Genie, Out of the Bottle

A distasteful spectacle in Amsterdam reveals how the Hamas agenda is spreading

Sure, criticize Israel. Go for it. A very large majority of Israelis also can’t wait to see the back of Benjamin Nethanyahu. Note however that a similarly large group of Israelis also wants the operation in Gaza to continue, even if it means taking the risk to attack the densely populated Rafah area. But before you put the knife in, realize that Jews have seen this movie before and are acutely aware that the current fight is one of actual survival. And now Jews possess the means to decide their fate. And yes, that’s waging war. The docile ghetto Jew is long gone. That Jew perished with six million others some eighty years ago. That event has a name. It is called the Holocaust or Shoah and we keep remembering it under the words ‘never again’.

Like yesterday in the heart of Amsterdam where - with a visiting Israeli president, the Dutch king and the capital’s mayor - a new Holocaust Museum was opened. It is located in the very area where the mass deportations had started in 1941, a neighbourhood that once was the bustling heart of Jewish Amsterdam, better known as Mokum. Instead of a respectful ceremony without any unnecessary political excursions it turned into one of the most lamentable displays of Jew hatred seen in recent times. At the very moment the museum was opened by a survivor and his granddaughter (the family largely perished in Sobibor) by attaching a mezuzah to the entrance, a massive choir of hate drowned out this very solemn moment. The ‘Free Palestine’ supporters put their full repertoire on display, hitting the bottom of the pit of unfiltered evil by screaming ‘cancerous Jews, fuck off’.

It needs no elaboration on how utterly distasteful the scenes in Amsterdam were yesterday and how the total lack of respect for the event was given a free pass under the guise of ‘the right to demonstrate’. The entire week leading up to the museum’s opening the Dutch media were full of how the visit by Israeli president Isaac Herzog would inflame sentiments, some voices even calling for his arrest for ‘genocide’. Drowned out were the more reasonable suggestions pointing out that Herzog represented the many Jews that both perished and survived, that his father had actually fought on the British side to liberate the Dutch and that, in my estimate, he is a politically neutral head of state. It was suggested that his comments after October 7th were hateful and inflammatory, it would be fair however in his defence to say that his once moderate stance was somewhat curtailed by probably one of the bloodiest pogroms the world has come to witness.

It was notably members of the newly merged Green-Left and Labour Party who delivered the fiercest comments, politicizing and criticizing Herzog attending the event. So much that famous Jewish journalist and media personality Frits Barend went on TV and in an emotional statement decried how the Dutch left had abandoned its once core principles of support for Israel and against anti-Semitism. He added that he was happy that some noted Jewish Labour leaders were no longer around to see what now passes for debate in The Netherlands. As is the case with many other ‘progressive’ political parties, think about the recent turmoil in Canada, Jews are no longer welcome.

Indeed this is hardly just a Dutch phenomenon. It is bingo every weekend with pro-Hamas and anti-Israel rallies everywhere and invariably they morph into Anti-semitic hatefests. Jewish institutions are being attacked in New York, Toronto, Paris, Los Angeles and London on a regular basis, while police often stand by idly as the hate metastasizes. The fact that authorities of all political stripes take an often indecisive approach only makes things worse. Amsterdam’s Mayor, Femke Halsema, could have prevented the ugly scenes yesterday by cordoning off the area and have a more pro-active police presence, but she opted not to act.

The hate is given a free reign, demonstrating how incredibly meaningless the words ‘never again’ have been all along. The campaigns we thought we would never live to see again are back in full force and are widely promoted on social media and abetted by incompetent politicians. It is very hard to see how it all can be stopped, worse, the question now is what is next. Think of the likely long duration of the conflict in Israel, the growing and often radicalized Muslim populations in western countries, the general political climate of anger and resentment; they all combine and play into this deadly and growing anti-Semitic dynamic. The genie is truly out of the bottle.

And the danger is evident. Democratic norms are under pressure, civil discourse and respect are evaporating while radical positions are being mainstreamed. The doors for politically intolerant movements, left and right, are wide open all of a sudden. Anti-semitism is a first sign that societies are being pulled apart and that Jews are only the first casualties in the resulting line of fire. There is more and far worse for others to come in particular as institutions such as for instance law enforcement, universities and bureaucracies get infected. We have seen it, we have witnessed it before and yet in most democracies the wish to stay silent and keep a safe distance from it all is scarily prevalent.

The Dutch above all have experienced this and once the 104,000 Jews were disappeared and murdered and what followed was an ever gruesome destruction of civil society which concluded with the winter of hunger in 1944-45. If the allies had not liberated the country in 1945 it is fair to assume that not much would have been left of civil society once the Nazis had completed their job. The Dutch however bounced back phenomenally and became a beacon of tolerance and social success, even in bringing back what was left of Jewish life. That now is in danger of being extinguished forever.

Think about it, it is a two-step approach. Much like Hamas first taking its prisoners and then raping and torturing them, there is an unbending need to inflict maximum pain on Jews. First you protest and criticize them, then you cruelly walk all over the Holocaust, ideally if survivors are present. The street protests in the West are pretty much the political equivalent of Hamas’ terrorist operations. Both have the same ultimate goal, the very thing we thought we would never see again.

Note: the Holocaust Museum is not the first monument to remember Amsterdam’s Jews. There is of course the Anne Frank House, the Auschwitz Memorial and the Monument of Names which was inaugurated in 2021. The latter lists each victim individually: