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11/1 Jurists want to stay in Oudemanhuispoort

8/2 Mayor’s portrait

8/2 Websites for social cohesion

7/2 Spreading tourism proceeds with difficulty

7/2 GroenLinks on districts: Be a man

6/2 Zuideramstel opens new office on Sabbath

5/2 The truth about integration

4/2 Wilders has little support on Amsterdam

3/2 Elite involved in neighbourhood

2/2 Johnnie Walker avoids taxes in Amsterdam

1/2 Rotterdam to tinker with district councils as well

31/1 Wooden rowing boats to disappear from Amstel

31/1 ZeeburgTV launched

27/1 Privacy activists to mess up loyalty card system

27/1 A few were still coughing, but that was an act

27/1 Chrisis in de Baarsjes

26/1 Youth have positive view of districts

24/1 Action groups call for Carmel and Jaffa boycott

24/1 PvdA members dismiss plan for districts

23/1 KLM takes on crisis with new uniform

23/1 District office not squatted

21/1 Merge districts

20/1 Closing squat bar Vrankrijk not necessary

20/1 Cleaners welcome new Schiphol director

18/1 Palestine at the Jewish Historical Museum

18/1 What is the right size for a district?

17/1 PvdA Oost against fewer districts

16/1 Committee: 7 districts by 2010

15/1 Soldiers may attend Afghanistan debate after all

15/1 Bait bike leads to arrest

14/1 Youth for Christ to republish vacancies

13/1 Paintings of the Zuidas

13/1 New Youth for Christ contoversy

11/1 Social cohesion initiative raises eyebrows

10/1 Fewer districts in 2010

10/1 Zuidas: People feel that we are losers

9/1 Fun on the ice - but not for all

9/1 Supermarket coupon fraud thwarted

9/1 I Amsterdam must remain exclusive

8/1 Use term Apartheid in every discussion

8/1 No city kiosk in Amsterdam yet

7/1 Snow

7/1 Fatima Elatik to run Zeeburg

7/1 Municipal managers to return to shop floor

4/1 Police: take photo of strange people

3/1 Gaza protest criticises politicians

1/1 Thousands to protest against attacks on Gaza

1/1 Mustapha Laboui leaves district council

2008 Archive

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Rode Hoed home to anti-Islam bloggers

3 January 2008 - Formerly progressive intelectuals fight the Islam on their weblogs. After a heated debate at the Rode Hoed last June, attended by many of these ‘angry bloggers’, Vrij Nederland’s Margalith Kleijwegt set out to explore their world.

At the Rode Hoed, a debate was held on issues such as the newly founded organisation of former Muslims. Many among the crowd expressed hostility towards Muslims. One of the people demanding to be heard was a man from Amsterdam-Oost, who contributes to the Hoeiboei weblog under the name Leo Sar.

Later, Sar emailed Kleijwegt about what motivates him: “I see what Samuel Huntington sees. The Islam can’t be integrated. South America was taken by a few hundred Spaniards with guns. Why couldn’t Europe be subjected by twenty million Muslims, a vanguard of whom are just making realistic threats with dirty bombs? For example, simultaneously in Amsterdam and Berlin? With how many were the Bolsheviks at the beginning?”

Lucida, editor of the Atlucida and Ayaan Hirsi Ali weblogs, has similar concerns: “It won’t be long before our ‘beautiful neighbourhoods’ [government lingo for disadvantaged neighbourhoods] will be sporting names like Mekka Square or Avenue de Bin Laden. Residents of the Slotervaart District are sick and tired of it. The ‘incidents’ of intimidation, vandalism, street terror, theft, destructiveness and rapacity keep on piling up. And what is our jolly Jew [referring to Mayor Job Cohen] doing? Exactly, he is having another cup of tea at the local mosque”.

Interestingly, all the bloggers used to vote for progressive parties, but now they criticise the ‘betrayal of the Left’ and the rise of ‘Sharia Socialism’. Most are ‘highly educated citizens, readers of de Volkskrant, NRC Handelsblad and Vrij Nederland’, who are uncomfortable with the populism of politicians like Geert Wilders. “For a moment I considered voting for Wilders”, one of them told Kleijwegt, “but I think he’s not sophisticated enough, he is using too many one-liners”.

As was to be expected, Kleijwegt’s article has been discussed extensively at the weblogs she describes. While some say her description is quite accurate, others say she describes the bloggers in such a way as to make them look like pathetic losers.

Article in Vrij Nederland (in Dutch; containing links to the weblogs described). Meeting at the Rode Hoed. Illustration: building blocks designed by Annechien van Litsenburg

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