Guerrilla History - Zionist Rampage & Narrative Distortion in Amsterdam [Dispatch] w/ Jazie Veldhuyzen

Episode Date: November 22, 2024

In this dispatch episode of Guerrilla History, bring on left-wing Amsterdam City Council member Jazie Veldhuyzen to discuss the recent events that took place in Amsterdam surrounding an Ajax-Maccabi Tel Aviv football match, where violent Zionist hooligans went on a rampage through the city, but the media and major Dutch politicians instead characterized the event as a "modern pogrom" until the facts became too clear to ignore.  This is a really important discussion that not only clarifies that specific situation, but also examines how Zionism influences narratives in mainstream discourse, why to remain vigilant in the face of these distortions and lies, and how to build movements in the face of these narratives and distortions.  Recommendations that were mentioned in this episode were the article by Asa Winstanley, our comrade from Electronic Intifada, titled NY Times killed investigation of Israeli hooligans, internal email reveals, as well as discussions on The Majlis around the IHRA "definition" of antisemitism.  Check out The politics of the IHRA definition of Antisemitism and Academic Freedom as well as IHRA, Bill 168 and Academic Research and Teaching. Jazie Veldhuyzen is an activist, social worker, and Amsterdam City Council member and party chairman for De Vonk.  Follow him on Instagram or on twitter @JazieAnthony.  You can also follow De Vonk on Instagram. Help support the show by signing up to our patreon, where you also will get bonus content: https://www.patreon.com/guerrillahistory 

You don't remember Den Bamboo? No! The same thing happened in Algeria, in Africa. They didn't have anything but a rank. The French had all these highly mechanized instruments of warfare. But they put some guerrilla action on. Hello and welcome. Welcome to Guerrilla History, the podcast that acts as a reconnaissance report of global proletarian

history and aims to use the lessons of history to analyze the present. I'm one of your co-hosts, Henry Huckmacki, joined as usual by my co-host, Professor Adnan Hussein, historian and director of the School of Religion at Queen's University in Ontario, Canada. Hello, Adnan. How are you today? I'm really well, Henry. It's a pleasure to be with you. Absolutely. It's always nice seeing you. It's only been a couple days since we last recorded, but nevertheless, it's always a pleasure. I can never get enough of this show. Not my day job, but I wish it was. We have a terrific guest today and a really fascinating topic, a topic that expands on some of our previous conversations, but looks kind of at it from a different way and looks at a current event that's happening outside of Gaza itself.

And listeners, you will hear what that topic is going to be in just a second. But before I turn to our guests to have him introduce himself, I'm going to remind you that you can help support the show and allow us to continue making episodes like this by going to Patreon.com forward slash guerrilla history. That's G-U-E-R-R-I-L-A history. And you can keep up to date with everything that Adnan and I are doing individually and collectively by following us on Twitter at Gorilla underscore pod, G-U-E-R-R-I-L-L-A- underscore pod, and on Instagram at Gorilla-Histor History. Yes. Again, Gorilla with 2Rs underscore history. So without further ado, we have a terrific guest today to discuss a really interesting event. We have Jay-Z. Velhuisin. Forgive me on the pronunciation. You can correct me as you come in and tell the listeners who you are, but I just want to lay out what we are going to be talking about today.

So listeners, longtime listeners of guerrilla history will know that Adnan and I are both football fans. And, of course, Adnan and I watch a lot of football. episodes about football on our feed. We have a World Cup episode with Alex Avina, a Euros episode with Alex Avina, and a football more broadly episode with Alex Avina. All of these episodes, of course, are not talking about the sports specifically, but rather the politics and history behind this sport that Adnan and I are both fans of. Now, listeners, if you are also a fan of football, you probably saw that last week, there was quite a bit of news that surrounded a football match in Amsterdam.

It was the Maccabee Tel Aviv Iax match. And I am not going to describe what the news surrounding the events were because we have Jay Z. Veldehuizen here, who is a city council member from Amsterdam, a

leftist city council member from Amsterdam, to tell us about how this event was portrayed and what actually happened. So Jay-Z, as we bring you in, can you tell the listeners a little bit about yourself? and then bring us up to speed. I'm sure that a lot of our listeners are not kind of fully up to date

in terms of what happened, what was portrayed, and what has come out since that moment. Well, thank you very much. And just to begin with my name, it's J.C. Feldhausen. It may be difficult to pronounce, but there you go. So thank you very much for having me. So as you said, I'm a city council member for a party called Defong. we stand for solidarity, free Palestine, and the struggle against capitalism.

So we are basically a party, or not yet a party, actually, but we are a fraction within the city council. We consider ourselves to be the left of the left. My own background, I'm not an historian. Actually, I'm a high school dropout who ended up being a social worker, specifically working with youngsters on the streets and later became an activist and without the intention of ever getting into politics, I kind of rolled into it. And what we've seen the last week in Amsterdam was a lot. It was a lot. Yeah. So basically it comes down to a football match between Ajax and

Maccabi tell Aviv. So how it all started. is Wednesday evening, when the Maccabi fans, or I would rather call them violent Zionist hooligans, they were walking around in our city, Amsterdam. They were armed. They were attacking houses that had Palestinian flags hanging, and they were tearing them down. And at some point, the cat driver tried to tell them, hey, stop that. And he got assaulted by one, of the Maccabi hooligans. This is also on video with a weapon. His car was attacked.

He drove off to the police, and the police actually refused to let him file a report, and he had to get the help of a lawyer, and only then days and days later he was able to file a report. Well, the cab drivers in Amsterdam are known to stand up for each other, So, well, one of them getting attacked, that's where they drew a line. There's a very good reporting as well by Salah Edin on YouTube on the actual story of the cab drivers, how they experienced it because they were being attacked. They were also afraid, but they also saw that their bread driving around in the city, getting people from A to B, that, well, their work was also in danger because violent hooligans were marching the streets.

with weapon attacking people from Amsterdam attacking them. And, well, they countered the Maccabi Huygens. And as a result, the group had to flee. They ended up hiding in a casino. And one of them actually ended up in the Amsterdam canals. So that is where it all started. And then the day after, on Thursday, that is the day of the match, We had a city council meeting, and this is also when I asked questions to the mayor why this Maccabi team was allowed to play in Amsterdam and why they were allowed to bring their fans.

And the mayor said that it wasn't in her jurisdiction to make that call and she's got a point there that it's actually FIFA and UEFA, who I think should ban all Israeli teams, at least as long as the occupation and the genocide is going on, or at the bare minimum. minimum, Maccabi should have been labeled as a high-risk club, which at this point it still isn't. But the mayor of Amsterdam and also the public prosecutor and the police, they also made a political analysis. And here I think they made a huge mistake because not only is Maccabi Tel Aviv one of the most racist clubs in Israel itself, their fans are known to sing genocidal chance wherever they go.

