While being interrogated by Dutch police Monday, far-Right Dutch politician Geert Wilders stood by his anti-Moroccan comments and doubled down on his call for less Islam in the Netherlands.
Wilders, who heads the Party for Freedom (PVV), is currently facing discrimination charges brought on by a public prosecutor after leading a crowd of supporters in a chant demanding fewer Moroccan immigrants. The spectacle drew mass condemnation, with some hyperbolically comparing him to Hitler and saying the event was reminiscent of Nazi propagandist Josef Goebbels’ famous 1943 speech.
“In my fight for freedom and against the Islamization of the Netherlands, I will never let anyone silence me. No matter the cost, no matter by whom, whatever the consequences may be.”
“I do not retract anything of what I have said. Because I have said nothing wrong,” Wilders said in a statement Monday. “In my fight for freedom and against the Islamization of the Netherlands, I will never let anyone silence me. No matter the cost, no matter by whom, whatever the consequences may be.”
Wilders also made it clear that he not only wants fewer Moroccan immigrants, many of whom practice Islam, but that he against of the Islamic faith altogether.
“I also want less Islam in the Netherlands,” he factly stated, adding that his party opposes immigration from all Islamic countries. Wilders claims that a large percentage of the Dutch populous agrees with him and his party that “Islamic culture does not belong to the Netherlands.”
Of course, such rhetoric has become synonymous with Wilders, who has previously proposed a tax on women wearing a headscarf and has equated the Qur’an to Mein Kampf. Even just last month, a PVV member of parliament called for a closure of all mosques in the Netherlands.
In fact, this is the second time Wilders has faced prosecution for such rhetoric. In 2010, Wilders was brought to trial after being accused of criminal hate speech and inciting discrimination. However, he was acquitted in 2011.
Wilders seems to be confident that this will once again be the case. According to him, this has nothing to do with hate, but rather an effort to “preserve” Dutch culture and identity. The two, however, do not appear to be mutually exclusive, but Wilders still claimed that any attempt to prosecute him will be “politically motivated.”