- By giving the signal that Salafists can patrol the streets with government-sanctioned authority, Mayor van Aartsen is handing a Muslim minority a parallel society, increasingly controlled by Muslims, that actively opposes a Dutch (political) culture.
- “If they [Salafists] are a necessity for maintaining order in the streets, then the city has suffered deeper wounds than any New Year’s Eve vandalism can inflict.” — Nausicaa Marbe, Dutch-Romanian author.
The Hague’s mayor, Jozias van Aartsen, of the Dutch center-right People’s Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD), is known for raising eyebrows when it comes to Islamic extremism. In early July 2014, during demonstrations protesting Israel’s Operation Protective Edge in the Gaza strip against the Hamas terrorist organization, Van Aartsen stated that “No boundaries were crossed” when ISIS supporters chanted the anti-Jewish battle cry: “Khaybar Khaybar, ya yahud, Jaish Muhammad, sa yahud” [“Jews, remember Khaybar, the army of Muhammad is returning”] — basically an incitement to genocide — and “death to the Jews.” Other chants included, “Jews should return to the sewer” and “Long live Hitler.” Islamists also threatened journalists.
Van Aartsen responded through his spokesman and with an interview in the Netherlands’ most politically correct newspaper, NRC-Handelsblad. In it, he called the controversy around his statements “an exaggerated smear campaign,” and spun the entire matter into a rant against Geert Wilders (of the Dutch Freedom Party) — without, of course, Van Aartsen ever being hindered or questioned further by the interviewer.
Another episode in which Van Aartsen generated controversy was during New Year’s Eve 2014, when Salafists from the As-Soennah Mosque patrolled the streets of The Hague’s Schilderswijk and Transvaal neighborhoods, ostensibly to “prevent youths from causing trouble” — with the full approval of the city council.
Geert Wilders’s Dutch Freedom Party and the Party for The Netherlands (composed of two ex-Freedom Party members), were fiercely opposed to these patrols.
The Dutch Intelligence and Security Service published a report (p.15) in which it states, about the As Soennah Mosque, that, “The Salafist ideology contains elements that are conflicting with democratic legal order and can contribute to intolerance, isolationism and polarisation.”
Full article: The Hague’s Mayor: No Problem with Islamic Extremists (The Gatestone Institute)
Global Geopolitics 