Recently in Netherlands Category

Which youth? "Dutch Raise Terrorism Alert, Citing Radicalization Of Youth In Syria," from Reuters, March 13 (thanks to Sonny):

AMSTERDAM, March 13 (Reuters) - The Netherlands raised its alert level for terrorist attacks to "substantial" on Wednesday, citing an increase in the number of Islamist militants travelling from the Netherlands to Syria, as well as a radicalisation of Dutch youth.

"The chance of an attack in the Netherlands or against Dutch interests abroad has risen," the National Coordinator for Security and Counterterrorism (NCTV) said in a statement.

"Close to a hundred individuals have recently left the Netherlands for various countries in Africa and the Middle East, especially Syria."

The agency said individuals fighting for radical Islam abroad could return and "inspire others in the Netherlands to follow in their footsteps"....

Why we don't see more genuine Muslim reformers, part 334,392. Tiny Minority of Extremists Update: "Volunteer who Opposed Dutch Hitler Admirers in Hiding," from Arutz Sheva, March 11 (thanks to Anne Crockett):

The Dutch daily NRC writes that Mehmet Sahin, a doctoral student, has had to go into hiding with his family. The Mayor of Arnhem, Pauline Krikke, advised him to do so after he received death threats. Sahin is a volunteer who tries to re-educate street youths in Arnhem.

A few weeks ago, he interviewed several Dutch-Turkish youngsters on the Nederland 2 TV station. They said that they admired Hitler and the Holocaust and regretted that Hitler had not finished exterminating the Jews. Sahin reprimanded them. Apparently, people in the neighborhood where he lives are collecting signatures to make Sahin leave the area. The municipality has announced that the prosecution is investigating the matter....

After all, the Qur'an designates Jews the worst enemies of the Muslims (cf. 5:82). Yet some still deny the reality of Islamic antisemitism, even as it makes Europe progressively less hospitable and more dangerous for Jews. "Muslim Turkish teens on Jews: ‘Hitler should have killed all,’" by Cheryl K. Chumley for The Washington Times, March 6:

A Dutch researcher who interviewed a group of Muslim immigrant teenage boys from Turkey was shocked at their repeated response to questions about the Holocaust: Hitler should have finished the job, they suggested.

“As far as I’m concerned, Hitler should have killed all Jews,” one said on the video, which aired on Nederland 2 TV last month and is now available with English subtitles, The Blaze reported.

And another: “On the one hand, I’m satisfied with what Hitler did with the Jews. I am being really honest.” His friends agreed, The Blaze reported.

That line of thought is echoed throughout the boys’ school, they said.

“Nobody in our school likes Jews,” one said in the interview. “Come to our school. I mean it.”

The boys said they had no Jewish friends — but that it didn’t matter.

“You don’t have to know any Jews to say something about them,” said one, The Blaze reported.

While the mainstream media widely circulates fanciful stories about its own supposed "anti-Muslim bias," this is an example of what really happens all too often: the Islamic identity of those who commit crimes is entirely concealed. Is it entirely irrelevant in this case? Not necessarily. It could be that the killers in this "Dutch youth club" thought of the referee as a dirty kuffar whose life was worth less than that of one of the "best of people" (Qur'an 3:110). It could be that they thought he had offended Islam in some way. It could be that they were asserting the presence and power of Muslims in the Netherlands in this stark and savage way. Or maybe something else altogether is going on -- but we will never know, because the mainstream media is much more interested in making sure that we do not know that the attackers were Muslim in the first place.

"Global Media Conceals Fact that Football Players Who Beat Dutch Referee to Death were Moroccans," by Cheradenine Zakalwe at Islam Versus Europe, December 5 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):

The story about a referee being beaten to death by players of a Dutch youth club went round the world. Here's a typical example from the Guardian.

Richard Nieuwenhuizen was doing what he loved: watching his son play football and helping out his local club by running the touchline as a volunteer linesman.

On Monday the 41-year-old father's passion for football cost him his life.

Prosecutors announced on Tuesday they were charging three players, two 15-year-olds and a 16-year-old, with manslaughter, assault and public violence for alleged involvement in a vicious attack on Nieuwenhuizen after a youth match between two local clubs, Buitenboys and Nieuw Sloten. The players, whose identities were not released, will be arraigned on Thursday at a closed-door hearing.

Prosecutors say a group of Nieuw Sloten players surrounded Nieuwenhuizen and kicked and punched him after the match against his son's team on Sunday . Nieuwenhuizen went home to lie down, and returned later to watch another game, where he collapsed and was rushed to hospital. He died the next day.

