Netherlands

Netherlands
Flag
Capital	Amsterdam
Government	Constitutional monarchy
Language	Dutch (official)
Monarch	King Willem-Alexander of the Netherlands
Prime minister	Rob Jetten
Area	41,526 km² (18,41% water)
Population	17,150,000 (2020)
GDP	$900,000,000,000 (2020)
GDP per capita	$52,478 (2020)
Currency	Euro (€) (EUR)
International dialing code	31
Internet top-level domain	.nl

For the impact on left-wing policies on the Netherlands and the rest of Europe, see European migrant crisis

The Netherlands (Dutch: Nederland), also known informally as Holland or The Low Countries, is a country in northwestern Europe. It is the primary component of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, which also includes the Caribbean countries of Aruba, Curaçao and Sint Maarten. It is bordered by Belgium to the south and Germany to the east, while facing the North Sea to the north and west. Amsterdam is the official capital, while The Hague is the actual seat of government.

The Netherlands is famous for being a small, low-lying, and densely populated country. Its total area is 16,160 square miles: only 12,900 (82%) of that land, the rest water, and its total population in 2020 was 17.3 million. With aquatic areas excluded, the country has a population density of 1,341/mi², the fifth-highest in the world and the second-highest in the European Union, of which it is a leading member. The land area of the Netherlands would be much smaller if not for a complex process of land reclamation that dates back to the Middle Ages; more than a fourth of the land today is in fact below sea level, protected by a complex of dikes and drainage systems. The very name "Netherlands" almost directly translates as "Low Countries," in reference to its elevation.

Since 1848, the country has been a constitutional monarchy with a unitary system of government. Of its twelve provinces, the most important historically are North-Holland and South-Holland, which contain the cities of Amsterdam, The Hague, and Rotterdam. Because of their disproportionate influence, the country is often referred to as "Holland". The official language is Dutch and the people are referred to in English as Dutchmen or collectively as the Dutch.

The major ethnic groups in the Netherlands are Dutch 79%, Turks 2%, Surinamese 2%, Moroccans 2%.

The Netherlands has long been notorious for its left-leaning social policies, having in the recent past legalized prostitution, euthanasia, gay "marriage", and the recreational use of many harmful drugs. Although a traditional adherence to pro-free-market policies has given the country one of the world's highest per-capita incomes, this has been endangered by a leftward drift in economic matters as well, as the ongoing persecution of Dutch farmers demonstrates. In certain respects, the country should be thought of as a technocracy rather than a parliamentary democracy.

History

See History of the Netherlands

In 1672 while the country was at war with France and England, an angry mob lynched the prime minister Johan de Witt, and ate his remains.

Dike system

The term "Netherlands" means "low country": about a quarter of the land area, containing more than half of the population, is actually below sea level, and would flood if the sea were not held back by a system of dikes. The Dutch have a saying that "God created the earth, but the Dutch made Holland".

A major breach of the dikes occurred in 1953, killing 1800 people. To avoid a repeat of the disaster the Dutch began construction of the "Delta Project" to protect the country from future inundations. Begun in 1953 and completed in 2002 the Delta Project is considered a modern wonder of civil engineering. After Hurricane Katrina, a delegation of American engineers was invited by the Dutch government to see how the project works and how its technology can be applied in the United States for low-lying cities like New Orleans. Intentional flooding of the countryside has also been used to halt invading armies, dating back to the 80 years war.

Major cities

Amsterdam, named for the Amstel river, is the largest city, and the capital of the Netherlands. Amsterdam is ringed by an extensive system of concentric canals. The seat of government, however, is located for historical reasons in The Hague (Den Haag).

Eindhoven, a city of the southern province of Brabant, is the location of the giant electronics corporation, Philips (full name: Koninklijke Philips Electronics N.V.), with annual revenue equivalent to about $40 billion. (The U.S. corporation General Electric has revenues of about $150 billion, but much of it is from non-electronics businesses). The Eindhoven area is known for its high concentration of high-tech industires, which include ASML, the world primary producer of lithography system for the production of semiconductors, and Océ, a leading producer of printers and copiers.

