reaching 78%), it is estimated that they will determine 12 seats (out of a 150-seat parliament). Apparently there is lots of interest from Arab and Moroccan TV-stations as a Labour victory would see Amsterdam councillor Ahmed Aboutaleb become minister.

9:15 AM The mainstream media are actively looking at the Dutch too. The Guardian claims that The Dutch Recover Their Courage while the Washington Times sees a welfare-cutting prime-minister cruising to victory. Both outlets could be very wrong.

9:20 AM The woman who would have run, and who now resides at AEI weighs in on the burqa ban debate.

10:10 AM The first exit poll is expected at 11:50 AM from RTL , which is stirring up a little controversy as they will be releasing these numbers ten minutes before the polls close.

11:30 AM While we are awaiting results it may be worthwhile noting that the Dutch have a proportional representation system and - as opposed to Germany - no threshold to get represenation. If indeed we end up with the Party for the Animals in parliament with one seat, you know the numerical logic behind it.

Another remarkable thing to note is that one religious party, the small Christian Union (not to be confused with the Christian Democrats) is also expected to do well. Interestingly this party positions itself to the left of the center and is therefore associated with a more socialist interpretation of the bible. And the Socialist Party - yes, the one with the maoist roots - has benefited from the participation of Huub Oosterhuis, a former priest known for the quote: "The Socialist Party is closer to the social ethics of the Bible than many Christian parties." Whoever said Europe had gone secular?

11:45 AM Look, I really like the Jerusalem Post but this heading is just ridiculous: Hard-line prime minister looks set to win Dutch elections. Hard-line?

11.58 AM EXIT POLL The Christian-Democrats of the 'hard-line' incumbent prime-minister are set to win according to RTL's exit poll. But marginally, all the large parties lose seats, the smaller parties are doing well. Here's your ticket to instability.

The NOS - Dutch public broadcaster - has its numbers here, they are different, but same trend. The big winner is the Socialist Party, the party that was born out of the split in the Dutch communist party in the 1970s. They have acquired a measure of respectability and have been clever at marketing to the undecideds. But they remain an old-style left-wing outfit, come to think of it, they are actually 'hard-line'. With some 20% (this may change) of the vote they may be holding the balance of power and actually have a say in a new coalition arrangement. Think Noam Chomsky heading up the US Treasury.

Geert Wilders does well, as does the Party for the Animals. If these numbers hold we're going back to vote sooner rather than later. The only likely coalition may be Christian Democrats-Labour-Christian Union and as I mentioned, this will be a left-religious undertaking.

It's early and a grand centre-left coalition of Christian Democrats-Labour is equally likely. But centre-right is out of the question.

The traditional Dutch right, the free-market liberal VVD (Verdonk, and formerly Hirsi Ali) is suffering a severe electoral blow. And they deserve it.

12:21 PM You can follow Dutch TV here. Just saw the leader of the Party for the Animals commenting that addressing "the castration of pigs without an anaesthetic" will be her first priority now that she has entered parliament. I kid you not.

12:47 PM The Fortuyn revolution is over, that much is clear. His intellectual heir (whom I had the pleasure of meeting a little while back), Marco Pastors will be lucky to win only one seat. The Fortuyn vote has gone to the successful Christian-Democrats, Wilders and yes, the Socialist Party. The anger and discontent are still there but they have been channeled in a different direction.

1:08 PM The numbers are updated and a Christian Democrats-Labour coalition with a majority looks unlikely now.

Prime-minister Balkenende will stay on as the nation's leader, a job that will not go to Labour's Blairite talent Wouter Bos. Bos failed to unite the left under one reformed umbrella and is paying a heavy electoral price for this tonight.

2:18 PM A very high turn-out: 80.8%.

2:24 PM Here are the most recent, probably final, numbers. In summary, the left has won marginally but as it stands divided between the moderate Bos (Labour) and radical Marijnissen (Socialist Party) it has been unable to actually win this election outright. So the default winner, Christian-Democrat Balkenende, will have the unenviable task of having to form a left-of-center coalition. In that he will have to distance himself from his own successful economic policies. What will happen with the immigration and law and order files remains unclear, but they will not be addressed from a conservative perspective, that much is certain.

More analysis about the election and its broader implications in the days ahead.

Others Blogging
Klein Verzet (which translates to 'Small Resistance') has some pre-analysis and argues that "Subconsciously, everybody feels the stakes are very high". I think he's right.

Dutch blog Sargasso runs an election cafe and has a very useful post with seat projections.

At Crooked Timber, Ingrid Robeyns has a preview and notes that the Party for the Animals is projected to win a parliamenary seat (h/t One Way Street: Aesthetics and Politics).

The Dutch general election is tomorrow and here is a summary of the most recent poll numbers from three different sources:

The very latest poll is here.

No major changes from previous updates: the Christian-Democrats will probably win this election by a very small margin, a resurgent left is going to do some good business and the right will put in an abysmal performance. What is potentially even more troubling is that if these numbers end up on the screen tomorrow night it will be very hard to cobble together a workable coalition with strong parliamentary support. Still there are many undecided voters so we may be in for a few last minute surprises.

It is too early to state that this outcome will end the Foruyn-era, but it is evident that too much change and revolutionary thought falls hard on the Dutch stomach.

Of course, I will do a liveblog tomorrow and gather some reactions as well as put forward some of my own thoughts. Stay tuned.

To many outsiders it may seem odd that Muslim immigration has taken some sort of backseat during most of the current campaign. The tendency towards complacency and avoiding explosive issues is nicely described in this piece from the IHT that also wonders why a relative calm has settled over the troubled lowlands. The answer is the basic Dutch instinct to neutralize conflict:

Both Frits Bolkestein, the former European Commission member who began writing in the early 1990s about Islam as a challenge for Europe, and Halberstadt emphasize that the Dutch are weary of confrontation. Halberstadt says that the present consensus reflects a current Dutch "satisfaction with perceptions, and not wanting to spend passion on issues."

For Bolkestein, integrating Islam "remains Europe's most serious problem." He believes the Dutch are not really going to come to final terms with it until there is a constitutional amendment ending religious schooling. "Divided schooling leads to a divided country," he says.

And reigniting the schooling debate is probably the last thing the Dutch want at this juncture. That in particular goes for incumbent Christian-Democrat prime-minister Balkenende whose entire campaign was based around an issueless feelgood message, purportedly steering the Dutch back to normality.

In the final stretch of the campaign the immigration debate came back, but it was most often used as a tool of desperation in order to get some media attention and possible movement in voting intentions. The best example of course was the burqa ban which all of a sudden emerged. But even more serious attempts to frame the debate over immigration in a historical context failed to excite the Dutch. A good example is Marco Pastors who in a radio commercial compared the inability to face the Islamization of Europe to the inaction that existed in the 1930s when it came to confronting the Nazi threat. Some outrage ensued, an Islamic party even reported the comments to the police as discriminatory language, but it did not force the Dutch to debate one of the more pressing issues facing the nation. It didn’t even shift the polls and Pastors' new party so far has failed to get material traction.

Personally, I find it equally troubling that a nation that enthusiastically rejected the draft European Constitution is barely a year later able to talk about what it then wants from Europe. One can blame the various parties for this absence of a EU-discussion, but I would equally lay the blame in front of an electorate that after a communal round of venting indeed prefers to be lulled back to a consensus that artificially and comfortably covers up the key issues. And sooner or later these will erupt, from jihadist violence to unfundable pension obligations to irreversible Euro-legislation. But few appear to care about that.

On the eve of the general election a major cover-up by the current coalition government has surfaced:

Dutch military interrogators abused 15 Iraqi prisoners in 2003, dousing them with water to keep them awake and exposing them to loud sounds and strong lights, the government said Friday.

The allegation, first reported by a respected Dutch newspaper, shocked ranking government officials and led one opposition leader to compare it to the U.S. abuse of Iraqi prisoners in the scandal at Abu Ghraib prison.

Defense Minister Henk Kamp told reporters that military police had investigated the use of these tactics by military intelligence officers in Iraq in 2003 and found they did not overstep the law.

Well maybe they didn't. But Kamp has been deeply mistaken to keep quiet about only to see the issue resurface days before an election where both his party and his coalition are not exactly expected to do very well. This is an extraordinary gift to both Labour and the Socialist Party and they will milk it for all it's worth, so expect some interesting shifts in the next poll. Remember, around 40% was undecided and even if this turns out to be a non-issue, it will have a material impact on an already highly confused electorate.

NOTE: The Moderate Voice has been covering Dutch events too and here is a useful post on how the left has been changing its approach. Add the latest twist in the mix and they may edge closer to numbers that would allow a Labour-Socialist Party-Green Left coalition. More news and analysis later.

UPDATE: Yes, a burqa ban was put on the table today too. Always a tough proposition and in the current environment it will go absolutely nowhere. It's cheap last minute electioneering.

More instability ahead?

With a little over a week to go to voting day the latest poll numbers corroborate the trend of the past few weeks and they point to a remarkable outcome. The centrist Christian-Democrats remain solidly ahead of Labour which has been losing momentum over the past few weeks. Here are the numbers from Angus-Reid and they concur with most of the other polling numbers coming out of The Netherlands over the past few days:

But, what is so significant?

First, Labour (or PvdA) is failing to live up to what many believed was their unique chance to become the largest party, deliver the next prime-minister and become the dominant player in a collation of its own choosing. Labour leader Bos is starting to look too Blairite for his core constituency and voters on the left are now increasingly supporting the Socialist Party, an unreconstructed leftist outfit that stands solidly to the left of the traditionally moderate Labour Party. This trend is exacerbated by the public perception that the race over who is to become the largest party is essentially over and that a vote for Labour is increasingly irrelevant. In addition there is the so-called ‘floating protest vote’ which tends to throw its allegiance to the latest political star - Pim Fortuyn benefited from that in the past - which in the Dutch political scene today is Jan Marijnissen. Anecdotal evidence points to the fact that the Socialist leader has been able to shed his stalinist antics and is now a ‘reasonable guy’ who has become acceptable material for public office. This is political experimentation at best and the truth about Marijnissen remains quite murky, at least in my mind.

Secondly, the slide of the traditional Dutch right, the VVD, is irreversible. This party – fiscally conservative, socially liberal and hawkish on foreign policy – continues to bleed for its highly ambiguous strategy. On the one hand they are trying to appeal to the far right by parading immigration minister Rita Verdonk around as a key asset – not wise given the minister’s key role in the Hirsi Ali affair – but at the same time they are desperately trying to reach to drifters in the center with their youthful and moderate leader Mark Rutte. This two pronged approach is actually turning voters away to the smaller parties on the right and to whatever else operates in the center. Many lifelong VVD-ers are disgusted with the lack of clarity in their party and the poor campaign of the past few weeks. It does indeed look that after being part of government coalitions since 1994 they will be relegated to opposition status, and in seat numbers, humiliatingly, behind the now robust Socialist Party.

It should be noted that according to various polls some 40% of the voters is still undecided and the current projected numbers may turn out differently. Yet, there has been a very clear pattern and there are no indications that will change materially in the week ahead. If it holds the right is getting a fairly humiliating defeat and a centrist prime-minister will have no other option than look to the left to form a government. In doing that he may have to put the very economic policies at risk that allowed him to comfortably cruise through this campaign.

Another first:

The Netherlands may become the first European country to ban Muslim face veils after its government pledged yesterday to outlaw the wearing in public spaces of the niqab, or veil, and the burka, or full-length cloak covering the head.

The right-leaning coalition said last night that it would look for a way to outlaw the wearing of all Muslim face veils.

The right-leaning coalition is, with some ten days to go to the election, in its last throes and it will be hard to put this measure in place on such a short notice. In addition, this is a blanket ban and would no doubt run into some serious parliamentary resistance. Not only would it conflict with the principle of religious freedom, it would be seen as a serious invasion of personal freedom. The latter would not just alarm the left; it would surely create some discord on the right as well.

We have seen many attempts all over Europe to do something about these veils, but it seems that limited bans - for public employees, or in public spaces - are far more effective. And, they serve a clearly defined goal, such as security or the impartiality of government workers. Again, immigration-related issues are proving to be quite attractive in the final stretch of the campaign, but don't count on any of the proposals that are floating around now to become law anytime soon.

Here is a measure of how shameless some nations have become:

The Dutch government plans to give a citation to troops who served as peacekeepers in Srebrenica but failed to stop the massacre of Bosnian Muslims 11 years ago in what was supposed to be a UN-protected safe haven. The plan to award a unique insignia for duty at Srebrenica outraged survivors and victims' families Wednesday, who called it an insult to those who died.

The award was meant to heal a painful wound in the military, which felt unfairly blamed for the massacre and its reputation unjustly tarnished.

Even in the face of massive failures, all of which were corroborated by a parliamentary inquest that sparked the resignation of a government, there are those who find ways for some macabre self-congratulation. If you want to get a flavor of the Dutchbats accomplishments in Srebrenica take a look at this sobering article by Guido Snel. Key excerpts:

The Dutch, in fact, felt as endangered as the local population, which in the given circumstances, to put it mildly, made no sense. Rules, instructions and poor communication would later supply the desired justification.

[ ... ]

‘My case is one of the most terrible in terms of the international community’s role. The Dutch major Robert Franken told me to explain to my father that he can remain on the base. My father asks what will happen to his younger son and my mother. Franken tells me: "Hasan, tell your father that if he does not want to stay, he can go too. And there’ll be no further discussion." My father had three seconds to decide whether he wants to stay on the base, to go on living with his elder son, or go and die with his younger son and his wife. He chose to leave. A month ago, at the court in The Hague, Major Franken coolly states that he gave him a choice. What sort of choice?’

Well, the Armenian genocide is back in the election campaign. The Dutch-Turkish contingent has threatened to shift its allegiance away from Labour after its leader, Wouter Bos, had managed to alienate the Turkish vote by taking a very clear stance on the Armenian genocide.

As I discussed here and here, Labour is in trouble and Bos has now decided to undercut his own clear moral stance by reconsidering the Armenian genocide in order to entice the Turks back into Labour's fold:

The word genocide is being used too freely in The Netherlands according to Bos. He argued that there is an international judicial debate going on about this topic. “We condemn murder, but we have to be careful in using the term genocide”.

Bos said that he would stop using the work genocide. “It is a learning process for me too. Labour prefers to in the future refer to the ‘Armenian issue’.

The irony of using the word 'issue' here will probably not be lost on most of you. The desperation with which Bos is willing to reverse his previous position while cleansing his language is not only disappointing, it is reason for deep concern.

It is in fact scary if you consider how he has opened the door for other electoral groups that might have an interest in revisiting certain historic events. We can debate the ‘Armenian issue’ ad nauseam and I am sure there are certain facts and interpretations lost on most of us. The real question is how many election cycles it will take before some parties are open to reconsidering less ambiguous historical events. And yes, I can think of at least one.

