Manfred Gerstenfeld wrote a fascinating column for the Jerusalem Post about ethnic profiling in the Netherlands. According to Gerstenfeld, the Dutch government is increasingly concerned with ethnic profiling in order to combat extremism, but also normal crime, and even high rates of students dropping out of high school.

The Dutch government, led by Christian Democrats and Laborites, has basically declared a war on Moroccan-Dutch who, as figures prove, are more likely to detest democracy, to drop out of school, and to commit crimes than any other ethnic group.

Since the Dutch government has tried to combat these issues for years, decades even, albeit without ethnic profiling, and has failed in putting them to a halt, it now feels forced to do something we the Dutch considered morally wrong for centuries: throwing the principle of considering all people as equal overboard.

One of the product’s of this shift in Dutch society is Geert Wilders. Many Dutch believe that Wilders exaggerates the need to combat these problems and, especially, exaggerates the role of ethnicity and religion. Yet, he can count on significant support and due to this support, other parties feel increasingly forced to adopt a hardline stance as well.

Negative publicity about Muslims and Moroccans reached new heights in recent weeks. In Gouda, internationally renowned for its cheese, the bus company stopped service to a neighborhood for a few days after its drivers had been threatened and spat at by young Moroccans. A few days later a television crew was also threatened there. In Nijmegen, where Ter Horst had been mayor, her successor, former minister Thom de Graaf of the left-of-center D66 party, forbade 56 youngsters, mainly Moroccans, to enter certain areas during the evening and night. In Gorinchem firemen have to do their work under police protection as Moroccan youngsters hindered them. There were several articles about Moroccans stealing in food retail outlets. In Utrecht a lesbian couple had to go in hiding as they were threatened by Moroccans. In Rotterdam a Muslim lawyer refused to stand in the courtroom when the judges entered, claiming religious reasons.

The incidents did not abate. After a Rotterdam policeman of Moroccan origin was fired because of suspicion of spying for Morocco, two Moroccan diplomats had to leave the Netherlands. German police arrested on a plane of the Dutch airline KLM, two potential Somalian terrorists, one of whom was studying at a college in the Netherlands. Four Muslim terrorists were condemned by a court in The Hague to jail sentences of four to nine years, after being found guilty of planning to attack the headquarters of the Dutch intelligence services…

THESE AND other incidents increase the popularity of Geert Wilders, the leader of the right-wing Freedom Party and the only internationally known Dutch politician. He suggested that Dutch soldiers should be recalled from Afghanistan to maintain order in Gouda and similar towns. Wilders also remarked that the region’s police chief should be fired as he was more suitable to be a parking guard. The latter had belittled the problems in Gouda and claimed that white Dutch youngsters cause his force more problems than Moroccans.

Other parliamentarians, such as Hans Spekman of Labor, also proposed radical suggestions. He said that criminal Moroccans should be humiliated in front of their friends: for instance sentenced youngsters from this community should be put to work in their own neighborhood, while wearing prison clothing.

Gerstenfeld rightfully points out that the new Dutch policies indicate that if the Netherlands would have faced the same problems Israel faced for decades already, the Netherlands would probably have done away with most liberal democratic principles we held dear for centuries.

Muslims and Moroccans have usually defended problematic individuals from their community, but with the new political wind blowing, the Union of Moroccan Muslim Organizations in the Netherlands said that “whole generations of Moroccan youngsters grow up as scum because the Dutch do not enforce their norms and values in the public domain.” Even the Islamist As-Sunna mosque in The Hague approached the intelligence services and warned that they had lost sight of 15 to 20 radical youngsters who could become terrorists. Shortly afterwards he wrote on his internet site that Muslims who marry a second wife do not have to tell their first wife beforehand. He did not mention that polygamy is illegal in The Netherlands.

Moroccans are not the only minority targeted by the Dutch government. It also wants to set up a data bank of problematic youngsters from the Dutch Antilles and Aruba. One organization of Caribbean Dutchmen is considering taking the government to the European Court because of the discriminatory character of this measure.

The author concludes:

It may sound surprising that this far-reaching ethnic profiling and stigmatizing does not lead to strong reactions in the Netherlands. The reason is that many Dutch consider these steps worthwhile to try to deal with problems, until now unsolvable. For that they are willing to throw the national value of all people being considered equal overboard.

These current Dutch developments have Jewish and Israeli perspectives as well. Once ethnicities are singled out, Jews for whatever reason are likely to be a target of somebody along the line.

The Dutch authorities had to drop their norms of political correctness because of a limited number of troublemakers – a few thousand at most – from the Moroccan ethnic group which represents less than 2 percent of the population. One may wonder whether the Netherlands could survive as a democracy if it ever has to confront much more complex challenges such as those Israel is facing.

The real problem, though, is that it is unclear what the government can do about this problem if it does not use ethnic profiling. I agree with him that this new approach is highly problematic, possibly dangerous. I also agree that the language used in the debate about immigrants, immigration, and children and grandchildren of immigrants especially Moroccans is divisive. But, although they only form 2% or so of the population as a whole, they cause problems far bigger than their numbers indicate. 2% of the population can hold the other 98% hostage.

What is more, the less these individuals are willing to integrate and to become a true, productive member of Dutch society, the more likely it is that the problems will escalate in the years ahead. They form 2%, or so, of the population now, but immigrants will form the majority in all major cities within a few decades time. By 2050, the majory populations of Rotterdam and Amsterdam, for instance, will be immigrant, or their (grand) children. The 2% of radical, problematic Moroccans will grow to 20% or so. Considering that they are already causing so much trouble, it does not take a rocket scientist to figure out that they will cause much more problems if the government does not act against them.

Then again, the current approach results in Moroccans feeling alienated and discriminated against, while ‘real’ Dutch become increasingly more negative about their Moroccan fellow countrymen, which will result in a society divided among ethnic lines, much more so than is the case today.