Netherlands inaugurates Amsterdam Holocaust Museum amid protests over Israeli president’s presence | International

The president of Israel, Isaac Herzog, took advantage of his presence at the inauguration this Sunday of the new National Holocaust Museum in Amsterdam to call for the release of the Israeli Hamas hostages still held in Gaza. Herzog’s presence at the event had been expected for months, but the war in the Strip has now lasted for five months and has provoked protests from Jewish and Palestinian organizations. There were clashes between protesters and police during heavy surveillance around the Portuguese synagogue and the old Jewish quarter, where most of this community was concentrated before World War II. It is the area where the new museum commemorates their persecution.

In Waterloo Square, also a very touristy place in the Dutch capital, more and more people gathered, sitting on the ground when the police asked for people to disperse. Fireworks were thrown at the police and several people attempted to get into police vehicles, but were pushed back by riot police.

It took two decades to complete the new museum and illustrate the persecution of the Jewish community in the Netherlands. It has government funding and civil society organizations. The Dutch Government Information Service indicated that the king would attend the event “because it is a place of great national significance and importance.” For his part, Emile Schrijver, director of the center, underlined that Herzog symbolizes the thousands of Dutch Jews who emigrated to Israel.

More than 200 Dutch mosques had asked King William not to receive the politician, and boos could be heard as he left the ceremony. In his speech, the monarch stressed that anti-Semitism “must be prevented so that it does not have influence again”. This museum, he said, “shows us that not much time has passed since that [el Holocausto]”. Later, before the street demonstration, the king declared: “With the liberation of the Netherlands [tras la guerra] The right to demonstrate is back. “It’s great to be able to do that when we don’t agree on something.”

Amnesty International has criticized Herzog’s prominence because he represents a country “that tramples on international law in Gaza”, according to spokespersons for the NGO. President Herzog, in his speeches after the October 7 attacks, made no distinction between Hamas militiamen and the Palestinian population, holding “the entire Palestinian nation” responsible for the massacre. The assault resulted in the deaths of approximately 1,200 people and the capture of over 240 people as hostages. His words, however, are part of the complaint presented by South Africa against Israel for incitement to genocide before the United Nations International Court of Justice. In late 2023, Herzog wrote the phrase “I trust you” on a shell fired over Gaza.

The first part of the inauguration of the Holocaust Museum took place in the Portuguese synagogue in the Dutch capital. There, Herzog said the new space is a reminder of “the atrocities that come from anti-Semitism.” “Hatred and anti-Semitism are currently sweeping the world,” he warned. On the streets, protesters carried banners showing their rejection of Israel’s actions in the Strip. “This granddaughter of an Auschwitz survivor says: ‘Stop the Holocaust in Gaza,’” she reads on one of the posters. “It will never happen again now,” said another. “Yes to the museum. Not to Herzog,” she read in another.

Yuval Gal, a member of the Jewish organization Erev Rav, which called for Sunday’s demonstrations, urged the International Criminal Court (ICC) Prosecutor’s Office to take measures to arrest the Israeli president. The radical Islamic organization Hizb ut-Tahir joined the protests in Amsterdam. In their case, men and women left separately. Present at the inauguration of the Holocaust Museum, together with King Wilhelm and Herzog, were the president of Austria, Alexander van der Bellen, and the president of the German Bundesrat (the equivalent of the Senate), Manuela Schwesig. The delegation also included the resigning Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte and the mayor of Amsterdam, Femke Halsema.

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