Organisations raising funds to benefit the Israeli army and illegal settlements in the West Bank enjoy tax-exempt status in Europe, an investigation has shown.
The Sar-El Foundation is one of several groups working in the Netherlands dedicated to supporting the Israel Defence Forces. It organises regular visits to Israel, where Dutch volunteers spend three week periods training with the IDF.
Max Arpels Lezer, the foundation’s Amsterdam-based chairman, said that he tries to encourage volunteers to work in Israeli hospitals but if “that is not possible they can do civilian work on military bases.” He has previously stated that while the volunteers do not become soldiers, “they help in the battle against the Palestinians”. But he would not comment when asked why he wishes to assist the Israeli army, given that a United Nations inquiry led by retired South African judge Richard Goldstone found that its troops committed war crimes during a three-week offensive against Gaza in 2008 and 2009.
“I don’t wish to answer the question,” he said. “We don’t talk about politics. Our organisation is a non-political organisation.”
Under Dutch law, foundations such as Sar-El are exempt from tax and individuals giving money to them can deduct the donations from their income tax.
A similar group Collectieve Israël Action (Collective Action Israel) collects about 8 million euros (11 million dollars) per year, according to its website. Among the projects it assists are training for Israeli soldiers, particularly on the applications of advanced technology. The CIA’s board of advisers includes Doron Livnat, director of Riwal, a supplier of cranes used in the construction of the massive wall that Israel has built in the West Bank. That wall was found to be illegal in a 2004 opinion issued by the International Court of Justice in The Hague.
The Nachamoe Foundation, meanwhile, raises money for the upkeep of Israeli families. The foundation has admitted that some of the families live on Israeli settlements between Jerusalem and Bethlehem. These settlements violate international law; the 1949 Fourth Geneva Convention forbids an occupying power from transferring part of its own civilian population into the land it is occupying.
Some groups in the Netherlands have categorised support for the IDF as “humanitarian aid”. Visie voor Israël (Vision for Israel) encourages its sympathisers to give donations that will be used to buy gifts such as backpacks for Israeli soldiers. A newsletter from the organisation says that the quantity of gifts provided has increased substantially since the Israeli army’s offensive against Gaza over the past two years.
Shuva is one of several Christian Zionist organisations working in the Netherlands viewing the foundation of Israel and the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza as the fulfilment of a Biblical prophecy. According to one of its 2009 newsletters, it has financed a school in Nofei Nechemia, an extension (frequently termed an “illegal outpost” by Israeli newspapers) of the Israeli settlement of Ariel the West Bank. Shuva has stated too that it helps hundreds of settlers to establish themselves in four Israeli communities in the West Bank every year.
A spokesman for the Dutch inland revenue service said that the country’s tax rules do not contain any clauses relating to breaches of international law. He said that Dutch legislation allows non-profit organisations to apply for tax exemptions based on their stated goals. “At any given moment, the Dutch tax authorities may decide to revoke this favoured status” after examining the activities of those benefiting from it, he added. But the spokesman said he was unable to speak about the status enjoyed by any particular organisation.
Ghada Zeidan from United Civilians for Peace, a Palestinian solidarity group in the Netherlands, said it is “very difficult” to convince the authorities that they should take action against fundraising by pro-Israel organisations. “The problem is that there is a kind of culture of acceptance of it,” she added.
Earlier this year a campaign was launched in Britain to have the Jewish National Fund (JNF) stripped of its status as a charity. While the JNF presents itself as an ecologically-minded body that plants trees in Israel, it has actively supported violence against Palestinians for many decades. One of its leading figures Yosef Weitz explicitly advocated in 1940 – eight years before the state of Israel was founded - that Palestinians should be forced out of Palestine. More recently, the JNF has concentrated much of its energies on settling Jews in the Negev, a process that has involved the uprooting of indigenous Bedouins, often by the destruction of their homes.
The latest accounts made public by the JNF in London say that its total income for 2008 amounted to 7.7 million pounds (12.2 million dollars). Another priority for the fund has been to help the Benji Hillman Foundation; set up in memory of a soldier killed when Israel attacked Lebanon in 2006, it offers accommodation to young people who travel from abroad to join the Israeli army.
A spokesman for the British revenue authority would not say if any investigations have been undertaken into the JNF’s activities.
