Dutch Anti-Islam Politician Wilders to Speak at Mosque Protest
Dutch Anti-Islam Politician Wilders Speak at Mosque Protest
Valerie Kuypers/AFP/Getty Image
Leader of the the Dutch Party for Freedom, Geert Wilders.
Leader of the the Dutch Party for Freedom, Geert Wilders. Photographer: Valerie Kuypers/AFP/Getty Image
Geert Wilders, the leader of the anti-Islamic Freedom Party that’s seeking a share of power in the Netherlands, will speak in New York tomorrow against plans to build a mosque near the World Trade Center site.
Wilders said on his website that he was invited by the Stop Islamization Of America movement, which is organizing a protest at the site at 2 p.m. tomorrow, the anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks.
“No mosque near Ground Zero!” Wilders wrote on his Twitter Inc. account Aug. 10. “Booked flight and hotel New York today. Good feeling. Important speech. Nobody will stop me.”
Former NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer is among Dutch politicians who’ve said they’re concerned Wilders’s speech may hurt the country’s interests abroad. Wilders, 47, is offering the support of Freedom Party lawmakers to ensure a minority government of Liberals and Christians Democrats can pass legislation, three months after inconclusive elections.
De Hoop Scheffer, a Christian Democrat, told the newspaper NRC Handelsblad in an interview published last month that whatever Wilders says tomorrow will be seen as representing the views of the Dutch government, even though he is not a minister.
Two years ago a film by Wilders, “Fitna,” featuring verses from the Koran alongside images of the Sept. 11 attacks in the U.S, led to protests in majority-Muslim nations, such as Indonesia and Pakistan, and calls for a boycott of Dutch products in Malaysia.
The Cordoba Initiative, the New York project’s sponsor, describes itself as a pluralistic organization seeking better relations between the Islamic community and other faiths. Plans for the community center and mosque also include a 500-seat auditorium, swimming pool, restaurants, bookstores and space for art exhibitions, according to the group’s website.
More than 2,700 people died at the World Trade Center when two hijacked commercial airliners slammed into the twin towers in the Sept. 11 assault in 2001. The attacks were planned by al- Qaeda, an Islamist terrorist group headed by Osama bin Laden.
To contact the reporter on this story: Jurjen van de Pol in Amsterdam at jvandepol@bloomberg.net.
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