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December 11, 2007

Controversial Anti-Muslim Dutch Film Warns Of 'Tsunami Of Islamicization Coming To Europe

Topics: Understanding Islam

"Threats of murder. Fears of riots and religious violence. Demands for censorship. Politicians in hiding, fearing for their lives. A government preparing for the worst." - all because of a 10 minute film that hasn't even been shown yet.

As Fox News reports, this is happening in the Netherlands, once regarded as Europe's quietest and most stable nation:

[...] It's the work of Dutch lawmaker Geert Wilders, who calls his movie "a call to shake off the creeping tyranny of Islamicization." Wilders plans to present it to his country on television sometime next month.

"People who watch the movie will see that the Koran is very much alive today, leading to the destruction of everything we in the Western world stand for, which is respect and tolerance," Wilders, the 41-year-old leader of the right-wing Party for Freedom, said in a telephone interview.

"The tsunami of Islamicization is coming to Europe. We should come to be far stronger."

Like other European countries, the Netherlands is struggling to cope with an influx of Muslim immigrants, and the newcomers are often relegated to working at low-paying jobs and living in high-crime ghettos. Though the Dutch boast of their culture of tolerance, tensions have been high, with some blaming rising unemployment and crime on newcomers from Muslim countries like Turkey, Morocco and Somalia.

[...] Though Wilders has remained steadfastly vague about the specific contents of his movie, saying he wants to maximize the "moment of the broadcast itself," he added that it will include "images and parts of real-time movies that really happen in the Netherlands and the U.K. and the Middle East, the intolerance of the Koran that is still alive and vivid today."

[...] The Dutch government, which is protecting Wilders, has publicly warned him about the potential for violence at the completion of his film and has expressed concern over his personal safety. The government is also concerned about peace within the country and interests abroad. In 2005, cartoons printed in a Danish newspaper led to Danish embassies being set on fire, multi-million-dollar anti-Danish consumer boycotts in the Middle East, and hundreds of deaths in riots across the Muslim world.

"The government is taking the announcement of this movie quite seriously," said Floris van Hovell, a spokesman for the Dutch Embassy in Washington, D.C. "Obviously, because the movie hasn't been made, we cannot say anything about the movie until the movie has been shown, but the message Mr. Wilders has told us he wants to portray is disturbing."

Asked if the government plans to beef up security, Van Hovell said he couldn't comment. But he did say that the government is making a concerted effort to reach out to the Muslim community in the Netherlands and the larger Muslim world.

"We're explaining that in the Netherlands you have freedom of expression, and that at the same time the Dutch government is very concerned about the message Mr. Wilders supposedly wants to portray in his movie," van Hovell said.

Read it all ...

Floris van Hovell, a spokesman for the Dutch Embassy in Washington, D.C., says: "... the message Mr. Wilders has told us he wants to portray is disturbing."

Hmmmm. Yes, truth can be "very" disturbing.

HT - Harry Owens

Posted by Richard at December 11, 2007 10:26 PM

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• Controversial Anti-Muslim Dutch Film Warns Of 'Tsunami Of Islamicization Coming To Europe - Dec 11, 2007