About the “Patriotic Party”

Since I’m already knee-deep in ordure from the last few months of controversy, I might as well wade in a little further and see if I can get in above my hips.

*   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *
The latest word, according to EU Business, is that a pan-European party has been formed by four political parties: Le Pen’s Front National of France, the Flemish independence party Vlaams Belang, the Bulgarian party Attaca, and the Austrian Freedom Party led by Heinz-Christian Strache.

This European-wide party has announced no platform or objectives to counter the Islamization of Europe, to oppose anti-Semitism, or to support Israel. It would be helpful if they were to make their positions on these issues clear. A detailed platform including all three of those objectives would be most welcome; it would demonstrate a policy leadership for all parties across the political spectrum.

From EU Business:

Right-wing nationalist leaders from four EU member states announced Friday in Vienna the creation of a broad new European “patriotic” party by November.

The leaders of Austria’s Freedom Party, France’s National Front, the Bulgarian Attaca party and Belgium’s Vlaams Belang told a press conference that they had agreed to set up the new party as a counter-balance to other political forces in Europe.

“We say: patriots of all the countries of Europe, unite! Because only together will we solve our problems,” Freedom Party leader Heinz-Christian Strache told journalists.

“European parties receive great benefits within the union and so we believe there is no reason nationalists shouldn’t also have a formation like the Socialists, the Christian Democrats, the liberals or the Greens,” the National Front’s Jean-Marie Le Pen told AFP.

The announcement comes months after the demise of the barely one-year-old extreme right group in the European Parliament, “Identity, Tradition, Sovereignty” (ITS), to which several of the founders of the new party belonged.

[…]

Unlike a European parliamentary group, which according to EU law requires at least 20deputies from five different states to exist, a party only needs members from seven states.

“Our goal is clear, we want more than 10 parties as members and ideally one party from each EU country,” Strache told journalists.

He said he and his partners were in talks with parties in several countries, including non-EU member states, but refused to give any names until decisions were finalised.

The new European party is expected to be set up on November 15.

Before the inevitable ton of bricks comes down on my head, I have to say this:
- - - - - - - - -
The Front National, the FPÖ and Attaca were not invited to the Counterjihad Brussels 2007 conference. They have not published policies that are specifically and publicly pro-Israel, they do not have a history of opposing Holocaust Denial and anti-Semitism, and they do not have a consistent history of anti-Islamization.

Vlaams Belang has all of these specific positions and did attend the conference.

In their dealings outside of Flanders and within EU the political labyrinth, VB is engaging in the same kinds of compromises and alliances that any political party has to make in order to survive and achieve electoral success. I don’t expect that all of their chosen allies will be palatable to me — but then again, I’m not trying to run a political party.

As long as Vlaams Belang continues to be a vigorous opponent of Islamization, a supporter of Israel, and a staunch denouncer of anti-Semitism, then I will continue to give it a favorable hearing.

Our primary mission here at Gates of Vienna is opposition to Islamization, with an emphasis on the incompatibility of sharia with constitutional law.

We also support Israel’s absolute right to exist as a Jewish state within defensible borders, and we oppose all forms of Jew-hatred and anti-Semitism.

In other words, as we have said since the beginning, we stand with the Jews.

We also decry the massive genocides against Christians and other minorities in Muslim countries, the treatment of women under Islamic law, the violence and tyranny endemic to Muslim states, and all the other outrages and injustices perpetrated in the name of Islam.

*   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *
Overt anti-Semitism and an ambivalence towards Islamism make some European political parties unacceptable allies for the Counterjihad. Vlaams Belang and others may find it expedient to build bridges to them, but the policies of such parties will keep us from supporting them.

Europe’s great misfortune over the last few decades has been the absolute anathema pronounced upon conservatives and the opponents of the EU by the ruling elites. The predictable result is that many worthy anti-jihad activists are being forced into the arms of the extreme right, since all other political groupings now consider them untouchable.

One of our jobs here is to make an ethically acceptable and broad-based case for the Counterjihad, and thereby ameliorate the pernicious effects of this European “cordon sanitaire”.