The International Solidarity Movement (ISM) – one of the organisations monitoring the JNF’s work – is seeking a probe into whether fund-raisers for foreign armies can be considered charities under British law. Matthew Richardson, an ISM activist, noted that the JNF has powerful allies – David Cameron, the current British prime minister, has agreed to be one of its patrons; so too did his predecessors Gordon Brown and Tony Blair. Richardson added: “The JNF is very embedded within the (pro-Israel) lobby and the political elite as a whole.”
•First published by Inter Press Service (www.ipsnews.net), 28 September 2010
Showing posts with label Christian Zionism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Christian Zionism. Show all posts
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
Dutch Christian groups finance theft of Palestine
Sandwiched between giant car and furniture stores on a motorway stop-off, a blue-and-white Star of David flag droops nonchalantly on a stifling summer’s day. The factory-like building beside it could easily missed by a traveller who blinks too soon, yet the work undertaken here in the Israel Centre is far from commonplace. Its staff and management are dedicated not to the manufacturing of goods or to devising sales strategies but to drumming up support for a contentious political project: expanding Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories.
The centre – located on the outskirts of Nijkerk, a sleepy Dutch town - is home to Christenen voor Israel (Christians for Israel), an organisation that views the creation of the state of Israel as the fulfilment of a Biblical prophecy. “It is very important that we in Holland work with the churches and let them know that Israel is one of the important players in the Bible and that they (Israelis) are God’s chosen people,” André Groenewegen, a spokesman for the group, said.
Further on up the corridor from his office, a shop does a brisk trade. The merchandise it sells is promoted as “made in Israel” yet closer inspection reveals that some of it is sold by firms headquartered in Israeli settlements in the West Bank. The shop’s cosmetics section brims with Ahava products; though boasting minerals from the Dead Sea, these are manufactured in the settlement of Mitzpe Shalem. The shop’s website, meanwhile, offers spices from Amnon and Tamar Karmi, whose head office is located in the settlement of Alfei Menashe, near the Palestinian town of Qalqilyah.
Unlike almost every member country of the United Nations, Christians for Israel refuses to regard the West Bank as occupied Palestinian territory. According to Groenewegen, “the Bible tells us” that it is part of Israel. (International law is at odds with that view; the 1949 Fourth Geneva Convention makes it illegal for an occupying power to transfer part of its own civilian population into the land it is occupying).
Although a brochure on display at the centre’s entrance states that one of the group’s activities is to support Israeli settlements in Judea and Samaria (the Biblical name for the West Bank), Groenewegen claims he is unaware of specific projects that it is aiding in the settlements. He concedes, though, that “our daughter organisation”, Christian Friends of Israeli Communities (CFOIC) is involved in such work.
CFOIC was founded in 1995 after some Christian Zionists had expressed the view that Israel had granted too many concessions to the Palestinian Authority as part of the so-called Oslo accords. Literature published by CFOIC argues that the West Bank was granted to the Jewish people 4,000 years ago. The book of Ezekiel in the Old Testament implores Jews to settle this land and to make it “prosper more than before”, according to CFOIC.
“We don’t consider Judea and Samaria to be occupied,” said Henk Poot, a clergyman active in CFOIC and Christians for Israel. “There was never a Palestinian state or people. Apart from this we believe that the land of Israel has been promised by God Almighty to the Jewish people and in that way we feel very much connected to the religious Zionist movement.”
Poot did not respond to requests for information about how much financial assistance the CFOIC sends to Israeli settlements. Yet the organisation’s website solicits donations for the installation of “security cameras” for the gates of Zufim, a settlement beside Qalqilyah, as well as for the maintenance of students in Ariel, a university for settlers.
Even though they are supporting settlement activities that the Dutch government officially considers to be illegal, Christians for Israel and the CFOIC enjoy a cordial relationship with some of the most powerful politicians in the Netherlands. Maxime Verhagen, parliamentary leader of the Christian Democrats party and the outgoing minister for foreign affairs, expressed his support for the work of pro-Israel lobby groups in an interview published in a Christians for Israel newsletter earlier this month. Verhagen has defended Israeli atrocities against Palestinians even more hawkishly than most of his peers in the European Union’s 27 governments. In January 2009, Verhagen visited the southern Israeli town of Sderot as a gesture of solidarity with its residents; three Israeli civilians were killed by rockets fired from Gaza in late 2008 and early 2009. Verhagen refused to travel further into Gaza itself, where 1,400 Palestinians were killed over a three-week bombardment by Israeli forces.
