Vlaams Belang
Vlaams Belang (VB) or Flemish Interest is a far-right Flemish nationalist party formed in 2004, when its predecessor Vlaams Blok was declared to be racist by a Belgian court.[1]
In October 2007, Filip Dewinter of Vlaams Belang spoke at the CounterJihad Brussels 2007 conference, and Vlaams Belang became an affiliate of the CounterJihad Europa network which emerged from the event.[2]
Vlaams Belang's participation was defended by Robert Spencer:
- The counterjihad conference that touched all this controversy off -- since VB and SD reps attended it -- was openly pro-Israel, featuring an address by Andrew Bostom on antisemitism and another by the decidedly non-dhimmi Israeli politician Aryeh Eldad. There was nothing white supremacist or neo-Nazi about it, and in fact it seemed to herald a new phase of cooperation between European and American anti-jihadists, although its genuine work has been completely overwhelmed by the ensuing controversy.[3]
In January 2008, Vlaams Belang joined with other European far-right parties to launch a new organisation opposing the 'islamisation of Europe'.
- The group dubbed "Cities against Islamisation" was presented to the media in the northern Belgian city of Antwerp by Filip Dewinter, head of the far-right Belgian party Vlaams Belang (Flemish Interest) along with Austrian FPOE leader Heinz-Christian Strace and Robert Spieler of the regionalist Alsace First group.
- Parties from Britain (the British National Party), Denmark, Germany and Italy were also represented at the launch of the group which has a road-sign-style crossed-out mosque as its logo.[4]
Robert Spencer initially accepted this as a vindication of the critics of Vlaams Belang, but reverted his position somewhat, after being told that the BNP had not joined the new organisation.[5]
In December 2008, Senior VB figure Roeland Raes was convicted of holocaust denial.[6]
Affiliations
References
- ↑ Vlaams Belang in the USA, by Leonard Zeskind, Searchlight magazine, April 2007.
- ↑ Counterjihad Brussels 2007 Conference, CounterJihad Europa, accessed 6 December 2008.
- ↑ Vlaams Belang, Charles Johnson, and all that, by Robert Spencer, Jihad Watch, 15 November 2007.
- ↑ Right-wingers gather against 'Islamisation', Agence France Presse, The Australian,18 January 2008.
- ↑ Vlaams Belang allies with British National Party, by Robert Spencer, Jihad Watch, 20 January 2008.
- ↑ Daniel Luban and Eli Clifton, POLITICS: Dutch Foe of Islam Ignores US Allies' Far Right Ties, Inter Press Service, 28 February 2009.