Prosecutors released no details of a possible motive and the Buitenboys club chairman, Marcel Oost, said the reason for the attack was not certain.

"We still don't have a clear picture yet," prosecution spokeswoman Brigit Haan told Associated Press.

Source: Guardian

Almost all reports left out one important fact however: the perpetrators were Moroccans.

This fact was mentioned by the German newspaper Tagesspiegel, referencing a report in a Dutch newspaper.

That the attackers who have been arrested were three Moroccans, according to the "Algemeen Dagblad", certainly does not make the case any easier. According to an Interior Ministry report from November 2011, 40 per cent of all Moroccan immigrants aged between 12 and 24 were arrested, sentenced or charged within the last five years. In city districts where people of Moroccan descent form a majority of the inhabitants, youth criminality already reaches 50 per cent.

Source: Tagesspiegel.de Via: PI

While other Western nations flirt with introducing blasphemy laws under the guise of "hate speech" codes, the Netherlands, of all places, affirms free speech. "Dutch Parliament Revokes Blasphemy Law," by Frud Bezhan for RFE/RL, November 29:

Insulting God will no longer be a crime in the Netherlands after the Dutch parliament decided to revoke a decades-old blasphemy law from the statute books.

The law, which was drafted in the 1930s, had not been used for half a century, leading legislators to decide there was no longer a need for it.

Discussions over whether to formally abolish blasphemy restrictions in the Netherlands began a decade ago as part of a debate about the limits of freedom of expression.

But Marc Veldt, a media-law lecturer at the University of Applied Sciences in Utrecht, says the November 29 decision was made possible by national elections in September, in which two liberal parties emerged victorious. Far-right and conservative parties, which had opposed lifting the blasphemy ban, took heavy losses in the poll.

Veldt says the move to lift the ban on blasphemy was also an indirect result of the legal case involving anti-Islam Dutch politician Geert Wilders. In June 2011, a Dutch court ruled that Wilders had the right to criticize Islam, even though his opinions insulted many Muslims.

Wilders, who leads the Freedom Party, had described Islam as "fascist" and compared Islam's holy book, the Koran, to Adolf Hitler's autobiography and political manifesto "Mein Kampf." Amsterdam judge Marcel van Oosten said Wilders' statements were directed at Islam and not at Muslims. Van Oosten said the statements were "gross and denigrating" but still "acceptable within the context of public debate."

Wilders said at the time that the verdict was "not only an acquittal for me, but a victory for freedom of expression in the Netherlands."

The decision to abolish the country's blasphemy law has been hailed by activists internationally, who have long called it outdated and a threat to free speech.

Push Back Against Blasphemy Laws

One of them is Padraig Reidy, a news editor at "Index on Censorship," a magazine based in London that is devoted to protecting freedom of expression.

Reidy says many European states still have laws prohibiting blasphemy, although in many cases such legislation has not been invoked for decades. Different European countries have taken their own trajectories on the issue in recent years, making it hard to discern a clear trend.

Britain, for example, scrapped a blasphemy law in 2008, which had made it illegal to insult Christianity. But it has since replaced it with a more general law against incitement to religious hatred.

Ireland introduced a new law in 2010 that makes blasphemy a crime punishable by a fine of up to 25,000 euros ($32,485). The Irish law defines blasphemy as "publishing or uttering matter that is grossly abusive or insulting in relation to matters sacred by any religion thereby intentionally causing outrage among a substantial number of adherents of that religion, with some defenses permitted."

Reidy argues that blasphemy laws are no longer relevant in the 21st century. He says there is no place for a law defending religion, which he calls an "ideal." He says it should be people who have rights, not ideals.

"There's no question that blasphemy laws are a severe restriction on free speech. Any push back against blasphemy laws -- [against the notion that ideas] should be protected -- is a good thing. It's very important that blasphemy laws should be repealed," Reidy says....

Indeed.

This will only encourage more such threats. "Sharia4Holland spokesman fined for threatening Geert Wilders," from Dutch News, July 11 (thanks to The Muslim Issue):

A member of fringe Muslim group Shariah4Holland has been fined €750 and sentenced to a one-month suspended jail sentence for threatening Geert Wilders, leader of the anti-Islam PVV.

At an impromptu press conference on Dam square in Amsterdam in May, Ab Qasim, 29, likened Wilders to a Roman dog and warned him to learn the lesson of what happened to Theo van Gogh. Van Gogh was killed by an Islamic militant....

