Several major Dutch newspapers have published that Dutch-Turkish volunteer Mehmet Sahin, is being harassed and intimidated by other Turks - almost on a daily basis. He had comitted the "sin" of admonishing three youngsters from his community who praised the Holocaust, Hitler and the killing of Jewish babies in February on TV.
Sahin mentioned that reactions from other Turks included that he “is a Jewish agent,” “psychologically sick,” and “a collaborator.” Sahin had received death threats after his admonishment of the young Turkish anti-Semites.
The Mayor of Arnhem where he lives, rather than offering protection, then recommended that Sahin go into hiding with his family, which he did. Thereafter, Sahin remained at home for a month.
Sahin now told the press that when he went out on the streets afterwards, he was called names in Turkish including: “You are born out of the sperm of a Jew who raped a Turkish mother.” He said, “I replied ‘Dirty Fascists!’ He also said that Turks in his neighborhood isolate him and the same is the case with Turkish organizations and key figures in and outside Arnhem.
The official prosecution claimed that only one of the youngsters had said things which were punishable by law, and made an agreement with him that he would work with an organization which fights anti-Semitism. Sahin however was warned by the prosecution that if he insults people again within a year, he will be prosecuted.
Sahin wanted to take the youths on a trip to Auschwitz, but now doubts whether this will ever happen. Sahin insisted that he will continue to fight anti-Semitism.
In view of the ongoing negative news from the Netherlands concerning Jews and Israel, Arutz Sheva asked Israeli anti-Semitism expert Dr. Manfred Gerstenfeld to comment on this issue.
He said, “The Sahin Affair, even if it concerns a single victim, well illustrates three major negative aspects of contemporary Dutch society. The first issue is, as Sahin relates, the immoral attitudes held by significant parts of Dutch Turkish society. The second aspect is the failure of the Dutch major media which only started to give substantial publicity to the scandal of the young Hitler admirers on mainstream TV after several weeks had passed, when the Simon Wiesenthal Center wrote a protest letter to Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte.
The third more recent failure is that of the Dutch police and prosecution. The net result of the death threats and hatred against Sahin coming out of the Turkish community is that one of the youths receives some superficial “educational training,” while the victim is warned that he will be brought before a court if he insults his aggressors again. This shows that there is much which is radically wrong with Dutch police and the Justice Ministry, under which the prosecution resides. The authorities make much of the fact that the youngster apologized to the police for what he said. Sahin hits the nail on the head when he says that the youngsters should apologize to him and the Jewish community, which they have not done.
Nothing is known about investigations by police in Arnhem’s Turkish community concerning the harassment of Sahin. One first step should have been to check what was said in his neighborhood’s Turkish mosque. Are the Dutch police really so incompetent that they could not identify even one of his harassers? While this may have been difficult in the first day or two, weeks later when Sahin went out again, it should have been relatively easy to catch them. It is more likely that Dutch authorities once again do not wish to deal with a significant problem coming out of a Dutch-Muslim community more than on a superficial basis.