Related Post
The Armenian Genocide

The latest Dutch poll numbers are out, and they confirm the trend that incumbent prime-minister Balkenende is solidifying his lead over Labour’s Wouter Bos. And the dynamics of the battle between the two men is clear:

In a poll in de Telegraaf newspaper, readers said they would rather go on holiday with the youthful and charismatic Mr Bos, but would prefer to buy a used car from Mr Balkenende, who is seen as trustworthy and reliable. Whereas Mr Bos is the better communicator, Mr Balkenende can let the results of a fiscal management forecast that predicts a three per cent increase in economic growth in 2007, speak for themselves.

Not surprisingly Mr Bos has tried to shift the debate away from purchasing power to concerns about inner city safety and social integration.

That is exactly the point I made in my PJM column last week, the parties falling behind in this election are now all of a sudden turning to immigration and integration in order to bring about some last moment electoral shifts. With a little over two weeks to go it is too early to say if that will happen, but the recent trend contradicts any such movements. The Dutch are opting for calm, trust and short-term convenience while preferring to avoid the harder questions for the future. And to his credit, Bos has not just tried to talk about integration; he has equally raised the specter of altering both the unsustainable retirement arrangements and mortgage rate deductibility. None of which has given him access to a leading position and that tells us something about the ability of politicians of whatever stripe to effect meaningful change in Europe.

Still, the race remains close and it should also be noted that Balkenende based on the current numbers is not able to form a credible right-of-center coalition. That would put the Dutch exactly where their German neighbors are: being governed by a grand coalition of Christian-Democrats and Labour. And that in turn means a minding-the-store solution with the prospect of another premature election. Developing.

This is a Dutch expression, and you probably understand its deeper meaning. Consider this:

The Dutch parliament ordered an investigation Thursday into how much the country's top intelligence agency service knew about an Islamic extremist before he shot and stabbed film maker Theo van Gogh.

Lawmakers, including members of the government, supported a motion by the opposition Labor Party ordering an evaluation of why the intelligence agency knew Mohammed Bouyeri belonged to a radical group known as the Hofstad Network but did not consider him a major threat.

It has taken two years to get to this point and legal impediments – reasons cited by the government for delaying the inquest – seem not entirely plausible. What is remarkable though is the timing of the motion asking for an investigation. Yes, we are one week away from the second anniversary of Theo van Gogh’s murder and four weeks away from a general election. No prizes for those who can answer the question as to why it was Labor that has picked this week to move this issue back on the agenda.

And no, I do not expect this investigation to yield any worthwhile revelations, just like the inquest into Fortuyn’s protection failed to produce anything disruptive. That is often not the point of any of these exercises; they are used to placate some pressing voter concerns and more broadly to put the national conscience at ease.

The latest polls numbers are in and Balkenende's Christian-Democrats are now pulling ahead of Labour. And in the man-to-man popularity contest for the role of prime-minister, Balkenende is also ahead of his Labour rival, with a edge of 35% to 24% over Wouter Bos. Noteworthy is that 40% of Dutch voters react negatively to both men and that reveals a level of apathy or disappointment with the current political scene that raises some deeper questions about the Dutch political landscape. And the debate which we've argued has been pretty tame so far. It is clear however that Bos peaked too early while not managing a tight campaign whereas Balkenende has always been somewhat of a 'by default' prime-minister.

In coalition terms it will remain difficult to form a majority one, but with these numbers the smaller factions on the right (wilders, Pastors and the Christian Union) could hold the key to a new right-of-center cabinet. We've got another four weeks ahead of us, but it seems that the Dutch are beginning to lean rightwards, carefully.

... for those interested to learn that a possible burqa ban will be (a) general, ie. not restricted to public employees only and (b) continues to be studied by a committee of wise men who will advise the government in early November.

Prediction: excpect a pragmatic Dutch compromise, not to be mistaken for 'tolerance'.

The Dutch Supreme Court has ruled last week that the earlier decision by the Court of the City of Amsterdam - the one that evicted Ayaan from her apartment in The Hague - needs to be revisited. Good news for sure, but not only is it late in the day, even a favorable ruling from the lower court will never eradicate the embarrassment and pain caused by the initial ruling.

Posts Related to the Hirsi Ali Court Case
Hirsi Ali Case: Translation
Hirsi Ali, The Hunted (3)
Hirsi Ali, The Hunted (2)
Hirsi Ali, The Hunted

Consider this:

The CNV trade union federation feels that a Muslim feast should be introduced as a bank holiday in the Netherlands. The Christian trade union federation is willing to sacrifice a Christian holiday.

This is by no means a new idea; in fact former Labor leader Ad Melkert floated it during the turbulent campaign of 2002, the one which eventually doomed his political career. It is not exactly a surprise to see it back now that the immigration debate has taken on a very different tone compared to four years ago.

So here is what I think. There is no problem in sacrificing a few Christian holidays at all, in fact this is one of the better ideas we’ve heard in a long time. But rather than replace them with Muslim holidays I would suggest replacing them with actual working days. Now that will run into some real and serious opposition in The Netherlands.

Michael van der Galien at TMV reviews Ayaan Hirsi Ali's autobiography "My Freedom". Key excerpt:

The main focus of the book is - of course - the development Ayaan went through herself: from being raised to become a good 'baari' (a submissive woman, adhering to every demand of her husband, a good Muslima, etc.) to a critic of integration and a fighter for womens-rights in Muslim communities in the West.

This development, this transformation is a remarkable one and perhaps one of the main reasons why she is as greatly respected as she is today. To be able to understand the true nature of this transformation, to understand how rare and how special Ayaan is in this regard, this book is quite simply a necessity.

Which begs the question: when will the book be availabe in English? Not sure, my Dutch copy is in the mail as I write this. Generally translations from Dutch to English move much slower than the other way around, but as soon as I find out I will let you now.

NOTE: Take a look at The Owl and the Ostrich, an edited version of a speech Hirsi Ali gave last week about Europe and its future.

UPDATE: So, it does take longer. According to this report "My Freedom" will be released in English in February under the title "Infidel". Not sure if postponing it for this long is a savvy marketing approach, giving it a new and somewhat explosive title surely is.

The latest poll is out and it confirms the trend we’ve been discussing here for a few weeks now. The PvdA or Labour is slipping in the polls and now for the first time is no longer the front runner: the CDA or Christian-Democrats are ahead as the largest party. What is telling is that neither party is able to form a clear majority coalition government, a situation partly created by the slide of the VVD.

The assessment that the Dutch right is divided does not only apply to the smaller and new outfits that emerged in Pim Fortuyn’s wake. The classical liberal VVD, that bastion of the traditional Dutch right is giving up valuable ground at the moment. Given the way the party has behaved recently, from failing to grasp the opportunity to enlist the nation’s renewed taste for the right to outright blunders (the Hirsi Ali-Verdonk affair) that is hardly surprising. And somewhat desperate claims by its new leader that the party is also there for young people that care about the environment while squandering its free-market ideology to promote an expensive universal childcare system have not helped either.

So, incumbent prime-minister Balkenende of the CDA is now positioned to do well, benefiting from the right’s confusion and the left’s recent propensity of being too honest with the voters. To be sure, the CDA under Balkenende can be billed as ‘conservative’, but historically this party has been as willing to either go left or right in order to remain the dominant force is government which it has been for the last century and a half.

One of the unpredictable byproducts of integrating certain minorities into your society is that you are also incorporating their history, and in particular their somewhat biased interpretation of the past. The sizeable Turkish contingent in The Netherlands – highly sought after by all political parties – this week threatened to stay home and ignore the vote:

Meanwhile, Turkish groups in the Netherlands expressed concern Thursday that voters of Turkish origin will boycott elections after candidates for parliament were bumped off the electoral lists after refusing to acknowledge the Armenian genocide. Last week the Netherlands' two biggest political parties, the ruling Christian Democrat CDA and the opposition PvdA labor party, scrapped three prospective MP's of Turkish origin from their list of candidates for the November 22 elections because they would not recognize the World War I massacre of Armenians as a genocide.

Interesting. It even went as far as holding a vigil outside the PvdA’s head office this week, trying to make the point that the party had silenced the Turks.

It looks like these protesters are trying to turn this into a free speech issue, but it isn’t of course. No one will stop them from denying or re-evaluating some historical facts, they are only invited to do it in their own circles and not within the platform of the two largest political parties.

Again, you’ve got to give some credit to the PvdA labor party here. They’re brutally honest, first in expressing that the retirement age of sixty-five and mortgage rate deductibility are no longer sustainable, now in refusing to obfuscate the Armenian genocide in return for a few votes. It will cost them dearly when the votes are counted, but at the moment they’re the least politically expedient of the larger parties.

UPDATE: Bilateral relations between France and Turkey are under pressure too:

Turkey today warned France that bilateral ties will suffer "irreparable damage" if the French parliament passes a bill make it a criminal offence to deny that Armenians were the victims of a genocide during World War I.

I have a problem with France's penchant to legislate speech, but an equal problem with Turkey denying its bloody past. As you can see: integration and co-operation in Europe is in full swing.

Interesting piece in the IHT on the Dutch election campaign discussing how Fortuyn's views on immigration have become mainstream. The writer asserts that the ‘right has won’, but if that is true I wonder why it is that even Fortuyn’s watered down agenda is getting so little traction among the Dutch electorate. To be fair, the article notes the absence of some of it during the current contest:

School director Bart Engbers says it's a mistake to avoid discussing the problems of the emerging immigrant underclass.

Politicians "don't speak about the big issues," said Engbers. "People say, 'Let's have some rest now.' But everyone knows there is no rest."

Fortuyn was laid to rest four years ago, but as discussed earlier his legacy has evidently not been laid to rest and any rest the electorate is taking from pressing social issues will in the end prove to be illusory.

The latest Dutch poll numbers are in and Labour's lead is shrinking with incumbent prime minister Balkenende and his CDA party now favored to win this contest. As it stands however he will not be able to form a majority coalition, nor will the various parties on left be able to cobble one together. For now, the electorate is split.

This week:

Opposition left-wing parties Labour PvdA, green-left GroenLinks and Socialist SP clashed with coalition partners the Liberal VVD and Christian Democrat CDA in discussions over purchasing power, the AOW old age pension and healthcare.

Leading the charge was PvdA leader Wouter Bos, who said the Netherlands was suffering morally despite the pleasing economic recovery. He said the lack of understanding between Native Dutch and immigrants has increased, the same as the differences between the rich and poor.

As discussed before Labour leader Wouter Bos is an old acquaintance of mine and I have always considered him to be a fairly clever and pragmatic Blairite rather than a traditional social-democrat. Before going into politics he worked at Royal Dutch/Shell, giving him a solid grounding in what drives businesses in a global economy. As such Bos knows all too well that free markets and low taxes need to be embraced and I was a bit surprised to see him advocate the Swedish Model as something the Dutch should aspire to. That approach always reeked of placating his left-wing base and the outcome of the recent Swedish election must have given Bos pause to further advocate this as the solution for an economy that is otherwise doing quite well.

In addition, Bos has alienated himself from the traditional Dutch center by suggesting that mortgage rate deductibility and retirement at 65 are no longer sustainable. Kudos to him, but the complacent electorate is not at all interested in reality-based missives.

No, the prime ministerial hopeful must have sensed that there are no points to be scored on economic matters and that is why he undoubtedly has opened up the debate that seemed to have been somewhat neglected: integration and moral decay. These are real and pressing issues, but they have conveniently been swept under the carpet by the larger parties given their propensity to divide the electorate and arouse some unwanted emotional outbursts. It is also the territory where the divided Dutch right is currently playing, although Bos will have to put a somewhat different slant on integration than for instance Marco Pastors and Geert Wilders.

However Labour is still ahead in the polls, but its comfortable lead is shrinking, while the incumbent Christian-Democrat/VVD coalition appears to be capitalizing on its decent economic record. It is to be hoped that the left and the new right can add some sizzle to the campaign by talking about how the nation’s wealth generating capabilities can be applied to building a better and sustainable nation, at peace with itself and its immigrants

NOTE: Bos laid out his vision for the future in a booklet entitled “This country can do so much better” which I read on my most recent flight from Amsterdam. His sentiments about the nation’s ability to do better are absolutely correct, but to date Bos has failed to offer some real substance as to how the Dutch should get there. He’s got less than two months to articulate that. Stay tuned.

There was a time when I got e-mails suggesting that European governments should pay all Muslim immigrants an amount of money sufficient enough to get them to move back to their country of origin. A buy-out literally, but one that is not only impossible to implement and somewhat morally abject, one that is also economically dangerous. The Dutch economy for instance would grind to a halt if some 7% of the population: (a) wrecked the national budget by cashing in on these 'go home bonuses' and (b) all decided to go leave instantly.

Yet, there are some that actually go voluntarily and maybe they are discovering ways to bring the benefits and opportunities of free trading democracies to stagnant Arab economies. Consider this:

Mimoun a young Moroccan entrepreneur from The Netherlands wants to start a cookies factory back in Morocco. By emigrating to Morocco he plans to start a new life.

[ ... ]

Many well-educated and well-integrated, second generation Moroccans like Mimoun leave The Netherlands. They don’t see many economic opportunities and feel unwelcome in The Netherlands. In Morocco they seek to start a new life.

These well-integrated second-generation immigrants are probably the one group that Europe does not want to lose as they can be instrumental in helping the rest of their ethnic and religious group make that important transition. Still, if they are able create economic opportunity in countries like Morocco, they may prove themselves to be as valuable there as they could have been back in their adopted home country.

NOTE: I translated ‘stroopwafels’ as ‘cookies’ but those of you familiar with this Dutch delicacy will know that is not correct. There is no English word for it, 'syrup waffles' is probably the best one, but think of it as two thinly baked pieces of dough which are glued together by a thin layer of molasses or syrup. I used to buy them at Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport on my way back to London and Hong Kong and they were an instant hit with foreign colleagues who thought it was a unique delicacy. Well, it is up to Mimoun to prove that he can unleash the same excitement in Morocco and turn it into a profitable venture.

With two months to go to an election two Dutch ministers have resigned over a fire at Schiphol airport that killed 11 illegal aliens last year. An inquiry found that both the Justice and the Housing, Planning & Environment ministries failed in their responsibilities. Michael van der Galien at TMV has the details.

Say what you want, if something goes seriously wrong government ministers in Europe in general tend to take responsibility and hand in their portfolios. In the US and Canada in recent years we have witnessed too many scandals and disasters where elected officials managed to get away with a few obligatory excuses and carried on as if nothing had happened. Not good. Ministerial responsibility is a cornerstone of parliamentary democracies.

The One Netherlands party presented its list of candidates today and it includes one Muslim, Hikmat Mahawat Khan as well as one candidate with a Turkish background, Secil Arda. Khan is already billed in Dutch media as a ‘critical Muslim’:

“Muslims will have to take a more critical look at themselves, argues Khan. “Some demand to apply for a job wearing a burka and if they don’t get the job they expect to get welfare benefits” was a comment he made to newspaper Trouw recently.

He is furthermore angered over the anti-gay attitudes of Moroccan youths in Amsterdam, radical mosques and more recently about the hospitality with which Holland welcomed the radical imam Mohammed Anas Noorani Siddiqui.

So, One Netherlands leader Pastors not only distances himself from the irrational and xenophobic zealots that have emerged on the right, he positions immigrants as instrumental to a new and possibly more creative approach to integration. Decades of hands-off, soft multiculturalism has created disengagement, deprivation and finally, radicalism. Among the rubble of these policies we will have to find the talent that is prepared to make hard choices and willing to roll up its sleeves. They are not going to go away so what better approach is there than to get them on board to help build a new Europe. Confrontation and forced alienation can never be an option.

This is the first in what will be regular updates from the Dutch election front, the frequency of which will no doubt increase closer to the November 22 voting date.

Today the remnants of the ruling coalition of Christian Democrats (CDA) and VVD, led by prime-minister Balkenende presented the budget on the traditional third Tuesday of September. And, not entirely surprisingly in an election year, things are looking good:

Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende said that years of belt-tightening have given the country a strong foundation to capitalize on global economic growth. "I have always said there would be sweetness after the bitter times," he said.

The budget plan featured spending of €156.8 billion, or $198 billion, 1.5 percent higher than this year, but still included a projected budget surplus.

The budget outline represented the opening salvo of the election campaign, with the governing center-right government offering sweeteners to business and the public, while the center-left opposition complained that the Netherlands lagged behind the rest of Europe.

The opposition is probably unwilling to acknowledge that the Dutch currently have the lowest unemployment rate in the EU and that in terms of GDP growth this year are turning in a number that is quite close to the EU average. But all these numbers are rather meaningless to voters unless they see some actual increases in their net disposable income and this is what this budget sets out to do. It will allow the CDA and VVD to frame the core theme of the campaign by arguing that things are on track and moving in the right direction. And compared to other nations the tightening of the Dutch belt has been rather painless, even by Dutch standards.

So does this mean this election is the ruling coalition’s to lose? Maybe. Their polling numbers have been abysmal to date and to get both parties in majority territory appears to be an uphill struggle, at least so far. This budget could give them the opportunity to get some momentum; still I would suspect that they need a third party to continue their stay in office. But, it’s still early days and an awful lot can happen over the next two months. Stay tuned.

Of course, the question has been asked who will take on the legacy of Pim Fortuyn now that the remnants of his old party have more or less disappeared. As I pointed out before, Rotterdam politician Marco Pastors who is a former business and political associate of the slain professor, is the most likely person to fill that ideological and political void. He launched his new party last month and last week I met Pastors at the old residence of Fortuyn. It is a beautiful and stately home that was purchased by a real estate tycoon who has seen to it that the house remains in exactly the same state as in the days Fortuyn lived in it until he was murdered. Even after four years, it was chilling to see the politician's schedule and the papers of that fateful day in May on his desk.

It was a great opportunity to dive into some pressing issues and I tried to figure out how Pastors has been able to gain a position of respectability within the Dutch political scene following the initial hostility towards its new right-of-center players. He explained that after his (and Fortuyn’s) party’s huge electoral win in the 2002 local elections in Rotterdam their main objective was to keep the rhetoric down and focus on results. That would not only neutralize the party’s eager critics, it would also directly address the deep frustration over the political arrogance that had created such a disconnect between the city council and the local population. For a city that is known for its hard work and action-oriented culture, it was a fitting approach and Pastors was pleased with the rapid decisionmaking that ended a culture of endless debate and bureaucratic standstill. That record of success however was not fully underwritten by voters in the 2006 election, a good example of how fickle Dutch voters have become in a time that both the left and right agree is one of deep uncertainty.

So Pastors’ timing to leverage his local experience on the national scene appears to be timely, although he and fellow founder Joost Eerdmans had to rush to launch their One Netherlands party following the early fall of the Dutch cabinet over the Hirsi Ali affair. The trick for them now will be to move the debate in the right direction as so far it is not very clear what the core campaign issue for most parties is going to be. Judging from news reports, it won’t be integration as the NRC Handelsblad last week noted that most parties are relatively quiet about the topic and the public at large appears to be equally unmoved. But as Pastors pointed out, there may have been some fixes to immigration, integration is virtually untouched. Again an erratic electorate was given an opportunity to vent and now that anger and frustrations have been released many have probably convinced themselves that the issue is gone. The focus appears to be shifting back to mortgage rate deductability and extending the retirement age beyond sixty-five. To his credit, it is the left’s foreman Wouter Bos who has been daring enough to raise these key issues, something the centrist Christian-Democrats and right of center VVD have been very keen to avoid.

If minimizing damage is going to be the central theme for most parties, then I would give Pastors a decent chance at winning a significant number of seats in parliament. His track record in Rotterdam indicates that voters eventually tire over obfuscating pressing matters - whatever they are - and are willing to take a risk on drastic change. The question is if two months are sufficient to accomplish that.

Whatever shape the campaign is going to take, its unpredictability and potency for political change will not only be the creation of its current contestants, but also of the man who never lived to see the current electoral challenge. When I closed the gates of Pim’s old residence behind me one thing seemed very clear: it is going to be an extraordinary campaign.

Related
The Divided Dutch Right
A Troubling Dismissal
Peaktalk's Fortuyn Files

At the end of November the Dutch will go to the polls for a general election and this week a number of parties on the right launched their platforms. My initial take can be found in a column for PJM Politics Central, here.

Yes, there is little Dutch news to report on this summer, but expect that to change when the election campaign will switch into gear early September. In the meantime, check out the impressions and photos from this Portland blogger who is visiting Amsterdam. Keep scrolling.

Radio Netherlands has kindly made available some numbers on the Dutch attitudes towards Israel and Hezbollah. As expected, there is a slight tilt in favor of Israel, but a 35% number saying it can understand Israel’s position is underwhelming, to say the least. Especially if you note that 18% “understands” Hezbollah. I am not sure how to interpret the latter, but I guess it is not meant to represent an objective understanding of how terrorist organizations operate.

Anyway, longtime readers know that the Dutch were once one of the staunchest supporters of the Jewish state and I have to say my current stance is in no small part influenced by the blue and white hallelujah atmosphere of the 1970s. Things like that tend to impress the young.

So what has changed since those halcyon days? What has prompted the Dutch to abandon their solid support for Israel and instead opt for a more ambivalent attitude? There are a few things at work here and I would mark the 1980s as a turning point:

(1) Holocaust - The deep guilt over the deportation and murder of about 85% of the Dutch-Jewish population during World War II - which fueled the strong support for the young state - started to wear off after some forty years;

(2) Domestic Polics - At the height of the Dutch-Israeli love fest in the mid-1970s both countries were governed by Labor and that in no small part facilitated forging strong and deep ties. Likud, the dominant player in Israeli politics during the 1980s was not easily and automatically aligned with the left-of-center tilt that characterizes Dutch politics;

(3) Lebanon 1982 - The invasion of Lebanon in 1982 was not interpreted to be an act of self-defence and was carried out by Likud, a party that as noted above could not count on automatic popularity in The Netherlands;

(4) The Underdog - The love for the underdog – a feeling ironically in part crafted by the holocaust – could no longer realistically be applied to Israel from 1982 onwards. The Palestinians had successfully claimed the underdog mantle and leveraged that position skillfully – think media campaigns – until this very day.

(5) Muslim Immigration - A growing Muslim population in The Netherlands may have contributed to the factors 1 to 4 listed above, although I would be reluctant to make any claim that Dutch-Muslim organizations were able to hijack the debate to their advantage. One can’t deny however that a sizeable Muslim contingent which also benefits from the ‘underdog’ and ‘multicultural’ attitudes was and is in a far better position to make its case than the diminished pro-Israel crowd.

(6) European Integration - Yes, each EU member carries out its own foreign policy, but throughout the 1980s and 90s there has been a strong tendency to align or form a joint EU foreign policy which has – for a variety of other reasons – not exactly been overtly pro-Israel and that is of course an understatement.

(7) Naiveté - Of course the 'peace process' proved to be a defining factor in shaping perceptions and that brings me back to the Radio Netherlands report:

Lack of understanding can easily lead to impatience, and without the respondents showing any outspoken sympathy for either of the warring parties or any true understanding of what lies at the heart of the conflict, it seems there's just one thing they clearly want: for it all to end as quickly as possible.

Of course, war is unpleasant and forces a moral choice and both concepts do not fit into the culture of self-gratification and peace of mind. All western societies are prone to that, but the Dutch have turned it into an art.

NOTE: Here is an idea of how things are being considered by the Dutch’s neighbors, Germany.

The Dutch will go to the polls for a general election later this year – November to be precise - and one party in particular is projected to do well, namely the Socialist Party, a more radical and doctrinaire Labour Party offshoot. Its leader, Jan Marijnissen, made headlines last week by comparing jihadist terrorism to the Dutch resistance during World War II:

" Terrorism is a recurring thing throughout history and often has the intention to make life for an occupying power as difficult as possible. The Dutch have, during the Second World War here blown up city halls in order to disrupt Nazi Germany’s machine of destruction – most city halls kept registries with names of Jewish citizens. In the Middle East, things are not that different. Islamic fundamentalism, including its terrorist subsidiary, is a reaction to the occupation of Palestine by Israel, the American presence in the Middle East and the support of undemocratic regimes in the Middle East by the west "

Not only a false and to some highly insulting analogy, Marijnissen also fails to note that radical Islam is driven by religion and not by politics, a point that is not often understood in Europe's secular circles. As we have seen over the past few weeks, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is merely a useful conduit to expand the radical Islamic franchise as is so eloquently explained by Amir Taheri in the Times today:

The problem is that since the Iranian regime is Shi’ite it would not be easy to sell it to most Arabs, who are Sunni. To overcome that hurdle, it is necessary to persuade the Arabs that only Iran is sincere in its desire and capacity to wipe Israel off the map. Once that claim is sold to the Arabs, so Ahmadinejad hopes, they would rally behind his vision of the Middle East instead of the “American vision”.

The jury is out on whether the Palestinians would really enjoy life under Ahmadinejad’s Shi’ite umbrella, but that’s a topic for a very different discussion.

In the meantime Marijnissen has hurried to tone down his original comment on his own weblog as Dutch pollsters predict that he will pick up some 10% of the vote if an election were held today. If he does indeed manage that in November, the Socialist Party may become a player in parliament, possibly holding the balance of power. I will leave it to your imagination as to how that would affect the Dutch, and to some extent the European, debate over waging war on terror.

The emergency debate turned into a marathon session of the Dutch lower house and early in the morning an apparently emotional Immigration Minster Verdonk accepted two separate motions to reconsider revoking Hirsi Ali's Dutch nationality. She will now have six weeks to see if there are mitigating circumstances that will allow Hirsi Ali to remain a Dutch citizen.

What to say? It is a moral victory for our embattled heroine that much is certain, but at this point it is of course of little help to her. As she mentioned during her press conference yesterday, it was the court ruling that led to the eviction from her apartment a few weeks back that forced her decision to resign from parliament and leave the lowlands in search for greener pastures overseas. Upon joining AEI she will most likely be in a position to apply for US citizenship and consider her Dutch passport as a tainted relic that will forever remind her of her dreadful last few months in The Netherlands.

For Verdonk, the story is truly extraordinary, and not exactly in a positive sense. She gambled that a tough stance vis-à-vis Ayaan would pay her political dividends in the leadership race for her party, but the gamble failed to pay off. Not only were the motions against her actions supported by a wide spectrum of the Dutch left and right, during the debate she also lied about certain issues according to writer Leon de Winter on Dutch TV last night. A group of Dutch celebrities published an open letter yesterday in which they stated “we are embarrassed about our own country”, and if you read it, it is patently clear that – without mentioning her name – the finger is pointed directly at the erstwhile Dutch 'iron lady'.

The real iron lady would probably tell us that ruthless political power play is perfectly fine, as long as it is supported by sound moral principles, by separating right and wrong. And by taking a risk, rather than by reckless gambling. Rita Verdonk failed across the board, on all counts and it would seem that her political career is pretty much history.

My friends at The Augean Stables nail it once again:

Anyone who thinks that Holland “woke up” after Theo Van Gogh’s murder needs to rethink. Not only was it the “progressive camp” that did Ali in politically, and her good, cautious, bourgeois neighbors who wanted her out lest they share in the dangers she ran, but that segment of the population that supposedly did wake up has done little to nothing to save her.

It were the neighbours who represent more than anything else the self-induced sleep that Hirsi Ali's former countrymen appear to prefer. So much that they were willing to go through the trouble of using the courts to allow them to stay asleep.

While you're at the stables, make sure to also check out Richard Landes' account of Hirsi Ali's recent visit to Harvard.

From an American reader:

Surely there must be some way for the Netherlands to resolve its political difficulties without lurching from crisis to crisis and without violence.

If not, there's not much hope for the rest of us.

It seems to me that many European countries have consensus-style governments (either through formal mechanisms such as proportional representation or widely held social and political customs) that tend to produce paralysis through a combination of political fear and narrow self-interest.

The oddity is that such arrangements were designed in part to limit personality based politics; but in moments of paralysis and crisis that is exactly what they produce, because only a 'super-star' politician (or a demagogue) can cobble together a majority large enough and stable enough to push through needed reforms.

I hope the Dutch people will be able to find a way through these difficulties without settling into a fragile but stifling center-left consensus to do nothing, punctuated by growing violence and unrest, but it doesn't look good at the moment.

The outlook is bleaker than ever, in my opinion.

For posterity, in its entirety:

I came to Holland in the summer of 1992 because I wanted to be able to determine my own future. I didn’t want to be forced into a destiny that other people had chosen for me, so I opted for the protection of the rule of law. Here in Holland, I found freedom and opportunities, and I took those opportunities to speak out against religious terror.

In January 2003, at the invitation of the VVD party, I became a member of parliament. I accepted the VVD’s invitation on the condition that I would be the party’s spokesman for the emancipation of women and the integration of immigrants.

What exactly did I want to achieve?

First of all I wanted to put the oppression of immigrant women -- especially Muslim women – squarely on the Dutch political agenda. Second, I wanted Holland to pay attention to the specific cultural and religious issues that were holding back many ethnic minorities, instead of always taking a one-sided approach that focused only on their socio-economic circumstances. Lastly, I wanted politicians to grasp the fact that major aspects of Islamic doctrine and tradition, as practiced today, are incompatible with the open society.

Now I have to ask myself, have I accomplished that task?

I have stumbled often in my political career. It has sometimes been frustrating and slow. However, I am completely certain that I have, in my own way, succeeded in contributing to the debate. Issues related to Islam – such as impediments to free speech; refusal of the separation of Church and State; widespread domestic violence; honor killings; the repudiation of wives; and Islam’s failure to condemn genital mutilation -- these subjects can no longer be swept under the carpet in our country’s capital. Some of the measures that this government has begun taking give me satisfaction. Many illusions of how easy it will be to establish a multicultural society have disappeared forever. We are now more realistic and more open in this debate, and I am proud to have contributed to that process.