A Muslim party in the Netherlands that says it was striving to "decrease the gap between Muslims and non-Muslims and to improve Islam’s image in the Netherlands" has closed up shop, saying that "the Dutch Muslim community is too politically divided." Generally Muslim rhetoric in the West about decreasing the gap between Muslims and non-Muslims and building bridges between the two camps is just thinly-veiled proselytizing, as the premier Muslim Brotherhood theorist, Sayyid Qutb, made clear in Milestones: "The chasm between Islam and Jahiliyyah is great, and a bridge is not to be built across it so that the people on the two sides may mix with each other, but only so that the people of Jahiliyyah may come over to Islam."

Likewise attempts by Muslims to "improve Islam's image" generally involve pretending that non-Muslim analysts, not Islamic jihadists, are responsible for linking Islam to terrorism, and demonizing those who are working to resist jihad and Islamic supremacism.

Still, it is noteworthy that the Muslim community in the Netherlands is so rent by political divisions that this part can't get off the ground. Do Muslims in the Netherlands oppose attempts to "bridge the gap" between Muslims and non-Muslims, even if such attempts consist essentially of dawah?

Henny Kreeft, eh? Any relation to Peter Kreeft? It would seem that they hold a good many views in common. "Dutch Muslim Party dissolved," from Radio Netherlands, June 25 (thanks to David):

The Dutch Muslim Party (NMP) no longer exists.

Board members Henny Kreeft and Jacques Visker have resigned, and dissolved the party.
The two men have decided that the Netherlands is not ready for a Muslim political party in parliament. Kreeft and Visker say the Dutch Muslim community is too politically divided.

The NMP was founded in 2007 but has not been a success. In local elections in 2010, the NMP did not garner any municipal seats. The party had planned to participate in the upcoming parliamentary elections, but was unable to pull together an organisation to do so.

The NMP’s stated purpose was to decrease the gap between Muslims and non-Muslims and to improve Islam’s image in the Netherlands. Remarkably, co-founder Henny Kreeft was a supporter of Islam-critic and politician Pim Fortuyn, who was mudered [sic] in 2002. Kreeft converted to the Islamic faith in the 1990’s.

Ah. He must be a close relative of Peter.

Dhimmi double standard in the Netherlands: "No racial hatred charges for British Sharia law expert," from Dutch News, June 22 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):

The public prosecution department has no plans to bring charges against a British-Palestinian expert in Sharia law for allegedly making comments which incited hatred and discrimination in Amsterdam earlier this year, news agency ANP reports.

Haitham al-Haddad made the comments during a debate which replaced a two-day symposium at Amsterdam's VU University. The conference was cancelled following a row over al-Haddad's views about Jews.

Anti-Islam campaigner Ehsan Jami had called for legal action against al-Haddad after he told the debate ex Muslims deserve the death penalty, as outlined in Sharia law.

However, the public prosecution department said al-Haddad had not committed any offences because he had outlined a number of conditions for applying the death penalty which made it clear this could not happen in the Netherlands.

Yet.

As one Moroccan-born writer, Hafid Bouazza, noted: "Islamists have learned that in the West, the best way to proselytize is to say you want to ‘debate." So, is Bouazza a "racist," or an "Islamophobe" for pointing that out? "UK-based Palestinian extremist speaks at Amsterdam venue," by Cnaan Lipshiz for the Jerusalem Post, February 22:

AMSTERDAM – A Palestinian cleric who called on Muslims to kill Jewish “enemies of Allah” spoke last week about Islam in Europe at one of Amsterdam’s foremost forums for political debate.

Haitham al-Haddad appeared there on Thursday night at the invitation of a student association of a major Dutch university.

“Islam became part of the landscape of Europe. Non-Muslims cannot dictate what Islam is,” Haddad – a Saudi-born Palestinian based in London – told the crowd at De Balie, a privately owned cultural and political institution in central Amsterdam.

“We’re very happy that you’ve agreed to talk to us in a setting like this with all the press present,” the director of De Balie, Youri Albrecht, told Haddad.

“You’ve had a long day, so a warm welcome, I would say, to Mr. Haddad.”

De Balie, situated at what used to be Amsterdam’s district court, often hosts public readings and debates with dignitaries and official guests of the Dutch Foreign Ministry. In November the ministry hosted Dr. Shirin Ebadi, the Iranian human rights activist and 2003 Nobel Peace Prize laureate, at De Balie.

