Anyone (outside of the Netherlands) heard this news? A rather famous Dutch columnist and filmmaker, known for his outspoken views on religion in general, and Islam in particular, was murdered last week (november 2nd) by an Islamic fundamentalist guy. The murderer was a second generation Dutch-Moroccan, born and bred in the Netherlands.
<a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/europe/11/02/netherlands.filmmaker/index.html">Link to story</a>
Quote:
AMSTERDAM, Netherlands -- Controversial Dutch filmmaker and newspaper columnist Theo van Gogh, who made a film about violence against women in Islamic societies, has been murdered in Amsterdam, police said.
Police said they arrested a man at the scene after a shootout. The suspect, a 26-year-old man with dual Dutch-Moroccan nationality, and a police officer were slightly wounded.
Filmmaker Theo van Gogh had been threatened after the August airing of the movie "Submission," which he made with a right-wing Dutch politician who had renounced the Islamic faith of her birth.
Van Gogh, 47 -- who said he was the great grandson of the brother of famous Dutch painter Vincent van Gogh, who was also named Theo -- had received police protection after the film's release.
The killing immediately rekindled memories of the 2002 assassination of Dutch anti-immigration politician Pim Fortuyn who was shot to death days before national elections.
Van Gogh had been making a film about Fortuyn, which was due for release in December.
In a recent radio interview, Van Gogh dismissed the threats and called "Submission" "the best protection I could have. It's not something I worry about."
Police told The Associated Press that Van Gogh's killer shot and stabbed his victim and left a note on his body. They declined to comment on reports that the filmmaker's neck was slashed.
Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende called on the Dutch people to remain calm and not to jump to conclusions.
In a report by Dutch national broadcaster NOS quoted by AP, an unidentified witness who lives in the neighborhood said she heard six shots and saw the suspect concealing a gun. She said he walked away slowly, spoke to someone at the edge of the park, and then ran.
She said he was wearing a long beard and Islamic garb and appeared to be either an Arabic man or someone disguised as a Muslim.
Another unidentified witness told Dutch Radio 1 the killer arrived by bicycle and shot Van Gogh as he got out of a car. "He fell backward on the bicycle path and just laid there. The shooter stayed next to him and waited. Waited to make sure he was dead."
...
|
I posted this story in order to highlight the growing unrest in my country. People are pissed off about this, and many Muslim immigrants don't seem to understand why.
Just to provide some background material:
- Muslims, specifically of Moroccan descent, are angry at being linked to the murderer. They see the murderer as an insane deviant, who isn't even a real Muslim (because of his crime).
- Some Muslims say that van Gogh deserved to be murdered because of what he said. Some say he didn't deserve it, but they can understand the murderer. Some say he didn't deserve it, but that he should have expected it.
- A lot of native Dutch people have been angry at Moroccans in general for a while now, for their unwillingness to "blend in". There have been many incidents of Moroccan kids being a pain in the arse to other people. Only two weeks ago there was a story on the news about a Dutch family practically forced to move from a predominantly Moroccan street; the kids there bullied them on a daily basis, until they finally left. There's Moroccan kids calling Dutch girls whores, there's Muslim clerics denouncing gay people as diseased, there's Moroccan kids playing soccer with packs of flowers on our national day of mourning for the deaths of WW2... tons and tons of stories, all supposed to be "incidents".
- A lot of the Muslim immigrants, specifically Moroccans, have a hard time getting a job. Partly because of their lower social class and education, partly because of the bad examples set by some of their kin.
Now, what do outsiders think of this? Does anyone know how we can get out of this mess?