Antwerp: calls to ban anti-Israeli demonstrations

" ... it's hallucinatory that the Antwerp police needs to arrest immigrants possessing Molotov cocktails ..."

"The self-employed organization Unizo of Antwerp and political party Lijst Dedecker are asking to ban further anti-Israel protests, following the recent clashes between police and demonstrators in the city.

Unizo Antwerp reacted indignantly to the riots of last Wednesday, after a protest action of the Arab European League in Borgerhout.

The shopkeepers want regulations to limit or even ban demonstrations in shopping streets. According to Unizo Antwerp the demonstrations damage the image of Antwerp as a shopping city and leads to investors holding back. This week starts off the most important sales period of the city, with special bargains for the next month.

The organization is also asking for extra vigilance in the affected shopping streets around the Turnhoutsebaan and in the diamond sector.

"Antwerp entrepreneurs and citizens are not responsible for the problems in the Middle East. Damaging properties and shops is not a solution for the conflict," emphasizes the organization. "We don't want to limit the right to free speech, but ask for respect for the right to do business."

The organization says that they had informed the mayor in advance of their anxiety but that he told them everything was under control. They are therefore extremely upset about the derailment of the demonstration Wednesday.

Meanwhile, Lijst Dedecker (LDD) wants to ban today's planned demonstration, a silent march of women's organizations. On Saturday police stopped an illegal protest in the Groenplaats square. 93 people were arrested, 60 of them minors, the youngest of which was 11. They were apparently called to demonstrate by SMS. Some of the Muslim youth had forbidden weapons such as Molotov cocktails, sticks and pepper sprays.

Police spread out in the area and stopped everyperson on their way to the square. If they said they were on their way to the demonstration or were wearing Palestinian shawls and shouting slogans, they were asked to leave. If they did not do so, they were arrested (administratively detained).

LDD says that "the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians is being abused in order to create conflicts in Antwerp and to set population groups against each other.

"Flemish parliament member Jurgen Verstrepen says that "as long as nobody can convince me that there's no danger during the sales period, Patrick Janssens (Antwerp Socialist Mayor) must take responsibility."

Verstrepent thinks it's hallucinatory that the Antwerp police needs to arrest immigrants possessing Molotov cocktails on the most important sales day of the year. "Imagine that such 'rifraf' would take actions in the shopping masses. The results would be disastrous," says Verstrepen. The course of today's women's march was changed so as not to go through the shopping district."

Sources: Islam in Europe, HLN 1, 2, 3 (Dutch)

Previous articles:

- Antwerp: Arab riots, Jewish neighborhood sealed (UPDATED)

- Antwerp: AEL riots + Video

Nizar Rayyan: Hamas "Human Shield" strategist succumbs to his own stratagem, by Ely Karmon

"According to the Jerusalem Post of January 1, 2009, Sheikh Nizar Rayyan, 52, a senior Hamas leader and cleric, was killed along with several others on Thursday when an IAF aircraft dropped a bomb on the eight-story Jabalya apartment building he lived. Rayyan was not only the religious leader of Hamas's military wing, Izzadin Kassam, but also one of their military commanders. A lecturer at Gaza's Islamist University, Rayyan, had mentored suicide bombers and would sometimes go on patrol with Hamas fighters. He was an outspoken advocate of renewing suicide bombings against Israel.

Rayyan's house was serving as an arms and ammunition warehouse and as a Hamas communications center, a statement released by the government press office said. In addition, a tunnel was located under the house and was used for the escape of terror operatives.

He was both the director and the financier of the March 14, 2004 sophisticated terrorist attack at the strategic Ashdod port perpetrated by two terrorists hiding in a container with double walls specifically built for this operation. Israeli police evaluated at the time that this suicide attack using a highly sophisticated plastic explosive may have targeted tanks of dangerous chemicals, including bromine, causing far greater casualties. Ten Israelis were killed in the attack.

As a consequence of this strategic attack, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin the leader of Hamas, responsible for dozens of suicide attacks inside Israel during the second intifadah, was killed in a targeted helicopter gunship operation on March 22, 2004.

In the air attack on Nizar Rayyan, nine other people were killed, including Rayyan's four wives and four of his 12 children, and around 30 were wounded in the air strike. According to Palestinian sources, his family was warned before the attack but did not leave the building.

According to the Hamas website in English it was Rayyan, 'who took the initiative, two years ago, to protect homes against Israeli occupation air strikes by forming human shields'.