“The best role for women to play is to be good mothers, supporting the family and supporting society through this. We are suffering from women who are abandoning their children or women who are following media,” Haddad also said at De Balie.

His address was part of a debate with Tofik Dibi, a member of parliament for the Green Left party, and Kustaw Bessems, a Dutch journalist for the freely distributed newspaper De Pers. Bessems arranged the event together with the Islamic student association of the Free University.

Haddad was scheduled to speak on campus, but the university canceled the talk after protest by the Center for Information and Documentation on Israel, the Netherlands’ watchdog on anti-Semitism.

CIDI obtained a copy of an Arabiclanguage op-ed from 2002 carrying Haddad’s name that praises suicide bombers, describes “peace with the Jews” as “betrayal” and calls Jews and Christians “the enemies of Allah.”

Haddad, who is based in London, was born to Palestinian parents in Saudi Arabia, where he grew up. At a televised sermon from 2009, he said: “Israel will never live in peace. This message has to be clear for the Israelis: Israeli will never live in peace. That’s why my proposed solution for the Israelis is to leave Palestine and to go back to their own countries.”

A parliamentary majority has asked Dutch Justice Minister Ivo Opstelten to ban the Islamic scholar from entering the Netherlands, but Haddad’s visit was approved.

“It was only after that parliamentary majority decided they’d try to interfere and try to stop Haddad from entering, and after the Free University gave in to political pressure and canceled an event where he was scheduled to speak, that it became a matter of principle to find some venue,” Bessems said. He added that he found some of Haddad’s ideas “despicable.”

Hafid Bouazza, a Moroccan-born Dutch writer, accused Bessems of acting like “a black lawyer willfully jumping to defend Ku Klux Klansmen,” in a column for De Volkskrant, an influential daily. “Islamists have learned that in the West, the best way to proselytize is to say you want to ‘debate,’” Bouazza wrote.

Muhammad didn't like dogs:

"Once Gabriel promised the Prophet (that he would visit him, but Gabriel did not come) and later on he said, 'We, angels, do not enter a house which contains a picture or a dog.'" -- Sahih Bukhari 4.54.50

"Abdullah (b. Umar) (Allah be pleased with them) reported: Allah's Messenger (may peace be upon him) ordered the killing of dogs and we would send (men) in Medina and its corners and we did not spare any dog that we did not kill, so much so that we killed the dog that accompanied the wet she-camel belonging to the people of the desert." -- Sahih Muslim 10.3811

"Ibn Mughaffal reported: The Messenger of Allah (may peace be upon him) ordered killing of the dogs, and then said: What about them, i. e. about other dogs? and then granted concession (to keep) the dog for hunting and the dog for (the security) of the herd, and said: When the dog licks the utensil, wash it seven times, and rub it with earth the eighth time." -- Sahih Muslim 551

Hasan Küçük wants to impose Muhammad's tastes on the Dutch. "Muslims Declare Jihad on Dogs in Europe," by Soeren Kern for the Stonegate Institute, January 31:

A Dutch Muslim politician has called for a ban on dogs in The Hague, the third-largest city in the Netherlands.

Islamic legal tradition holds that dogs are "unclean" animals, and some say the call to ban them in Holland and elsewhere represents an attempted encroachment of Islamic Sharia law in Europe.

This latest canine controversy -- which the Dutch public has greeted with a mix of amusement and outrage -- follows dozens of other Muslim-vs-dog-related incidents in Europe. Critics say it reflects the growing assertiveness of Muslims in Europe as they attempt to impose Islamic legal and religious norms on European society.

The Dutch dustup erupted after Hasan Küçük, a Turkish-Dutch representative on The Hague city council for the Islam Democrats, vehemently opposed a proposal by the Party for the Animals (Partij voor de Dieren) to make the city more dog friendly.

According to a January 28 report in the Amsterdam-based newspaper De Telegraaf, Küçük counter-argued that keeping dogs as pets is tantamount to animal abuse and he then called for the possession of dogs in The Hague to be criminalized.

According to its website, the Islam Democrats [ID] party is "founded on the Islamic principles of justice, equality and solidarity. ID is a bottom-up response to the large gap between the Muslim and immigrant communities and local politics…ID focuses on the political awareness within the Muslim and immigrant communities. Awareness about the need to organize, but also the need for mutual support."

Paul ter Linden, who represents the Dutch Freedom Party (PVV) on The Hague city council, responded to Küçük by saying: "In this country pet ownership is legal. Whoever disagrees with this should move to another country."