And they even did that in Amsterdam years and years ago. And just months before this last match, they proudly re-uploaded a video of them on social media singing a genocidal chance. And also, Maccabi hooligans are known for their violence against fans of Israeli clubs that are conspited to be leftists, but also they're known for their violence against Israelis who protest against Netanyahu. And with the mandatory subscription to the IOF in Israel, you can safely say that these hooligans are violent Zionists who glorify genocide, many of them being IOWF soldiers among, of course, also war criminals. One of them in a Dutch newspaper even complained how he came to Amsterdam as a vacation in between his job in the IOF. so the Israeli occupation force which I refer to

when I talk about the IDF and these people should have never been allowed in our city marching our streets chanting things like death to Arabs while many people in our city they are Arabs they are Muslims and in Amsterdam

literally every day people have been protesting against the genocide so how the mayor couldn't see it coming that this situation was going to explode is beyond me. And as a safety percussion,

different areas were declared to be safety security zones. So this was still on Thursday. And within these zones, like the dam square, for example, the city center of Amsterdam, before the match,

Makabi hulguns, they sang genocidal chants. They harassed and attacked people who looked like Muslims or Arabs or people who were wearing Palestinian symbols. and the police, they stood by and they did nothing. And after the match, these same hooligans were able to get back to the city center

where they armed themselves with metal pipes and also stones. And again, attacking people throwing stones through windows of houses that had Palestinian flags hanging. And when it became clear that the people of Amsterdam wouldn't accept this, the violent Zionist Maccabi hulgans who were this whole time, escorted by the police, were let into a bus by the police and they got taken to

their hotels, a free ride after, well, everything they did. And then the next day, and that's where I think I will end it and give you guys an opportunity to respond. The next day, politicians and media in the Netherlands,

but also worldwide, they spoke about Jew hunting and programs and completely leaving out the context in which all of this happened. And the mayor of Amsterdam forbid all demonstrations up until the end of the weekend. Also very well-knowingly that the ban would mostly target pro-Palestinian activists since they have been the ones who have been demonstrating in our city on a daily basis. And on this day, on the Friday after the match, here at Wilders, who is the de facto leader

of the country, I would say, who is convicted for discrimination. And is the leader of the biggest party in the Netherlands, a party that is racist and Islamophobic, for example, calling for a ban on the Quran and Islamic schools. He sat down with the Speaker of the Knesset. And you can say from here on out, media and politicians in the Netherlands, opened their doors for the propaganda of the extreme right and Zionists, coming from the Netherlands itself, but also directly from Israel. Because soon after, for example, it became clear that the Dutch state started working together with the Israeli regime to investigate what happened in the week of the football match.

And now, and that's then literally the final thing I'm going to say, now we know that they have published a report already targeting pro-Palestinian activists and organizations and even a right-wing journalist coming out and saying, well, some of these people. who were involved with counter attacks against Maccabi hooligans, it's better if they don't travel to Turkey or to Morocco next summer because the Mossad is going to be after them. And that's one thing I forget. That was also already known before the match that Mossad was actually traveling along with Maccabi Tel Aviv to protect the team. So I'm just going to leave it for here now and let you guys jump in.

Yeah, well, that was a wonderful account of the events on Wednesday and Thursday. And I had wanted, you know, to actually follow up and ask if it had been known to city authorities and the police that Mossad agents, you know, according to a Jerusalem Post article, had announced before, at least a couple of days before the actual match and before the Maccabi Tel Aviv fans actually are. arrived, you know, in the Netherlands, that they would be accompanying them. And, of course, it was framed by them as, you know, for the protection of the traveling away fans and Israelis. However, I'm wondering, what was this, you know, knowledge available? Did they know about this? And of course, the implication here is that it is a very hostile, you know, situation. they're already anticipating, you know, that there's going to be, you know, problems, regardless of who is involved and that should have been a signal, shouldn't it have been to city authorities and UEFA that this was a security problem potentially and that perhaps the away traveling fans, as has been the case in many other matches where they have deemed, you know, the presence of away fans.

as a danger and a security risk that, you know, this should have meant that they shouldn't be there or at the very least that there should have been measures by the local police to restrain, you know, these fans, you know, and keep them under control. And from your account, it seems like none of that was happening. In fact, actually, there was facilitation of their criminal behavior by the police. That's something I wanted to ask a little bit more about. And then the second point is in your account of what happened on Thursday, you mentioned that the police, you know, ended up facilitating their move when the situation became difficult and there was a counter response by local, you know, residents to the violence of the Makabi fans that they helped them, you know, go back to their hotel at the end of the night, you know, on buses. for the purpose. But I believe there were reports as well that some of the violence by Maccabi Tel Aviv fans

had been directed actually at the police themselves at certain points over the evening. And it's so, therefore, it's really quite remarkable that there was no police response or police reporting about, you know, these problems. It was kept very quiet and only came out later that maybe 10 fans or something from among the Maccabi Tel Aviv group of hooligans, you know, had been arrested.

And it's still unclear to me exactly what their status is and has been. But those are two questions about what happened on the evening I wanted to ask you about for further information and comment. Yeah. Yeah, well, it's like you said, not only Israeli newspapers, but also Dutch media have reported on the Mossad coming to the Netherlands so of course myself but also another city council member

asked questions about this to the mayor on Thursday and she said Italy well then you have more information than I do which is very interesting because later it came out that the

Mossad itself apparently warned the Dutch government about violence directed at Maccabi fans if they would come to Amsterdam, which of course was also, like you said, the reasoning why they should come over to protect him. And well, everybody by now has seen what really happened and who needed to be protected. And I just want to say this here because I think this is very important to mention that a lot of people in Amsterdam on Wednesday and on Thursday have felt very unsafe

because people were allowed by the government, by the municipality, by the mayor, by the police, by the public prosecutor, by the authorities to march on our streets while they were armed while they were chanting, let the IDF win to F all Arabs and which is part of a longer song. And there are no schools in Gaza left because there are no children.

anymore. And people were attacked in the city center of Amsterdam for wearing Palestinian symbols. So there was a lot of feelings of unsafety among people of Amsterdam. And this is also being left out completely by most media internationally. Well, it also sounds like it hasn't been addressed by municipal authorities and the police about why they didn't. you know, do any policing or put in any safety and security measures to protect the population from, you know, these hooligans, which is like a normal standard, you know, procedure when you have away fans for a big event, a football match, you put in the place to, you know, protect people, to keep restraint, make sure there's no property damage and and so on. But quite the

reverse seems to have happened. And no, you know, the fact that the Mossad agents had already announced means that they, in some sense, set up and framed, you know, the way this situation should be perceived, right? It suggests that they intended and, you know, intended to provoke violence and, you know, unsafety in the local, in local population. And yet the authorities have not addressed anything about what happened before that they failed to manage these, you know, this situation and provide. policing and security, which is their mandate.