Meanwhile, the ideas which I espouse have begun spreading to other countries. In recent years I have given speeches and attended debates in many European countries and in the United States. For months now, I have felt that I needed to make a decision: should I go on in Dutch politics, or should I now transfer my ideas to an international forum?

In the fall of 2005 I told Gerrit Zalm and Jozias van Aartsen, the leaders of the VVD, that I would not be a candidate for the parliamentary elections in 2007. I had decided to opt for a more international platform, because I wanted to contribute to the international debate on the emancipation of Muslim women and the complex relationship between Islam and the West.

Now that I am announcing that I will resign from Dutch politics, I would like to thank the members of the VVD for my years in parliament – to thank them for inviting me to stand for parliament, and -- perhaps more importantly -- for putting up with me while I was there, for this has been in many ways a rough ride for us all. I want to thank my other colleagues here in parliament for their help, although some of our debates have been sharp. (Femke Halsema, thank you especially for that!). I would also like to thank the 30,758 people who in January 2003 trusted their preference vote to a newcomer.

But why am I not remaining in parliament for my full term, until next year’s election? Why, after only three and a half years, have I decided to resign from the Lower Chamber?

It is common knowledge that threats against my life began building up ever since I first talked about Islam publicly, in the spring of 2002. Months before I even entered politics, my freedom of movement was greatly curtailed, and that became worse after Theo van Gogh was murdered in 2004. I have been obliged to move house so many times I have lost count. The direct cause for the ending of my membership in parliament is that on April 27 of this year, a Dutch court ruled that I must once again leave my home, because my neighbors filed a complaint that they could not feel safe living next to me. The Dutch government will appeal this verdict and I grateful for that, because how on earth will other people whose lives are threatened manage to find a place to stay if this verdict is allowed to rest? However, this appeal does not alter my situation: I have to leave my apartment by the end of August.

Another reason for my departure is the discussion that has arisen from a TV program, The Holy Ayaan, which was aired on May 11. This program centered on two issues: the story that I told when I was applying for asylum here in Holland, and questions about my forced marriage.

I have been very open about the fact that when I applied for asylum in the Netherlands in 1992, I did so under a false name and with a fabricated story. In 2002, I spoke on national television about the conditions of my arrival, and I said then that I fabricated a story in order to be able to receive asylum here. Since that TV program I have repeated this dozens of times, in Dutch and international media. Many times I have truthfully named my father and given my correct date of birth. (You will find a selection of these articles in the press folder). I also informed the VVD leadership and members of this fact when I was invited to stand for parliament.

I have said many times that I am not proud that I lied when I sought asylum in the Netherlands. It was wrong to do so. I did it because I felt I had no choice. I was frightened that if I simply said I was fleeing a forced marriage, I would be sent back to my family. And I was frightened that if I gave my real name, my clan would hunt me down and find me. So I chose a name that I thought I could disappear with – the real name of my grandfather, who was given the birth-name Ali. I claimed that my name was Ayaan Hirsi Ali, although I should have said it was Ayaan Hirsi Magan.

You probably are wondering, what is my real name?

I am Ayaan, the daughter of Hirsi, who is the son of a man who took the name of Magan. Magan was the son of Isse, who was the son of Guleid, who was the son of Ali. He was the son of Wai’ays, who was the son of Muhammad. He was the son of Ali, who was the son of Umar. Umar was the son of Osman, who was the son of Mahamud. This is my clan, and therefore, in Somalia, this is my name: Ayaan Hirsi Magan Isse Guleid Ali Wai’ays Muhammad Ali Umar Osman Mahamud.

Following the May 11 television broadcast, legal questions have been raised about my naturalization as a Dutch citizen. Minister Verdonk has written to me saying that my passport will be annulled, because it was issued to a person who does not hold my real name. I am not at liberty to discuss the legal issues in this case.

Now for the questions about my forced marriage. Last week’s TV program cast doubt on my credibility in that respect, and the final conclusion of the documentary is that all this is terribly complicated. Let me tell you, it’s not so complex. The allegations that I willingly married my distant cousin, and was present at the wedding ceremony, are simply untrue. This man arrived in Nairobi from Canada, asked my father for one of his five daughters, and my father gave him me. I can assure you my father is not a man who takes no for an answer. Still, I refused to attend the formal ceremony, and I was married regardless. Then, on my way to Canada -- during a stopover in Germany -- I traveled to the Netherlands and asked for asylum here. In all simplicity this is what happened, nothing more and nothing less. For those who are interested in the intimate details of my transition from a pre-modern society to a modern one, and how I came to love what the West stands for, please read my memoir, which is due to be published this fall.

To return to the present day, may I say that it is difficult to live with so many threats on your life and such a level of police protection. It is difficult to work as a parliamentarian if you have nowhere to live. All that is difficult, but not impossible. It has become impossible since last night, when Minister Verdonk informed me that she would strip me of my Dutch citizenship.

I am therefore preparing to leave Holland. But the questions for our society remain. The future of Islam in our country; the subjugation of women in Islamic culture; the integration of the many Muslims in the West: it is self-deceit to imagine that these issues will disappear.

I will continue to ask uncomfortable questions, despite the obvious resistance that they elicit. I feel that I should help other people to live in freedom, as many people have helped me. I personally have gone through a long and sometimes painful process of personal growth in this country. It began with learning to tell the truth to myself, and then the truth about myself: I strive now to also tell the truth about society as I see it.

That transition from becoming a member of a clan to becoming a citizen in an open society is what public service has come to mean for me. Only clear thinking and strong action can lead to real change, and free many people within our society from the mental cage of submission. The idea that I can contribute to their freedom, whether in the Netherlands or in another country, gives me deep satisfaction.

Ladies and Gentlemen, as of today, I resign from Parliament. I regret that I will be leaving the Netherlands, the country which has given me so many opportunities and enriched my life, but I am glad that I will be able to continue my work.

I will go on.

Thanks for your e-mails, links and comments, there will be more later.

Dutch parliament has convened for an emergency session following the highly controversial maneuvers from Immigration Minister Rita Verdonk to declare that Hirsi Ali’s citizenship is likely to be revoked. Arjan Dasselaar is liveblogging events as they unfold in his usual trenchant style, it seems he is not exactly pleased to be Dutch on this particular day.

To be clear, Hirsi Ali was scheduled to leave parliament and join AEI long before both the eviction-affair and the documentary about her entry into the The Netherlands became headline news. Both Hirsi Ali and some of her closest associates must have determined a while ago that there was probably a better and safer future in America. The court ruling which gave her four months to vacate her apartment essentially brought that decision forward. That in essence raises even more questions about Verdonk’s heavy handed approach which it appears is now backfiring and could well derail her political career – and leadership ambitions – for good.

So, there have been five political and/or public talents in The Netherlands who have tried to initiate a debate and tried to change the direction of the troubled nation. Here’s what has happened to each of them:

Frits Bolkestein: Retired
Pim Fortuyn: Murdered
Theo van Gogh: Murdered
Ayaan Hirsi Ali: Humiliated and expelled
Rita Verdonk: Disgraced

And then I didn’t count the many that have decided to stay quiet out of fear or refrain from getting involved in politics out of total disgust. Any guesses about the future of political debate in The Netherlands?

Ayaan Hirsi Ali is a brave, intelligent and unique woman but she is a spent force in Dutch politics. Yes, she’s a star and that is precisely her problem. If you want to succeed in Dutch politics the one thing you can’t have is star-status and on the policy front you need to be able to show some ability for compromise and moderation. Hirsi Ali fails on both counts. She has caused her party, the right-leaning liberals, incredible headaches and they have not been doing well in the polls at all. It’s not Hirsi Ali’s fault of course, but I expect that her outspoken manner, star-status and the fact she’s a security issue will all be huge liabilities for the party going forward.

So in a way it wasn’t surprising to hear Hirsi Ali answer to the question how an asylum seeker could make it from factory worker to Dutch parliament as follows: “the American Dream”. She pointed to her journey so far but she is now well positioned to continue her mission on the other side of the ocean, the book she’s working on for instance is written in English rather than Dutch. She’ll be an asset to any think-tank and be able to influence a far larger audience if she’s given the time and room in a less politicized and much safer place.

I wrote this on March 13, 2005.

I will be on Rob Breakenridge's The World Tonight at 6:30 PST to talk about, yes, Hirsi Ali.

Rita Verdonk has just driven the final nail into Ayaan Hirsi Ali's coffin by stating that the hunted ex-parliamentarian and fresh AEI-employee "cannot be deemed to have received the Dutch nationality". Arjan Dasselaar has the latest and concludes that it is indeed Hirsi Ali's own party that has put the dagger in her back. There is a difference between someone resigning over past mistakes and delivering the K.O. to someone who is already down. This is it and it is a pretty disgraceful spectacle. More comments later.

UPDATE: Leon de Winter is both appalled and embarrassed and I am getting lots of Dutch e-mails arguing that I was probably wise to leave the place behind a while ago. No one there believes things will get better anytime soon, if ever.

Well, that didn't take long. Ayaan Hirsi Ali will in September leave The Netherlands and join the AEI. This outcome was expected and in a way I think it is very good news for her, but it is not all that good for the Dutch. Not only will they lose a talented, vocal and original thinker, they allowed - quite probably deliberately - her to fall in a very public manner and I don't think she deserved that.

UPDATE: A Dutch reader writes:

You're right, it must be a relief for her to be able to move to the US. But for us? The security/eviction affair made us look pretty ridiculous. Now one of the most colorful, bravest and intelligent people is leaving The Netherlands. What does that say about the state of affairs here?

There were three musketeers in The Netherlands not too long ago, brave and unconventional free thinking individuals. Two have been murdered, the last one has now been expelled.

MORE REACTIONS: Here.

Judging form the many e-mails over the past weekend it is clear that the latest installment in the Ayaan Hirsi Ali saga is probably one of the more spectacular and at the same time more controversial ones. In short, last Thursday a television documentary (you can watch it here) tried to verify the various claims Hirsi Ali has made about her past and the way in which she became a refugee seeking political asylum in The Netherlands in the early 90s. What is clear is that she did indeed lie in order to obtain refugee status, a fact she wholeheartedly admits. Murkier are the details surrounding her arranged marriage and the way in which she tried to extract herself from it.

The tone of the documentary called "Saint Ayaan" made by the VARA – which is a left-of-center public broadcaster affiliated with both the Labour Party and organized labour – clearly underlines its intent: to take down Hirsi Ali. Leon de Winter points out in his blog that the left may have been down but hardly out, and is now in full swing to restore the Dutch age of politically correct consensus by publicly executing Hirsi Ali.

That is a correct assumption. But what has not been discussed in detail is that the Dutch right, and notably Hirsi Ali’s own liberal party (VVD) may have decided that it is time to get shot of her. Ayaan’s lies will now be the subject of a formal investigation by Immigration Minister Rita Verdonk, who as it happens is also part of the VVD and is in the middle of hotly contested leadership struggle (to be concluded later this month) in which she faces a more moderate and centrist candidate. So, if Verdonk’s aim is to gain control over the VVD she will have to not only make sure that by investigating Hirsi Ali she is living up to her ‘going by the book’ reputation, but she will have to placate her party’s more centrist members. As such, Hirsi Ali is of no real use to her, and it is Verdonk herself who has grabbed the "less-government, tough on immigration" mantle that has been vacant following Fortuyn’s and Van Gogh’s respective murders. Hirsi Ali has served her purpose by formulating a number of highly controversial positions, something that no one previously dared saying, and now that the word is out it is up to others to take the message forward.

The other aspect that should be underlined here is the deep resentment that success and ambition usually generate in The Netherlands. Dynamic careers, success, outspokenness, standing out in the crowd are things that have always been frowned upon, although that has changed a bit in recent years I guess. Still, the Dutch coined the phrase “act normal, that is strange enough” and a very ambitious black Muslim woman who built up a spectacular political career with international allure by holding a mirror in front of the complacent and politically lethargic Dutch was of course not something that would be rewarded with eternal gratitude. Intelligent as she is, Hirsi Ali must have been keenly aware that she was bound to get into real trouble and by that I do not mean a jihadist ready to kill her. No, her once receptive hosts and former friends will now have the honor of wielding the knife.

Coming so quickly after the court ruling in the case that seeks to evict her from her house it is hard not to escape the conclusion that some sort of concerted effort is under way to get rid of her. As it stands, I believe that both the left and the right have a vested interest in bringing this about and without the support of her own party Hirsi Ali’s chances to hang on and run on the VVD ticket in the general election next year are remote.

Question is, should Hirsi Ali resign or otherwise be demoted from her present prominent role in the party on the basis of her past lies? The answer to that has to be affirmative. No one holding elected office should be exempt from the most simple ethical and moral test and the same goes for Hirsi Ali. What should not happen, but what I am afraid is will happen, is a very public humiliation of Hirsi Ali and with that of a lot of the ideas she stands for. In the past I have argued that she eventually would make her way across the Atlantic to find employ at a major think tank, a notion she herself always dismissed. But the latest turn of events will probably force her to once more make a dramatic move, although this time she will not have to lie about it.

OK, to follow up on Eugene Volokh's request:

The State has bought an apartment in an apartment building and outfitted this as a maximum security house. At present the state lets the subject (Ayaan Hirsi Ali) live in this apartment. A number of occupants of the other apartments have objected to this. They feel they are running the risk of becoming a victim if the subject is attacked while she is present in the apartment building. In addition, they argue that the security measures around the subject constitute a nuisance to them. The court generally finds in favor of the occupants. It is however not demonstrated beyond a reasonable doubt that occupants have suffered an excessive nuisance. But that the fact that the occupants feel unsafe as a result of the fact that one of the apartments in their building is outfitted as a maximum security house is supported. The reason for this is that the occupants feel unsafe in the place where they should themselves feel safer then anywhere else: the home, so a breach of their rights to fully enjoy their homes is clear. As this violation of Article 8 of the European Treaty for Human Rights fails to have any legal justification, the State will be required to ensure that subject will leave her apartment within a period of four months. The mistake of the State to house subject without a legal basis in her present apartment can not be shifted to the occupants of the apartment building. The judgment of the court has been based on the specific circumstances of this case and more in particular on the fact that the protected house is inhabited by the subject. There are insufficient grounds to pre-emptively conclude that in the case of other protected persons a similar violation of Article 8 of the European Treaty for Human Rights can be established.

Again, it is not so much the content or the spirit of Article 8 of the European Treaty for Human Rights that is troublesome, it is the intent of the occupants and their lawyers to have used it to evict Hirsi Ali from the home that was provided to her by the Dutch State.

Hirsi Ali’s appearance at Harvard's JFK School of Government today triggered the necessary media attention and that started earlier today with a Michelle Malkin vlog, honoring the group of brave women that are challenging radical Islam.