Groningen is home to many branches of KPN, the former state company of Post, Telegraphy and Telephony. It had its headquarters in Groningen when it was still state run, and move to The Hague since. KPN stands for Koninklijke PTT Nederland, or Royal PTT Netherlands. Groningen is also home to Gasunie (Gasunion), a public-private partnership that exploits the natural gas reseves in the province of Groningen and the adjoint North Sea.

Johan Barthold Jongkind, A Windmill near Delft, 1857.

Delft is a small town in South Holland, situated between Rotterdam and The Hague. It is noted for the blue-and-white Delft pottery, and as the home of the great artist Jan Vermeer.

Arnhem is a city in Gelderland, lying on the north bank of the Lower Rhine river. It was the scene of a major battle during Operation Market Garden in September 1944, when British and allied paratroop forces captured its strategic road bridge before being overwhelmed by German forces in the area.

Leeuwarden (Frisian: Ljouwert) is the capital of the northern province of Friesland; it was also the home town of the spy Mata Hari and the artist M.C. Escher. It has a population of 92,000.

Utrecht is a city of the central province of Utrecht. It is the seat of a bishopric and is a major communications hub and rail center. With a population of 290,000, it is the fourth largest city in the Netherlands. The city is best known as the site of lengthy peace negotiations to end the Wars of Spanish Succession in the 18th century. The resulting peace, called the Treaty of Utrecht, was signed in April 1713.

Hoek van Holland ("Hook of Holland", literally 'corner of Holland') is a port in South Holland, and is administratively part of the city of Rotterdam. It lies at the outflow of the Nieuwe Waterweg canal and the North Sea, and is the base for ferry services to Harwich in eastern England.

Economy

The Dutch economy is almost $1 trillion, which is expected to be reached in less than 5 years. It is the 17th largest in the world. It was 10th in 1985, ahead of China at that time. The Netherlands is a major center of trade among European countries.

• GDP: $900 billion (2020)
• GDP per capita: $52,478 (2020)
• Natural resources: Land, farms, forests, oil.

On July 6, 2022 Dutch police fired on Dutch farmers protesting environmental regulations attempting to shut down family farms.

Provinces

South Holland contains the cities of The Hague and Rotterdam.

Flevoland is the youngest of the twelve provinces, having the least population (ca. 360,000). It was created in 1986 on two polders: just 80 years ago, there was no dry land but the Zuiderzee. Its capital is Lelystad.

Friesland is a coastal province in the north, home to the Frisian language and people.

Gelderland borders Germany to the east, and extends north to the Ijsselmeer. Gelderland includes the major cities of Nijmegen and Arnhem, as well as the extensive heathland known as the Veluwe, now a national park.

North Brabant is often referred to as Brabant, as there is no south Brabant in the Netherlands. The southern part of the former duchy of Brabant (including the important cities of Antwerp and Leuven) now belongs to Belgium. While Eindhoven is the biggest city in North Brabant, its capital is 's-Hertogenbosch.

Business

The Netherlands is the home of the Anglo-Dutch oil company Royal Dutch Shell . Other well known Dutch or partly Dutch multinationals are Unilever, a company owning many household brands, ING Group, a banking group, Ahold, an international chain of supermarkets, Reed Elsevier, a publishing house, Nielsen Company, owner of the Yellow Pages, and Randstad Holding, a company providing human resource services. The famous Dutch East India Company, which dominated trade in with South-East Asia in the 17th century, is regarded as the first multinational in history. The Netherlands has long been famous for its production of flowers, and also for a related economic event, the "tulip mania" of 1636-1637. Tulips were traded on stock exchanges, and bid up to fantastic prices by people who understood that the prices were crazy but hoped to sell at a profit to even crazier investors. Many people mortgaged their homes for a single tulip bulb and in one case an entire brewery was exchanged for a few bulbs. As with all economic bubbles, when bidding began to lag people tried to sell and the bubble burst with disastrous consequences. Since then the Dutch have been renowned for their carefulness with money and have established a significant presence in the banking and financial sectors.