I mean, it's it's like they were prepared to give impunity to these, you know, violent hooligans from the outset. Yeah, yeah, I'm just thinking about what I, I think I spoke to a media outlet while it was happening. And I said, well, it looks like a very well-known Zionist tactic to provoke, to attack, tend to play the victim and we should come back to that later but what also happened on that Thursday night because what you're referring to right now is very important because so these designated safety security zones were actually there for the police to intervene quicker than

they normally can to protect public safety but if you look on specifically Thursday night when the match was happening, pro-Palestinian protesters, they were banned from demonstrating in front of the stadium where the football match is happening. And we have a, well, the mayor always says the right to protest, it's holy. And you always have to do it within sight and hearing distance. So the mayor of Amsterdam and the city board in general considers to be the right to protest as good as holy. And so you should also always be allowed to protest in sight and hearing distance. Well, they flew this out of the door when pro-Palestine protesters wanted to protest against Makabi playing in Amsterdam. And on that Thursday night,

while the police should be protecting the people from Amsterdam and also just people their property because they were also attacking property against these maccabi hooligans they were actually mostly mobilized to keep pro-Palestinian protesters in Czech who tried to demonstrate so while there was a massive police force in the city most of them were actually focused basically trying to make sure that the pro-Palestinian protesters wouldn't reach the stadium where they, according to the law, should be allowed to protest. And this is the context in which these macabee huligans were free to roam around the city and do whatever I just described.

Yeah, I just one other thing I wanted to mention. And of course, also, of course, the police themselves were attacked, which is quite amazing. That's a second question, you know, respond. They let the situation become so out of control that, the violence turned against them and they were unprepared to deal with it, which is quite amazing. But one other point of you had mentioned is that you had already raised the question, it seems to me, of why in the city council meetings on the Thursday, the day of the match later that evening, the match happens in the evening. But during the day, there were city council meetings and that you participated in. you mentioned that you were raising some of these concerns and objections about safety and about, you know, the fact that there's no good reason for, you know, clubs of a country that are violating international law, crimes against humanity, genocide, and so on, should be allowed in, you know, to travel, you know, for the match. They should be banned and those teams should be banned.

But when they said that UEFA, that's not under their authority, couldn't they and did they at least make any appeals? Like if the police and the city council or the mayor's office of a host city of a football match writes and makes a formal kind of complaint or letter of concern to UEFA, even if it's not under their authority to ban these fans, if they, they actually expressed their serious concerns with the knowledge that they had about the situation, you know, maybe UEFA would have done it. It's not just up to UEFA to make its own decisions. It needs the contributions of the local police and the local city council. And did they do any of that? You know, maybe that's worth asking if it hasn't already come out. But that's not really an excuse to say that, well, this isn't under the purview of the Amsterdam municipality, when clearly the Amsterdam municipality can express its reservations and concerns to UEFA, you know, to act upon. Yeah, well, that's both very good questions.

And to confirm the question that you asked before, it is indeed correct that these maccabi hooligans that they attacked the police. There is actually video footage of this and you also see that the police didn't react to this only up until the point where you can also see this where

people from Amsterdam actually start well reacting to it and yeah to me it looked like they could do whatever they wanted to do under police protection even going so far as attacking the police itself

but only when there was a threat of a reaction by the people of Amsterdam. That's when the police stepped in. And at that point, they were literally standing on a square with a big bag full of stones that while they were being driven into the bus were throwing through windows of houses that had Palestinian flags. And then the second point that you're making, I'm sure that, the mayor could have made a different choice. Just to confirm what you're saying,

I think as the city board, you should have done anything in your capabilities to try to prevent this match from happening, also to reach out to UEFA. None of this happened. But next to that, I think they also did have good grounds to say, okay, these fans shouldn't be here, or maybe the whole match should not have been played.

And that's within the framework of the political analysis that they said they make. So next to the whole part of jurisdiction, they also made a political analysis. And they are also responsible for the public safety of people in Amsterdam. And I think with everything that we've seen happening, you could have, and I think you could have also expected this to happen. And I think the conclusion of the political analysis should have been, it's unsafe to bring this club to Amsterdam. It's unsafe to bring these fans here. So we are going to say no.

And we're going to find out a way, you know. And I think it was in Belgium where some Israeli clubs actually have been stopped from coming because of similar reasons. Also, just to fill in, also in Turkey, so Maccabee Tel Aviv's next game was to be played against Bishikash in Istanbul and that game was then moved. The Turkish government essentially said that they didn't want to be responsible for the safety of the team and all of the hooligans that were going to be following them into

Istanbul, the Zionist hooligans. They didn't see it their responsibility to protect these people who then go in rampage through the cities in the way that you've been describing. But then UEFA, the governing body for these European competitions, then coordinated with the Hungarian government to relocate the game to a third neutral location

in Hungary for the game to take place between Maccabit Tel Aviv and Bishikas, just to add that into it. Well, I mean, that's actually an important point, Henry, because it wasn't unprecedented that there would be security issues. These could easily have been anticipated, and it's rather shocking that the municipal authorities and police of Amsterdam didn't, you know, actually be proactive in this circumstance,

as we were talking about. But it also shows that UEFA, rather than simply doing what it has done in the past, which has banned, you know, the away supporters who are the source of the violence, they actually took away a home match. for Besiktash and made them play in a neutral venue as their home match without their fans being able to attend. So, you know, there's a real bias and a problem with these institutions at so many levels. But one final sort of point just on what happened before is that is there no kind of concern that agents of, you know, intelligence service of a foreign country? would openly announce that they were accompanying and providing, you know, unauthorized, private, so-called security for, you know, a touristic group traveling somewhere else.

I mean, this seems like a pretty shocking, you know, practice or procedure that other countries would have to vet and you wouldn't just allow foreign intelligence. service to openly work on your streets. You know, this, another sort of crazy, shocking thing that they allowed. And I'm hoping that there will be some questions about those decisions, too. You indicated, Jay-Z, that the mayor, despite this being reported not only in the Jerusalem post, but you pointed out it was reported in the Dutch press, nonetheless claimed not to have had knowledge of this beforehand. That's, I, their incompetence or its real abdication of responsibility to, you know, oversee some sort of meaningful process to prevent, you know, foreign intelligence services operating in your

streets without authorization. Or it's obfuscation, you know. Well, clearly that's in some ways what it is. Of course. I think that you are being a little bit too charitable with your interpretation of that at none. Well, I'm not in trying. I'm saying just on those strict grounds, there's questions to be raised. I'm thinking of what Jay-Z can maybe even bring up if it hasn't been brought in the city council.

Yeah. So, I think, I think it's good to maybe give some contacts here of the political situation in the Netherlands. So I've told you, and you probably know about the pay for fair, he had a head, wielders, an extreme

right-wing party becoming the biggest, the last elections, then forming a government with a couple of other parties, basically a right-wing, extreme right-wing government. And he has been waiting for something like this to happen. So the moment the situation exploded, he came out and he called for deportations, specifically Moroccans. So what you can see is that the situation that happened was being used by local authorities in Amsterdam to put on a demonstration ban, which I can talk about more later. The national government or national politicians have been using this to basically push their agenda, the political agenda of hatred towards Muslims and migrants and refugees.

And thirdly, the ties with the Israeli regime were being strengthened. The doors for Israeli propaganda were opened. And one of the things that I think says a lot about the Dutch government and the Israeli regime working together is the fact that the Dutch state thought it was perfectly okay to work together with the Israeli regime,

which is currently committing a genocide, which is legally occupying the West Bank, which is doing programs themselves in the West Bank as we speak, to work together with them on the investigation about what happened last week. I mean, that just says a lot. And the mayor of MSM also used the word program, and she later basically said that she shouldn't have said that. So she took her words back.

