Category: Netherlands

Members of the Netherlands’ House of Representatives have asked questions of State Secretary for Finance, Frans Weekers, regarding tax deductions on financial donations given to the Church of Scientology via front groups.

Scientology is not considered a charitable organization in the Netherlands, and therefore encourages members to donate to the church via an ancillary foundation that does have charitable status.

People wearing burqas, balaclavas or all-in-one motorbike helmets in public in the Netherlands will soon face fines. On Friday, government ministers voted to outlaw all clothing which covers the face.

“People must be able to look each other in the face and be recognisable to one another. The wearing of face-covering clothing does not fit in with the Netherlands’ open society, in which participation in social traffic is actually crucial,” the cabinet said Friday.

A Christian civil servant has been fired by the Dutch city of The Hague for refusing to oversee same-sex marriages on Biblical grounds.

Wim Pijl, 67, said Tuesday, November 15, he would take legal action against the dismissal despite parliamentary support for gay weddings.

Holland is to become the latest European country to ban the burka, despite the fact that fewer than 100 Dutch women are thought to wear the face-covering Islamic dress.

A ‘burqa ban’ formed part of the minority Dutch government’s programme agreed with the populist Freedom Party (PVV) on whose parliamentary support the cabinet relies.

Retired Dutch politician Frits Bolkestein says the poor quality of Muslim-operated Islamic schools in the Netherlands distance Muslims further from Dutch society.

He fears this may result in ethnic segregation, creating areas in the Netherlands where Shariah is the rule of law.

Bolkestein warns against Islamic schools “where boys and girls are segregated, where Holocaust history is not taught, where anti-Semitism is not combated, and where the curriculum militates against the emancipation of women.”

The northern Dutch province of Friesland has the highest density of churches in Europe. But the number of worshippers is falling, and this is creating financial problems for the churches.

As a result, 100 of the province’s 700 churches are going to have to close.

Dutch anti-Islamist politician Geert Wilders, who plays a controversial but pivotal role in the formation of a new Dutch government, went on trial on Monday for inciting hatred against Muslims.

Wilders is charged with inciting hate and discrimination against Muslims in comments he made in the media and for insulting Muslims by comparing the Islamic faith to Nazism.