Political
turmoil rocks the Netherlands after Amsterdam violence
Ruling
coalition in crisis amid claims of racist remarks and speculation government
may collapse
Ashifa
Kassam, Senay Boztas and Pjotr Sauer in Amsterdam
Fri 15 Nov
2024 17.03 GMT
The violence
that erupted on Amsterdam’s streets last week has triggered a political crisis
in the Netherlands, with the ruling coalition in turmoil over alleged racist
remarks made by government officials during a closed-door meeting to discuss
the events.
Nora
Achahbar, the Moroccan-born secretary for benefits from the centre-right New
Social Contract (NSC) party, part of the ruling coalition, is expected to
announce her resignation over allegedly inflammatory and racist remarks by
colleagues about Dutch citizens from ethnically diverse backgrounds. Other NSC
members are also considering resigning in protest, the Dutch state broadcaster
NOS reported.
The heads of
the four rightwing ruling parties are now gathering for crisis talks amid
speculation that the government may collapse.
Tensions
have been high in The Hague days after Amsterdam was gripped by what Femke
Halsema, its mayor, described as “a toxic cocktail” of hooliganism,
antisemitism and anger over the war in Gaza. The left-leaning opposition has
accused the Dutch far-right leader Geert Wilders, whose PVV party holds the
largest number of seats in government, of exacerbating tensions by calling for
the revocation of Dutch citizenship and deportation for those convicted of
involvement in the attacks.
Earlier in
the day, Amsterdam city council adopted a motion calling for immediate action
to address the “real and imminent” risk of genocide in Gaza, in what was
described as an attempt to address last week’s unrest.
“These
tensions are not going away,” said Sheher Khan, whose leftwing Denk party was
one of the main backers of the motion. “I suspect – and I think we all agree –
that if we do not tackle the root causes then we will see those tensions again,
conflicts will keep happening.”
The motion,
backed by 35 of the council’s 45 members on Thursday, calls for action “as soon
as possible” to halt what it describes as “the real and imminent genocide in
Gaza”. It cited the January interim decision by the UN’s international court of
justice that stated there was “a real and imminent risk that irreparable
prejudice” would be caused to the rights of Palestinians in Gaza under the
genocide convention.
The motion
also calls on the city to support relief organisations offering aid to Gaza as
well as put pressure on the Dutch state to comply with international law and
prevent Israel from committing possible genocide in Gaza.
The motion
was approved exactly a week after the violence that followed the match between
Ajax and Maccabi Tel Aviv.
As officials
scrambled to piece together what had happened, an emergency ordinance banned
protests and demonstrations for a week. Even so, more than 250 pro-Palestinian
protesters were detained on Wednesday after gathering in defiance of the ban.
Dutch authorities later said they were investigating reports of police violence
after footage appeared to show police in riot gear beating protesters with
batons after breaking up the protest.
In an
interview on Friday, Khan said the continuing protests had reinforced the need
for the motion. “Despite the state of emergency, people continue to
demonstrate,” he said. He added that this was “not because people like to
demonstrate” but because of the images emerging daily from Gaza.
He pointed
to the demonstrations that greeted the Israeli president, Isaac Herzog, when he
arrived in March to open the country’s first Holocaust museum, as well as
pro-Palestinian student protests that had led to more than 150 arrests in
March. “It has been happening all year,” he said. “This is going to happen
again.”
Several of
the city’s councillors refused to back the motion, some expressing concerns
about the use of the word genocide and how it would be received in a city still
raw from the events of the past week. “I fear that it will cause polarisation
in the city,” Itay Garmy, of Volt Netherlands, told the Dutch newspaper Het
Parool.
Last week’s
unrest appears to have involved local people and visitors. Maccabi fans were
linked to an attack on a taxi driver, the tearing down and burning of a
Palestinian flag, and were filmed chanting racist, anti-Arab slogans, while the
city’s mayor said there had been violent “hit and run” attacks on Israeli
supporters. Witness accounts and screenshots of text messages suggest some
specifically targeted Jews, asking people if they were Israeli or to show their
passports.
Days later,
many people in Amsterdam are still reeling, with Jewish and Muslim people
speaking of heightened fears.
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