Dutch anti-Islam MP Geert Wilders goes on trial
BBC News
4 October 2010
Geert Wilders: “I am sitting here as a suspect because I have spoken… nothing but the truth”
The Dutch anti-Islam MP Geert Wilders has gone on trial in Amsterdam accused of inciting hatred against Muslims.
Mr Wilders, whose statements have included comparing the Koran with Hitler’s Mein Kampf, told the court freedom of expression was on trial.
If found guilty, he faces a maximum sentence of a year in jail.
Mr Wilders’ Freedom Party is the third biggest in the Netherlands after June’s elections, and is expected to play a key role in the next parliament.
Prosecutors have brought five charges of inciting hatred and discrimination, and the trial will scrutinise statements he made between 2006 and 2008…
The article, with video, continues at BBC News. The following analysis comes from the same page.
Analysis
Geraldine Coughlan
BBC News, The Hague
Geert Wilders is defending his right to freedom of speech, which lies at the heart of the Dutch constitution. He believes he’s said nothing offensive. He says his trial is a political process.
And he says it will not deter him from his mission, which is to stop the “Islamisation” of the Netherlands.
This trial is setting a precedent – judges said that in a democratic system, it is in the general interest to draw a clear line on the limits of hate speech.
And it comes at a time when Geert Wilders occupies a more crucial role, and enjoys a higher-profile, than ever. He is set to become a shadow partner in the next coalition government – giving tacit support to a minority cabinet.
But the three parties, including Mr Wilders’, would only control 76 of the 150 seats in parliament, so any MPs who break ranks threaten the coalition. And two Christian Democrats say they are opposed to the deal.
* * *
Wilders spoke in Berlin this weekend. Weasel Zippers linked to the text of his speech:
Dear Friends,
I am very happy to be here in Berlin today. As you know, the invitation which my friend René Stadtkewitz extended to me, has cost him his membership of the CDU group in the Berlin Parliament. René, however, did not give in to the pressure. He did not betray his convictions. His dismissal prompted René to start a new political party. I wish him all the best. As you may have heard, the past weeks were extremely busy for me. Earlier this week we succeeded in forging a minority government of the Liberals and the Christian-Democrats which will be supported by my party. This is an historic event for the Netherlands. I am very proud of having helped to achieve this. At this very moment the Christian-Democrat Party conference is deciding whether or not to approves this coalition. If they do, we will be able to rebuild our country, preserve our national identity and offer our children a better future.
Despite my busy schedule at home, however, I insisted on coming to Berlin, because Germany, too, needs a political movement to defend German identity and to oppose the Islamization of Germany. Chancellor Angela Merkel says that the Islamization of Germany is inevitable. She conveys the message that citizens have to be prepared for more changes as a result of immigration. She wants the Germans to adapt to this situation. The Christian-Democrat leader said: “More than before mosques will be an integral part of our cities.”
My friends, we should not accept the unacceptable as inevitable without trying to turn the tide. It is our duty as politicians to preserve our nations for our children. I hope that René’s movement will be as successful as my own Partij voor de Vrijheid, as Oskar Freysinger’s Schweizerische Volkspartei in Switzerland, as Pia Kjaersgaard’s Dansk Folkeparti in Denmark, and similar movements elsewhere.
My good friend Pia recently spoke in Sweden at the invitation of the Sverigedemokraterna. She said: “I have not come to mingle in Swedish domestic politics because that is for the Swedish people to be concerned with. No, I have come because in spite of certain differences the Swedish debate in many ways reminds me of the Danish debate 10-15 years ago. And I have come to Sweden because it is also a concern to Denmark. We cannot sit with our hands in our lap and be silent witnesses to the political development in Sweden.”
The same applies for me as a Dutchman with respect to Germany. I am here because Germany matters to the Netherlands and the rest of the world, and because we cannot establish an International Freedom Alliance without a strong German partner.
Dear friends, tomorrow is the Day of German Unity. Tomorrow exactly twenty years ago, your great nation was reunified after the collapse of the totalitarian Communist ideology. The Day of German Unity is an important day for the whole of Europe. Germany is the largest democracy in Europe. Germany is Europe’s economic powerhouse. The wellbeing and prosperity of Germany is a benefit to all of us, because the wellbeing and prosperity of Germany is a prerequisite for the wellbeing and prosperity of Europe.
