THE JEWISH COMMUNITY Some 35,000 Jewish citizens live in Belgium out of a total population of 10 million. The two main centers of Belgian Jewry are Antwerp (15,000) and Brussels (15,000). The Comité de Coordination des Organizations Juives de Belgique (Coordinating Committee of Jewish Organizations in Belgium – CCOJB), in Brussels, is the community’s umbrella organization. Because many European Union institutions are located in Brussels, the community plays an important role in hosting European Jewish events and in advocating the interests of communities across Europe. On 24 September 2000, Belgium Premier Guy Verhofstadt announced that Belgium would set up a fund to compensate the Jewish community for their losses and suffering during World War II. The fund will be used, inter alia, for projects to fight antisemitism, racism and other hate crimes. POLITICAL PARTIES AND EXTRA-PARLIAMENTARY GROUPS Introduction In the last few years, biological racism, which was the bedrock of Nazism, has increasingly gained ground among neo-fascist far right political forces. In 2000 the Centre for Equal Opportunity and Combating Racism (le Centre pour l’égalité des chances et la lutte contre le racisme), a federal government agency, expressed its concern at the increase in discrimination against individuals of foreign origin generally, and against Arabs in particular. Although racist activities of extreme right organizations in Belgium are directed mainly against Arabs, all extreme right organizations, groups and publications have antisemitic tendencies, which they refrain from disseminating overtly. Instead they use euphemisms such as “high finance,” “itinerant and anonymous high finance,” “cosmopolitanism,” or “internationalism.” The Jews are perceived by some racist groups as the main enemy, and the “international conspiracy” of the “Jewish International” is one of the main themes of antisemitic propaganda. Thus, not infrequently, direct references to so-called Jewish plans to dominate the world by wiping out the white race appear in the publications of Belgian racist groups. Similar foreign journals, such as the French weekly Rivarol, are recommended to readers by these groups. Political Parties The current leadership of the extreme right Vlaams Blok (Flemish Bloc – VB) – which enjoys over 15 percent of popular support throughout the entire Flemish Region, reaching 33 percent in Antwerp (see ASW 1999/2000) – is attempting to present a more respectable image in order to further increase its electoral strength. However, the VB, headed by Philip Dewinter, is aware that it will have to attract new voters and enter into alliances with the conservative wings of democratic parties. Thus, it must moderate its language on certain topics, notably antisemitism. During the October 2000 municipal elections the VB claimed that it wished to do away with all visible references to its antisemitic legacy. The question remains whether these attempts at reform are sincere or for propaganda purposes only. It should be noted that antisemites who were involved in the establishment of the VB in 1978, as well as young militants from neo-Nazi groups, are still part of its innermost circles. Extra-parliamentary Groups A number of militant structures and think-tanks close to the VB continue to foster antisemitism, among them Voorpost, which acts as a link between the VB and even more extremist groups. An action group with pagan tendencies, Voorpost was set up in 1976 by young nationalist leaders close to the French New Right (in particular GRECE – see France) and neo-Nazi organizations abroad. Voorpost was also involved in distributing publications denying crimes of the Nazi regime. In 2000/1Voorpost is run by senior members of the VB leadership, such as former Senator Roeland Raes (its vice-president from 1978 to February 2001) and member of parliament Francis Vanden Eynde (current vice-president of the country’s Chamber of Deputies). Before its formation, Voorpost was part of another nationalist group, Were Di (Verbond van Nederlandse Werkgemeenschappen). Were Di was created in 1962 by former pro-Nazi collaborators, including members of the Flemish Waffen-SS and founder of the VB Karel Dillen. The theoretical works of this think-tank constituted the basis of the VB’s founding manifesto. Like the VB, Were Di aims at overthrowing the Belgian state and creating an independent Flemish state based upon a “homogeneous community” of the “white race.” Several of VB’s parliamentary members still serve on the editorial committee of Dietsland-Europa, Were Di’s monthly publication. Dietsland-Europa is a staunch defender of leading French Holocaust denier Robert Faurisson and the National Socialist (NS) heritage. The Nationalistische Studenten Verbond (NSV) is an association of extreme right university students founded in 1976. A number of the VB’s leaders began their political activity in the NSV, including current leaders Philip Dewinter and Franck Van Hecke. The NSV’s emblem is the Celtic cross, adopted by the neo-Nazis. After the law against denial of the Holocaust was passed on 23 March 1995, the NJSV (the high-school branch of the NSV) distributed a “Revisionism is no crime!” sticker. The