According to the Israeli Haaretz of January 2, 2009, in some cases residents of suspected houses have been able to prevent bombing by climbing up to the roof to show that they will not leave, prompting IDF commanders to call off the strike. The IDF has code named such operations 'roof knocking,' in which the army informs the residents of suspected building that they have 10 minutes to leave the premises. In these cases, the IAF sometimes launches a relatively harmless missile at the corner of the roof, avoiding casualties but successfully dispersing the crowd.

It seems therefore that for this time, the deliberated strategy of using human shields has not worked because the IDF opted to bomb the house anyway. The fact that his family was warned before the attack but did not leave the building, shows that Rayyan did not bother for more civilian victims even when they belonged to his family. He had already a history of family 'sacrifice': in October 2001, he sent his son to perpetrate a suicide attack in the Gush Katif settlement Elei Sinai, in which two young Israelis were killed.

Hamas spokesperson Mushir al-Masri responded to the attack saying, 'This is a new escalation in violence. We are taking every precaution to guard the Hamas leaders in order to ensure the enemy doesn't score further victories' and a Hamas statement threatened revenge on IDF soldiers."

Article by Dr. Ely Karmon, Senior Research Scholar at the Institute for Counter-Terrorism at The Interdisciplinary Center (IDC) in Herzliya and Senior Research Fellow at The Institute for Policy and Strategy at IDC.

Source: O Diplomata

German Chancellor Angela Merkel sides with Israel over Gaza operation

Source: EJP

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has blamed Hamas for the latest conflict with Israel and said Germany would do all it could to promote peace in the Middle East.

In her New Year's address, Merkel said that "the terror perpetrated by Hamas is unacceptable."
She placed the blame for Israel's military operation on Hamas's rocket attacks and stressed that Israel has the right to defend it territory and citizens.

"The causes and consequences of the current round of violence in the Gaza Strip should not be forgotten," she said.

"But we should also not forget there is no rational alternative to the peaceful co-existence of Palestinians and Israelis in two states. This is in the interests of people on both sides," she added.

Merkel spokesman Thomas Steg said Merkel stressed in a telephone conversation late Sunday that Israel must do everything possible to avoid civilian causalities and insisted that Hamas must immediately halt its rocket attacks on Israel.

Germany's Foreign Minister, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, who is a member of the Socialist Democratic Party (SPD), Merkel’s coalition partner, urged Muslim nations to use their influence to help secure an end to Hamas's rocket attacks on Israel.

The Foreign Ministry said Steinmeier advocated a "humanitarian cease-fire" that would make it easier to get supplies to Gaza's civilians and open the way for diplomacy.

In response to the ongoing military operation in Gaza, a fresh wave of anti-Israel demonstrations fanned out across Germany on Friday and Saturday.

Around 8,000 protesters marched in Berlin and 10,000 in Frankfurt on Saturday, including members of the Left Party who waved party flags among banners equating Operation Cast Lead with a “second Holocaust,” some reading "Israel, go to hell", and others with a crossed-out Star of David with the words "Israel, child murderer."

A representiative of the 12,000-member Berlin Jewish community told the Jerusalem Post that the community has filed a criminal complaint asserting incitement against Jews.

Levi Salomon, who is in charge of monitoring and combating anti-Semitism, was present at the anti-Israeli protests and said, "We cannot accept anti-Semitic taunts" such as "Jews out."

Sacha Stawski, the editor-in-chief of Honestly Concerned, a German media watchdog monitoring anti-Semitism and anti-Israelism, said he heard chants of "Gas the Jews" and "Merkel out," and witnessed the burning of an Israeli flag at the Frankfurt demonstration.

Merkel: The terror of Hamas cannot be accepted

Photos of anti-Israeli demonstration in Brussels

A few pictures of the demonstration in Brussels, courtesy of Indymedia.

Several thousand protesters (7,000-10,000) gathered at the Martyrs' Square in Brussels to demonstrate against the Israeli attacks in Gaza. The square is a national cemetery and [445] soldiers who died in the Belgian Revolution are buried there. Today it is a place honoring all those who fought for the freedom of Belgium. The Flemish government offices are located there.

The statue, Patria, represents the fatherland, Belgium. Somebody bothered climbing it and covering it with the flag of Islam.

Hizbullah flags.Israeli flag. A US flag was set aflame as well. Portrait of Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah.

Source: Islam in Europe

- Antwerp riots: letter of incitement

- Antwerp anti-Jewish riots: "Jihad, Yes We Can"

- Anti-Semitic vandalism in Brussels and Antwerp

- Belgium: Charleroi synagogue attacked

Antwerp riots: letter of incitement

Source: article in Islam in Europe

"In my previous post I briefly mentioned a letter given out in the AEL anti-Israel demonstration in Antwerp (Belgium).

