Report
By Khaled Shawkat, IOL Holland Correspondent
THE
HAGUE, July 2 (IslamOnline) – More than 20 thousand Palestinian
flags hang outside Dutch balconies in several Dutch cities – the
work of a solidarity campaign organized by Dutch and Palestinian
associations.
Organizers
said hanging the Palestinian flags was also an act of solidarity with
Greta Duisenberg, wife of the European Central Bank CEO, who has been
recently sued for insisting on hanging the Palestinian flag outside
the balcony of her home in an upper class neighborhood in Amsterdam.
Duisenberg
took part in a demonstration April 13 in solidarity with the
Palestinian Intifada. She decided to keep the Palestinian flag outside
her home balcony as an expression of her sympathy with the Palestinian
resistance and their legitimate right to an independent state, and her
rejection of the Israeli aggressions against the Palestinian people.
She
has found great support among the Muslim minority, especially for
standing up against Jewish pressure groups.
On
May 27th, the Jewish Union in Holland, a non-governmental
organization (NGO) that represents Dutch Jews, announced plans to file
a complaint to the preliminary court in Amsterdam in order to sue
Duisenberg for “anti-Semitism”.
Algemeen
Dagblad, a daily Dutch newspaper, quoted Tuesday, May 28, Vicken
De Leo, the liberal party member of the Amsterdam Municipal Council as
saying that it was Duisenberg’s neighbor who led the campaign
against her it sued her.
Duisenberg
resisted pressure from her neighbors and her husband’s friends –
let alone the media – to remove the Palestinian flag from her
balcony.
“I
am the one responsible for hanging the flag outside my balcony and not
my husband Wim,” Greta said in an interview with the Dutch Telegraph
newspaper. “I have raised this flag in a demonstration in Amsterdam
and have decided ever since to keep it hanging outside my home balcony
in a show of continued support.”
She
is unhappy with the way Holland and Europe have been dealing with
hardline Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s government’s
actions in Palestinian cities during the last few weeks, she said,
adding that she insists on her position.
“I
am an independent thinking woman and responsible for my actions. Both
my husband and I own this house which means I can practice my beliefs
here,” she said.
Dutch
papers have recently attacked Muslim protestors who burnt the Israeli
flag in pro-Palestinian demonstrations that were held in the Dutch
capital during the month of April. They saw these demonstrations as an
indication of the end of the Jewish control over the city and the
start of a new era in which Muslims are in control.
The
mayor of Amsterdam, Cohen, of Jewish origins, appeared in the Dutch
media angry at the burning of the Israeli flag in his city, which is
the first time this has taken place ever since Israel came into
existence in 1947.
Despite
their being a minority, Jews exercise a lot of political and economic
influence in the Netherland. They also control the media. The Dutch
authorities have always appointed a Jewish mayor for the city in
recognition of the role that was played by the Jews in the flourishing
of the city. They arrived as refugees with the start of Inquisition,
following the fall of Muslim Spain (Al-Andalus) in the fifteenth
century.
The
recent events in Palestine and the second Intifada against Israeli
occupation have pushed the Muslim minority in the city to surmount
their differences and to unite in huge demonstrations which many felt
threatened the “Jewish indentity” of the city.
Meanwhile,
Queen Beatrix of Holland visited June 26 the Al-Islam mosque which
lies in a popular district of The Hague. The Queen spoke to the Imam
of the mosque and the people in the administration of her trust in the
role that mosques and Islamic institutions play in merging Muslims in
Dutch social life.
The
visit came as a surprise for the Dutch people, especially at a time
when hardliners have launched a ferocious campaign against mosque
Imams, demanding Dutch authorities to expel them for allegedly
“encouraging hatred and animosity against non-Muslims.”
Muslim
figures have described the Queen’s visit as a positive step that
demonstrates the Dutch leadership’s awareness of the illogical
motives behind attacking Imams.
According
to official reports, the city’s Muslim population has far exceeded
the Jewish population, reaching 20 per cent from the population of
Amsterdam.
Nearly
50 per cent of the newborns during the next twenty years will be
Muslim, official sources say, which means a drastic change in the
social, cultural and political structure of the city which is one of
the most important economic centers in Europe.