last demonstration held by NSV – in March 2001 in Antwerp – was supported by the VB. Another youth organization, which is officially independent of the VB (but whose leaders are former heads of the VB youth organization), is the Vlaamse Jongeren Mechelen (VJM), a small skinhead group active in the town of Malines (Mechelen), which has contacts with several other neo-Nazi and antisemitic movements in Wallonia and abroad (see below). In 2000, a Flemish section of the British skinhead movement Blood & Honour (B&H) was set up in Belgium a few months after the voluntary liquidation of the Odal Aktiekomitee, a small neo-Nazi group which aimed at recreating the Vlaamse Militanten Orde (VMO). Known as Blood & Honour Flanders, its emblem is the swastika. A first unsuccessful attempt to found a section of B&H was made on the basis of the former VMO in the 1980s. The British-based Combat 18 (see UK) has several supporters recruited from Belgian extreme right-wing organizations such as B&H Flanders. Many Flemish neo-Nazis who profess their own “racial religion” belong to the official Flemish section of the World Church of the Creator (WCOTC – see USA). The semi-clandestine Belgian-Dutch network Consortium-De Levensboom and a new NS skinhead group, the Flanders White Nationalists (FWN), appear to have links to the Flemish section of WCOTC. The webmaster of the neo-Nazi Internet site Aryan Nightmare is thought to be one of the leaders of the WCOTC. The WCOTC section in France is led by Olivier Devalez, who has contacts in several neo-Nazi groups, both Flemish and French-speaking, among them the VHO, the l’Assaut group and NS skinhead groups. When it became known that Dimitri Vandenheede, a candidate on the VB list in the 2000 municipal elections, belonged to the WCOTC, the VB expelled him to avoid adversely affecting its new “moderate” image and deterring possible future political partners. However, this did not prevent the VB from leaving other militants close to neo-Nazis as candidates on their electoral lists. Efforts to establish the Ku Klux Klan in France and Belgium, with the support of Belgian sympathizers, were unsuccessful. The Fundamentalist Christian Right One of the main disseminators of classical antisemitism is Polemique-Info. This integrist Christian publication was set up in 1995 by Alain Escada, who split from the ultra-rightist Pro Belgica (a Belgian royalist and unitarian association). Escada first headed the youth section of the Belgique-Europe-België party (formed in 1989), became founding president of its splinter group Unie, and then official spokesman of the Front Nouveau de Belgique (FNB; fro199on). A sympathizer of the Front National, Escada also heads Belgique et Chrétienté and is a member of the Fraternité Saint-Pie X (see France). Documents of the Fraternité, which is active in Brussels and in the Flemish and Walloon regions, contain clearly antisemitic references, including praise of Marshal Phillipe Pétain and support for the judeophobic theories of the French Catholic nationalist theoretician Charles Maurras. At the end of July 2000, the Belgian French-language daily newspaper Le Soir reported that the Belgian branch of the Contre-Reforme Catholique (CRF, also known as the Communion phalangiste) was intending to gain a more solid foothold in Belgium. The goal of the CRF, which came into being in France under the inspiration of “Abbot” Georges de Nantes, is to continue the “Crusades” against the Jews. This sectarian Catholic group is apparently linked to two Belgian groups: Heusy (Liège province), and Westmalle (Antwerp province). Today, utterly isolated from the Catholic Church, the Belgian followers of “Abbot” Georges de Nantes are said to number about one hundred. Neo-pagan Groups Supporters of neo-pagan groups have been re-structuring themselves over the last years within the far right. Most oppose so-called Judeo-Christianity, the globalization of the economy led by the United States, the Americanization of society and international communism. The primary target of these groups is Judaism as the main monotheistic religion, viewed as being responsible for “repression” of the followers of polytheistism. These politico-religious groups are active within nationalist organizations with a more general agenda. Several of the latter, including Voorpost and les Amis de la Renaissance Européenne (which has ties with the Bloc Wallon party – see below), have a manifest bent toward various pagan cults. However, while representing a particular way of thinking, the extent of neo-pagan activities remains limited. The Association des Successeurs des Ases (ASA), known as the Fils des Ases, for example, has been active since 1992. Based in Brussels this small group which seeks to defend the “Nordic race,” evolved from neo-Nazi groups of the New Right. Recently, publications ascribed to the ASA or to its spokesman, Bernard Mengal, have unmistakably endorsed a shift toward armed combat against the establishment. Mengal was also the initiator of works based on biological racism and an obsessive antisemitism. The main contributor to Mengal’s publications is the Frenchman Pierre Chassard. Together, from June 1998 onwards, they