After the demonstration, a couple of hundred protesters marched towards the Jewish neighborhood, and were held off by police (here and here). The Arab-European League claimed that it was not responsible for the riots that followed.

The Arab-European League, which just a few weeks ago brought Hizbullah representatives to the Belgian parliament to discuss Israel's treatment of Palestinian prisoners, is a pan-Arabic movement which was founded by Dyab Abou-Jahjah. Abou-Jahjah is a member of Hizbullah and in the most recent Israel-Lebanese war went back to Lebanon to fight against Israel.

This letter is unsigned and it is of course impossible to know how many copies were given out or who was responsible for it. However, by telling the reader that redemption will only come when the Muslims fight the Jews, it certainly sets the tone for what happened next.

The letter is shown here and is just barely legible, but several friends helped me decipher it. My translation follows. All emphasis is in the original.

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"The Jews have again perpetrated attacks in Gaza against the Palestinians. Therefore according to the latest statistics published Tuesday evening there are already more than 360 dead and more than 1,700 wounded. It's terrible to see how our brothers and sisters must endure all the violence and hate. While we can only stand by idly, at a moment where we shouldn't think only of ourselves, but also of our brothers and sisters on the other side.

The Jews said that this is just the beginning.

"The bombardments on Gaza are a first phase" emphasized the Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert Tuesday.

Our beloved prophet Mohammad [Arabic] said "The Day [ed: day of judgment] will dawn when the Muslims will fight the Jews" (handed down by Moslem). [ed: this phrase is also quoted in the Hamas Charter]. Thus when our Ummah plots together and fights against the damned.

Allah [Arabic] says in in Sura Al-Maeda 54 [51]:

"Do not take the Jews and the Christians for friends; they are friends of each other".

Dear brothers and sisters, do not forget your beloved brothers and sisters in your prayers [dua's].

May Allah [Arabic] let us belong to the victors.

AMEN.

Spread these words as much as possible so that each one of us will be informed and perform as many prayers [dua's] as possible. [Arabic]

Let us only say that we will NOT forget our beloved brothers and sisters, let us therefore ensure that we will be heard.

There remains just one message to share with our fellow-men.

STOP THE VIOLENCE. STOP THE MASSACRE ! [Arabic]"."

But many Arabs are rooting against Hamas, Fiamma Nirenstein

Article in Il Giornale by Fiamma Nirenstein

"The most significant images of the war underway yesterday [28 December] are seen on the border between Gaza and Egypt with all the Arabesque plotting that the Middle East is able of composing. The Egyptian soldiers watch the border with grasped rifles from Rafiah along Tzir Philadephi; from the hours of the late morning unwinds the siege of the Palestinians who want to pass there beyond the border while the soldiers from the other part have ordered to hinder any fundamentalist tide of penetrating into the country of Mubarak, the moderate. Further along, there is the paradoxical scene of trucks full of humanitarian aid and ambulances, which the Palestinians won’t let pass as they yell at the Egyptians: "Let us enter alive instead of dealing with the dead".

Around five in the afternoon, while the sun sets on the Mediterranean Sea, F16s enter the scene fast and in four minutes destroy 40 tunnels under the border. It seems that they are the most important among the 600 dug for transporting inside Gaza goods of all kinds from Egypt, those that have filled Gaza with missiles. But yesterday the missiles, against all forecasts, did not rain from Gaza and the population of the south of Israel has passed a relatively tranquil day: sign that the targets hit by the IAF have been chosen with a clear intelligence operation and that the structures of Hamas find it hard to recover from an operation compared here in Israel to that of 1967, which hit Egyptian Mig-21s to the ground.