Dutch political commentators believe Küçük's declarations are a provocation designed to stir up the Muslim population in The Hague. Muslims -- who now make up more than 12% of the city's population of 500,000 -- view dogs as ritually unclean animals and Küçük's call for a ban on them is a sure vote-getter, they say.

The incident in Holland follows dog-related controversies in other European countries.

In Spain, two Islamic groups based in Lérida -- a city in the northeastern region of Catalonia where 29,000 Muslims now make up around 20% of the city's total population -- asked local officials to regulate the presence of dogs in public spaces so they do not "offend Muslims."

Muslims demanded that dogs be banned from all forms of public transportation including all city buses as well as from all areas frequented by Muslim immigrants. Muslims said the presence of dogs in Lérida violates their religious freedom and their right to live according to Islamic principles.

After the municipality refused to acquiesce to Muslim demands, the city experienced a wave of dog poisonings. More than a dozen dogs were poisoned in September 2011 in Lérida's working class neighborhoods of Cappont and La Bordeta, districts that are heavily populated by Muslim immigrants and where many dogs have been killed over the past several years.

Local residents taking their dogs for walks say they have been harassed by Muslim immigrants who are opposed to seeing the animals in public. Muslims have also launched a number of anti-dog campaigns on Islamic websites and blogs based in Spain.

In Britain, which has become "ground zero" for Europe's canine controversies, blind passengers are being ordered off buses or refused taxi rides because Muslim drivers or passengers object to their "unclean" guide dogs....

There is much more.

Photo from the Daily Mail.

It is one thing to be unidentifiable in a society where one is always under the control of a male guardian and a perpetual minor, but in a free and open society, full participation requires being identifiable as an individual and not merely in relation to another.

For that matter, in the West, unlike other places where the supposed equivalence has been stated very crassly, the bottom line is that the female face is not a private part.

"Dutch plan ban on Muslim face veils next year," from Reuters, January 27 (thanks to Kenneth):

(Reuters) - The Dutch minority government plans to ban Muslim face veils such as burqas and other forms of clothing that cover the face from next year. The ban would make the Netherlands, where 1 million out of 17 million people are Muslim, the second European Union country to ban the burqa after France, and would apply to face-covering veils if they were worn in public.

"People should be able to look at each other's faces and recognize each other when they meet," the interior affairs ministry said in a statement Friday.

The ban will also apply to balaclavas and motorcycle helmets when worn in inappropriate places, such as inside a store, Deputy Prime Minister Maxime Verhagen told reporters, denying that this was a ban on religious clothing.

Geert Wilders' anti-Islam Freedom Party (PVV), which helps give the Liberal-Christian Democrat coalition a majority in parliament, has set considerable political store on getting the so-called burqa ban passed into law.

Few Muslim women in the Netherlands wear the Arabic-style niqabs which leave the eyes uncovered and Afghan-style burqas that cover the face with a cloth grid. Academics estimate the numbers at between 100 and 400, whereas Muslim headscarves which leave the face exposed are far more common.

The coalition has agreed to submit a new law to parliament next week stipulating that offenders would be fined up to 390 euros ($510), the ministry said.

Verhagen said the ban was intended to ensure that a tradition of open communication cherished in Dutch society was upheld, and to prevent people from concealing their identity in order to do harm....

Why we don't see more Muslim reformers, part 578. And these aren't real reformers in any case, as you can see from their reference below to "Islamophobes." "Islamophobia" is a manipulative coinage invented by the Muslim Brotherhood to silence criticism of Islamic supremacism and jihad; that Manji and Dibi would buy into it casts doubts upon their interest in genuine Islamic reform. Manji, for her part, touts recovery of a fantasy Islam of her own making that she claims existed in the mythic past. Self-delusion and deception are not reform. But the fact that she dares criticize Islam in its present form in any way brought out the Allahu-akbaring thugs.

"Salafists disrupt liberal Islam debate in Amsterdam," by Heleen Sittig for Radio Netherlands, December 8 (thanks to David):

Radical Belgian Muslims disrupted a debate on Wednesday evening about a liberal approach to Islam. The leading debaters were Canadian writer and Muslim activist Irshad Manji and Green Left Party MP Tofik Dibi. Both describe themselves as liberal Muslims.

The debate at the Balie venue in Amsterdam consisted of a dialogue between Manji and Dibi about "how reformist Muslims can prevent the Islam debate from being hijacked by extremists, be they Islamophobes or radical Muslims". Irshad Manji, a known critic of Islam, is the author of The Islam Dilemma.

