The New Media Journal | Why the Dutch are Wrong by Mark Silverberg

A Dutch court is presently considering a petition by the Dutch Islamic Federation seeking a review of whether Dutch Freedom Party leader Geert Wilders's new 15-minute video Fitna (strife) violates Dutch hate-speech laws. The video is a graphic description of jihadist Salafi Islam (or “jihadism”) as an interpretation of the Quran that seeks to dominate the world and slaughter non-believers.

It splices together verses from the Quran with threats from imams calling for the annihilation of all infidels, shows videos of the mutilated bodies of bombing victims, destroyed buses resulting from the actions of suicide bombers, and details the World Trade Center attack on 9/11 including the images of those terrified souls who jumped to their deaths from the top floors of the Twin Towers. Dutch newspaper headlines are reproduced outlining threats to murder prominent Islamic moderates, as is footage of Jack Hensley's grisly beheading and an Afghan woman draped in a burka being shot in the head. One Moslem cleric is seen calling for the murder of Jews as he unsheathes a sword and cries out, "By Allah, we shall cut off the Jew's head! Allah is great! Allah is great! Jihad for the sake of Allah!" while the audience cheers him on.

In another sequence, a three year old Muslim girl calls Jews "apes and pigs" and an Imam exhorts: "The Jews...are the ones who must be butchered and killed." Sura 47, verse 4 is shown in relation to the murder of Dutch film director Theo Van Gogh on November 3, 2004 – a slaughter committed by jihadist Mohammed Bouyeri. Bouyeri is reported as saying: "If I had the opportunity to get out of prison, and I had the opportunity to do it again, Allah, I would have done exactly the same.” Protesters are shown supporting Van Gogh's murder warning others to heed the lesson or "pay with your blood". The film ends with the words: "It is not up to me, but up to Moslems themselves to tear out the hateful verses from the Quran...In 1945, Nazism was defeated in Europe. In 1989, Communism was defeated in Europe. Now, the Islamic ideology has to be defeated."

It was only when LiveLeak.com (a British video website) briefly posted Fitna that the world saw jihadism for the barbarism that it is. The Dutch government reacted in characteristic fashion. Writhing in outright panic, it embarked on a veritable world tour of pre-emptive appeasement. It spent weeks trying to prevent Fitna’s release which should come as no surprise since the Europeans have been hoping against hope that if they can appease the growing power of the jihadists in their midst, they might be able to prevent a repeat of the March 11, 2004 Madrid train bombings, the July 7, 2005 London tube bombings and the Danish anti-Mohammed cartoon riots of November 2006, not to mention the murder of Van Gogh in 2004 in Amsterdam after he released a short film (“Submission”) criticizing Islam's treatment of women.

The MEMRI blog reported that the Dutch government had even sent a letter disavowing Mr. Wilders to Sheikh Muhammad Sayyed Tantawi, Sunni Islam's foremost figure who has called for a jihad against U.S. forces in Iraq and sanctioned suicide bombings against Israeli women and children. The online Dutch site NIS News Bulletin reported that Dutch Prime Minister Jan-Peter Balkenende "stressed repeatedly and with irritation that Wilders and no one else was responsible for any violence that might break out after his film's release" and according to a story in the German publication Der Spiegel, he met with none other than Iran's foreign minister, who advised him to use an article from the 1948 Declaration of Human Rights to prevent the film's showing.

Following the lead of their Prime Minister and consistent with its growing national d’himmitude (accepted second-class status under Shari’a law) Dutch television stations refused to air the video out of sheer fear. In fact, the U.S. Internet provider that advertised the video suspended its Web site and feared even to list the URL at which the movie could be seen, and, to the surprise of no one, the U.N. Human Rights Council adopted a resolution deploring the use of the media to "incite acts of violence, xenophobia or related intolerance and discrimination towards Islam" or other religions. The European Union (the principal motor behind the Islamization of Europe) was quick to reassure the Islamic world that the whole idea of “free speech” was probably overrated and Thomas Landen of The Brussels Journal reported that one of the most respected Dutch journalists, Henk Hofland, had urged the Dutch government to withdraw state protection from Mr. Wilders who currently lives under constant threat of assassination.

These reactions confirm the fundamental problem within European society. While the international community is pre-occupied with condemning Geert Wilders for producing a video on the barbaric manifestations of jihadism, no one is denying the facts presented in the video. No one is arguing that the facts are being manipulated. Wilders did not make this up. These atrocities happened (and continue to happen). Moreover, the video shows clearly that terror has become a jihadist tactic that is having its intended effect – forcing European submission to Shari’a through fear. The sad irony is that Wilders has received jihadist threats for producing a video on jihadism committed by jihadists and is being condemned by European society for having produced it. Yet, even Omar Bakri, the Libyan-based jihadist cleric who is barred from Britain didn’t think the video was especially offensive. He commented: “On the contrary, if we leave out the first images and the sound of the page being torn, it could be a film of the (Islamist) Mujahideen.” Wilders is not being condemned for lying. He’s being condemned for exposing the truth. In Fitna, he is not attacking Islam per se; he is attacking the jihadist interpretation of Islam that seeks forcible conversion, death to those who do not convert or d’himmitude (voluntary second-class status) for non-believers based on these jihadists’ strict 7th century interpretation of the Quran.

At the conclusion of the video, a page (symbolizing a page from the Quran) is torn with the comment - "The sound you heard was a page being ripped from the phone book. For it is not up to me, but Muslims themselves to tear out the hateful pages from the Quran." That is the unfortunate truth of today’s so-called “clash of civilizations.” The success of jihadism is first and foremost a Muslim problem since jihadist control over Islam inhibits the development of a more moderate, pluralistic interpretation of the Quran. Our greatest concern should be the silence of moderate Muslim leaders who are failing to condemn these jihadist outrages in the name of their religion. Once again, an opportunity has been lost to put forth a more humanistic interpretation of Islam – an interpretation that argues that democracy and Islam are indeed compatible; that rejects jihadist violence in pursuit of Islam's goals; that emphasizes the inclusive rather than exclusive verses of the Quran, that condemns jihadist terrorism; that advocates equal rights for minorities and women; and that accepts pluralism within Islam. Based upon the silence of the Muslim world, an Islamic Renaissance is not yet within reach.

And the problem is no less disturbing from the perspective of European Christendom which is mortgaging the European enlightenment by appeasing the jihadists who seek to end it. Fitna would not have been necessary had European governments been prepared to link violence with jihadi Islam rather than seeing the Wilders video as an attack on Islam per se. All the West has done has been to jettison its basic principles in order to submit to the will of these jihadists. Nothing better shows potential jihadists just how weak and decadent their enemy has become and no better terrorist recruitment tool exists.