The Israeli military maintains that it has hit 50 percent of Hamas’s war resources, missiles, stored dynamite, etc. And Hamas prefers now to play the role of the victim, continues to point out, at least for a bit, that Israel continues to react in a "disproportionate" manner. But it is the Arab world, first and foremost, to be contradictory in front of Hamas’s victimization, and overall Egypt and the same Palestinian brothers guided by Abu Mazen: he has said from Cairo that he warned Hamas that its actions would bring an attack by Israel. Well, he has to take some of the responsibility, thus adding accusations for the dozens of Fatah militiamen who are Hamas’s prisoners who were killed in the prisons bombed by the Israeli: the massacre could have been avoided if they had been liberated beforehand. Also, the Egyptians have moved with ambiguity between demonstrations of solidarity with the Palestinians and disapproval towards Hamas’s incomprehensible politics, which has brought its population to the present situation. From Sana in Yemen, to many cities and Middle Eastern villages, including those of the West Bank and East Jerusalem itself, to Tehran, where Khamenei has asked all Muslims to fight for Gaza "in all ways possible," to Beirut where the protests called by Hezbollah yell slogans in which Mubarak’s name rhymes with Ehud Barak, to Amman where the Muslim Brothers have paraded with angry slogans, to Damascus where Mashaal calls for a military Intifada of the entire Arab world, has shown the usual anti-Israel rage, but this time it has also sparked anti-Egyptian and anti Fatah sentiments. Nasrallah, Hezbollah’s leader, has spoken with the same old tones of hatred, urging his men to be ready to defend themselves. But, cunningly, without inviting them to attack the Zionist monster.

It is the first time that moderates find themselves crushed in their reality, that they cannot wave the same flag of hatred against Israel. Hamas has immobilized them. And it is logical given the vertical rise of Islamic extremism in the Middle East. We have already written of a secret "moderate" Arab request to Israel of putting an end to it with Hamas, which is seen as Iran’s incendiary emissary, determined to destroy all equilibrium in the Middle East. Egypt, that has long attempted a truce between Fatah and Hamas, was furious beyond measure after that Hamas deserted the meeting of November in Cairo, surely by Iran’s request. In the meantime, Hamas searches for new shores: from Gaza City, Ismail Haniyeh has incessantly made many calls to Hamas’s leadership in Damascus, as well as to the King of Bahrain and to the rulers of Qatar. But Hamas can remain greatly harmed by the rupture with Egypt: there are in the works important economic agreements that seem very far from the snarling current reality. For sure now, after the facts of Gaza, the entire Arab world must come to terms with the new demonstrations of Israeli military deterrence, which after its war with Hezbollah in 2006 and because of the strategy of waiting chosen by the Israeli leadership, seemed to have greatly diminished. Now all neighbors, including Iran, know that the Israeli military is that of a time when it decides that - as Tzipi Livni said - "enough is enough.""

Source: Fiamma Nirenstein's blog

Italy: Fiamma Nirenstein will be in the next Parliament

Antwerp anti-Jewish riots: "Jihad, Yes We Can"

"How do you protest violence against a civilian population? Attack a civilian population, of course. These riots were expected, given the massive incitement that accompanied the organization of the demonstrations." (Esther @ Islam in Europe blog)

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31 December 2008

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"Many Jews don't dare anymore to go out on the streets in the area of the demonstrators. They fear vandalism and violence. An internal SMS text message service of the Jewish community of Antwerp warns Jews to avoid the areas of the Turnhoutsebaan and the Diamantwijk, reports Michael Freilich of the Jewish newspaper Joods Actueel.

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"The protesters must realize that Antwerp Jews are also Flemish and not Israeli soldiers. They have nothing to do with what is currently happening in the Gaza Strip," says Freilich. According to him the the Jewish community fears that the situation can escalate. "We haven't seen anything like this since 2003, when it also got out of hand," says the chief editor of the Jewish monthly. There's currently no response from politicians, but Freilich's phone is getting many calls from anxious people who don't know what to do.

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During today's demonstration damage was done, also in the Antwerp Diamantwijk (Diamond Center) where many Jews live and work. Today there is no activity in the sector, according to Freilich. Most shops are closed. Meanwhile the riots of isolated groups of protesters moved to Borgerhout and the Turnhoutsebaan area. The police is out in force.

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Hamas flags in Brussels

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There's also an issue of the Hamas flags which were present in the demonstration in Brussels for the suspension of the bombardments on the Gaza Strip. According to Freilich the green flag with the white text of Hamas is a banned symbol in Belgium of a terrorist organization. "Everybody has a right to express his opinion," says Freilich. "We as a community also oppose violence, although the side-comment must be made that everything began by the rocket attacks of Hamas on Israel". (...)"

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This 2-minute video [the riots lasted about 2 hours] shows the middle-aged owner of a car that was completely smashed looking very distressed and mournfully telling the rioters: "But I support your cause! What a shame!". One of the rioters then puts a hand affectionately on the driver's shoulder and runs away ... This is certainly a memorable scene.

.AEL protest in Antwerp (video)

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Source: Islam in Europe and HLN here and here

Antwerp: AEL riots + Video

Antwerp: Arab riots, Jewish neighborhood sealed