issued the journal Contre-Thèses. The Vlaams Heidens Front (Flemish Pagan Front – VHF) is another neo-pagan group which has stepped up its activity in Flanders (see ASW 1999/2000). NS in outlook, its main headquarters are in Torhouts. The Influence of Foreign Ultra-right Antisemitic Groups As mentioned above, several Belgian groups have ties with antisemitic and Holocaust denial organizations abroad, among them, the Fraternité Saint-Pie X and the WCOTC. Other contacts include the NSDAP-AO (United States), Unité radicale and Groupe Union Défense (France), Aktiefront Nationale Socialisten and Nederlandse Volksunie (Netherlands), and the NPD (Germany). In October 2000, a campaign to support the NPD was organized after Germany decided to take steps to ban this party. Belgian publications, the nationalist revolutionary Devenir in particular, supported a solidarity campaign with the NPD. The ideological trend of Belgian far right publications is apparent in their references to antisemitic papers and activists abroad. The Brussels paper Polemique-Info, for example, has in recent months made frequent mention of the French antisemitic agitator Henry Coston, who contributed to the antisemitic propaganda which paved the way for the deportation of French Jewry during the Nazi occupation. Lecture et Tradition, Lectures francaises, and Faits et Documents (see France) are also ideological sources of Belgian extreme right publications. Alain Escada (founder of Polemique-Info) once represented the French publication Rivarol in Belgium. Since its founding in France in 1952, this antisemitic and Holocaust denying weekly has enjoyed the support of various groups and publications of the Belgian extreme right, such as the FNB, Devenir, the Flemish satirical journal t’Pallieterke and the association les Amis de la Renaissance Européenne. Fundamentalist Islamic Networks In 1998, the report on Belgium drawn up by the European Centre for Research and Action against Racism and Antisemitism (CERA) noted the existence of fundamentalist Islamist groups with a radical anti-Jewish stance. These included offshoots of the various Muslim Brotherhood branches: Talia (affiliated with Syria), le Parti de la Libération Islamique (affiliated with the Palestinians), and le Secours Islamique (affiliated with Egypt). The annual report of the Centre for Equal Opportunity and Combating Racism, issued in May 2001, noted antisemitic slogans used during demonstrations organized in Brussels and Antwerp following the outbreak of the al-Aqsa intifada. Activists operating within the Maghreb community disseminated anti-Jewish propaganda, despite the calls for calm issued by various Muslim religious and cultural bodies, such as l’Exécutif des Musulmans de Belgique, the official body of the Belgium Muslim community). ANTISEMITIC ACTIVITIES Following the outbreak of the al-Aqsa intifada in September/October 2000 several violent incidents against Jewish institutions were recorded. An arson attempt was made on a Brussels synagogue and the monument to Jewish Martyrs in Anderlecht was defaced. On 28 September worshipers during Friday prayers at two mosques in Brussels were urged to take revenge against the Jews for their treatment of the Palestinians. Various Muslim religious and cultural authorities condemned the anti-Jewish attacks. There were several serious incidents in October. A Jew was hospitalized after being severely beaten by a group of Arabs near a Brussels synagogue. On 15 October four Molotov cocktails were thrown at the Sephardi synagogue in the Schaerbeedk quarter of Brussels. In addition, in Brussels stones were thrown at a synagogue, smashing several windows, antisemitic slogans were smeared on the Holocaust memorial and a large swastika was drawn on the main entrance of the Maimonides synagogue. A window of a Jewish library in Antwerp was also smashed. Most of these acts were allegedly perpetrated by Arabs and Muslims. However, some elements of the extreme right took advantage of the situation to launch an “anti-Zionist” campaign. In November posters with the slogan “Israel – Murderer!” bore the signature of Intifada Européenne, an offshoot of the Nation movement (see ASW 1999/2000). Intifada Européenne appears to have succeeded the Anti-Zionistische Aktie (AZA), a neo-Nazi group which was active at the end of the 1990s in Belgium and the Netherlands (see ASW 1998/9). Propaganda Dissemination on the Internet, via independent sites or discussion forums, of racist and/or antisemitic texts of Belgian origin, has increased steadily in recent years. A number of sites created by Belgian organizations are devoted in their entirety to this genre. This applies to the websites of the VB, the Front National, the Front Nouveau de Belgique, the Bloc Wallon, the VHO, Blood & Honour Flanders, Aryan Nightmare and others. In 2000, the Centre for Equal Opportunity and Combating Racism identified more than 82 Belgian sites which they categorized as far right, racist, and/or undemocratic. As in other European countries, racist and antisemitic slogans are often used in the soccer stadium. In December 2000, Marc Degryse, team leader of the GB Antwerp team, condemned fan club members who took advantage