King's Day

April 27 is King's Day - the national holiday to mark the official birthday of the monarch. King's Day is the one day of the year when ordinary Netherlanders are permitted to sell goods on the streets without a license. Consequently, the whole country is turned into a gigantic flea market (garage sale). The primary effect of this is that people buy goods they do not want or need, solely in order to sell them the following year. In an act of patriotism, most of the populace wear orange colored clothing (the national color) to identify with the Royal House Of Orange-Nassau.

Those not involved with selling their surplus belongings celebrate the national holiday at outdoors parties in the cities or with fine weather, spend the free day on a terrace of a pub, or cycle in the national Fietsen op Dijken tour around the nation's dikes.

Anne Frank

Anne Frank was a famous Jewish girl who hid from Nazis in the house of friends in Amsterdam. She wrote a diary which was later published and became a best seller. Her family left Germany in 1933 because of the Nazis, but the Nazis caught up with her and sent her to Belsen death camp where she died before end of war in 1945. Anne Frank's house in Amsterdam is now a popular tourist attraction.

The Netherlands in the Holocaust

The Netherlands in the Holocaust is widely documented that approximately 75% of Dutch Jews perished during the Holocaust. The Dutch Queen's consort Bertrand, who married Queen Juliana of the Netherlands in 1937, was an early member of the Nazi Party (NSDAP) as well as the brown shirts or Sturmabteilung (SA), and served as an officer in the Schutzstaffel (SS). While the Dutch government and much of the public initially opposed the Nazi occupation, the Dutch police and civil service eventually collaborated with the German occupying forces' persecution of Jews. A significant act of resistance was the February Strike of 1941 in Amsterdam, organized by the Communist Party in protest of the first mass arrests and deportation of Jews to concentration camps. The strike was violently suppressed by the Nazis, who subsequently imposed stricter measures and replaced Dutch officials in key positions to solidify their control and ensure the efficient implementation of anti-Jewish policies. Factors contributing to the high death toll in the Netherlands include: The effective and comprehensive Dutch civil administration, which had meticulously maintained population and address records that the Nazis exploited to identify Jewish citizens. The Dutch geography, with few places to hide effectively and limited escape routes. The pervasive collaboration of the Dutch bureaucracy and police in identifying, arresting, and deporting Jews, which allowed the Germans to manage the process with minimal manpower.

Amsterdam Pogrom by Arab Muslims (2024)

Racist Arab Muslim mob attacks Israelis post soccer game

Racist Arab Muslim mob attacks Israelis post soccer game

On Nov 8, 2024: Amsterdam, The Netherlands, Arab, Muslim mobs of a about 1,000 ambushed Israelis, Jews, with clubs, knives, some even ran over by cars. Called a 'hunt on Jews,' or a 'Jew hunt.'

The pogrom was planned ahead of a soccer match between Makabi and a local team.

'In coordinated Jihad; Jews run over, stabbed, thrown in canal.'

Hamas affiliated PGNL send messages to gather.

Amsterdam Arabic speakers on Jews: :"beat him to kill". Israeli-Druze soccer fan spoke in Arabic & saved Jewish friends.

As the Amsterdam Jewish community joined with local officials to commemorate the 86th anniversary of Kristallnacht at the city’s Portuguese-Jewish synagogue—established by Jews who escaped the Inquisition—a pogrom was taking place outside. Following a soccer match between the Dutch club Ajax and the visiting Maccabi Tel Aviv, Jewish and Israeli fans of the visiting club were ambushed and beaten in the city’s streets and alleys.

Footage shows an Israeli soccer fan being struck by a car, cartwheeling across the windshield. More footage shows the scene in downtown Amsterdam, where Israelis are pleading with their assailants, “not Jewish, not Jewish.” And they are beaten mercilessly.

