A Jewish human-rights group has asked the Dutch Prime Minister to reject an advisory report that “demonises Israel”.
Rabbi Abraham Cooper, associate dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre, accused the Dutch parliament’s advisory council on international affairs of producing a one-sided report on the Middle East conflict.
The report supports talks with Hamas and sanctions against Israel, whom it labels as the aggressor in the conflict.
Rabbi Cooper, who has asked Prime Minister Mark Rutte to dismantle the advisory council, said: “Beyond its multitude of factual errors, this document in effect calls on the Netherlands to distance itself from the Middle East’s only democracy, Israel, and get closer to a terrorist group, Hamas.
“It does not serve the cause of peace but only the most extreme forces in the Middle East and those who continuously demonise the Jewish nation.”
In 2011, a poll revealed that 38 per cent of Dutch nationals believed that Israel was carrying out a war of extermination against the Palestinians.
The report states: “Ongoing Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories, accompanied by political repression and permanent restrictions on the Palestinians’ freedom of movement and economic opportunities… mean that the conflict is likely… to result in an unprecedented eruption of violence…
“The EU in particular… cannot stand idly by as measures are introduced…that might block or even preclude the realisation of an independent state of Palestine.”
The report — “Between words and deeds: prospects for a sustainable peace in the Middle East” — was to be debated in The Hague this week.
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