Christians for Israel are part of a wider pro-Israel lobby with significant political clout in the Netherlands. The most influential organisation in the lobby network is the Centre for Information and Documentation on Israel (CIDI) in The Hague. During the recent general election in the Netherlands, one of CIDI’s staff members Wim Kortenoeven won a parliamentary seat for the Party for Freedom, led by the far-right politician Geert Wilders. This party is in talks with the Christian Democrats about the possible formation of a coalition government. Another pro-Israel lobbyist Gidi Markuszower had been named as a candidate on Wilders’ electoral list but Markuszower’s candidacy was withdrawn at a late stage in the election, reportedly because he had previously been arrested for carrying a gun in public.
Max Wieselmann, a representative of European Jews for a Just Peace, an organisation campaigning for the rights of Palestinians to be respected, said that Christians for Israel is in close contact with Israeli diplomats. “You can always see the Israeli ambassador at their meetings or when they have parties and receptions,” Wieselmann added. “This is a little bit funny. We always say – and it is the same for Christian fundamentalists in the U.S. – that they are not interested in Jews as people but only as a vehicle for their own views.”
•First published by Inter Press Service (www.ipsnews.net), 27 July 2010
The centre – located on the outskirts of Nijkerk, a sleepy Dutch town - is home to Christenen voor Israel (Christians for Israel), an organisation that views the creation of the state of Israel as the fulfilment of a Biblical prophecy. “It is very important that we in Holland work with the churches and let them know that Israel is one of the important players in the Bible and that they (Israelis) are God’s chosen people,” André Groenewegen, a spokesman for the group, said.
Further on up the corridor from his office, a shop does a brisk trade. The merchandise it sells is promoted as “made in Israel” yet closer inspection reveals that some of it is sold by firms headquartered in Israeli settlements in the West Bank. The shop’s cosmetics section brims with Ahava products; though boasting minerals from the Dead Sea, these are manufactured in the settlement of Mitzpe Shalem. The shop’s website, meanwhile, offers spices from Amnon and Tamar Karmi, whose head office is located in the settlement of Alfei Menashe, near the Palestinian town of Qalqilyah.
Unlike almost every member country of the United Nations, Christians for Israel refuses to regard the West Bank as occupied Palestinian territory. According to Groenewegen, “the Bible tells us” that it is part of Israel. (International law is at odds with that view; the 1949 Fourth Geneva Convention makes it illegal for an occupying power to transfer part of its own civilian population into the land it is occupying).
Although a brochure on display at the centre’s entrance states that one of the group’s activities is to support Israeli settlements in Judea and Samaria (the Biblical name for the West Bank), Groenewegen claims he is unaware of specific projects that it is aiding in the settlements. He concedes, though, that “our daughter organisation”, Christian Friends of Israeli Communities (CFOIC) is involved in such work.
CFOIC was founded in 1995 after some Christian Zionists had expressed the view that Israel had granted too many concessions to the Palestinian Authority as part of the so-called Oslo accords. Literature published by CFOIC argues that the West Bank was granted to the Jewish people 4,000 years ago. The book of Ezekiel in the Old Testament implores Jews to settle this land and to make it “prosper more than before”, according to CFOIC.
“We don’t consider Judea and Samaria to be occupied,” said Henk Poot, a clergyman active in CFOIC and Christians for Israel. “There was never a Palestinian state or people. Apart from this we believe that the land of Israel has been promised by God Almighty to the Jewish people and in that way we feel very much connected to the religious Zionist movement.”
Poot did not respond to requests for information about how much financial assistance the CFOIC sends to Israeli settlements. Yet the organisation’s website solicits donations for the installation of “security cameras” for the gates of Zufim, a settlement beside Qalqilyah, as well as for the maintenance of students in Ariel, a university for settlers.
Even though they are supporting settlement activities that the Dutch government officially considers to be illegal, Christians for Israel and the CFOIC enjoy a cordial relationship with some of the most powerful politicians in the Netherlands. Maxime Verhagen, parliamentary leader of the Christian Democrats party and the outgoing minister for foreign affairs, expressed his support for the work of pro-Israel lobby groups in an interview published in a Christians for Israel newsletter earlier this month. Verhagen has defended Israeli atrocities against Palestinians even more hawkishly than most of his peers in the European Union’s 27 governments. In January 2009, Verhagen visited the southern Israeli town of Sderot as a gesture of solidarity with its residents; three Israeli civilians were killed by rockets fired from Gaza in late 2008 and early 2009. Verhagen refused to travel further into Gaza itself, where 1,400 Palestinians were killed over a three-week bombardment by Israeli forces.