In video of other attacks last night, a victim is struck and lays injured on the ground, seemingly unconscious. A father can be seen fleeing with his son. A man jumps into one of Amsterdam’s canals to escape his assailants. In the recording, where he is forced to say “Free Palestine,” his assailants laugh and jeer that he is a “cancer Jew”—a classic slur in Dutch, where both diseases and the Jewish ethnicity are deployed as put-downs.

Much about the origins of the attack are still unclear, but early reports suggest that it was carried out by youth gangs from the Dutch Moroccan and Dutch Turkish community, and was orchestrated in advance. Visiting Israelis report being ambushed by groups of 10 to 15 masked assailants in various alleys. Fleeing Israelis told Channel 12’s Elad Simchayoff that “Amsterdam police instructed [Israelis] not to go by taxis. Police officers told fans that taxi drivers in the city are helping organize the riots and assisting the gangs.”

Exit quote: “Dutch society repeatedly told its post-Holocaust Jewish remnant—and itself—that ‘never again’ was not merely a concrete promise, but a core concept of modern Dutch morality. However, the dominant culture of the country’s immigrant communities has proven manifestly hostile to that worldview—and to Jews.”

And:

Footage shows an Israeli soccer fan being struck by a car, cartwheeling across the windshield. More footage shows the scene in downtown Amsterdam, where Israelis are pleading with their assailants, ‘not Jewish, not Jewish.’ And they are beaten mercilessly. In video of other attacks last night, a victim is struck and lies injured on the ground, seemingly unconscious. A father can be seen fleeing with his son. A man jumps into one of Amsterdam’s canals to escape his assailants. In the recording, where he is forced to say ‘Free Palestine,’ his assailants laugh and jeer that he is a ‘ca#cer Jew’ - a classic slur in Dutch….”

Aaron and Jacob are two young British Jews, fathers of young families from London, who visited Amsterdam for the game and were caught up in the pogrom. Aaron describes:

We left the game early to meet a friend, and as we walked towards the bar area, chaos broke out - mopeds appeared from alleyways, and a crowd surrounded an Israeli man. The man was on the ground, his head pinned between a curb and a metal gate, being viciously kicked.

Aaron and Jacob tried to push the mob away, only to be threatened with violence themselves. “Are you Yehudi? Are you Jewish?” the attackers asked, even demanding to see their passports to ascertain if they were Israeli. A gang member punched Aaron in the face, then was quickly joined by 20 other Muslim men.

“I told him to leave him alone and the next thing I know, he punched me in the face. It was so unexpected. My glasses were broken, my nose split. Blood everywhere,” Aaron described. A gang member realized that Aaron was Jewish and told the mob to leave him alone. “Yes, but he helped a Jew,” one of his attackers complained. “They knew what they were doing. It wasn’t a random ‘Let’s get an Israeli,” Aaron describes; “It was organized. It was ‘We want Jews. We want Jewish blood.’” Despite the violence, Aaron and Jacob recall, there were no police officers in the area to intervene.”

Attackers coordinated their pogrom using social media. “There is talk of people going on a Jew hunt,” explained Amsterdam Mayor Femke Halsema.

The many social media posts showing Jews and Israelis being beaten up in the streets and canals of Amsterdam were gleeful. “This coward jumped into the canal, afraid of getting beaten,” one typical post showed, along with “crying with laughter” emojis.

Another public post shows an unconscious man lying in the fetal position on a road in Amsterdam, being kicked by his attackers. Yet another post “shows a young Israeli football fan cornered in a narrow alley where he ends up crouching on the floor. He begs for mercy but his assailants knock him out with a punch to the head.” In these and other cases, the perpetrators appeared proud of what they were doing.

Revealed: How Pro-Palestinian mob organised via WhatsApp to ‘Hunt Jews’ across Amsterdam

The Telegraph reveals the messages of the pre-planned attack and pogrom of Jews in Amsterdam: “Tomorrow we will work them” “Who can get fireworks” “Come in this group tomorrow over here” “Tomorrow after the game, at night, part 2 of the Jew Hunt. Tomorrow we work them.”