Later today, Eugene Volokh picked up on the legal aspects raised by my initial post about Hirsi Ali’s impending eviction form her apartment in The Netherlands. Volokh is intrigued about the affair and it appears he will get someone to translate the ruling in order to give a more comprehensive review of the matter. Yes, I know, that is something I should actually have done as the native Dutchman here, but it is kind of hectic today around here, no time. As I mentioned before, the Dutch press has remained very quiet about this and there continues to be a chance that the case will end up in front of the Dutch Supreme Court who will assess whether the law was applied correctly by the lower court which issued the controversial ruling.

And finally, the first blogged accounts of Hirsi’Ali’s talk at Harvard are now available online, one by Miss Kelly (via Martin Solomon) and one by a Malkin reader.

NOTE: Shay at Booker Rising is also a dedicated follower of Hirsi Ali-related news.

Related Posts
Hirsi Ali, The Hunted (3)
Hirsi Ali, The Hunted (2)
Hirsi Ali, The Hunted

Yes, my post remembering Pim Fortuyn was terribly short, but to be frank I believe that I have said most of what needs to be said about him. We wouldn’t be doing him any justice to replay the same mantras about deregulation, privatization and immigration without end – visit the Peaktalk archives for that - but we do need to remember him and the terrible way in which he died. Thanks to a reader I did discover a gem in relation to Fortuyn that warrants some attention, and believe it or not, this is a eulogy written by a member of the Dutch Labour Party, on their site, praising Fortuyn. Money quote:

I was one of the few within the Labour Party who considered some of Fortuyn’s ideas interesting. That didn’t always result in very pleasant reactions within my own circle, to put it mildly. And, yes, another coming out: I did enjoy in secret Pim’s glorious entrance into the Rotterdam city hall on March 6, 2002 (Ed: the night of his local electoral win). Many Rotterdam-based fellow party members with their appalling arrogance had asked for it.

The writer, Job van Amerongen, concludes that many things in Dutch politics have changed for the better, thanks to Fortuyn. I do believe that it requires a measure of braveness to speak out this way, even four years after Fortuyn’s death. There is still some hope out there, you would think.

Got a e-mail from Arjan Dasselaar who tells me the latest round of desecrations was most likely the work of a native Dutch skinhead gang. Good, that proves the Weimar-theory: increasing violence from the political fringes, while the center looks on hopelessly.

Today, four years ago.

Yesterday was remembrance day in the The Netherlands, a solemn day during which the victims of WWII are remembered. Now, sixty years on this day has become the target of incidents and deliberate desecrations, like the one three years ago which I wrote about here:

I wanted to share this with you as Dutch newspapers last week reported that Moroccan youths had disturbed a number of these ceremonies throughout the country earlier this week. In one instance by throwing eggs onto participants and in another by playing football with the wreaths. The absolute bottom was reached when during the ceremony in one of Amsterdam’s suburbs a number of these youths shouted “we must kill the Jews”.

Interestingly, the damaged wreaths were just the start of what turned out to be a long drawn out battle in the Amsterdam district called De Baarsjes where the remembrance cross was eventually removed, allegedly as part of 'renovations in the area'. A storm of indignation followed, especially in light of the comments from the Chairman of the remembrance committee, who argued that protests from the local mosque prompted to re-evaluate the Christian nature of the memorial cross and that they would be looking to install a more "universal monument", one that would deal with more than just the Second World War.

The uproar about this spread to the rest of The Netherlands and as a result the cross will now be returned to a location close to where it stood before the 'renovations', once they are completed. There is no unambiguous answer as to what exactly prompted the removal - local Muslims may have been far less instrumental in this than is widely assumed - and looking over the various news reports it appears that once again it was a native Dutch decisionmaking body that decided to appease and placate in order to avoid trouble. Much like the attempt to not erect a monument for Theo van Gogh for fear of unrest, or the entire mainstream media repsonse to the Danish Cartoons.

The Dutch news this morning however reported that yesterday again, in Amsterdam, wreaths and flowers were destroyed. This apparently happened after midnight when a professional security service - which you need these days to guard memorial sites - went home.

Let me conclude the post with a translation from a newspaper clipping from a Dutch paper which I got earlier this week:

A while ago I wrote about the life of Mientje ten Dam-Pooters. She, a devoted communist, assisted in organizing the February Strike (in 1941) which was aimed at preventing the deportation of Amsterdam's Jews. Her husband Jaap was lying down on the municipal rail transport lines to prevent NSB members (Ed: Dutch Nazi collaborators) from leaving the station.

She is 89 now and when I call her she says she wants to continue to bear witness to what happened during those years, when taking a position was not without consequences but could cost you your life, like her brother, a resistance member. What does she think about events in The Baarsjes? "Have they completely lost their minds?", she cries out.

Indeed, and once again the mindless people here are not so much the Muslim immigrants, but the governing elites who will go to every imaginable length to keep the peace, to accomodate and to avoid standing up for the basic values of a free society. In doing so they embarrass not only themselves, but they shame and indeed desecrate the memory of the few Dutch that stood up against the Nazi occupier more than six decades ago. If they continue at this incredible rate, these brave souls will indeed be forgotten. Soon.

UPDATE: A timely piece from Joe Katzman, Europe's Shame, Europe's Suicide (hat tip: Glenn).

Listen to it here. Topics include fundamentalism, Islam, women and Islam, Danish cartoons, appeasement, multiculturalism and her own security. Listen to the whole thing.

From a reader weighing in on the Hirsi Ali-affair and describing European attitudes:

" Total concern about individual comfort and safety with no regard for present morality or future consequence "

Indeed, and the quote neatly captures one of the core themes of this blog when Europe is on the table. For completeness sake I will give you the entire e-mail to put the quote in context:

The reason the Hirsi Ali story has no traction is that it is so basically and basely European. When I first read about her problem I thought this is Europe today mirrored in an apartment building. Total concern about individual comfort and safety with no regard for present morality or future consequence. Europe after WWII is like France after WWI, a place of total lack of will. During WWII France had a six week retreat and a war long collaboration. Were the lessons learned from Munich, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Vichy, and the Holocaust that evil ignore is evil that goes away?

In the meantime media debate about it remains scant, one of the bigger Dutch blogs notes that a parliamentarian from the Green Left has so far been the only one to raise questions in parliament. Which begs the question, do some have a vested interest - including Hirsi Ali's own party - in staying quiet about this? More in the days ahead.

It's five days now since the contentious court ruling, but all I can see in the Dutch and international media landscape is a ghastly silence. The blogosphere picked it up, looked at it and moved the story forward, the rest of the world didn't care.

Related Posts
Hirsi Ali, The Hunted (2)
Hirsi Ali, The Hunted

There’s been a lot of response to the post on Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s forced removal from her apartment after her neighbors initiated court action, claiming she posed a security risk.

So far, there has been very little debate about it in the Dutch media, but that could be explained by the long Queen’s birthday holiday weekend the Dutch are enjoying. It could also be that a sense of deep embarrassment makes it hard to find the right words. Not for writer Leon de Winter who in the Elsevier (Dutch only) vents his anger over the pathetic journey that mainstream Dutch society has taken; a direction now dutifully followed by the courts. On his English-language blog he acknowledges his frustration and shame:

Now, officially she is a pariah. She cannot live anymore in a house or apartment, only on military bases. The orthodox Islamists and the progressive multiculti activists succeeded in isolating this remarkable person from society.
Shame upon my country.

Yes, same sentiments here. Let’s see how the media respond during the week that will mark the fourth anniversary of Pim Fortuyn’s death.

Just to show how far Dutch tolerance goes: Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s neighbors have sued the Dutch state in order to get her to be removed from the apartment complex in which she is living under police protection. The request was initially rejected, but following an appeal a higher court has now ordered Hirsi Ali to leave her house within four months, I translate:

The court considers in its ruling that the neighbors have been put into a situation that has contributed to them feeling less safe in their own house. That feeling is extended to the communal living spaces of the apartment complex, but also to their own apartments. The court argues that this is a severe violation of one’s private life (as per Article 8 of the European Treaty for Human Rights).

A few things. Firstly, it should be noted that Hirsi Ali is now booted out of her own house by virtue of the European Treaty for Human Rights which does indeed supersede Dutch law. Many cases are adjudicated by referring to this treaty, but given the subject matter here I would say: Euroskeptics, go knock yourselves out.

Secondly, and this is the one that really bothers me, is that somehow Hirsi Ali’s neighbors self-interest runs so deep that they are prepared to use the court system to throw someone whose life is in danger out of her own house. It goes like this: we’re tolerant, we support free speech and a critical attitude, but if it comes too close to our front porch, sorry, we are no longer interested. On the contrary, self-interest is the deciding motivator. True, Hirsi Ali’s flatmates do have a reasonable point in arguing that the Dutch State has an obligation to ensure that their security measures benefit the entire complex. If the State has dropped the ball in that respect, they should be compelled by the courts to correct this, but to put the burden on Hirsi Ali is a very disturbing precedent. Yet, the plaintiffs are quite happy with the ruling:

“We are relieved. We just didn’t feel safe any longer in our own homes. Of course, we consider it to be terrible for Hirsi Ali to have to leave her house. The case was not directed at her personally. The point was that the State should not open us to so much danger”

The State may appeal this ruling, in which case it will go to the Dutch Supreme Court. The potential of a ruling that will favor Hirsi Ali and is able to address the upset neighbors may turn out to become a costly adventure for Dutch authorities as it is not just about one outspoken member of parliament. Beyond a number of politicians there is a growing constituency of writers, artists and cartoonists who may rightfully claim government protection. And in most cases their neighbors are equally likely to take a less than charitable view of their right to exercise free speech. This is once more evidence of how Europeans fail to understand the bigger picture and are more than willing to let some short term comfort prevail over the long term survival of core values that built their societies in the first place.

So there are no winners here. The neighborhood is unmasked as a group whose shallow self interest is paramount, the State may have made a few mistakes and will have to spend yet more on security and Ayaan, well, she remains the hunted one. It seems that those responsible for threatening her will have the last laugh.

It’s not the first time that I’ve touched on the Dutch immigration mess where the political pressure to take a firm stand has resulted in some warped results. The most notable one is transporting gays and Christians back to that liberal paradise of human rights, Iran. Well, not more according to the latest to which I was alerted by a loyal American reader:

Immigration and Integration Minister Rita Verdonk has bowed to pressure from parliament and agreed not to deport Iranian gay people and Christian converts for the time being.

The Minister told MPs on Wednesday afternoon she would extend a previous moratorium on the expulsions. She took the decision when it became clear a majority of MPs doubt whether the rejected asylum seekers would be safe in Iran.

The moratorium will remain in force until a new foreign ministry assessment of the situation in Iran for gays and Muslims who have converted to Christianity has been completed. This will likely take until August or September.

The pre-existing notion that gays or Christians could somehow be safe in a nation like Iran is simply too absurd to seriously entertain and Verdonk was rightly called on that by parliament.

The basic rationale for asylum seekers and refugees is to provide a haven of safety up to the point when it can be convincingly argued that they can return back home, a simple premise that is incredibly hard to implement for the Dutch immigration services. My mother-in-law used to be quite active as a volunteer working with refugees, most of whom had conveniently lost their identification papers in order to facilitate an extended stay in the lowlands. Through her I became acquainted with an endearing Afghan family who had rightly abandoned a nation ravaged by the Taliban. The father, who used to be part of the police in Kabul, didn’t fit into the new order although he was never able to convincingly make his case to Dutch authorities. Yet, he and his family were granted a permanent stay - something I do not begrudge them – but it ignored the fact that given the changed circumstances in Afghanistan there was good reason to apply the refugee-principle and let the man and his family return home to help rebuild their fatherland. All the more so as around the same time a Syrian Christian family was given its definitive marching orders after a considerably longer Dutch stay, and, a far more comprehensive case file that would have warranted a prolonged safe harbor.

Again, it appears to be hard to get this right and it would serve Verdonk – especially in light of her political ambitions – well to improve the process and make it less 'assumptions-based'.

An English summary of the controversial recommendations on dealing with Islam by The Netherlands Scientific Council for Government Policy are now available online. The entire report can be found here, an English translation will not be available until July this year.

It seems that the comments to the press that accompanied this report generated most of the storm, although they were directly based on the council's findings. Judging from the summary it appears that the recommendations bank to a very high degree on the progress and success of moderate Muslim groups and parties, both in and outside Europe. That, the report acknowledges, can be a long and difficult process that is easy to disrupt for radical elements. Such a conclusion is hardly new and it would seem that the report's empirical work contributes more to the ongoing debate about Islam than some of its more contentious conclusions.

NOTE: This warning is evidence of how for instance Iran has a vested interest in derailing any attempts of rapprochement between the West and the Muslim world, underlining exactly how difficult it is for the report's ideas to be realized.

Jane Kramer from The New Yorker has for years been writing Letters from Europe and in the April edition her letter, a lengthy one, is about her visit to The Netherlands in The Dutch Model: Multiculturalism and Muslim Immigrants. Given our experiences to date, I am always a bit skeptical of American journalistic forays into my home country, but Kramer has done her homework. An excellent read. (via The Free West).

One of the beautiful things about blogging is that once you’ve put forward a certain idea, you will find that in a very short period of time there is an overwhelming amount of fresh evidence online to support it. So, the idea that the debate over Europe, immigration and jihadist terror is entering a new phase where the left-of-center elites are reclaiming some lost ground, is corroborated by a new report from The Netherlands Scientific Council for Government Policy. This is an independent think tank for the Dutch government and it advises a sitting administration on a variety of issues. This council is highly regarded as providing some solid scientific underpinnings to public policy, at least that is what I remember of it.

Their latest report on Islam in Europe will be released tomorrow – with an English summary on their website - but one of their key researchers, Jan Schoonenboom, has been kind enough to talk to the press in advance of the report’s release and in doing so has given us a preview of the report's general intellectual direction:

An unjustified fear of and aversion to Islam exists in the Netherlands. Instead of continuing to drag the name of that faith through the mud, there should be far more criticism of friendly countries such as the US, Israel and Russia, the Scientific Council for Government Policy (WRR) concludes.

As I said, the tone is set. In an unusual move Schoonenboom takes on a number of politicians directly, no doubt targeting one particular female member of parliament when addressing the issue of sharia:

According to Schoonenboom "we should not be so spastic about the Sharia." It may be that the system leads to corporal punishment in countries like Saudi Arabia and Sudan, "but under the Sharia in Morocco, family law has been reformed, very much to the advantage of women's rights." The Sharia for Muslims is comparable to the Ten Commandments for Christians, in the researcher's view. "It is God's plan for human nature."

The WRR researcher wipes the floor with Islam critics such as MPs Hirsi Ali, Wilders and Verhagen, law philosopher Afshin Ellian and Rotterdam politician Marco Pastors. "They often play on gut feelings in the debate. On fear of Islam and of Muslims. You also see that in the debate on the accession of Turkey to the EU, this country is made out to be much more Islamic than it is, and Europe much more Christian that it really is."

