Netherlands

THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — Anti-Islam populist Geert Wilders said Thursday that he is ready to join the next Dutch coalition government after he surged to a huge election victory that marked a stunning lurch to the far right for a nation once famed as a beacon of tolerance.

The result is sending shockwaves through Europe, where extremist nationalist ideology is putting pressure on democracies that now face the possibility of having to deal with the first far-right prime minister of the Netherlands.

AMSTERDAM, Nov 22 (Reuters) - Dutch voters cast their ballots on Wednesday in a nail-biting election in which opinion polls show at least three parties - including the far right - could hope for the top spot.

A weighted poll published on the eve of the vote showed anti-Islam firebrand Geert Wilders' Freedom Party (PVV) tied for the lead with the conservative People's Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD) of outgoing Prime Minister Mark Rutte.

THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — One thing is certain for the Dutch voters casting ballots Wednesday in a general election: Mark Rutte, the Netherlands’ longest-serving prime minister, is on the way out.

His replacement after 13 years in office could be the country’s first female premier or a social democrat who left his job as the European Union’s climate czar to return to national politics. The next prime minister also might turn out to be an anti-Islam lawmaker or a centrist who created his party only three months ago.

VOORBURG, Netherlands (AP) — Cans of fish, jars of pasta sauce and bags of beans are stacked in blue crates. Meat, dairy and bread are kept cold in a huge freezer and a walk-in refrigerator in this affluent Dutch town. The supplies are on hand to feed the new poor in one of the richest nations in the world.

Needy families are lining up for free handouts at food banks across the Netherlands, underscoring how poverty is taking root even in lower middle-class families and why tackling it has become a major theme in next Wednesday’s parliamentary election.

AMSTERDAM (AP) — Tens of thousands of people marched through the streets of Amsterdam on Sunday calling for more action to tackle climate change, in a mass protest just 10 days before a national election.

Organizers claimed that 70,000 people took part in the march and called it the biggest climate protest ever in the Netherlands.

THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — Thirty-four journalists have been killed in the war between Israel and Hamas, an international media freedom group said Wednesday, accusing both sides of committing possible war crimes.

Reporters Without Borders called on International Criminal Court prosecutors to investigate the deaths. The organization said it already filed a complaint regarding eight Palestinian journalists it said were killed in Israel’s bombardment of civilian areas in the Gaza Strip, and an Israeli journalist killed during Hamas’ surprise attack in southern Israel.

31 October 2023; MEMO: Obstructing relief supplies to the Gaza Strip may constitute a crime under the International Criminal Court’s (ICC) jurisdiction, the body’s top prosecutor has warned.

Speaking to a news conference in Egypt on Sunday, the ICC’s top prosecutor Karim Khan told Israel that it must make “discernable efforts, without further delay to make sure civilians receive basic foods, medicine.”

THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — A court in Amsterdam sentenced a Polish-Canadian national to two months in prison on Thursday for projecting a message alluding to an antisemitic conspiracy theory onto the Anne Frank House museum.

Robert Wilson was charged with insulting a group and inciting discrimination for using a laser projector in February to display the words “Ann (sic) Frank invented the ballpoint pen” on the side of the canal house where the Jewish teenager hid with her family during the Holocaust.

30 September 2023; MEMO: The International Court of Justice (ICJ) announced on Thursday that it will start hearings on the case of the Syrian regime’s crimes against Syrians.

THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — People have been killed in two shootings Thursday at a university hospital and a nearby home in the Dutch port city of Rotterdam, police said, but they did not immediately announce the number of victims.

Rotterdam police said on X, formerly Twitter, that they were informing next of kin before releasing any more details. A suspect had been arrested after the shootings at the Erasmus Medical Center and the nearby apartment.

Fire also broke out at both locations, local authorities said.