A group of 30 Islamists waving the Salafist flag entered the hall and began shouting "Sharia for Holland". They threatened and spat on Ms Manji. The Islamists, who also threw raw eggs, demanded that the debate participants leave the stage; the debaters refused. Mr Dibi later tweeted that the debate “about a promising new generation of Muslims” was later continued at the request of Ms Manji.

Eventually, the police were called in to remove the protestors. A police spokesperson later said that two of the 22 men involved were arrested, one for making threats, and one for insulting Ms Manji. Tofik Dibi accompanied her to the police station where she filed a report.

Tofik Dibi, speaking later the same evening on public TV talkshow Pauw & Witteman, said that “the disruption of the debate shows that it is necessary to continue the debate on a free and moderate Islam.” Ms Manji added that she had experienced her share of fierce opposition but that she had never before seen anything like this....

Freedom Party leader Geert Wilders tweeted: “Dibi does not deserve eggs from radical Muslims or disruption of the meeting. He must be able to say what he wants.”

Where did he get that idea? Why, Muhammad, who is the supreme example of conduct for Muslims (Qur'an 33:21):

"The Prophet wrote the (marriage contract) with 'Aisha while she was six years old and consummated his marriage with her while she was nine years old and she remained with him for nine years (i.e. till his death)." -- Sahih ("sound," "reliable") Bukhari 7.62.88.

Despite apologists' various tap dances around the subject, from claiming that Aisha was much older, didn't know how old she was, or perhaps was "nine" in Galapagos tortoise years (well, we haven't seen that one yet), Muslims across the world continue to believe this account, accept it, and act accordingly. For calling attention to it and to the untold numbers of girls victimized by it, we're branded as "Islamophobes." "Outcry in The Hague over ‘pedo imam’," from Radio Netherlands Worldwide, December 6:

Labour Party MP Ahmed Marcouch wants to bar imam Mohamed al-Maghraoui from entering the Netherlands.

The controversial Moroccan imam has been invited to attend a conference in the As Sunnah mosque in The Hague.

Al Maghraoui caused an uproar in Morocco in 2008 when he issued a fatwa approving a marriage with a nine-year-old girl. The fatwa has since been nullified by the Moroccan religious authorities and the controversial imam fled to Saudi Arabia to avoid prosecution. He reportedly repeated his fatwa when he returned to Morocco in 2011.

Freedom Party leader Geert Wilders has also said the imam should not be allowed to visit the Netherlands.

The As Sunnah mosque has repeatedly been the subject of controversy. Earlier, the Salafist As Sunnah Imam Sheikh Fawaz Jneid called on his followers not to integrate into Dutch society.

Don't let the door hit ya where Allah subhanahu wa-ta'ala split ya.

The mosque has declined to comment on the planned visit by the controversial Moroccan imam.

"Among the domains listed [for fake certificates] are Google, Facebook, Twitter and Skype."

Twitter and Facebook have been key organizing tools for protests, including the current bane of the regime's existence, water fights. An update on this story. "Fake DigiNotar web certificate risk to Iranians," from BBC News, September 6:

Fresh evidence has emerged that stolen web security certificates may have been used to spy on people in Iran.

Analysis by Trend Micro suggests a spike in the number of compromised DigiNotar certificates being issued to the Islamic Republic.

It is believed the digital IDs were being used to trick computers into thinking they were directly accessing sites such as Google.

In reality, someone else may have been monitoring the communications.

Hundreds of bogus certificates are thought to have been generated following a hack on Netherlands-based DigiNotar.

The company is owned by US firm Vasco Data Security. [...]

Unconfirmed information published online suggested that more than 500 false DigiNotar certificates exist.

Among the domains listed are Google, Facebook, Twitter and Skype.

At the same time, it was noticed that a sizeable portion of the Dutch company's certificates were mysteriously going to users in Iran.

By August, 76.5% of DigiNotar validations were in the Netherlands. 18.7% were in Iran and 4.8% elsewhere in the world, according to security firm Trend Micro.

Iranian activity dropped off after the certificates were revoked.

DigiNotar eventually went public about the intrusion on 30 August, at which time most web browsers stopped recognising DigiNotar certificates altogether.

Soft target

There are many reasons why Iran may have been targeted using the bogus certificates, according to security experts.

The republic's tight controls on dissent mean that monitoring web traffic could yield useful information.

