Pampering the Radical Minority

Below is a report by our Flemish correspondent VH on the latest from Vlaams Belang concerning the anti-Israel riots and the violence against Jews in Belgium. VH notes:

This is the intervention of Filip Dewinter in the special meeting of the City Council of Antwerp concerning the AEL riots. Underneath it a short article on the intervention: “Vlaams Belang wants to revoke the Belgian nationality of immigrant rioters”.

Note: The mayor of Antwerp is Patrick Janssens, SP.a [Flemish Socialist Progressive Party]*. The city government is a coalition of SP.a, CD&V [Christian Democrats], and Open VLD [Liberals]

From Filip Dewinter’s website:

Intervention in the extra meeting of the Antwerp City Council concerning the AEL [Arabic European League] incidents and riots

Published on January 13, 2009 at 11:01

Mr. Mayor,

Let me start right away. You blundered! The procedure of the city government [SP.a, CD&V-Christian Democrats, and Open VLD-Liberals] in response to the AEL-demonstration on December 31, 2008 was a jumbo-size stinker. How is it possible that an organization with such a past was allowed to demonstrate in the center of this city on New Year’s Eve, without your having taken sufficient measures to prevent riots and incidents, or at least to restrict such risk? To let the AEL demonstrate only a few hundred meters — as seen in a straight line — from the Jewish district without any police blockade, without security, and no clear agreements, is asking for trouble. These problems of course also occurred… Car windows, street furniture and shop windows have taken their share.

Mr. Mayor,

Once bitten, twice shy. Only a few years ago, in April 2002, in this city, a quasi-identical AEL demonstration took place at the same location with identical consequences. Yet the mayor says that following the AEL demonstration on New Year’s Eve, the police “had wrongly assessed” the risk and that the AEL has “too little experience with demonstrations.” Thus an assessment error. Statements that made me scowl. After all that happened in the past years in this city, I wonder how it is possible to wrongly judge the risks of an AEL demonstration?

Mr. Mayor,

For all I care, the AEL may demonstrate as long as they stick by the rules, but not in the center of this city, and certainly not on New Year’s Eve. Let the AEL demonstrations on Antwerp soil be held where they can do no harm and cause no trouble to anyone… For all I care, in a deserted street in the middle of nowhere, the Rode Weelweg at the Hooge Maey for example, but under no circumstances in Borgerhout, nor in the vicinity of the Jewish district, and not the center of Antwerp. Secondly, surround such a demonstration with sufficient police in combat uniform and all the technical equipment needed, apply the technique of controlled intimidation so as to show who the is boss here on the streets and who isn’t.

Thirdly, put clear and binding rules on the organizers of the event: they should have their own security system, no masks or scarves to cover their faces, no anti-Semitic or racist slogans or chants calling for violence. If there are riots or incidents during or in the aftermath of a demonstration, the organizers should pay for the damage. That it can be done in this way was shown in the days and weeks after the New Years Eve AEL demonstration. Under pressure of public opinion, the city government changed course after the panicky acts of the previous days, and out of necessity was forced into a firm policy.

Mr. Mayor,

- - - - - - - - -

Let us be frank. The riots on New Year’s Eve are not the result of an miscalculation by the police nor because of underestimating of risk of such a demonstration, but a deliberate policy of avoiding any form of provocation towards the immigrant community. The Muslim immigrants are the new voters of the SP.a and must be embraced and should certainly not be met with a rebuff. This policy of pampering ensures the radical minority the delusion of being untouchable. “Everything can and is allowed!” they think, because they enjoy the protection from above, of Patrick Janssens. Some think they are so untouchable they even permit themselves to go to a forbidden demonstration on the Groenplaats, armed with Molotov cocktails and other weaponry.

Mr. Mayor,

You harvest what you have sown. The Socialist pamper-politics of past years and decades with regard to immigrants are responsible for the explosive situation we are facing today in the streets of Antwerp and elsewhere. The multiculture has ensured that with respect to the immigration invasion of so many hundreds of thousands of non-European foreigners, we not only learned their language, their food, and their more-or-less exotic customs, but also imported their conflicts, their problems, their religious intolerance, and their wars. Antwerp is there, looks at it and wonders what he or she actually has to do with this all.

In other words, this is not just a good framework for a demonstration or for thorough agreements with the organizers, and it is about more than freedom of expression and the right to demonstrate, but also and perhaps mostly about the failure of integration policy and the bankruptcy of the multicultural society. Allow me to quote from a relevant new paper of the Dutch Socialist Party [PvdA, Labour] who want to turn integration policy in the Netherlands to a very different tack.** The Labor Party states in it: “Tolerance slowed down the integration in the Netherlands, so we now opt for confrontation.”

Integration has long been an ideal of tolerance, and with it all would turn out to be fine. In practice this tolerance meant looking away from real problems. The stage of avoidance is now over. The mistake we should never make again is to swallow criticism of culture or religion out of tolerance. We must be active in pointing out our values and confronting others with them.