Without having seen the report it is hard to determine how the council arrives at foreign policy recommendations, but it seems to me that the one that they have now tabled is driven much more by playing politics and emotional reactions, than by offering sound advice. Hold on to your jaws for this one:

Schoonenboom advises "an adventurous foreign policy" for the Dutch government. "We must support the moderate Islamic powers much more, such as the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and Hezbollah in Lebanon, instead of secular movements without prospects in Muslim countries. We must talk to the Palestinian regime of Hamas. They are democratically elected. It is a terrorist movement, but so was Arafat's PLO. And the IRA in Ireland."

There is a series of blogposts to be written about this last paragraph alone, but for now let’s suffice by pointing to the Counterterrorism Blog’s recent take on the pre-emptive capabilities of Hezbollah. An adventurous and moderate foreign policy partner indeed.

As I mentioned earlier today, the debate in Europe is becoming more polarized. This report from an independent government-funded think-tank is all the evidence you need to have to support that observation.

UPDATE: Ayaan Hirsi Ali has already responded, noting that the report "is not scientific research, but a politically motivated leaflet. These researchers should join a political party".

So the French election next year will be a very interesting one. But there is another one heating up only a few hours north of Paris, one that will equally see a clash between the new right and the old left. And the struggling and somewhat divided Dutch right got a major boost this week from the launch of “Iron” Rita Verdonk’s bid for the leadership of the VVD, the Dutch free-market classical liberals, or in other words the traditional Dutch right. And she’s off to a clear and good start, making straight talk one of the pillars of her campaign:

Verdonk has thrilled the right-wing of the party with her tough immigration policies and insistence that newcomers integrate by learning Dutch and by accepting Dutch norms and values.

The minister told the press conference she is neither left-wing nor right-wing. Stressing these definitions are outdated anyway, Verdonk said she "steers a straight course".

Her main motivation for running for the leadership position, she said, is to prevent the Netherlands getting a "disastrous left-wing cabinet", made up of the Labour Party (PvdA), green-left party GroenLinks and the Socialist Party (SP) next year.

Straight and direct is a key Dutch virtue, but in the small nation’s political arena it has practically become extinct, if we discount the brief Fortuyn insurgency of 2002. Verdonk – a former prison warden - is considered to be a frontrunner to lead the party and should be able to attract the sizeable non-ideological vote which has been floating ever since Fortuyn’s death. It's too early to attach any firm conclusions, but like France, the fight for the soul of the nation has started early.

NOTE: It's one of my older posts but the Dutch Politics 101 is still useful, I think.

In the aftermath of last month’s local elections in The Netherlands it was clear that the left was back after a few years of confusion and rightward momentum. Down but not out is probably the way to describe it and some of the thinkers of the left will tomorrow present a report outlining how the current government has failed to address the immigration issue. The key mistake according to the report writers: not using the paradigms that underpinned their failed policies which they are more than willing to resurrect. Here is the news report with my comments in bold:

Seven senior political figures from different parties have come together to express alarm at what they believe to be the harsh tone in the debate about the relationship between native Dutch people and residents from immigrant backgrounds.

The news release lists five prominent politicians, one of whom comes from the Dutch right but who was by all accounts one of its more left-leaning figures. Of the remaining four two represent the traditional left and the two remaining members belong to the hard left (Green Left and Socialist Party). The membership structure gives the reader some idea of the ideological structure of ‘the alarm’.

The politicians warn Dutch society may become divided if something isn't done to promote a dialogue between the groups.

Pim Fortuyn emerged on the scene as a politician in the 1990s and pointed out that there were deep divisions in Dutch society, all of whom were carefully covered up by precisely some of the people who now – in 2006 – argue that the nation “may become divided”.

They are to present the manifesto "Eén land, één samenleving" (one land, one society) to the chairpersons of the youth wings of most of the main Dutch political parties in the The Hague on Tuesday.

There was a time when a slogan like “one land, one society” was immediately associated with Europe’s dark past. Odd for the left to recycle it.

The figures behind the initiative include former Liberal Party leader Hans Dijkstal, former junior minister Jos van Kemenade (Labour - PvdA), former D-66 minister Jan Terlouw, former MP Mohammed Rabbae (GroenLinks) and Anja Meulenbelt, a Socialist Party Senator.

As I said above, the membership of this group is indicative of the sort of recommendations we are going to get from it.

"We have to combine our forces," Rabbae said on Monday. "If we do nothing we could be faced with major conflicts and collisions."
The seven have expressed concern about what they see as the "threatened emotional alienation" between native Dutch people and Muslims in the Netherlands.

Whatever a “threatened emotional alienation” is, it assumes that there wasn’t some sort of gap or divide to begin with. A glaring fallacy in the group’s analysis.

Rabbae said his contacts with Muslims indicated to him how great the divisions had become since the terrorist attacks in the US on September 11. "The Netherlands was always a country of tolerance and freedom, but we are gradually becoming the pariah of Europe."

The Netherlands has become the pariah of Europe - according to some - when a sizable majority of the population figured out that a European Constitution was not the sort of document that should guide the nation into its future. They rejected the draft constitution at the ballot box.

The Netherlands continues to be very free - the envy of the North American left - and pragmatic, but the local tolerance level has indeed dropped a few notches. But that is not at all a concern for the rest of Europe; it may however have irked some potential immigrants who were ready to take advantage of the generous open door policy that once characterized Dutch immigration.

The manifesto calls for a new approach to bring the different groups in the Netherlands closer together. The authors claim the climate in the Netherlands has changed drastically in recent years from one of toleration to one of "demands and sanctions".

Some consider that progress and are intended to accomplish bridging the gaps that currently exist between different groups. “Demands and sanctions” were virtually absent from the politics advocated and implemented by the report’s writers. For their failed policies of the past they can be forgiven – in those days everyone was wrong – it is inexcusable to make a serious suggestion to resurrect them.

Accusing the government's integration demands on migrants of approaching assimilation, the document continues: "The tone of the cabinet's policy strengthens ‘us and them thinking’ and alienates the new citizens from the government and society."

Maybe. But the intention of this cabinet’s tone is to instill a sense of effort into new immigrants, effort to become a part of Dutch society and play by its rules.

It also accused politicians in the Netherlands of choosing inward-looking provincialism rather than an open and tolerant society.

The Dutch have never been tolerant by nature. They are pragmatists and that attitude has now told them that their erstwhile pragmatism of doing nothing and appeasing just didn’t work all that well.

The youth wing of Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende's Christian Democratic Party (CDA) is boycotting Tuesday's presentation. CDJA chairman Ronald van Bruchem dismissed the manifesto as a "cuddly document", which does not take account of what the government has achieved in the last three years in relation to integration and marriage migration.

Precisely. The CDA is the largest party in The Netherlands and if the report writers fail to even get a hearing from the party’s youth wing then there is a good chance it will end up in the dustbin. If at the next general election Labour beats the CDA to become the largest party you can bet that this manifesto will return in some shape or form to help in formulating new government policy.

Noting the document does not emphasise the requirement for allochtonen to make an effort, by learning Dutch and integrating, Van Bruchem said he "didn't want to go back to the 1980s".

And that is exactly the point.

Allochtonen can be used to refer to foreigners, migrants or first or second-generation Dutch citizens with a non-Dutch background.

Of course since the AIVD - the Dutch intelligence service - blundered its way through the entire Van Gogh episode, there is reason to believe that they are now over-cautious in assessing and predicting the dangers of a world of terror. It is very similar to the increased awareness that we saw from US security agencies after they had missed the boat on 9/11. Still, the conclusions from their recent report warrant attention, although they are hardly new:

Terrorism increasingly originates in the Netherlands. The Jihadist threat is increasingly often a home-grown product and does not come from abroad, concludes the AIVD secret service in a report 'The violent Jihad in the Netherlands, current trends in the Islamic-terrorist threat'.

As the primary reason for domestic Jihadism, the AIVD names the increasing recruitment and radicalisation among young Muslims born and bred in the Netherlands. Internet plays an increasing role in this process. The terrorist threat has not waned since the November 2004 murder of Theo van Gogh, but a new trend is that members of local networks increasingly seek and make contact with Jihad veterans from other countries, such as Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, the report reads.

More here.

Thanks to one of my loyal readers I found out that there is some tension brewing between The Netherlands and Venezuela in relation to the Dutch Antilles. The three Dutch islands (Aruba, Curacao and Bonaire) are only a short distance off Venezuela's coast and it would require very little effort to invade them. He writes:

I’m concerned that a Dutch coalition government of the left may not have the backbone or stomach to face down Hugo Chavez. I’m not sure if it’s bluster or not but I suspect that if the Dutch government shows what he perceives to be weakness, he’ll move. It is almost a no lose scenario for him. He is dealing with discontent at home and a little island snatching can distract the populace. Remember the Falklands? But where is the Dutch Maggie Thatcher? Additionally if he succeeds, he stood up to the United States and humiliated Bush in his own back yard – or so the press reports will read. He’ll get kudos, accolades and concession from all of his neighbors who don’t want to be next.

It may be a wild and unlikely scenario, but that's what we all said about the Falklands which did turn into a major armed conflict. As for a "Dutch Maggie Thatcher", well she announced today that she is mulling a bid to run:

Immigration and Integration Minister Rita Verdonk revealed on Thursday she is after all considering entering the race to lead the Liberal (VVD) party into the general election in 2007.

When the previous incumbent Jozias van Aartsen resigned after the local elections earlier this month, Verdonk dismissed the idea she would be a candidate to replace him.

But the minister - who prides herself on sticking to her decisions, no matter how controversial - appears to be wavering.

Interesting times.

European demographics have been the theme over the past week and general interest in it has always been driven by projections of Europe’s collapsing birthrate and the often cited Muslim baby-boom. And while some have poured cold water on these notions before, they have remained fairly persistent absence any numbers to debunk them. Yet, evidence from the Dutch Central Bureau for Statistics (CBS) does indeed appear to support the claim that the birthrates of second-generation immigrants adjust towards that of the native population:

Non-western immigrant women are getting less babies. The number of children produced by the second generation of immigrants is almost equal to that of native Dutch women.

[ … ]

Especially the number of births given by Moroccan women has decreased sharply over the past decade. The first generation Moroccan women who were born between 1945 and 1949 got an average of 5.4 children. For women of the first generation who were born twenty years later that number has been halved.

The age at which the second generation of immigrant women becomes a mother has also moved closer to that of the native inhabitants. For them the average age in 2004 was 30 years, Antillian and Aruban women are even somewhat older when they get their first child.

Furthermore, immigrant women are increasingly childless, report the researchers. Turkish, Moroccan, Surinam and Antillian women are more often without children at age 35 than local women.

This is not an insignificant finding and does indeed put the “Sharia 2050” theory, always more of an argumentative estimate, into question. It also underlines that immigrants do integrate as their reproductive behaviour can not be seen in isolation from their social and economic circumstances.

It doesn’t mean we can abandon some of our deeper concerns over Europe and its future, they stand, but we do have to better understand the numbers that underlie these alarmist assumptions.

While many are wondering how Europe is going to get itself out of its demographic bind, there are some who will do anything to make things worse. Take Sharon Dijksma, deputy parliamentary leader of the Dutch Labor Party who came up with the following:

"A highly-educated woman who chooses to stay at home and not to work - that is destruction of capital," Dijksma said. "If you receive the benefit of an expensive education at the cost of society, you should not be allowed to throw away that knowledge unpunished."

The MP said a fine for non-working mothers is a logical consequence of the PvdA's intention to introduce a 'feudal system', under which graduates repay money dependant on their earnings. "If someone chooses not to work, then a substantial repayment is in order," Dijksma said.

There is simply no logical argument to be found in this argument, not even a fiscal one, but then the Dutch left have for years made it a priority of the state to get women to work in spite of any practical considerations. Millions of guilders and euros have been wasted on studies, workshops, back-to-work-programs and endless government advertising without sparing even so much as a moment to consider the ultimate cost to society.

Don't get me wrong, I am highly supportive of working women and equality in the workplace, but the state just does not have any business in artificially manipulating this process. The results of these efforts very often have some unintended consequences and in this case women may well decide to forego having an education when they know that having children and planning to take care of them - perish the thought - will cost them. There never is an easy answer for families to balance work and career requirements and governments just do not have a great track record in helping them out.

That also means that the opposite, getting women to stay at home and give them an incentive to produce offspring, is equally unwelcome statist tinkering. But at a time when a shrinking and exceedingly egotistical population is set to represent the Dutch future - if there is one - there will be a cost to Dijksma's ideas that dwarfs her outdated concepts of beneficial social engineering.

Further to my earlier post, the results are now in:

The Latinos beat the women’s team 8-0, the Muslims beat the gay team 4-0 and the Muslims went on to win the final against the Latinos 4-1.

“Unfortunately the women lost and the gays lost but it’s not about winning and losing. It’s about having fun together,”

Via Norm.

One of the things that probably get lost in all the demographic projections for Europe – which by the way are subject to some credible criticisms - is the fact that they most likely do not take account of native Europeans becoming Muslim. The Washington Post yesterday had a revealing piece on one Rabi'a Frank, a Dutch woman who used to go through life as Rebecca Frank, and who following her marriage to a Moroccan immigrant became a devout Muslim. Here are some quotes from Frank which gives you a general idea of the unique transformation she went through:

"I'm a Muslim, a woman and also Dutch," she continued. "What upsets people is that I'm a Muslim first."

"I am a Muslim," she said with finality. "That's my identity."

During her pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia with her husband and mother-in-law, she covered her face in public for the first time. Far from feeling oppressed, she said, she felt liberated.

We can talk all we want about integration, but if the hallmark of being Muslim is Europe is being “Muslim first” it may be an uphill struggle although Frank could be an anomaly. More alarming is the statement that “she feels liberated” which interestingly coincides with a newspaper interview with Dutch Minister for Transportation Karla Peijs on this very issue:

Minister Peijs sees the Islamic headscarf no longer as a sign of repression. The scarf “gives women freedom” says the minister in an interview with the Telegraaf. She changed her mind after a visit to a conference of Women as world leaders in Abu Dhabi, where 1200 women from 87 countries got together.

[ … ]

“Wearing a headscarf is of course culturally determined. And that’s the way these women experience that, because that’s how they experience their religion. In addition, the headscarf offers opportunities for women is some Islamic countries, because without one they won’t be able to leave home” says the minister.

Up to that point Minister Peijs' comments could be considered to be some sort of analysis of the situation outside Europe, but she goes terribly off track when she comes with the following suggestion:

Peijs would consider a minister with a headscarf in the next cabinet a good idea. “It would enhance the recognizability of the cabinet. It should be someone however picked for her qualities”.