And as a response, the minister of foreign affairs from Israel, or the Zionist entity called Israel, said that it is completely unacceptable that the mayor took back her words. And he even said that she tried to shove like what happened under the rock. And to me, that is just, well, wow, I'm like Israel, like I said, is committing a genocide right now. in Gaza. They're doing programs themselves in the West Bank. And they're using this situation, of course, to throw whatever they're doing under the rod. But they're pointing their finger at Amsterdam. They're pointing their finger, even at the mayor. So I think this says a lot about the pressure Dutch politicians and also Dutch media are under right now. And it literally took days in the Netherlands for mainstream media to start reporting on what actually

happened. And in those days, I've been interviewed by many international media who were actually interested in hearing the other side of the story, what actually happened. But it took days here in the Netherlands, not only for the media, but also for politicians to actually understand what really happened. And yeah, that shows how deeply influenced our state and our media. are by Zainist propaganda and specifically yeah

also the PVEV by the Israeli regime because the moment Geert Wilder sat down with the speaker of the Knesset after that

yeah Dutch government officials politicians they all started sitting down with Israeli politicians and government officials

so well I want to talk about the reaction a bit but also to talk about how narrative is important within the way that things are framed and the way that stories get out there. So narrative is something that I focused on quite a bit on the show, particularly within the last, I'd say about the last year or so. When we think

about narrative, narrative is not just a reflection of reality. In fact, it is what creates reality. So I'm paraphrasing Michael Halliday here, a functional linguist who said language does not passively reflect reality. Language actively creates reality. Now, when it comes to narrative and the way that language is utilized within the imperialist West and within colonial nations and settler colonial nations, the narrative is always structured in a way that is pro-Zionist. And so what happens is that when events come to bear, these events take place, the events that Jay-Z has been describing, the narrative that breaks out then is not necessarily an accurate reflection of reality, but it is always an inaccurate reflection of reality in a single direction. Why? Because these states that have a vested interest in colonialism and imperialism have an interest in shaping reality, utilizing narrative. So when we see the narrative breaking out as an event is unfolding, what we see is this acceptance of any Zionist narrative and this quelling of any narrative that would be against

what the Zionist narrative would be, regardless of what the facts are. And so in this case, what we see is that that narrative that was coming out of pogroms is the one that gets picked up by the mainstream media outlets that are run out of the imperialist West. We do not see any of that early reporting coming out as things are quote unquote unverified in terms of what the Maccabee hooligans are doing. We only see that program language. And as we look at how things are reported, we see stark examples of how. how this countervailing narrative, the narrative that goes against the Zionist narrative,

is quelled. The electronic intifada, which I know Adnan and I recommend to everyone all the time, and I'm going to recommend checking out the electronic intifada once again if you don't regularly read them and watch their material. Our friend Aesowin Stanley recently conducted an interview and then also put out a text-based update on how the New York Times killed one of its own reports by a Dutch reporter that the New York Times has

that was an investigation into what happened during these events in Amsterdam. That story that the reporter Christian Tribert had written, which showed, again, showed the facts based on an investigation, showing that these quote-unquote anti-Semitic attacks actually showed Israeli mob violence against Dutch citizens. When this report was filed, the New York Times killed that. And this story came out because an email that showed that they killed it accidentally came out. So what we see here is an example.

And I can, if I remember, I'll try to link to this piece from the electronic intifada in the show notes so that people can check it out. But what we see is time and time again when there is early reporting of some, something happening, what is the narrative that is always picked up? It's always the Zionist narrative. It's always the imperialist narrative. It's always the colonizers narrative. And it's because this early narrative that is put forth before people constructs reality. It reinforces imperialist narratives, colonial narratives, in the minds of people who otherwise are not informed about these sorts of matters. And so, the reason that I'm bringing this up is that

as time goes on and we get farther and farther away from the event taking place as more of these facts begin to come out it fades away from popular consciousness so once things are clarified people just generally speaking you know gorilla history listeners are not your average person but the average person loses interest they get distracted they forget about what happened last week or the week before and so as these facts come out the facts aren't what are picked up in popular consciousness. The reality is what that original reporting was, which is always the colonial and imperial narrative, the one that supports the Zionist entity. So, Jay-Z, with that exposition out of the way, I want to turn it to you to discuss how the narrative is portrayed within the

Netherlands, not only of this event, but more broadly speaking, with the genocide that is ongoing within Palestine and particularly within Gaza, but of course Palestine has been under a perpetual genocide for decades. And then also how the narrative that comes out of the Netherlands into the more broad West consciousness similarly reinforces these narratives. So if you can speak on that at all, that would be great. Yeah, thank you. So just to give you some perspective on in relation to what happened. It was, of course, two weeks ago when the match happened. But while the match happened, I think on that day, at least 40 people were murdered in Gaza.

The IOWF, they blew up Palestinian houses as a result to what happened in Amsterdam on the next day. I think it was a couple of days later when a UN report came out that said that 70% of the people who got murdered in Gaza that they are women and children. And so we have been seeing nothing or barely anything about this in the Dutch media because they were busy with trying to uphold the Zionist thing. And even that is last week Tuesday when there was an emergency debate about what happened in that week before, the mayor of Amsterdam said that a Muslim woman who was shopping with her husband and kid and got hit on the head by riot police

collapsed, ended on the ground with her face covered in blood that this woman wasn't a victim of police violence but that she fell. And this was later exposed to be a lie by independent leftist Dutch media maker left laser. And the mayor and also police later confirmed that she probably was hit

And now an investigation has opened. So, yeah, just to, I think that's important also to say, because what we've been experiencing here is that they will, like, lie to your face and only up until the point where you actually show them the video footage and expose their lies, then they will come around and they'll say, oh, yeah, we'll open an investigation. Well, actually, the woman that I was speaking about has a severe, severe head or even brain damage.

So this was very, very clearly police violence. And during the city council that followed on the emergency debate about what happened, one of the policy proposals that I filed was to stop working together with Citi, which is basically the Dutch APEC, you can say. say. And the voting on that policy proposal says a lot about the state of the left in the Netherlands. Because not only do the social democrats, the Partai von derbyter party of the workers, are one of the main, let's say, producers of the chairs of the city, also DASIS and Sesteg, a more liberal, progressive party, has also delivered a lot of chairs

to the board of C.E. But our policy proposal to stop working together with them only got the support from two other small parties who are migrant parties who are pro-Palestinian and another party, which is also kind of on the left of the left, it's the party for the animals. Mostly they focus on animal rights, sustainability, but specifically about this proposal, they said that this organization, city, that the government or the municipality shouldn't be working together with them because they are framing everything in a very one-sided way, that they're pushing a one-sided narrative, but also that they are attacking and trying to I'm trying to basically make people shut up about what's actually happening by pressuring them.

And I'll give you one example of how they're actually trying to get a civil servant who was working for the municipality in Amsterdam. He was speaking out against the genocide, they're trying to get this person fired. And they're also targeting other civil servants. and so that's also what I wanted to share and maybe before I go to your next question there's two other things that I think is also worth worth mentioning because as a result of everything that happened last week on Monday riots broke out in New West which is a district in Amsterdam where most of our Arab and also March.