Today I am here, however, to warn you for looming disunity. Germany’s national identity, its democracy and economic prosperity, is being threatened by the political ideology of Islam. In 1848, Karl Marx began his Communist Manifesto with the famous words: “A specter is haunting Europe – the specter of communism.” Today, another specter is haunting Europe. It is the specter of Islam. This danger, too, is political. Islam is not merely a religion, as many people seem to think: Islam is mainly a political ideology.
This insight is not new.
I quote from the bestselling book and BBC television series The Triumph of the West which the renowned Oxford historian J.M. Roberts wrote in 1985: “Although we carelessly speak of Islam as a ‘religion’; that word carries many overtones of the special history of western Europe. The Muslim is primarily a member of a community, the follower of a certain way, an adherent to a system of law, rather than someone holding particular theological views.” The Flemish Professor Urbain Vermeulen, the former president of the European Union of Arabists and Islamicists, too, points out that “Islam is primarily a legal system, a law,” rather than a religion.
The American political scientist Mark Alexander writes that “One of our greatest mistakes is to think of Islam as just another one of the world’s great religions. We shouldn’t. Islam is politics or it is nothing at all, but, of course, it is politics with a spiritual dimension, … which will stop at nothing until the West is no more, until the West has … been well and truly Islamized.”
These are not just statements by opponents of Islam. Islamic scholars say the same thing. There cannot be any doubt about the nature of Islam to those who have read the Koran, the Sira and the Hadith. Abul Ala Maududi, the influential 20th century Pakistani Islamic thinker, wrote – I quote, emphasizing that these are not my words but those of a leading Islamic scholar – “Islam is not merely a religious creed [but] a revolutionary ideology and jihad refers to that revolutionary struggle … to destroy all states and governments anywhere on the face of the earth, which are opposed to the ideology and program of Islam.”…
…We must realize that Islam expands in two ways. Since it is not a religion, conversion is only a marginal phenomenon. Historically, Islam expanded either by military conquest or by using the weapon of hijra, immigration. Muhammad conquered Medina through immigration. Hijra is also what we are experiencing today. The Islamization of Europe continues all the time. But the West has no strategy for dealing with the Islamic ideology, because our elites say that we must adapt to them rather than the other way round.
There is a lesson which we can learn in this regard from America, the freest nation on earth. Americans are proud of their nation, its achievements and its flag. We, too, should be proud of our nation. The United States has always been a nation of immigrants. U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt was very clear about the duty of immigrants. Here is what he said: “We should insist that if the immigrant who comes here in good faith becomes an American and assimilates himself to us, he shall be treated on an exact equality with everyone else … But this is predicated upon the man’s becoming in very fact an American, and nothing but an American. … There can be no divided allegiance here. … We have room for but one sole loyalty and that is a loyalty to the American people.”…
Please use this link to read the entire text of Wilders’ speech.
Also, at Gates of Vienna, The Wilders Trial: Day 1
…Klein Verzet has a report on the first day of the new proceedings against Mr. Wilders:
Today, it was the 1st real trial day in the prosecution against Geert Wilders and his opinions. The event is broadcasted live on Dutch state television and it’s quite a story:
The first amazing thing was that the court wanted to show Fitna in court. That means that for the first time, Fitna will be broadcasted on Dutch national television.
Second surprise was that at the start of the trial, Wilders his lawyer, unexpectedly stated that Wilders would use his right not to answer any questions during his trial, as he as his lawyer had advised him to do so…
At the UK’s Guardian, Geert Wilders trial halted as lawyer accuses judge of bias
Geert Wilders appears in court in Amsterdam on charges of inciting racial hatred against Muslims. Photograph: Pool/Reuters
Update: The Astute Bloggers, Geert Wilders on Trial
Holland’s dhimmified court system are still out to get him…Whether Wilders could keep his seat in parliament, this is a very serious test for free speech against Islamofascism and jihadism in the Netherlands…
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