Mr. Mayor,

The rioters of today are the terrorists of tomorrow. Indeed, when I see how immigrant minors are stirred up and misused to join in such demonstrations and then serve as cannon fodder to vandalize and commit violence; when I notice how a demented mass burns flags of allies and screams “Jews Out”; when I determine that in such demonstrations they wave signs, posters and banners with texts such as “Osama, we need you now”, “Jihad yes we can” and “Hamas, Jihad, and Hezbollah”, then I notice that there is a far-reaching radicalizing to be addressed in a part of the Muslim immigrant community. What we have seen in recent days on the street is unfortunately the tip of the iceberg. Anyone who has read the documentary series “The Jihad of Antwerp-North” in Knack realizes that radicalization is well under way in several mosques in the city where also young faithful Muslims from Antwerp are recruited to be sent to training camps in Pakistan and the Middle East and then, as mujahideen, wage Jihad for Allah.

Mr. Mayor,
Colleagues,

It is time that we make clear to the minority of radical Muslims, who are here as guests and are of the opinion that they can — from out of Antwerp, from out of our country and from out of Europe — wage a holy war against the West, can yell “Jews out” and “Osama, we need you now”, who find our society and our way of life objectionable and decadent, to make it clear to them that we here not only have a democratic right to freedom of expression and therefore are guaranteed to be able to demonstrate, that there is also another fundamental right applies, namely the right — if they do not appreciate it here — to leave and return to their country of origin.

Mr. Mayor,

The political hooliganism we have seen the last few days in this city must come an end. The panic policy of the city government should give way to a firm and tough policy that alongside the right to free speech also, or maybe above all should guarantee the right of identity, security, and safety to the residents of Antwerp! There should be strict and firm actions taken, also, to the immigrant rioters and political-religious hooligans. In regard to this, the policy of the prosecutor is a joke. With the exception of some administrative arrests, no one is prosecuted for the incidents. However, it is my belief that a tit fir tat policy should be chosen towards immigrants who commit these kinds of incidents, acts of violence, and vandalism — whether it happens in Brussels, Antwerp or elsewhere in our country — whereby the Belgian nationality is revoked and they are expelled from this country. To conclude: integration and immigration policy must change its track. Indeed, like the Dutch model, we should opt for confrontation instead of excessive tolerance, because we want to be and remain masters of our own city and our own country!

Also from Filip Dewinter’s website:

Vlaams Belang wants to revoke the Belgian nationality of immigrant rioters

Published on January 13, 2009 at 09:19

Filip Dewinter: “He who will not be taught must suffer. Flanders is not the Gaza Strip. Immigrant troublemakers are the terrorists of the future, abuse our hospitality and must leave!”

In recent days and weeks, in Antwerp as well as in Brussels and Mechelen, young immigrants triggered riots and caused a lot of damage to shops, public buildings and street furniture as a result. The violence and vandalism were invariably the result of anti-Israel demonstrations of all sorts. According to Filip Dewinter, the city government “harvests what they have sown. This policy of pampering ensures the radical minority the delusion of being untouchable. The war situation in Gaza is only a pretext to provoke the government and the authority, and to riot. Organizations like the AEL and related extremist groups want to test the limits of what is acceptable and see how far they can go. In the end they apply the same tactics as the Hamas in Gaza: provocation, escalation, confrontation.”

According to Filip Dewinter, immigrants who run amok here and commit violence and acts of vandalism no longer have the right on our hospitality. “Given that all of these immigrants have a dual nationality, it is perfectly possible for to revoke their Belgian nationality and expel them,” said Filip Dewinter yesterday in a direct television debate on ATV.

“We must dare to set a clear example and follow a decisive stick-behind-the-door [under conditions] policy. A minority of Muslim immigrants benefits from the situation of lighting the fuse to the powder keg here as well. We must dare to show who the boss is on the street, not the Osama Bin Laden nominees, but our own government. The Islamic immigrant hooligans of today are the terrorists of tomorrow,” says Filip Dewinter.

Notes:

* The mayor of Antwerp, Patrick Janssens, is member of the SP.a, Flemish Socialist Progressives; the aldermen are from the SP.a, CD&V, and Open VLD. Since 1989, the parties in the city council have instituted a cordon sanitaire around the biggest party Vlaams Belang, locking them into the opposition. In 2004 immigrants for the first time were given the right to vote in municipal elections and made the relatively small Socialist coalition jump in the 2006 elections from 20% to 35.5%, slightly bigger than Vlaams Belang (33.5%). Since 1932 Antwerp has had Socialist mayors.

** Since the PvdA in the Netherlands lost in the polls and stood at the same level as the PVV [of Geert Wilders], they copy some PVV positions to compete and recover. The recent tough stand on immigration might only be window dressing, since many PvdA members already criticize the sudden paper on immigrants, and the true Islamizers and appeasers still hold power.