Christians for Israel are part of a wider pro-Israel lobby with significant political clout in the Netherlands. The most influential organisation in the lobby network is the Centre for Information and Documentation on Israel (CIDI) in The Hague. During the recent general election in the Netherlands, one of CIDI’s staff members Wim Kortenoeven won a parliamentary seat for the Party for Freedom, led by the far-right politician Geert Wilders. This party is in talks with the Christian Democrats about the possible formation of a coalition government. Another pro-Israel lobbyist Gidi Markuszower had been named as a candidate on Wilders’ electoral list but Markuszower’s candidacy was withdrawn at a late stage in the election, reportedly because he had previously been arrested for carrying a gun in public.
Max Wieselmann, a representative of European Jews for a Just Peace, an organisation campaigning for the rights of Palestinians to be respected, said that Christians for Israel is in close contact with Israeli diplomats. “You can always see the Israeli ambassador at their meetings or when they have parties and receptions,” Wieselmann added. “This is a little bit funny. We always say – and it is the same for Christian fundamentalists in the U.S. – that they are not interested in Jews as people but only as a vehicle for their own views.”
•First published by Inter Press Service (www.ipsnews.net), 27 July 2010
Thursday, April 29, 2010
Israel finds allies in Europe's Christian fundamentalists
Flip through any issue of a major newspaper from the past decade and it is a safe bet you will be confronted with a warning about the dangers of religious extremism. So how could the mainstream media have failed to notice the growing influence of fundamentalists on the European Union's relations with one of its nearest neighbors: Israel? The explanation might lie in how the zealots in question are not Islamic but Christian.
Since September last year, the European Parliament's official delegation to the Knesset has been headed by veteran Dutch politician Bastiaan Belder. This has meant that the chief interlocutor with Israel for the EU's only directly-elected institution has been a man who makes Dick Cheney look moderate.
Belder belongs to the Political Reformed Party (known by its Dutch acronym SGP). Within the Netherlands, this Calvinist grouping has long been controversial because of its opposition to women's suffrage. Even though it has been forced to reverse its male-only membership rule by a 2003 court ruling, it has not yet fielded a female candidate in an election.
The party's literal interpretation of scriptures is especially pronounced in its policy on the Middle East. Adhering strictly to a Christian Zionist ideology, it views the foundation of the State of Israel in 1948 as the fulfillment of a Biblical prophecy. "For the SGP solidarity with the Jewish people is not negotiable," one of its key documents on foreign affairs states. "Therefore, we are committed to a secure existence for Israel in the territory that God has assigned to the Jewish people. The Jews are the 'beloved of the father's will,' to which the Lord assigned their country, as is written in the Old Testament."
Intriguingly, the same document displays a profound anti-Semitic bias. It identifies Judaism as a heresy and argues that Jews must convert to Christianity if they are to evade damnation. Islam, meanwhile, is described as a threat that needs to be "countered" because it "keeps people away from salvation."
In his 11 years as a member of the European Parliament (MEP), Belder has consistently defended Israel's oppression of the Palestinians. Frequently, his rhetoric is indistinguishable from the propaganda peddled by the Israeli diplomats with whom he is in regular contact. During a visit to Jerusalem in February, he contended that Israel would have nothing to fear if it set up an "independent" investigation into the conduct of its attacks on Gaza in late 2008 and early 2009. "When you are convinced that you did everything to prevent civilian casualties, when you have the moral high ground, show it and no one can blame you," he said.
Under Belder's chairmanship, meetings of the Parliament's delegation to Israel have generally been one-sided affairs. Last December, the main guest speaker at one such meeting was Emanuele Ottolenghi, then the Brussels representative of the American Jewish Committee, one of the most powerful pro-Israel lobby groups in Washington. Ottolenghi has penned a book (“ Under a Mushroom Cloud”, published in 2009) and several pamphlets that make the case for waging war against Iran over its alleged efforts to develop nuclear weapons. By contrast, Ottolenghi has portrayed Israel’s nuclear capability as necessary for stability in the Middle East, claiming that Arab leaders “sleep soundly under the shadow of Israel’s nuclear umbrella.”
Fortunately, Belder has not had everything his own way. Last year the Parliament's delegation to the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) sought a discussion with him on how its work could be coordinated with that of his delegation. Initially, Belder turned down this request but when pressured by other MEPs, he agreed in the past few months that joint meetings between the two delegations could be held. Proinsias de Rossa, an Irish MEP who chairs the delegation to the PLC, said he had made "various overtures" to Belder and was "brushed aside for a long time." However, Belder eventually accepted the principle that each delegation should be kept informed of the other's activities and "we are now cooperating very well," de Rossa added. Belder did not respond to my requests for a comment.