Muslim population lives. And the next day, as a result of what later turned out to be a 16-year-old kid who threw a Molotov cocktail or something in a tram, all public transport was stopped in the whole district. So there was collective punishment of everybody living there for the action of just one person. And that is also what people from that neighborhood have been telling me, they're concerned that every single action of a Muslim individual in the Netherlands will lead to collective punishment of all Muslims.

And I think that's what we see happening right now. And the demonstration ban that I was talking about before, it should have stopped on Sunday, but then they extended it until Thursday. And this is something I also want to share with you, because on that Wednesday evening, which was the last day, that the police to just to say it had free reign

to do whatever they wanted because there was an emergency state nobody could protest they could search anybody anywhere where they wanted they drove pro-Palestinian protesters who've been going out on the streets

despite of the ban or specifically also against the ban to demonstrate they drove them off to an industrial area on the side skirts of the city

and they hunted them down beats them up, hunted them down again and I've also seen video footage of this and now there's also going to be an investigation about this but yeah it just clearly shows also on which type the police is and also that well yeah that they were really really waiting for an opportunity it looks like to just beat up pro-Palestinian protesters.

And when they had that opportunity, they did. And I'm very curious what the result of that investigation is going to be. So it started with violent Zionists roaming through our city doing whatever they wanted under the protection of the police. Then the framing, the Zionist framing of pogroms and anti-Semitic attacks got taken over by Dutch media, by Dutch politicians, specifically also with the goal to not only criminalize pro-Palestinian protesters, but also to call for deportations of Muslims, for example. So it was being picked up by Zionists, or it was being picked up by media worldwide.

Then the Israeli state started using it also as, hey, yeah, look at this. This is exactly the anti-Semitism that we are defending ourselves to. in Israel right now. So they were actually also using what happened in Amsterdam, although the designers for the perpetrators there, they were using it to defend the genocide that they are still committing, that they were committing it while they were saying that. So it was just, yeah, you can say it was just very, very nasty.

And I just cannot understand how people could go along with this. And it also just says a lot about the current state of the left in the Netherlands, because, yeah, what I would say is that there isn't really a left anymore. The biggest party in the Netherlands, Gungling Spay from the A, which is a coalition between the party called the Green Left and the Social Democrats, labor, they're not voting to stop transporting arms to Israel. They're not voting for an economic ban on Israel. So if even the biggest party on the left and the Green Left is itself a coalition formed in the beginning of the 90s by the Communist Party of the Netherlands and also by the socialist, pacifist party, if even this party cannot stand up for what is right and not only for what is right, but also for what the Netherlands should do according to international law, Then that just says a lot about the very, very sad state, to put it like that, off the left in the Netherlands. And that is also why what we are doing as a team in the city council, we don't use our position there to, well, we don't see the politics as a goal, but as a means. So we really try to use our seats in the city council to try to pull the left to the left to the,

the left again because what we've seen in the last decades is that the left has just been going along with the rhetoric and the narratives of the right. And here in the Netherlands, that is specifically like very xenophobic, very racist against Muslims, against refugees, against migrants in general, but which is also just very Zionist, for example. And so you see that the extreme right and Zionism or fascism and Zionism actually goes hand in hand here in the Netherlands and this is also one of the reasons why we are now because the next city council elections are going to be up in March 2026 so I'm trying to

actually build a united front with other political parties who are on the left of the left and also activist grassroots parties because we are really in a situation here the left where we are in the defense, you know, where the extreme right-wing party that nobody wanted to work with for years and years suddenly is empowered. Suddenly everybody is bowing down to them. So we are trying to, yeah, organize ourselves to, yeah, to stand up against this government, which is becoming more and more authoritarian, but also against the left, which is basically complicit in the Netherlands turning more and more into a right-wing country, more and more

into a country that keeps on surfing the goals and the wishes of the U.S. And with that, of course, the Zionist entity Israel. Yeah, this is, I mean, really interesting analysis.

I'm so much enjoying your discussion of this because it makes many things very clear and links a lot of big problems and issues together in this perspective that you have. And I have to say, I wish you and your comrades a lot of success in what you're doing. It's a difficult fight because what you're pointing out in terms of Henry's framing of the question of narrative is that the left wing

and not even liberals, but the left, supposedly the left you're pointing out, is accepting the framing narratives of the right wing. And of course, when you participate in that, rather than calling it into question, then you keep, you know, being complicit in more and more right-wing kinds of actions taking place. I was very interested in the point that you mentioned that, of course, this is being used to criminalize protests, pro-Palestine protest. And of course, it's only a small step to expand police powers and to erode rights of political organizing and protests for other causes. They use one that there's seemingly some kind of consensus on to express authoritarian political suppression. And then they expand. And it continues to erode the fundamental rights. You know, and the left keeps, it seems, going along with this. Rather than defending and, you know, organizing to try and stop it, they're actually part of the problem here. It seems it seems like. And when you mention, And this was a very interesting point that you mentioned, that people in residence in that neighborhood where there was one particular incidents of like a, you know, vandalism and attack, you know, throwing a Molotov cocktail on public transportation is that there is collective punishment. That's what they're worried about.

is that something that would be dealt with as an individual case of public disorder that has to be, you know, resolved, becomes collectivized and generalized for a whole population. And that, it seems, is that it's politicizing everything related to the Dutch Moroccan and Muslim and immigrant kind of life and behavior in the Netherlands. So it seems to suggest to me, and I'm wondering your feeling on this, seems to me, in some sense, is very connected with this way that the right-wing government is trying to use it to deport and to strip, you know, in this case, citizenship rights, actually, you know, that's if somebody's a dual citizen, they're still fully a Dutch citizen, but they want to strip them of their rights if they are, you know, basically pro-Palestine. and if they run a foul of, you know, these kinds of new strictures that are being used to marginalize and exclude people and to criminalize, you know, rights of political protest. So there's something that's connecting all of these together, which is clearly that these Dutch Moroccans and immigrants and other groups are not really regarded fundamentally. Even by the left, they're accepting these presumptions. They're not regarded as fully Dutch citizens that have equal rights to others, that they are being excluded and that the basis for it is racism and Islamophobia that has become so rife that it's possible to undermine. And I heard something interesting.

