Muslim School Bombed in Netherlands
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James Joyner | Monday, November 8, 2004 |
Muslim school bombed in Netherlands (WaTi - UPI)
A powerful bomb gutted a Muslim school in the southern Dutch city of Eindhoven Monday, another in a recent series of anti-Muslim acts, the BBC reported. There were no injuries in the blast, but a police spokesman said the explosion was powerful enough to blow out windows from neighboring buildings.
Mosques in several Dutch cities have been targeted by vandals and failed arsonists in what police believe are revenge attacks since the murder last week of filmmaker Theo van Gogh by suspected Islamic militants. In the past three days, attacks against Muslim targets were reported in the cities of Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Breda and Huizen.
So far, police have made eight arrests in van Gogh’s death. He was shot and stabbed while bicycling to work in Amsterdam last Tuesday morning. He was apparently targeted after releasing a film called “Submission,” which was critical of how women are treated in Muslim society.
Anti-Muslim anger is certainly understandable given the circumstances. But indiscriminate violence against random members of a group in response to grievances with specific members of the group is no different from terrorism. It’s interesting, though, that the mature, peaceful citizens of Europe seem more prone to these acts of retaliation than the reckless, gun toting cowboys of the United States.
About the Author: James Joyner is the publisher of Outside the Beltway and the managing editor of the Atlantic Council. He's a former Army officer, Desert Storm vet, and college professor with a PhD in political science from The University of Alabama. He lives just outside the Beltway in Alexandria, Virginia.
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Europe generally and the Netherlands in particular is experiencing unprecedented levels of immigration over a sustained period. There will be social upheaval. The irony is that what they're experiencing for the first time we've experienced throughout our history. I'm afraid they just don't know what they're in for.
No, they really have no idea. Europeans tend to think they're enlightened compared to Americans, but they're really not.
When a racist incident like this happens in the US, Americans shake their heads in resignation, know the culprit is a brother/sister/cousin, and get back to work on building an egalitarian society. In Europe, there's denial that it even happen, quick blame on "outsiders" or "media" or "American aggression," and absolutely no desire to look at the root causes.
I think Americans accept racism and sexism. They despise it, but they do what they can to not be racist or sexist. Europeans deny that they could even been seen as low as American racists, and so they're blind to their overcrowded countries filling with more and more immigrants every day. Thus, you get the horrific case of Stephen Lawrence in the UK. If the Stephen Lawrence case happened in this country, the cops involved would have had their heads handed to them, and the perps would be rotting in jail, not sitting around playing PS2.
Actually, dw, with the exception of Holland and a few others the European countries aren't crowded. Their cities are crowded. And their interiors (like ours) are being hollowed out.
I don't think it can be ruled out that existing radical right-wing groups seized the oppurtunity to begin these attacks. We have those groups here, I don't think there's any denial about that. Nor denial about that that might not be the case. I haven't seen anyone explain away these things and blame them on the US (??). But then again I don't read Indymedia.
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