2/3 of Dutch Mosques Attacked: Research
“I cannot predict a significant growth or decline of attacks against mosques for the near future,” researcher Ineke van der Valk, the author of the book ‘Islamophobia and Discrimination’, told OnIslam.net.
“Many of these attacks appear to be a response to national or international events (like terrorist attacks) and obviously those cannot be predicted by me.”
Focusing on the amount and characteristics of attacks on mosques, the Muslims’ houses of worship, the research closely monitor trends and development in relation to multiculturalism and Islamophobia for many years.
According to the research, the Netherlands has approximately 450-475 buildings that are in use as a mosque.
It lists information of over 70 mosques in the country, indicating that approximately 69% of those mosques had experienced at least one attack or more during the last ten years.
The most common attacks were smashed windows, followed by slurs or anti-Islamic comments sprayed with graffiti and arson.
Other types of attacks include aggression against mosque personnel, amounting to death threats to Muslims in general or to a specific Mosque by email or phone.
For example, a Rotterdam-based mosque received various letters with content like ‘Death to all Muslims’. Other mosques received envelopes containing pornographic content or messages that contain blasphemy.
Other anti-mosque attacks included putting head or different other body parts or blood of either pigs or sheep at the buildings or on the terrain surrounding it.
Released in 2012, Van der Valk’s book, Islamophobia and Discrimination, has since been translated to English, French, German and Italian.
Muslims make up one million of the Netherlands’s 16 million population, mostly from Turkish and Moroccan origin.
Source: On Islam