I'm wondering your comment on this. I heard something interesting by Dr. Karim Atash on his. that he does collaboratively with another person, Bit Beat Beat Media. And he's of Moroccan, I mean, no, excuse me, I think he, I believe he's Dutch, but he has some Algerian background. And he was talking about how even the left media that was talking about what happened on Wednesday and Thursday really de-emphasize the fact that the Dutch Moroccan. seem to have been the ones particularly targeted by the Zionist Tel Aviv violent hooligans and also were the ones who were defending, you know, their rights on behalf of their, you know, city, you know, since the police weren't doing it, you know, the ones who were who were trying to defend themselves and to defend, you know, their city were these Dutch Moroccans and seldom in the reporting had they really been a reprim. presented, you know, sometimes it was just talked about as Dutch people, but there was a specific racialized targeting, you know, of this population. And that same population has then been not only abandoned and left to face the violence on their own of these, you know,

hooligans, Zionist hooligans from outside the Netherlands, but then they are the ones who are being then punished, attacked by the state itself, arrested and demonized, and so on. And so what it seems to me is that there is such a huge problem of racism and Islamophobia in the Netherlands and in the rest of the, you know, in the rest of Europe as well, but it seems extremely concerning that this is what's motivating and organizing the politics in, you know, in the Netherlands. Like, you can't understand the politics of the Netherlands without understanding that there is a huge measure of racism and Islamophobia even on the left that accepts all of

the presumptions and the right wing framing and thus goes along with the right wing policies. And just to add in Adnan, you know, this is not something that is unique to the Netherlands and it's not unique to this population either. You know, every time that we look at, and this is particularly the case, within imperialist countries, if you look at groups that are on the left, these groups that are on the left and individuals that are on the left are always allowed to be brutalized by other groups that align themselves with imperialism, even if that group that is on the left is within the country that is being targeted by these other imperialist groups.

And then, of course, there's layers to that, marginalized communities in whatever way we could talk about racial minorities, religious minorities, et cetera. These minority groups are even more the target of the brunt of these attacks. But again, when the attacks are taking place by allies of imperialism or imperialists themselves, then the other way is looked, even when the targeted community is of the country that should be able to fight back against those sorts of attacks. So this is definitely not just unique to the Netherlands, but listeners, if you're from an imperialist country, you can probably think of an instance in which some marginalized group, political, racial, religious, sexual, whatever, was brutalized by an outside force and very little was done to come to their aid because of their identity or because of their political background. I just wanted to add that in there. Yes.

Yeah, if I can step in, what I want to say is something to begin with, and then I'll continue where you left off. But yeah, it's not nice, you can say, to be a leftist in the Netherlands. And I think it's a worldwide problem, of course, what we're seeing. Fascism is rising everywhere. But what is motivating me, what is inspiring me, is the people who are fighting fascism, Zionism, imperialism and neo-colonialism.

And in Amsterdam, there is, of course, people who are doing that, one of the groups that are most active are actually the victims who are victimized most by the system. And these are undocumented people, people who have no papers. But also recently, my colleague and me, we've met up with about 400 parliament members from mostly the global south in a meeting to do. to organize, basically, on an international level, to organize people and politicians against rising fascism. And they also considered Zionism to be a manifestation, actually, of fascism. So, yeah, that's what's kind of inspiring me to go on, despite the terrible situation that we're in.

So, for example, Schof, the prime minister, who was being pushed forward by fair, Willis as I think his fourth candidate because the first three candidates didn't go through. One turned out to be a criminal and well that's a whole other story but in the end they found their guy and he was actually the head of the security or of the security intelligence services in the Netherlands which is also worth mentioning and he came out after what happened on that night and he pointed his finger, Schof the prime minister at migrants saying that we have a problem with integration

and we have a problem with migration and whatnot. And also what he did was he made it possible for people who I say defended their city against violence sinus, he made it possible for them to be convicted as terrorists.

And of course, Gheb Wilders, the de facto leader in the country who is using X or Twitter, I should say actually, as its platform, to cheer him on while he's pushing his racist policies. And of course, things like this could have never happened if it weren't or if the left wouldn't have given in to this narrative changing over the decades. And so what you saw in the last couple of two weeks, for example,

is that the left in Amsterdam, and that's including the Socialist Party, that's including the party for the animals, which are most of the times more critical than the biggest leftist party, Groomings Pei from the A. They voted in favor of the demonstration ban. And also they voted in favor of asking the extreme right-wing government to send more police to Amsterdam. So that is important to understand like how it could have come to this point. And also, for example, the socialist party in the Netherlands, they kicked out. their youth organization.

They banned them from their party because they were considered to be two Marxists. And also just recently, their new leader, who I must say is doing better than the former leader, he went along with the racist narrative that the Netherlands has an integration or a migrant problem

instead of pushing back against these racist narrative, instead of actually telling the truth about the Netherlands being an imperialist country, a colonial violent country who has been

terrorizing the world for 400 years. Firstly, of course, with actual colonialism, but on this day, by supporting imperialist wars, by a neo-colonelicism through trade agreements, I don't have to tell you guys, of course.

And yeah, what is also interesting is that this whole this whole, like everybody getting angry about so-called Jew hunts and programs. To put this in perspective, Dutch football fans of other teams who are playing Iox, because sometimes Ajax is claimed to be like a Jewish club, which is a discussion I think we shouldn't go into, but as a result of this, Dutch football fans have openly been calling for things like, we will go on a Jew hunt and stuff like this.

And it never became a problem this big, like, what happened two weeks ago. So, apparently, it is okay if you're white to call and go out for a Jew hunt. And it is okay also for Gheed Wilders, the de facto leader of the country, to use what happened two weeks ago to basically call out for a Moroccan hunt because that's what you could definitely define what he's being saying. But what is also important to notice is that there's voices who are being silenced and that are the voices of anti-Zionist Jews in the Netherlands. So, for example, there's an organization, an anti-Zionist Jewish collective called Adavrov

who wanted to commemorate a Kristolnacht. And they have been talking to the police, and the police try to prevent them from having the commemoration because they thought, that's what they said at the beginning, that they would vandalize the monument and that is the monument of the Jewish resistance in the Second World War that that would be vandalized

so then a Jewish person had to explain the Dutch police like how offensive that is and then they started coming up but yeah but you are going to be attacked by anti-fascist and then they had to respond but wait who do you think we are like we are

commemorated Kristolnacht all of us everybody that's going to be there are going to be anti-fascists. So these people, anti-Zionist Jews, they felt so unsafe that they had to cancel their Kristolnacht commemoration also because that was right on the Sunday after they saw that very violent Zionists were able to walk around the city without the police touching them and people being attacked. So that is also important to note that also politicians and media they are mostly amplifying the voices of Zionists.

And most of these, the worst Zionists are actually not Jewish themselves, right? But in the same time, they are censoring and silencing Jews who are anti-Zionists because that just doesn't fit their narrative. Yeah, absolutely. That's such an important point. And it shows the interconnection between Zionism and fashion. that you mentioned earlier before and that the charge of anti-Semitism has become so compromised and perverted to be used as justification for fascistic violence, while at the

same time genuine anti-Semitism continues on. You're just pointing out a very anti-Semitic kind of approach towards these anti-Zionist Jews. And so this kind of situation has really inverted, you could say, you know, a genuine understanding that the left should have together on universal values of opposing, you know, racism in all its forms. It's now, you know, impossible to, it seems, create that kind of consensus because people have become so confused by the inversion of this narrative and are missing, I think, that very important point that you mentioned of the way in which there was a mutually reinforcing politics. between, you know, Zionist Israel's genocidal policies and occupation and suppression of the