While only a handful of Dutch politicians espouse the same religious views as Belder, his unwavering support for Israel has been echoed by larger parties in the Netherlands. Dutch Foreign Minister Maxime Verhagen, a center-right Christian Democrat, will be garlanded as a "friend of Israel" in June when the American Jewish Committee presents him with an award. Verhagen has claimed that Israel "has no desire to see people in Gaza suffer." His comments were made when he travelled to the southern Israeli city of Sderot last year; Verhagen refused to venture across the nearby border crossing into Gaza to see for himself if Israel was making its 1.5 million inhabitants suffer.
Without doubt, the Netherlands' blood-splattered history helps explain some of the enduring attitudes towards Israel -- 70 percent of the Dutch Jewry were wiped out in the Holocaust. "After World War II, there was quite a lot of enthusiasm [in the Netherlands] about the small State of Israel," said Henri Veldhuis, a Calvinist theologian and a Palestine solidarity campaigner. "These new heroes fueled our faith. Some years later, there was guilt about the Holocaust and how most Jews in Holland were killed or deported. These deep feelings about faith and guilt are still quite strong in our churches."
Veldhuis, whose work for Palestinian rights has led one of his co-religionists to dub him a "follower of Hitler," says that the essential problem with the SGP and the like-minded ChristenUnie (the two parties contested last year's European Parliament election as a combined force) is that they view their reading of the Bible as more important than international law. "For me, this is quite shocking," he said.
A general election is scheduled to take place in the Netherlands in June after the Labor Party recently walked out of the government in protest at efforts to prolong the Dutch involvement in the war in Afghanistan. Many pundits expect the flamboyant anti-Muslim firebrand Geert Wilders to perform strongly in this summer's poll. The electoral list that he leads includes several candidates who have previously worked for the pro-Israel lobby in the Netherlands. Among them are a former Dutch representative for Likud, the party of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Nonetheless, the increasingly brutal nature of the occupation of Palestine has caused some Dutch politicians to reconsider their support for Israel, according to Ghada Zeidan from United Civilians for Peace, a Utrecht-based human rights group. "People are outraged here," she said. "Even some of the more conservative political parties like the VVD [one of the main opposition parties], who are seen in Holland as 'friends of Israel' are asking questions. I can see some movement at the moment but I also should say that the Israel lobby in general remains rather strong."
It would be comforting if Belder could be dismissed as unrepresentative of mainstream Dutch or European society. Yet he has proven to be an astute networker at a time when Israel’s political establishment is eagerly courting allies in the Brussels institutions with a view to deepening its diplomatic and economic ties with the EU. His close links with Israeli officialdom indicates that he is appreciated as someone who slavishly defends Israel’s agenda in an assembly it frequently regards as hostile. However extreme he may be, it would be foolish to ignore him.
•Originally published by The Electronic Intifada (www.electronicintifada.net)
Since September last year, the European Parliament's official delegation to the Knesset has been headed by veteran Dutch politician Bastiaan Belder. This has meant that the chief interlocutor with Israel for the EU's only directly-elected institution has been a man who makes Dick Cheney look moderate.
Belder belongs to the Political Reformed Party (known by its Dutch acronym SGP). Within the Netherlands, this Calvinist grouping has long been controversial because of its opposition to women's suffrage. Even though it has been forced to reverse its male-only membership rule by a 2003 court ruling, it has not yet fielded a female candidate in an election.
The party's literal interpretation of scriptures is especially pronounced in its policy on the Middle East. Adhering strictly to a Christian Zionist ideology, it views the foundation of the State of Israel in 1948 as the fulfillment of a Biblical prophecy. "For the SGP solidarity with the Jewish people is not negotiable," one of its key documents on foreign affairs states. "Therefore, we are committed to a secure existence for Israel in the territory that God has assigned to the Jewish people. The Jews are the 'beloved of the father's will,' to which the Lord assigned their country, as is written in the Old Testament."
Intriguingly, the same document displays a profound anti-Semitic bias. It identifies Judaism as a heresy and argues that Jews must convert to Christianity if they are to evade damnation. Islam, meanwhile, is described as a threat that needs to be "countered" because it "keeps people away from salvation."