The Arab networks are publishing a collection of videos from the pogrom, edited by the military wing of Hamas. At the beginning of the recording, chants of "Allah Akbar" are heard before the attack by the Israelis, followed by cursing and attacking.

Many shouted pro "palestine" slogans but as Dutch authorities said, this was no protest.

In fact, Arab - Muslims attacking Jews globally actually confirms the core of the "conflict" in the Middle East since 1913, as what it is, at the root: Arab racism, Islamic bigotry.

It was denounced in that country, all over. Including the US & Canadian governments. The Dutch King said, we failed to protect the Jews again. Referring to WW2).

The timing of being ahead of the kristallnacht anniversary was also brought up.

"Gaza of Europe": the messages embracing the State of Israel. The world did not remain indifferent to the documentation of the severe pogrom.

UNRWA teacher Ayman Nejmeh PGNL and 2024 Arab-Islamic Amsterdam pogrom

Apparently former UNRWA teacher, Ayman Nejmeh, helped organize Islamo-Arab Amsterdam pogrom by PGNL - Hamas-affiliated network in the Netherlands.

"Moderate" Palestinian Authority's official gloatibg over the Arab Islamic hate crimes casting the racist Arabs as the "world."

Days later, Anti-Semitic Arab-Islamic riots resume in Amsterdam. Footage: Moment Amsterdam tram goes up in flames after yob hurls firework inside following 'Jew hunt'.

Pallywood debunked: in fact Arab Cab drivers were attacking Israelis in Amsterdam the night before Ajax vs Maccabi Tel Aviv. Pre Islamo-Arab pogrom.

Aftermath

Over Amsterdam pogrom: Report: Dutch government could fall. Dutch government says it needs ‘more time’ to implement antisemitism strategy. It teeters over handling of antisemitic attacks on Israeli soccer fans.

Pandering to its Arab immigrants: 'Pogrom... propaganda[sic]' Amsterdam Mayor makes outrageous statement.

About 10 days after Pogrom: Dutch Arab-Muslim official resigns over post-pogrom ‘polarization’. Ex-undersecretary Nora Achahbar, who was born in Morocco, quit after right-wing pol Geert Wilders called for the deportation of those behind the Nov. 7 assaults, "most of whom" were Moroccan. The official resigned on Friday due to what she said were “polarizing attitudes” connected to the recent mass assaults by Arabs on Israelis in Amsterdam. It underlined how the Nov. 7 assaults are widening pre-existing divisions on immigration and the rule of law between rightists and centrists in the country’s ruling coalition.

Society

Painting of a windmill in Holland

Same-sex marriage has been recognized by the Dutch government since 2001. Furthermore, legal prostitution, euthanasia, abortion and its drug policy (see above) make The Netherlands the most liberal country in the world by most standards. Christianity was once the dominant factor in Dutch society and politics, but since the 1970s plays a secondary role in society, with only 15% of the population being Protestant (2015) and just under 24% are Roman Catholics. There is a rising Muslim population (5%) which has caused social strains. An overall decline in religion can be seen as of 2004. These days The Netherlands are considered one of the least churchgoing countries in Europe. However the Dutch does have its own bible belt which is still very conservative.

Drug policies

The Netherlands is noted for its low-crime rate (although comparable to other western European nations) and libertarian legislation. Examples are licensed prostitution in designated areas of major cities, such as Amsterdam's Red Light District, the legal soft drugs sold in the country's many coffee shops, abortion rights, same-sex marriages and euthanasia.

Consuming and carrying (for personal use only) the "soft drugs" (marijuana, hashish and hallucinogenic mushrooms) were made legal in the Netherlands in 1976 in a final attempt to stop drug-related crime in the 1970s. Soft drugs can be legally purchased by individuals over 18 in the famed (licensed) coffee shops, that do sell coffee as well, but are prohibited from serving alcohol. The Dutch policy regarding soft drugs (and previously prostitution) is called "gedoogbeleid" (condonement policy). This means that although certain behavior is officially prohibited by law, a condonement clause prevents law enforcement agencies from prosecuting this behavior. This clause is, legally speaking, not a law and can be reverted much easier than a regular law.