Now as you know there is a national election coming up in The Netherlands next year and Peijs is no doubt courting the Muslim vote, but if you scrutinize her suggestions more carefully she may actually lose a huge chunk of the female vote. And it was Hirsi Ali who made that point by arguing that wearing a headscarf might have certain benefits in Islamic nations in order to get out of the door and work, but that in Western Europe that would hardly be a requirement, on the contrary.

Peijs is not an anomaly. She represents the wave of placating and appeasing that may well precipitate a change of European values and attitudes long before the demographics have done their work.

NOTE: Val MacQueen today in TCS highlights some Muslim women who are liberated too, by western values that is.

UPDATE: And of course, there is Dr Wafa Sultan.

UPDATE II: Margaret Wente in the Globe and Mail points to the outer boundaries of her tolerance levels:

I'm all for multiculturalism -- up to a point. Head scarves, turbans and kirpans don't bother me at all. But my open-minded tolerance deserts me when I see women completely covered up. In every culture where this is the norm, women are oppressed. Do I need to learn to be more tolerant? Or am I right to think that women in chadors (and, more to the point, the men who walk four steps in front of them) should adapt to us?

Whatever you want to say about the Dutch, don't ever say they're not trying to solve things:

A Dutch multicultural group is organizing a soccer tournament between gays and Muslims, hoping to counter what a study published on Thursday said was a rising tide of fear among gays.

A nationwide survey by the Police Research Academy said that most gays questioned feel unsafe and reported experiencing verbal attacks in the last year.

Of the 776 homosexuals who responded to an internet questionnaire, 80 percent said they believed their safety was threatened at some time during the year, said academy director Frits Vlek, who commissioned the research.

Only 3 percent said they were physically assaulted, Vlek said in an interview, but some 40 percent claimed they had been insulted or verbally abused.

Youths from Moroccan and Turkish backgrounds often were blamed for the incidents, Vlek said, since homosexuality is not widely accepted in many Muslim cultures.

This comes on the heels of the launch of the introductory video to The Netherlands for immigrants. These are all laudable initiatives and are fully supported here, but for now they only serve as an indicator of the deep - and widening - rift between mainstream Dutch culture and immigrant attitudes.

Remember that I have always argued that the Dutch are not tolerant by nature but rather pragmatic. The underlying danger of course is that if all these feel good and well-meant initiatives fail - which is not unlikely - then the Dutch may well become pragmatic enough to trade or stop defending some of their liberal traditions just to keep the peace. If you consider the increase of (verbal) attacks on gays, you can argue that some of that is already happening.

More suggestions from Ayaan Hirsi Ali. Following the verdicts and sentencing in the Hofstad-trial last week where one member was sentenced to 18-months for possessing and disseminating radical ideas, she comments that:

Radical philosophies should not be combated via the criminal courts, but be fought in the "ideological arena", in the MP's view. "In an open society, you may possess and disseminate radical ideas, even if the essence of these leads to violence," Hirsi Ali maintained. "Combating ideas is not the task of the courts, as they would then be burdened with political and theological issues".

The government must however ensure that the participants in this public debate are protected if they express negative views on Islam. At present, it is not possible to fight the Islamic ideology in the Netherlands, because many Islam critics are afraid to speak out for fear of threats, according to Hirsi Ali.

In essence her statement is correct and defensible: hate speech should never be judged in a court of law, but in the court of public opinion, a point often made on this site.

However, even the most abject ideas can be interpreted to incite violence and thus become subject to action from the criminal justice system. It's a very thin line that can be crossed relatively easily and there is an interesting flip side to it as well: can anyone publicly supporting pre-emptive action against for instance Iran be dragged into court for inciting war? That probably was the backdrop for Hirsi Ali making her comments, as she is no doubt aware of the numerous groups who can't wait to haul opponents in front of a judge in order to make a certain point. However as a Dutch parliamentarian she should have realized that her suggestions crossed a thin line too. If taken at face value they would deprive the Dutch criminal justice system from using a very effective tool to take action against groups such as the Hofstad network.

UPDATE: Check out Michael Barone's post Tolerating Intolerance too.

Daily Pundit picks up on the new immigration test that has now become part of the process if you want to make The Netherlands your new home. It reflects the hardline approach by Immigration Minister Rita Verdonk and it is blatantly Dutch in its directness with a topless woman bather and a question about how to behave in a cafe if two men at the next table start kissing. It's hard to say if this test will have any positive effects on newcomers, there is as much to infuriate Muslims as there is to make their transition easier. More likely is that the new approach is meant as a marker in the sand: this is who we are, better get used to it now or otherwise stay away. As such it may start to act as a sort of barrier to curb immigration.

Better of course would be to tailor immigration on a 'needs' basis and only test and allow those that would add to the actual economic and demographic requirements of the Dutch state. Canada operates such a system where education, net worth, age, health and abilities are the deciding factors for entry. And upon arrival these immigrants are subjected to information about core Canadian values such as recycling and carpooling, less exciting than topless girls, but hey, to each country its own.

More than once do I get the question what has prompted my bleak outlook for Europe, and while it is easy to rattle off the standard list of issues and contrast them with North America, there is one that stands out above all the others. Not only because it symbolizes the powerlessness of the continent’s institutional arrangements, but also because it reveals the strong potential for ethnic strife and bloodshed that is residing somewhere deep in Europe’s wounded soul.

The violent disintegration of Yugoslavia and the sheer incompetence of the European Union (and subsequently the UN) to do anything about it stand as the pivotal case study of why any crisis of magnitude simply can not be expected to be resolved by Europe itself. And, it was the first such test following the collapse of the Soviet Union at a time when the spirit of European co-operation and integration was at peak levels. The incompetence and inaction was covered up by ineffective interventions and some bizarre forms of symbolism, I distinctly remember former French President Francois Mitterand’s walk through the ravaged streets of Sarajevo, an empty gesture indeed:

After President Mitterand of France visited Sarajevo most Bosnians and Herzegovinians, including President of Bosnia & Herzegovina Alija Izetbegović, believed that the West would not allow this horror to continue. They were mistaken. Instead of any action designed to stop the slaughter of innocent civilians, the French President recommended that a large United Nations Protection Force (UNPROFOR) be sent to Bosnia & Herzegovina. They were sent to “keep peace” with no peace to keep. Over, 7,000 people were eventually massacred at Srebrenica in 1995, under the “protection” of UN forces. In Omarska, Trnopolje, Manjača and other concentration camps in Serb-held territory, through which over a million civilians were processed as part of a systematic plan of ethnic cleansing, UNPROFOR simply never arrived.

Approximately 10,000 civilians, including 1,500 children, were killed in Sarajevo alone, while it was under UN protection.

Of course I bring this up to as the Balkan-crisis of the 1990s was accelerated by the man who died this weekend in a prison cell in The Hague, Slobodan Milosevic. The conditions of his relatively early departure are highly symbolic. The international body that wasn’t able to restrain him when he set out on his journey of hate, destruction and genocide proved to be as incompetent when they finally had him in their prison cell. Not only was the International Court of Justice the wrong venue to hold Milosevic to account – that should have been in Belgrade, in a Serb court – it had over a period of some four years accomplished very little with only an occasional pyrrhic victory by the weakened defendant reaching the international headlines. And the real butchers, especially Bosnian Serb leaders Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic, are still on the loose.

The other part of deeper significance is that he died on Dutch soil. As much as the EU and UN would like to forget their shameful role in the former Yugoslavia, it is especially the Dutch who are more than a little willing to forget the dreadful performance of its tarnished Dutchbat defending the "safe haven" of Srebrenica. To describe it as a botched defense would be too generous a treatment of history: not a single shot was fired to prevent the subsequent mass murder by Mladic’s thugs.

So in death, the erstwhile butcher of the Balkans has been able to serve up a few painful reminders to those who would be more than willing to forget. And to me and many others struggling with Europe’s difficult journey, another reminder of Europe’s inherent weaknesses.

Anyone thinking that communism collapsed with the fall of the iron curtain is wrong as there continue to be vibrant pockets of Marxism all over the world. This nugget - coming out of the Dutch local elections - was just too good to pass on:

Councillor Willem Gomes, the local leader of the New Communist Party Netherlands (NCPN), received 1,025 of the 11,188 cast in the town in North Holland province during the local elections on Tuesday.

Technically this is enough to give the NCPN a second seat on the council. The problem is that Gomes was the only candidate on the party's electorate list in the town as he couldn't find anyone else willing to stand with him.

Communism is alive and kicking, it just has become a very lonely place to be.

Yesterday the Dutch cast their ballots in local elections and the end result left little room for doubt: the biggest winners were Labour and the hard-left Socialist Party. If these results are translated to a national parliamentary outcome then the two big winners would be able to form a left-wing coalition government together with the Green Left who maintained their support levels. So, with one year to go to a general election the Dutch fling with the right is essentially over, something that I have been predicting here on this site for quite a while. No more ‘right turns’.

That short lived turn to the right originated in Rotterdam, the country’s most ethnically diverse city, where the Fortuyn insurgency started exactly four years ago. The so-called Liveable Rotterdam party managed to upstage the ruling Labour Party in the city it had virtually owned for decades. Last night Labour reclaimed the position of largest party and the fortuynists managed to come in as the second largest with some 30% of the vote. Still, a respectable result but the magic of the previous election has clearly fizzled. Its leader, Marco Pastors – one of the few measured and intelligent emerging stars on the Dutch right - has hinted at a career on the national level, a place where he may be needed badly as both the old and new right appear to be clueless and divided. For instance, Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s party, the free-market liberals have been in an electoral freefall and aren’t even appealing enough to capture some of the former floating Fortuyn voters.

The question is of course what has prompted this spectacular shift. There can be little doubt that recent events - Fortuyn, Van Gogh – have left the Dutch nation in a state of confusion where none of the large and established parties have been able to provide direction or even a measure of vision. And the Fortuyn-inspired parties haven’t been doing all that well either as most of them consisted of newcomers in politics who in a lot of cases, often highly publicized, appeared clueless in dealing with the responsibilities of elected office. And yes, the one person who got them elected and may have been able to manage the capital the Dutch electorate so royally gave them was murdered, ages ago.

Nor have there been any spectacular results on the economic and security front, something for which an electorate geared toward instant gratification may have been looking. Yet, the shaky center-right coalition has been able to achieve quite a few things – the economy is back on track, liberalization of healthcare is actually working – but it is the negative aspects that have been capturing the headlines. The embarrassing debate over the mission to Afghanistan, the shoot-from-the-hip immigration minister and other populist exercises have grabbed most of the attention and motivated an already restless electorate into throwing more confusion in the political mix. Glenn Reynolds a few weeks ago already pointed to the ‘Weimarizing’ of politics and if you want a revealing example of the latter, look no further than The Netherlands.

It is true that local elections in The Netherlands tend to produce more leftward results than national ones, but given the state of the center-right parties on the national level it would appear that with some twelve months to go Labour and its potential left-wing coalition parties are looking at an election that is theirs to loose.

A number of you sent me a link to this article on baby euthanasia in The Netherlands. Although I do not believe that Dutch attitudes to this practice can be automatically qualified as “the kind of activities that got some German doctors hanged after Nuremberg”, I do underwrite the "slippery slope" theory:

A committee set up to regulate the practice will begin operating in the next few weeks, effectively making Holland, where adult euthanasia is legal, the first country in the world to allow “baby euthanasia” as well.

The development has angered opponents of euthanasia who warn of a “slippery slope” leading to abuses by doctors and parents, who will be making decisions for individuals incapable of expressing a will.

Here is one case:

When Frank and Anita’s daughter Chanou was born with an extremely rare, incurable illness in August 2000, they knew that her life would be short and battled against the odds to make it happy.

They struggled around the clock against their baby’s pain. “We tried all sorts of things,” said Anita, a 37-year-old local government worker. “She cried all the time. Every time I touched her it hurt.”

Chanou was suffering from a metabolic disorder that had resulted in abnormal bone development. Doctors gave her no more than 30 months to live. “We felt terrible watching her suffer,” said Anita at their home near Amsterdam. “We felt we were letting her down.”

Frank and Anita began to believe that their daughter would be better off dead. “She kept throwing up milk that was fed through a tube in her nose,” said Anita. “She seemed to be saying, ‘Mummy, I don’t want to live any more. Let me go’.”

Eventually, doctors agreed to help the baby die at seven months. The feeding was stopped. Chanou was given morphine. “We were with her at that last moment,” said Anita. “She was exhausted. She took a very deep last breath. It was so peaceful. It made me feel at peace inside to know that she wasn’t suffering any more.”

The core of the issue is that any law to regulate euthanasia banks on the moral integrity of parents and doctors and their willingness to co-operate with law enforcement officers to the extent the law requires them to do so. As we know, moral values are increasingly becoming subsidiary to convenience and the warped belief of entitlement that has pervaded our western society. Therefore, without discounting the pain and suffering in Chanou's case, I despair at the thought of how a generation from now Dutch euthanasia laws can effectively be used to manage the cost of healthcare and create the picture perfect family.

NOTE: This is again not an example of Dutch tolerance or liberalism, no, the enactment of the practice once more underlines the Dutch need to pragmatically regulate anything that moves. The outcome of which can often be worse than the problem it sought to regulate in the first place.

So this is how a tough stance on immigration can produce some bizarre results, in The Netherlands of all places:

Alien Affairs Minister Rita Verdonk wants to start sending back rejected homosexual Iranian asylum-seekers. About six months ago, she had decided temporarily not to deport them, following the execution of two homosexual men in Iran.

In a letter to the Lower House, Verdonk now says it appears "there is no question of execution/death sentence on grounds of the sole fact that someone is homosexual." She does note that the death penalty applies to gay sex in the Islamic country. Nonetheless, Verdonk sees no reason any more to suspend the deportations any longer.

The minister bases her decision on a report from the foreign ministry on the current situation in Iran. This says that the Iranian authorities have stated that the two homosexual men were not executed for their sexual orientation, but because they were guilty of robbery, abduction and rape of a minor.

Two things:

(1) Even though it may not be that "being homosexual" constitutes ground for execution, does anyone seriously want to send any refugees back to Iran?

(2) No matter how gruesome the execution of the two young men, isn't it time that all the bloggers who ran the item front and center on their blogs establish all the facts before making the erroneous assumption about the sole cause of the execution? Verdonk is making the wrong call here, sure, but given the sensitivity of the case I do believe that the department of foreign affairs does a thorough enough job to unearth all the evidence before it makes one. Although statements made by Iranian authorities are by their very nature, questionable.

So: poorly crafted decision, wrong call, terrible precedent.

UPDATE: Of course, I failed to make the obvious comment: "Fortuyn is turning in his grave"

Can they work together and can Muslim imigrants learn from the Jewish experience in Europe? Dutch Rabbi Awraham Soetendorp thinks so. In an environment that is less volatile, less charged, probably yes.

Dutch parliament yesterday finally found a way to support the nation’s participation with some 1400 troops in NATO’S ISAF mission (together with Britain and Canada) in Afghanistan for a further two years, thereby averting a political crisis. As explained before, the centre-right coalition relies on the support of a small centrist party with left-of-center sympathies and this group was starting to have second thoughts about supporting the mission.