In his 11 years as a member of the European Parliament (MEP), Belder has consistently defended Israel's oppression of the Palestinians. Frequently, his rhetoric is indistinguishable from the propaganda peddled by the Israeli diplomats with whom he is in regular contact. During a visit to Jerusalem in February, he contended that Israel would have nothing to fear if it set up an "independent" investigation into the conduct of its attacks on Gaza in late 2008 and early 2009. "When you are convinced that you did everything to prevent civilian casualties, when you have the moral high ground, show it and no one can blame you," he said.
Under Belder's chairmanship, meetings of the Parliament's delegation to Israel have generally been one-sided affairs. Last December, the main guest speaker at one such meeting was Emanuele Ottolenghi, then the Brussels representative of the American Jewish Committee, one of the most powerful pro-Israel lobby groups in Washington. Ottolenghi has penned a book (“ Under a Mushroom Cloud”, published in 2009) and several pamphlets that make the case for waging war against Iran over its alleged efforts to develop nuclear weapons. By contrast, Ottolenghi has portrayed Israel’s nuclear capability as necessary for stability in the Middle East, claiming that Arab leaders “sleep soundly under the shadow of Israel’s nuclear umbrella.”
Fortunately, Belder has not had everything his own way. Last year the Parliament's delegation to the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) sought a discussion with him on how its work could be coordinated with that of his delegation. Initially, Belder turned down this request but when pressured by other MEPs, he agreed in the past few months that joint meetings between the two delegations could be held. Proinsias de Rossa, an Irish MEP who chairs the delegation to the PLC, said he had made "various overtures" to Belder and was "brushed aside for a long time." However, Belder eventually accepted the principle that each delegation should be kept informed of the other's activities and "we are now cooperating very well," de Rossa added. Belder did not respond to my requests for a comment.
While only a handful of Dutch politicians espouse the same religious views as Belder, his unwavering support for Israel has been echoed by larger parties in the Netherlands. Dutch Foreign Minister Maxime Verhagen, a center-right Christian Democrat, will be garlanded as a "friend of Israel" in June when the American Jewish Committee presents him with an award. Verhagen has claimed that Israel "has no desire to see people in Gaza suffer." His comments were made when he travelled to the southern Israeli city of Sderot last year; Verhagen refused to venture across the nearby border crossing into Gaza to see for himself if Israel was making its 1.5 million inhabitants suffer.
Without doubt, the Netherlands' blood-splattered history helps explain some of the enduring attitudes towards Israel -- 70 percent of the Dutch Jewry were wiped out in the Holocaust. "After World War II, there was quite a lot of enthusiasm [in the Netherlands] about the small State of Israel," said Henri Veldhuis, a Calvinist theologian and a Palestine solidarity campaigner. "These new heroes fueled our faith. Some years later, there was guilt about the Holocaust and how most Jews in Holland were killed or deported. These deep feelings about faith and guilt are still quite strong in our churches."
Veldhuis, whose work for Palestinian rights has led one of his co-religionists to dub him a "follower of Hitler," says that the essential problem with the SGP and the like-minded ChristenUnie (the two parties contested last year's European Parliament election as a combined force) is that they view their reading of the Bible as more important than international law. "For me, this is quite shocking," he said.
A general election is scheduled to take place in the Netherlands in June after the Labor Party recently walked out of the government in protest at efforts to prolong the Dutch involvement in the war in Afghanistan. Many pundits expect the flamboyant anti-Muslim firebrand Geert Wilders to perform strongly in this summer's poll. The electoral list that he leads includes several candidates who have previously worked for the pro-Israel lobby in the Netherlands. Among them are a former Dutch representative for Likud, the party of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Nonetheless, the increasingly brutal nature of the occupation of Palestine has caused some Dutch politicians to reconsider their support for Israel, according to Ghada Zeidan from United Civilians for Peace, a Utrecht-based human rights group. "People are outraged here," she said. "Even some of the more conservative political parties like the VVD [one of the main opposition parties], who are seen in Holland as 'friends of Israel' are asking questions. I can see some movement at the moment but I also should say that the Israel lobby in general remains rather strong."
It would be comforting if Belder could be dismissed as unrepresentative of mainstream Dutch or European society. Yet he has proven to be an astute networker at a time when Israel’s political establishment is eagerly courting allies in the Brussels institutions with a view to deepening its diplomatic and economic ties with the EU. His close links with Israeli officialdom indicates that he is appreciated as someone who slavishly defends Israel’s agenda in an assembly it frequently regards as hostile. However extreme he may be, it would be foolish to ignore him.
•Originally published by The Electronic Intifada (www.electronicintifada.net)
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