Palestinians and using the idea that anti-Semitism out in the world is so terrible that it justifies what we're doing here. We have to have this kind of violence and that Israel is the only safe place for Jews, you know, this is kind of the narrative that is being used in the context of a failed, you know, kind of war is not achieving its military means. They're suffering great economic, you know, kinds of problems as a result of this. Yet, you know, this is a way to reinforce their position, right? So that's one hand. And the other side is the right-wing fascistic, you know, forces that use these provocative attempts to create this situation to then demonize, you know, Muslims, Moroccans, immigrants, migrants, and others for their politics of

racial exclusion in Europe. So we've got a kind of mutually reinforcing situation and we really need clear-headed, you know, thinkers like yourself, active, you know, in the society and in the government to clarify and to break down this kind of mutually reinforcing politics of Zionism and fascism together. So what I want to turn it over to Henry is to ask you about, you know, what kinds of things you're going to be doing in the council forward, given this kind of political situation that you've been very articulate in in discussing with us today. So maybe you can wrap us up. Of course. So, you know, I mentioned at the top of this conversation that we wanted to record this last week, but Jay-Z was in city council meetings, doing actual work, you know,

like we all try to do from time to time, but his work was rather important at that particular moment. Now, of course, the work that Jay-Zee, you've been doing regarding, you know, combating Zionist narratives, combating Zionist influence, combating Zionist policy, and supporting a free Palestine goes far before the events that we've been primarily discussing on this program regarding the events surrounding the Iax-Macabee Tel Aviv match. Your actions and your work extends far before that. Your party is committed to a free Palestine. And so, and then also, as I mentioned, you were actually in a city council meeting at the end of last week when we wanted to record with you. So, you know, that work is ongoing, and I know you have plans for continued work in this

regard. So can you tell the listeners a bit about the work that you have done in this field, the work that you are doing in this field, and what the plans are going forward for both you and your party, or your pre-party formation, I should say. Yeah. Thank you. So, yeah, maybe just one small thing to begin with, the I-H-R-A definition. You are probably known you probably know what I'm talking about.

This is the definition which has been taking off of our definition of anti-Semitism which has been taking over by the National Parliament in the Netherlands which was being pushed by Zionist lobby organizations like CID that I tried to cut ties with or that we tried to cut ties with

and that the left refused to do so. And just to be clear on this, the person who created this definition himself said that it was meant to be a working definition. I had that. It was never meant to be used in the way it is being used now. Numerous human rights groups, scholars have spoken out against this definition because not only it classifies anti-Zionism as anti-Semitism, but it also makes Jewish people more unsafe because it doesn't address actual anti-Semitism enough, because it mostly focuses on labeling anti-Zianism as anti-Semitism.

Jay-Z, just to step in for one quick second. So, of course, we have talked about the IHRA definition several times on our show, but I also want to direct the listeners to Adnan's other podcast, the Mudge List. Adnan, I recall about three years ago, probably at this point, you have an episode that's devoted to the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism. And that was, we've got a couple. Yeah, I remember, I know I've listened to all of your. episodes, but there was one in particular. I don't remember who the guest was, but it was

an absolutely terrific and enlightening discussion that really dove deep into that definition as used by the IHRA, the political reasoning for the creation and the adaptation of the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism and the need to combat it, both within the academy where you are located, as well as in activist circles where, you know, I know J-Z work in the government, but where you come from, where I come from. So just to recommend that episode of Mudgellis, I don't recall the title of it, Adnan, but I'll get some links to your episodes in the show notes as well. So listeners, check that.

But what Jasey's saying is absolutely correct that the person who developed it has since repudiated the use that is being made, basically to immunize criticism of the state of Israel and its policies. And the problem is, is that many governments and municipalities and institutions are adopting officially this definition. So that's definitely, you know, an issue and it's being developed with a new set of parameters that are even more anti-Zionist in the approach in Canada right now. There's an IRHRA handbook that's been developed that expands the way in which, you know,

it limits or classifies critique, anti-Zionism. critique of Israel's policies as anti-Semitic. So that's definitely something that's a common front, and listeners everywhere you are, you should be aware that this definition is being used to essentially criminalize and isolate and marginalize criticism of Israel and anti-Zionist politics. So thank you very much, yeah, for elaborating that, because that indeed is very important. And then to come back to your other question, so we consciously didn't come out when we just came out with our new name, the Fonk, which is actually the name of one of the two of the first anti-fascist communist resistance newspapers during the Second World War, which actually translates to ISCRA, so you guys are known with that. We consciously said we are not a political party yet, but we will become one if the people want us to become one. Also, because what I said before, it's not our goal to be, I don't even like to be in the city council, to be honest.

Like, it's kind of like something we feel we have to do because if we're not doing it, like nobody else is doing it. And we came out when we made our new name known as, well, a political entity that tries to push revolutionary politics. So, of course, we use our seats in the city council to try to improve the living standards of people in Amsterdam. And then specifically, but not exclusively, people in the most marginalized position. So, for example, undocumented people, or I've been doing a lot of people, a lot of work for homeless people since, well, we've got a capitalist system that forces people into poverty, forces people to live on the streets, while we are living literally in one of the richest countries in the world. So it's not that we completely ignore what we can actually achieve. through parliamentary politics, but we don't think that the actual change

will come through parliamentary politics. So we mainly try to push the left to the left, bring the streets to the city council that's in Dutch you say, we bring it the strait na the raat, so then it rhymes. And we try to be a leftish watchdog. So we try to not only criticize what the city board is doing,

but also criticize the political, political positions of the leftists' parties. And so next to, for example, the policy proposal about the city, we have been, of course, trying to push through BDS policies without result, I must say. So before I got into politics, I was, and I still am an activist, and I've been squatting with undocumented people to make sure that they have a roof above their head. So although at that time I was actually considering myself

to be a revolutionary socialist, Trotskis mostly. I was working mostly with anarchists because they were the ones at that point in our city who were organizing solidarity with the people who were victimized most by neo-colonialists and by imperialists and by capitalism. isn't. But one of the things that I think I'm most proud of is that one of the policy proposals that I filed in that actually made it was to stop homeless people from being fined for sleeping

on Central Station in Amsterdam, which is just like if you don't have a home, you have to sleep somewhere, right? And then the police starts finding these people who don't have money, so the problems that they're in just become bigger and bigger. And I filed it in. And at first, the mayor's pre-advice, there's always a pre-advice to policy proposals, was that she wasn't going to support it. But in that specific city council,

she read through my policy proposal. She was like, I think Mr. Feldhausen is right. I'm going to say, I'm going to say, yes, she should vote in favor of it. And then what happened was that her department of basically public safety and public security wrote a letter in response to my policy proposal and it was full of shit, sorry for my language,

but they were just lying about what was happening. And I had to bring along a legal observer from an organization which is actually being subsidized by the municipality itself to help homeless people. I had to bring a legal person forward to tell the city council, to tell the city board that what the mayor wrote down in a letter, of course, she just got that information by a specific department was actually untrue and that people are getting fined for sleeping on the streets on almost a daily basis in central station.

