When the Dutch Islamist Mohammad Bouyeri butchered Dutch film director Theo Van Gogh in response to a film by Van Gogh about the oppression of Muslim women, it seemed plausible to think the Dutch might finally awaken to the internal threat posed by Islamofascism, at least to the extent of rallying to defend their own free speech rights. Today, as Anne Applebaum shows, it’s no longer plausible to believe this.
Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a Dutch-Somali politician, wrote the script for Van Gogh’s film. The knife Bouyeri thrust into Van Gogh contained a death threat directed at Hirsi Ali. Even before this event, she had been under Dutch police protection. But last year, the Dutch government tried to revoke her citizenship. And last week, the government cut off her security funding. Currently, she lives in the U.S. under privately financed security protection. The Dutch are about to debate whether to resume funding.
How that debate turns out is probably immaterial. The fact that the Dutch are having this debate, instead of debating the quickest way to arrest and/or deport the Islamists who pose such a threat to their freedoms, tells me that the game is probably lost in Holland.
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