Israeli fans who attended a football match in Amsterdam in November 2024 were attacked by an organized mob of local Arabs and Muslims. Following the attack, we met with the Netherlands’ national coordinator for combating antisemitism, Eddo Verdoner, and Minister of Justice and Security David van Weel. We pressed both officials in The Hague to go beyond counting antisemitic incidents and forge a plan to combat Jew-hatred.

We also met with Jewish leaders, including local rabbis. The situation was so tense that Jews were afraid to convene a protest in Amsterdam’s city square, so it was left to sympathetic Christians to sponsor it. For the first time in nearly half a century, Simon Wiesenthal Center officials needed private security at a rally in a Western democracy.

In recent days, Jewish life in the Netherlands once again came under attack. An arsonist targeted a synagogue in Rotterdam, and an explosion struck a Jewish school in Amsterdam, one that we had visited 16 months earlier. These deliberate antisemitic acts finally awakened the political elite.

To his credit, the new Dutch prime minister, Rob Jetten, met with representatives of the Jewish communities. Van Weel, the justice minister, who has responsibility for the National Police Corps and the General Intelligence and Security Service, was also in attendance. The message was clear: The government recognized the danger and was committing resources to ensure the safety of Jewish institutions.

That meeting mattered. It signaled awareness. It raised hope. But hope cannot survive contradiction.

Almost simultaneously, the same Dutch government announced that it would intervene in the genocide case brought by South Africa against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) over the Jewish state’s counterattack following Hamas’ October 7, 2023, mass murder, rape, and hostage-taking. The Dutch intervention provides political legitimacy for a false narrative contrived by Hamas terrorists and their backers. Never mind that the Netherlands is not a party to the case, nor has it submitted factual accusations against Israel.

In today’s reality, legal nuance does not travel far beyond The Hague. Such distinctions are obliterated on the streets of European capitals seething with anti-Israel and antisemitic protests.

What does travel is the perception that European states are helping smear Israelis as mass murderers of innocent children.

So, Prime Minister Jetten: Your government cannot simultaneously seek to reassure its Jewish citizens while supporting a process that slanders the Jewish state with a charge that puts Israel in the same league as perpetrators of crimes against humanity and mass murder.

The Dutch people have seen where such big lies lead. When Israel is portrayed as uniquely evil, even “Nazi-like,” this does not remain confined to legal or academic forums. It enters public discourse, ignites protests, and too often grows into public intimidation and worse. If Israel is branded genocidal, what inevitably follows is a dangerous moral logic: Those accused of ultimate evil are no longer treated as legitimate actors, but as legitimate targets.