The main reason for this policy is to try to split the market for "soft drugs" from the one for "hard drugs", this to avoid that users "upgrade" from soft to "hard drugs" (the latter are still illegal). So in short, the law tries to prevent citizen's exposure to hard drugs by providing a legal context in which to purchase cannabis. The policy also allows the police to focus on the war on hard drugs and criminal trade, and avoid the exhaustive bureaucratic costs associated with low-profile possession busts. In fact, most major cities in the world have similar non-prosecution policies, but the Dutch one is the only nationwide one.

Growing marijuana and hashish for commercial purposes is still officially illegal (it is legal to own up to four plants per household), causing coffee shop owners to rely on illegal homegrown products. Only two state run companies are exempted from this rule in order to grow marijuana for medicinal purposes. Leftist movements have stated that the government should make its mind up: "either make growing marijuana and hashish legal, or ban soft drugs altogether".

Some argue that the legal status of soft drugs has had no significant adverse effects on Dutch society.^{[Who says?]} This is probably due to the fact that it has become a more or less socially accepted drug like alcohol and tobacco, removing the need for dealers and effectively terminating cannabis' status as an anti-establishment symbol, and in effect diminishing its' popularity somewhat amongst youth. Some disagree:

• The head of Holland’s best-known drug abuse rehabilitation center has described what the new drug culture has created: The strong form of marijuana that most of the young people smoke, he says, produces "a chronically passive individual—someone who is lazy, who doesn’t want to take initiatives, doesn’t want to be active—the kid who’d prefer to lie in bed with a joint in the morning rather than getting up and doing something." [3]

See also

• Painting of the Dutch Century
• Gallery of Flemish and Dutch painting
• Flemish School of Painting
• Gallery of Dutch Still life Masterpieces
• Countries of the world - Gross Domestic Product per capita

Bibliography

Guides

• DK. Amsterdam (2008) excerpt and text search
• DK. Netherlands (2008) excerpt and text search
• Lonely Planet the Netherlands (2007) excerpt and text search
• Michelin the Green Guide Netherlands (2007) excerpt and text search

Current conditions

• Delsen, Lei. Exit Polder Model? Socioeconomic Changes in the Netherlands (2002) online edition
• Mathijs, Ernest, ed. The Cinema of the Low Countries. (2004). 268 pp.
• Vuijsje, Herman. The Politically Correct Netherlands: Since the 1960s. (2000). 244 pp.
• White, Colin, et al. The Undutchables: An Observation of the Netherlands, Its Culture And Its Inhabitants (2005)

History surveys

• Arblaster, Paul. A History of the Low Countries. (2006). 298 pp.
• Blom, J. C. H. and E. Lamberts, eds. History of the Low Countries (2006) 504pp excerpt and text search; also complete edition online
• Hooker, Mark T. The History of Holland (1999) 264pp excerpt and text search
• Israel, Jonathan. The Dutch Republic: Its Rise, Greatness, and Fall, 1477-1806 (1995) a major synthesis; complete online edition; also excerpt and text search
• Kossmann, E. H. The Low Countries 1780-1940 (1978)
• van Oostrom, Frits, and Hubert Slings. A Key to Dutch History (2007)
• Pirenne, Henri. Belgian Democracy, Its Early History (1910, 1915) 250 pp. history of towns in the Low Countries online free
• Rietbergen, P.J.A.N. A Short History of the Netherlands. From Prehistory to the Present Day. 5th ed. Amersfoort: Bekking, 2002. ISBN 9061094402
• Vlekke, Bernard H. M. Evolution of the Dutch Nation (1945) 382 pp. online edition

Online resources

• International Institute of Social History (IISH)
• History of the Netherlands, introduction from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs
• Dutch revolt: maps