But the sad thing is that now we're working on this again because we found out that they are still finding people who are sleeping on the streets, but they're not on central station, but just around the city itself. So, yeah, I'm proud of that, but maybe mostly what I think I'm proud of is not like the policy proposals that we've been filing in. We've been, we have, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, is to combine activism with the politics that we're doing in the city council. So, for example, on the moment that I was filing in a policy proposal

to make sure that nobody has to sleep on the streets in Amsterdam, grassroots organizations of homeless people, and just other organizations that help homeless people from a humanitarian standpoint, They were organizing a demonstration in front of the city council. And I think I'm most proud of that we try to do politics in this way and not, yeah, just, I don't know, like sit behind the desk, read whatever the city board is sending to us and then go to the city council meetings and talk about whatever they wrote down. No, we actually talk to the people who are, who are being targeted by policies. we organize with them and I think that's also

why we get respect from from the actual left and yeah we hope we're gonna we're gonna do good in the next elections if we're gonna run but after everything that's been happening in the last two weeks we've been getting

so much support from so many people in Amsterdam that yeah it looks like we're gonna do good well that's a great approach and I certainly wish you and your comrades great success. I'm just wondering, you know, given that approach that you've taken, what specific, you know, plans do you have vis-a-vis this issue that we've been discussing about the response and reaction to the public safety situation

as a result of the, you know, Tel Aviv, Makabi Tel Aviv supporters violating, you know, Your city, particularly since it seems to me that, as you mentioned, the mayor admitted that it was unwise to have characterized what happened on Thursday as a program against the Maccabee Tel Aviv supporters. It suggests to me that the revelations from independent news media, a journalists on the ground reporters documenting what actually happened, that they may be somewhat vulnerable here, you know, in terms of how they handled. And I'm wondering, you know, going forward, do you plan to still make an issue of this? And what are the avenues that you might be pursuing to, you know, raise the questions and put political pressure on city officials and

agencies for abdicating, you know, their responsibilities, at least, you know, within the structure of expectations of governance, they abandoned a lot of the significant responsibilities they should have for public safety, particularly for vulnerable communities who have now been demonized even further, you know, by the right-wing reaction and media portrayals. So, you know, what are the opportunities you might have going forward? for pushing on this issue and redressing, you know, the situation. So there's, of course, a lot of things that we are going to ask questions about. Everything that we have, that we've talked about is at some point going to be addressed by me

or my colleague Nila Pagmadi. But I think what is most important, to be honest, is that the city is going to make sure that there is going to be an independent research or evaluation on what happened that week. also on the emergency ban that came into effect after. And also the effect that it had on the people of Amsterdam and their feelings of unsafe or safety. And so I think that is one of the most important things that we are going to be asking about. But there's also, of course, the fact that the mayor basically lied about a woman who was brutally attacked by the police that she fell on the ground.

so we really need to hear apologies for that. That's just like a very basic thing. And of course, the fact that something like 10 days later, the mayor says that she shouldn't have used the word pogroms, well, it's kind of late. And I'm wondering how does she reflect on her, because that's what she's been also referring to, that the word program was being used now to inside hate,

towards other groups. So, well, we would want to hear a reflection on that. And next to that, I think it's mainly our task to keep on exposing the influence that Zionists have on our city and on the Dutch politics in general. But like I said before, we were in the defense. So what we have to make sure is that civil servants who work for the municipality,

who are pro-Palestinian, who go to protest, who dare to speak out against the genocide, that they're being protected, that their jobs are not being taken away. And we need to get every form of collaboration with Zionist entity Israel. We need to get rid of that as quickly as possible. But that's not something that we are going to achieve, of course. So we've now put forward the policy proposal to stop working to. together with CD, with APEC here. It got some media attention, but we will keep on continuing in this way.

And so, for example, we will be working on a policy proposal to, for example, work with the Jerusalem Declaration definition of anti-Semitism instead of the IHRA. And just last week, for example, I also filed in a couple of policy proposals of, well, One was Amsterdam against war, and it basically said that the city council speaks out against the transformation of our economy to a war economy, and that we speak out against any like military activity or companies involved with it in Amsterdam, because of course, all of that in the Netherlands is going to be the NATO military industrial complex, is going to be serving the geopolitical goals of the U.S. hegemony.

but that didn't get through but that is kind of the line that we're following. What we also voted about last week, a policy proposal I've written is because we are as a city shareholder of Schiphol one of the biggest airports in

the world and the city board always says that they want to be an activist shareholder at least when it comes to sustainability because I said well let's be an activist shareholder and do everything in our power to ban all weapon transports through Schipel

because there's a lot of them and that also didn't get through but that's just some to give you some more insights on what we have been doing and what you can expect for us but next to that we are also just yeah just working on policy proposals for example to fight what we call like menstruation, armuda, menstruational property to make sure that people who need like menstruational products can get it. There's a lot of other topics that we are also working on because we have a team of eight people and we're all driven by the same motivation. But everybody has, of course, their own specific theme.

or topics that they want to focus on. But yeah, that's about it, I think. Well, I think that that's a great way to wrap up this conversation. Again, listeners, our guest was Jamie Feld-ezen. Hopefully I did better this time than

the first time. But can you tell the listeners where they can find more from you, maybe social media profiles, if there's anywhere that you would like to direct the listeners to, and we will be sure to also link anything that you let us into the show notes so that the listeners can scroll down and find anything that you tell us to put there.

Yeah, sure. So you can find me on basically all social media platforms. Jay-Z Anthony is my handle. And our party, which is not yet a party, is Defonk 020 or so the Fonk 020, which is the city code of Amsterdam in the Netherlands. I've shared them with you so yeah people can follow us we try to do most of things that are relevant for non-n Dutch speakers we try to do communicate in English as well so yeah people are of course more than welcome to follow us and also feel free to reach out to us if you want to get in touch with us because we believe that well the struggle has

to be an international struggle. So, yeah, it was an honor to be on the show. And thank you very much for that. Yeah, it's our pleasure. Adnan, can you let the listeners know where they can find you and your other excellent podcast? Sure. You can follow me on Twitter.

I'm still calling it that at Adnan, A-Husain-H-U-S-A-I-N. And you can listen to the M-J-L-L-I-S. Henry mentioned a couple of episodes that related to the conversation we're having today about I-H-R-A definitions of anti-Semitism and so forth. But I want to say how much I enjoyed having you on, Jay-Z. I look forward to following more of your work. And, you know, as I've said, we wish you and your comrades full solidarity and full success in the important work that you're doing there. It was fascinating to hear about what's happening in the Amsterdam. seen from you.

And so we thank you very much for your time and for the work that you're doing. Yeah, thank you. And of course I echo Adnan sentiments. As for me, listeners, you can find me on Twitter at Huck 1995, H-U-C-K-1995. I will pitch Iskra books since we mentioned Iskra during the conversation. Iskrabooks.org. You can download our entire catalog for free. All PDFs from Isker Books are free.

But, of course, you can help support the work that we do by picking up physical copies as well. Again, it's for your books.org. As for guerrilla history, you can help support us and allow us to continue making episodes like this by going to patreon.com forward slash guerrilla history. That's G-U-E-R-R-I-L-A history. You can keep up to date with everything that Adnan and I are doing individually and collectively by following us on social media. Twitter is at Gorilla underscore pod, G-G-U-E-R-R-I-E-I-E-I-S.

LL8 underscore pod. And Instagram is Gorilla underscore History. Again, Gorilla 2R's underscore history. And until next time, listeners, Solidarity. Thank you.