Iran's internet setup also makes some types of interception easier, according to Rik Ferguson, Trend Micro's director of security research and communications.

"All the internet traffic has to go through an Iranian government proxy before it goes out to the final destination.

"If you want to spy on normal HTTP traffic, that is not a problem - you get to see all the outbound requests and all the inbound responses," he explained.

For secure websites, attempts to intercept would ring alarm bells with the web browser and therefore the user.

One option is to make the Iranian national proxy server look like it is the target website - using a fake DigiNotar certificate.

The proxy then relays information to and from the real website, e.g. Google.com, but there is no indication that the secure chain has been broken.

Government involvement?

While much online debate has centred around the role of the Iranian authorities, there is no firm evidence to support such a theory.

However, a spokesman for the Dutch Interior Ministry, Vincent van Steen told the Netherland's-based ANP news agency that the cabinet was looking into claims of Iranian government involvement....

The prior report posted here noted that the nature and magnitude of the attack would require access to infrastructure that small-time vandals and crooks would not have.

Analysts noted that the nature of the attack requires access to infrastructure that a couple of small-time vandals would not have. "Dutch study possible Iran hacking of government web sites," by Gilbert Kreijger and William MacLean for Reuters, September 4:

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - The Dutch government said on Sunday it was investigating whether Iran may have been involved in hacking Dutch state websites after digital certificates were stolen.

Dutch Interior Ministry spokesman Vincent van Steen declined to say whether Iranian authorities in the Netherlands or Iran had been contacted, and said more details would be published in a letter to the Dutch parliament early next week.

But van Steen confirmed the veracity of a report by the Dutch news agency ANP saying the cabinet was looking into whether the Iranian government played a part in breaking into Dutch government websites.

Such web sites may no longer be safe after the digital theft of internet security certificates from Dutch IT company DigiNotar, the Interior Ministry said in a statement.

Officials at the Iranian embassy in The Hague were not immediately available for comment nor was there an immediate reply to emails asking for comment.

Google said in its security blog on August 29 that it had received reports of attacks on Google users, that "the people affected were primarily located in Iran," and that the attacker used a fraudulent certificate issued by DigiNotar.

DigiNotar's systems were hacked in mid-July and security certificates were stolen for a number of domains, DigiNotar and its owner, U.S.-listed VASCO Data Security International, said on August 30.

Relations between Iran and the Netherlands deteriorated early this year when a Dutch-Iranian woman was hanged in Iran in January and buried without her relatives being present. She had been arrested after taking part in demonstrations and accused of drug smuggling.

In April, the Iranian embassy in the Hague criticised the Dutch government after an Iranian asylum seeker who was being extradited set himself on fire in Amsterdam and died.

A certificate guarantees that a web surfer is securely connected with a website and not being monitored by someone else. Breaking into a secure link is known as a "man-in-the-middle attack."

The stolen certificates were immediately revoked after detection of the theft but one, for the site Google.com, was only "recently" revoked after a warning from the Dutch government, DigiNotar and VASCO said.

Internet security experts said it was possible the hacking originated from Iran and involved state support.

"This is the second batch of fraudulent security certificates in the last six months with questionable links to Iranian actors," said John Bumgarner, a cyber researcher and chief technology officer for the non-profit U.S. Cyber Consequences Unit.

"The certificates in question would not only allow a state actor to access the email and skype accounts of dissenters, but also install monitoring software on their computers," Bumgarner said.

Experts use the term "cui bono test" to know who could benefit from an act and be the perpetrator.

"The 'cui bono?' test suggests Iranian state involvement. No doubt the government of Iran will try to blame some hacker group, if they say anything at all," said Ross Anderson, Professor in Security Engineering at Cambridge University.

It was possible, Anderson said, that a government used hacker groups as auxiliaries but it was not likely that a small group would do a man-in-the-middle attack on its own.

"To use the forged certificate to do a man-in-the-middle attack on gmail, you need to be in a position to be the man in the middle, which means you usually have to be an internet service provider (ISP), or in a position to compel an ISP to do your bidding. That means proximity to government," he said.

Shorter version from a different angle, showing the Queen's dawning dismay and the police escorting the Muslim preacher out:

Welcome to Eurabia. Here is yet another indication that Islamic supremacists will not allow the Infidels to maintain their practices that are forbidden by Sharia -- such as music. Expect much more of this sort of thing in the new Europe. "Man disrupts Queen's concert," a translation (error correction invited) of "Man verstoort concert Koningin," from ShowNieuws, September 3 (thanks to Ferenc):

Tonight a man was arrested at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam. There was a classical concert scheduled in the Great Hall, where Queen Beatrix sat on the first row. Concertgebouw director Simon Reinink confirmed this to ShowNieuws.