The Dutch have their reservations when it comes to entering war zones, the mission in Srebrenica in 1995 was an outright disaster and restoring order in Southern Iraq had its problems too. These experiences have made the Dutch more than a little wary of overseas military engagements. At the same time it has sparked a much deeper probe about the expectations of armed ventures: is the Dutch military a force to fight and defend, or is it better to let it resemble that idealist model dreamed up in the 1990s, a peacekeeping force?

Peacekeeping missions by their very nature include a ‘war-component’ as you will have to pacify some elements that have fail to recognize the terms of the truce that a peacekeeping force is supposed to maintain. In some nations, Canada being a great example, most people don’t even know that their sons and daughters in Afghanistan are actually engaged in fighting the Taliban. “We’re a peaceful nation and we’re making peace” is an often heard belief and it is hard to argue with it as no one has ever made it clear to the average Canadian what their mission was all about. So, Canadians and Dutch alike are often left with the artificial peacekeeping construct, used to buy political support, to ignore realities on the ground, and to wishfully think that there are no real life threatening hazards in today’s world.

And that also was the nature of the recent Dutch debate. The opposition kept on pressing the issue of reconstruction - for which they were able to negotiate more funds - and demanded that there be no fusion with US operations, knowing full well that any association with American military power would directly undermine the widely held belief that it is a peace mission. And since Americans are “waging war” and we are “rebuilding and bringing peace” there would have to be a way to live up to international obligations without really getting your hands dirty. And some actually believe that there is a way to align these divergent views of how to get to work in Afghanistan, like this Labour parliamentarian who eventually got the assurances that underpins this odd compromise:

He wanted to know if there would be a clear separation between the ISAF mission and the American-led Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF), which is focused on tracking down terrorists.

To that minister Kamp responded that the ISAF-mission would not be a ‘fighting-mission’ but that situation could arise where military personnel need the help of OEF to take on terrorist units in their territory. But: “in that case we are talking about an exception about which clear agreements have been made. If we don’t want it to happen, it won’t happen”

It’s hard to fathom what that would mean in practice. Say some enthusiastic Taliban decide to blow up a Dutch field hospital, would the servicemen there wait for American forces to arrive and prevent the attack or chase down the terrorists once they’ve done their work? Is it me or has NATO become an entirely dysfunctional organization where joint defense and military co-operation are myths that no one even cares to support in any meaningful way? Look, isn’t the fact that the Dutch even had to debate this venture ad nauseam following British and Canadian commitments not proof in itself that there is no real political will to support any democratization and stabilization efforts in the Middle East? It all probably depends on what you believe democracy and stability should ultimately look like, and it is sad to note that this particular interpretation has been gaining a great deal of momentum in the lowlands:

A small group of demonstrators stood outside parliament, one wearing a mask representing U.S. President George W. Bush and holding a puppet representing [Dutch PM] Balkenende. At his feet lay a dozen dolls made to look bloody and bullet-riddled. "This will only make more Guantanamo Bays and won't help peace," he said, referring to the U.S prison camp.

You either take up arms to help Afghanis achieve their peace or you don’t. Poorly defined missions and political compromises do not make great military successes.

UPDATE: Canadians are prepared to kill according to this report which reveals a somewhat better understanding of the situation on the ground:

Canadian soldiers are ready to kill and die in Afghanistan if need be to keep that country from ever again becoming a nest for terrorists, says the general who will command the troops in Kandahar.

"This is a dangerous mission. This is a dangerous environment," Brigadier-General David Fraser said yesterday. "And I cannot reduce the risk to zero."

The Hofstadgroup trial is wrapping up and today was the day in which convicted Van Gogh-murderer Mohammed Bouyeri, who has also been a defendant in this case, addressed the court. It took him more than two hours to read out his statement, but it didn't have the fireworks that some were expecting:

... observers afterwards agreed it was too long and confusing. Bouyeri did not address the prosecution's contention about the existence of a terrorist organisation, or the central role he allegedly played in it.

Journalists in court estimated 70 percent of his speech consisted of citations taken from a range of writers, including Michael Ignatieff and Jessica Stern. Bouyeri gathered the material from the prison library.

Dressed in a traditional Arabic garment with a red and white scarf on his head, Bouyeri began his address with a Muslim confession of his faith in Arabic. A translator interpreted his words for the court.

"Comparing me to Osama bin Laden does the man a great wrong and extends me too much honour I don't deserve," Bouyeri said.

"But it fills me with me with honour, pride and joy that you see me as the standard-bearer of Islam in Europe," he told the prosecution.

Another observer noted:

His precise intention, therefore, remained totally unclear. The only point he appeared to make was that the Prophet Mohammed had regularly called for the use of violence against unbelievers. He raised numerous examples as to how and why unbelievers ought to be killed, an aspect of his 'lecture' which must have had the lawyers acting for the other defendants grinding their teeth. They have been endeavouring for weeks to convince the court that the ideas adhered to by the Hofstad group do not automatically have to result in violent acts.

His intention may not have been clear to all of us, but Bouyeri knows quite well that there is an audience of potential "standard-bearers" of which there are more than a few in Europe. What is unclear to us, is perfectly clear to them.

This probably heralds the end of Bouyeri's direct siginificance as a media magnet, something he no doubt realized himself given the effort he put into his lenghty statement. As this trial concludes and as he is already serving a life sentence for the Van Gogh murder, he probably won't have another opportunity to repeat it. But his call to potential followers stands.

This coming Thursday there will be a debate in Dutch parliament about sending a contingent of some 1,200 troops to Afghanistan. There have been some doubts about the project, you see. In the meantime pressure has been building on the Dutch to join the US-led efforts with NATO headquarters and even Kofi Annan weighing in on the importance of a sustained multilateral effort.

As I have discussed before, the current Dutch government can not rely on a very strong majority in parliament. That makes selling a dangerous mission difficult, especially when it becomes clear that casualties and war rather than peacemaking start to feature the agenda. The question the Dutch have to ask themselves though is, why it is that other NATO members should be willing to accept the consequences of a risky mission while they can bail out arguing that the mission is "too dangerous"? More on Thursday.

The Hofstad trial is nearing its end now that the public prosecutor earlier this week put his sentencing demands on the table. They are, for Dutch standards, substantial:

The Public Prosecutor's Office (OM) demanded sentences on Wednesday of up to 20 years for 13 Dutch Muslims on trial in Amsterdam for alleged membership of a terrorist organisation.

Investigators gave the group the code-name 'Hofstadgroep' and alleged they met regularly to plot terrorism. The accused men claim they were just friends who met frequently to discuss Islam.

Jason W. and Ismail A. face the highest sentence. They were arrested after a day-long siege of a home in the Laak district of The Hague on 10 November 2004. The siege developed after five members of a police raiding party were injured by a grenade thrown by one of the two men.

It remains to be seen if the judge will take up the prosectution's wish list, generally Dutch courts will take some of the defense's arguments into consideration and hand out a penalty that is often milder than what was asked for. Sentencing is on March 10.

NOTE: Emerson Vermaat has been following the trial and has written a revealing piece about the group's defense attorneys. That group has shifted its interests from the now defunct Baader-Meinhof and other left-wing activists who somehow ended up in court to jihadists. With that they have tapped into a veritable growth market.

Foreign writers, please stop acting surprised whenever the Dutch do not live up to the stereotype you have of them. Stop mentioning "the country's liberal stances on marijuana and prostitution" in the first paragraph of a piece on immigration and Muslims. And stop pretending that the stereotype used to be true, but now, alas, things have changed.

This is Jasper Emmering at his Hollandaise blog. He’s right and his comments capture exactly my sentiments which I’ve been expressing here and elsewhere for quite a while now. North American mainstream media dived into The Netherlands in the years following the Fortuyn and Van Gogh murders and most articles started off with exactly the same lame introduction that Jasper highlights. The above quote is actually in response to yet another North American journalistic foray into The Netherlands - this time by The New Republic's Abigail Esman – and Jasper emphatically tears the piece apart.

One would have expected that the renewed interest in the lowlands at the very least would have sparked some more creative reporting and objective fact gathering. It’s interesting, but I have been doing exactly that for a period of three years on this is site, for free, with hardly any interest from mainstream outlets. One that I should mention however is The Economist – actually one of the better and more informed sources – where at one point I discovered one of my ideas recycled in a piece about the Dutch troubles. For a lot of media here there is no budget to get some dedicated reporting out of The Netherlands. For instance, I know of one major New York based newspaper which gave exactly that reason when someone approached them with the idea to become a dedicated reporter on the ground in Amsterdam (no, it wasn't me). Still, financial considerations should hardly be an excuse to serve up poorly researched clichés.

The downside of this flawed reporting is that even in the blogosphere some very faulty conceptions gain favor. When I was in New York for the Pajamas Media launch there were many observers who, like TNR, believed that the Dutch had now sharply moved to the right and that the small nation was in the vanguard of fighting the war on jihadism. If only. If elections were held today the left – consisting of Labour, Green Left, and Socialists – would take parliament by storm and have no trouble replacing the shaky center-right coalition that is now in place. The remains of Fortuyn’s party would be swiped away and the natural heirs to the professor’s platform - the Free Market Liberals - would suffer a very embarrassing defeat. There’s no need to get into the why of it, the point is that the Dutch are not moving to the right, they’re now even balking at sending more troops to Afghanistan.

Sure, the country overall has abandoned some of the politically correct paradigms that used to stifle debate and all political parties have become much more pragmatic in order to find new solutions. But that doesn’t mean a strong rightward turn as the TNR’s Esman suggests, or as Arjan Dasselaar argued last week: it’s all talk and precious little action. And, as Jasper Emmering points out, a lot of what now is identified as hard-right policy was in the making long before the Fortuyn/Van Gogh murders swept the country off its feet.

So, beware what you read. There are a few part-time bloggers out there who have so far provided far better and more accurate coverage about The Netherlands than some of the more established media have.

I haven't been paying a lot of attention to the Hofstad Group trial in The Netherlands, but Emerson Vermaat at FrontPage Magazine has. His latest installment can be found here.

Dutch politician Ayaan Hirsi Ali has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Price for 2006. Shay at Dean's World sums it up succinctly:

Until a year and a half ago, I felt like I was the only libertarianesque black feminist on the planet, as I was seemingly a one-woman army arguing with leftist feminists in my hometown on issues such as gun control, why the war in Afghanistan was a feminist cause, etc. That is, until I came across a profile of Ayaan Hirsi Ali on the Tech Central Station website.

MP Hirsi Ali is far more deserving of a Nobel Peace Prize nomination than the late Tookie Williams, who co-founded the Crips, murdered four people (the ones we know about) and then claimed redemption and was nominated for the Prize. However, MP Hirsi Ali is surely too politically incorrect for the Nobel Prize committee. She won't win.

Shay is right, Hirsi Ali's blunt and often confrontational approach is even sometimes a little too rich for her own right-of-center party. It puts her at a distinct disadvantage to any other prospective nominees. But, it is yet one more sign (after scoping earlier awards, here and here) that her message has traction and increasing international attention.

UPDATE: Yes, I know that this prize is no longer in any way related to the concept of "making peace". Most often it is awarded to those effecting profound change in human relations. It is is up to the highly subjective interpretation by the Nobel Committee what that means of course.

It has been relatively quiet on the Dutch front – something regular readers have no doubt noticed – one of the reasons being that some sort of calm appeared to have settled itself over the nation’s streets. Silence before the storm? Most probably, according to Amsterdam Mayor Cohen who this week raised the alarm over a resurgence of violence in the city:

"There is an underlying feeling whereby it would only take minor incidents to cause an outburst," Cohen said.

Cohen said officials in all the city districts are poised to nip any unrest in the bud.

Moroccan-Dutch youth were involved in many of the incidents Cohen was referring to. A group of youths broke the windows of 39 cars in the southern part of the Pijp district around New Year.

Locals in the area have also complained about an increase in threatening behaviour by groups of young people. A Jewish resident was threatened and a firework was thrown through the window pane of his home. A gay couple have reported being the regular victims of harassment.

Again, it is deeply and doubly depressing to witness this sort of violence in the city which submitted one of the holocaust's darkest chapters, but somehow in the post-war years bounced back to reclaim its status as a center of tolerance and freedom.

As we are witnessing in Brussels and Paris, it is often the lethargic and expedient political culture that has somehow compounded the problems which are beginning to look like they are not going to be solved anytime soon, if ever. It’s tempting to start thinking of a Paris-Brussels-Amsterdam axis, all cities that are close geographically and ethnically, all with a similar immigrant problem, and each experiencing occasional flare ups of violence and a concurrent erosion of individual freedoms. The increasing intensity and the un-Cohenesque sounding of the alarm bells is ominous.

NOTE: Yes, London was the other place where car windows get smashed on a regular basis.

More than once I have pointed out that there are Muslim immigrants in Europe that have assimilated and are contributing to the debate about radicalism and the resulting dilemmas that Europe is currently facing. One of those is Youssef Azhgari, a Dutch-Moroccan writer and teacher, who has recently published a book about the cultural disconnect:

He draws a sharp contrast between the two cultures but knows that there are gradations in between. As he sees it, the Netherlands -- the West, really -- is a "content-directed" society, by which he means that its societies care more for the content of the message than the form in which it's delivered.

Equality, honesty, acceptance, tolerance and clarity are values such societies espouse. Even children are urged to think for themselves. Freedom of expression, individualism and democracy are prized above everything.

The East, which Azghari takes to include the Muslim world as well as much of Asia, is "form-directed." Its societies value the package more than the message, he argues. The way something is said trumps individual expression.

Obedience, loyalty, respect, empathy and discretion are supreme values. The naked truth is unseemly, for truth is less consequential than the manner in which it is revealed.

While Azhgari rightly argues for schools and universities to engage their Muslim students into more independent thinking, the reverse has been happening. While increasing numbers of Muslims have been exposed to a critical approach and open debate, the more they have withdrawn to a form of basic groupthink wherein all the wrongs of radical Islam are somehow justified, according to Azhgari.

One of the aspects of radicalization and jihadist terror that keeps coming back is that the tools the West has offered to other cultures are increasingly turned against the West itself. While the proliferation of terror owes a lot to the internet, it seems that education and knowledge gathering yield a result that is often equally undesirable. Interestingly, Azhgari himself was part of that fairly uncritical nature and considered himself fully integrated at the same time, until a classmate asked him if he too felt that Salman Rushdie should die. That was a turning point for him and it initiated the critical journey which has now resulted in his first book about the issue.

The argument to have “moderate Muslims” stake out a position in this debate and assist in thwarting radicalism never came out of thin air, and it is irritating to note that some argue that "moderates" do not exist. Of course they do and here's one good example. It’s only their direct experience that can help forge a bridge between a clueless Western Europe and a disconnected rapidly growing army of radicalized Muslims. Azhgari and like minded-souls need a louder voice, soon.

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