of sports events to hurl racist insults at other supporters or at the players of opposing teams. For example, at a match in 2000 between Bruges and Antwerp, the stands were filled with supporters making Nazi salutes and shouting antisemitic slogans. This is not surprising given the fact that soccer fan clubs have been systematically infiltrated by extreme right acfor severayears. In Charleroi, for example, members of a gang of hooligans, the Wallon Boys, participate regularly in the demonstrations of the REF (see ASW 1999/2000) and other nationalist groups. As mentioned above, antisemitic slogans were used against Israel by Islamist demonstrators. The radical left in Belgium, among them Jewish organizations such as the Union des Progressistes Juifs de Belgique (UPJB) and the Cercle Communautaire Laic Juif (CCLJ), makes a principled distinction between resistance to Israel and antisemitism, expressed in their opposition to antisemitic groups of the extreme right. Nevertheless, at the demonstrations against the Israeli government in late 2000, explicitly antisemitic leaflets were circulated, despite the presence of Jewish participants. In October, one such demonstration was followed by disturbances accompanied also by antisemitic rallying cries. OPINION POLL As confirmed by opinion polls, antisemitism is not shared by the majority of the country’s population. On the other hand, either because of ignorance or the influence of extreme right or fundamentalist propaganda (notably, the anti- semitic writings of Charles Maurras on politicians from observant Catholic ultra-right circles), antisemitism is fostered in certain limited spheres of society. An academic publication, issued jointly by the King Baudouin Foundation and De Boeck Publishers in early 2001, reports that 13 percent of Belgians would prefer not to have Jews as neighbors; 17 percent preferred not to have people of another race, 18 percent, foreign or immigrant workers, 22 percent, Muslims, and 35 percent, Gypsies (Roma). ATTITUDES TOWARD THE HOLOCAUST In 1995, Belgium adopted legislation against Holocaust denial. Nevertheless, the Vrij Historisch Onderzoek (Free Historical Research – VHO) organization, founded in Antwerp in 1983 by Siegfried Verbeke and other supporters of the VB, works intensively to distribute its pamphlets denying Nazi crimes, especially the Holocaust; in February, for instance, it carried out a large-scale dissemination campaign in three Brussels communes. Although, because of the 1995 law, the VHO no longer receives official support from nationalist movements, close ties exist between this semi-clandestine organization and senior leaders of these groups. In October 2000, VB vice-president Roeland Raes expressed doubts, not for the first time, about the existence of the Nazi gas chambers during a Dutch TV broadcast. In fall 2000 well-known French Holocaust denier Vincent Reynouard joined forces with this organization. Reynouard had chosen to go into exile in Belgium because he was being investigated by the French justice authorities. Reynouard found refuge in Ixelles (Brussels) in a fundamentalist Christian community close to the Fraternité Saint-Pie X (see above). In the early 1990s, Olivier Mathieu, another antisemitic French agitator, sought refuge with the same community. Reynouard’s presence in Brussels demonstrates that Belgium has remained an international center of Holocaust denial and neo-Nazism. The VHO shares its website with Bradley Smith’s Holocaust denial site CODOH. This site, uniting the most active Holocaust deniers worldwide, is operated by German denier Germar Rudolf (see Germany). It should be noted that some organizations which do not promote Holocaust denial, nonetheless have ties with denial groups. This applies, in particular, to les Amis de la Renaissance Européenne. Established by the current leaders of the Bloc Wallon party, which appeared during the October 2000 municipal elections, this association is in contact with the editor of l’autre histoire (a Holocaust revisionist publication issued in Brittany) and Jean-Robert Debbaudt (see ASW 1998/9). In November 2000 a Brussels court found David Vercruysse guilty of charges of violating the law against Holocaust denial. A member of the VB, Vercruysse campaigned among French-speaking organizations, including Robert Steuckers’ Synergies Européennes. RESPONSES TO RACISM AND ANTISEMITISM Several sectors of Belgian society have organized to counter the phenomenon of intensified extremism. The number of anti-fascist demonstrations increased in 2000, with trade unions, as well as many political parties, mobilizing their forces. The “cordon sanitaire,” an agreement between all the democratic parties in order to isolate the VB and the far right politically in Wallonia, has been reinforced. Legal complaints and proceedings against far right leaders have increased in recent years. Educational establishments disseminate information in order to make students of all ages aware of relevant issues. According to the Centre for Equal Opportunity and Combating Racism, there has been an increase in the federal government’s, as well as parliament’s, use of powers to combat discrimination on a wider level.