This man, neatly dressed in a suit, entered the stage and began a speech about Islam. He called himself the servant of God and invited the public to believe. One person who was present wrote on Twitter: "He said: 'There is no bomb ... I'm sorry.'"

When the guards discovered that he was not a speaker on the program, they took him off the stage and brought him over to police. According Reinink, the man did not threaten the queen. Therefore she remained quietly in her seat.

The somewhat confused man, who is known to the police, spent the next night at the police station.

Because they are already part of the EU, and are thus as European as wooden shoes and the Schreierstoren. Everyone knows that, you greasy Islamophobe.

"Turks need not integrate," from Dutch News, August 16 (thanks to C. Cantoni):

Turkish nationals do not have to attend integration courses, the court of appeal ruled on Tuesday in a case brought by the Dutch government.

The ruling states that because Turkey has an association agreement with the European Union, Turkish nationals living in the Netherlands may not be forced to attend language and civic studies courses.

The agreement implies that Turkey is part of the EU and EU citizens do not have to integrate, the court said.

Two earlier courts reached the same conclusion and no further appeal is possible.

Well, glad that's settled. Now we can all retire to the nearest hashish cafe and relax.

Hey, kids! Why just seek asylum from your virtually uninhabitable homeland when you can be the reason it's that way? Well, there's also the famine, but the al-Shabaab jihadists' official position remains that the famine doesn't exist. It's just a tad dry out. An update on this story. "Extradited terrorist suspect appears in US court," from Radio Netherlands Worldwide, August 16 (thanks to Twostellas):

A 45-year-old Somali terrorism suspect, who was extradited to the United States last week, made his first appearance in court in St Paul, Minnesota on Monday.

Mahamud Said Omar is suspected of supporting the Somali rebel organisation al-Shabaab, designated by the US authorities as a terrorist organisation.

The suspect has not yet given a statement. He has requested an interpreter for the Somali Maay Maay dialect but none is available.

Local paper the Star Tribune reports that the next hearing will be on 26 August to give the defence time to prepare its case.

Mahamud Said Omar was arrested in 2009 at an asylum seekers centre in the Dutch town of Dronten. He had travelled to the Netherlands from Minnesota a year earlier. He is believed to have recruited young men in the US state for the 'holy war' in Somalia.

According to the Star Tribune, the authorities believe at least 20 Somali-Americans who left Minnesota at different times since 2007 were recruited by al-Shabaab to join its fight for control of the East African nation.

Mr Omar is one of 14 men who have been arrested in the FBI's investigation into recruitment for al-Shabaab.

FBI agent E.K. Wilson praised Dutch Justice Minister Ivo Opstelten for his role in the extradition procedures: “We would not have been able to get to this place in this particular extradition without the expertise and professionalism of this Dutch agency."

Dank u wel.

After the anti-democratic terrorist attack in Norway, a Dutch survey was made. It contained good news for those who do not dare to speak out about their views on Islam because they think that they stand alone with in holding such views.

On Friday a survey showed that 52 percent of Dutchmen do not see any reason for Wilders to moderate his rhetoric following the terror attacks in Norway. 44 percent think he should.

29 percent say they agree with Wilders' view on Muslims.

Indeed. "Wilders accuses left of demonising him over Norway shootings," from Dutch News, August 1 (thanks to C. Cantoni):

Geert Wilders, leader of the anti-Islam party PVV, has accused left-wing politicians of a witch hunt by trying to implicate him and his ideas in the Norwegian mass shootings of 10 days ago.

In an interview with the Telegraaf, Wilders says the left is out to demonise him by trying to connect him to shootings.

Various politicians and commentators have said that Wilders' anti-Islam speeches and his constant referrals to the 'left-wing elite' have helped create the climate in which Anders Breivik acted.

Islam-huggers

'The truth has to be told because Islam-huggers like [Job] Cohen of the Party of the Arabs [Labour party] caused the problems and have repeatedly ignored them,' Wilders said. 'I would say to Cohen and the rest of the left in the Netherlands: it is not my words, but your silence about the dangers of Islam which has the negative influences.'

In a statement last week, Wilders condemned the actions of Breivik as those of a psychopath and a lunatic....