EUJS Complaint to UNIA about Incitement to Anti-Muslim Violence on Doorbraak.be

Get The Trolls Out! partner for Flemish-language Belgian media, European Union of Jewish Students have sent a letter of complaint to Centre for Equal Opportunities and Opposition to Racism (UNIA) – Belgium’s independent public institution that fights discrimination and promotes equal opportunities at the federal, regional and community level – after the sensationalist website Doorbraak.be ran Johan Sanctorum’s op-ed ‘Samuel Paty, Allerheiligen en Halloween’ [Samuel Paty, All Saints Day and Halloween]. In this piece, Sanctorum used Halloween traditions as a metaphor to call for violence against all Muslims, in retaliation for Samuel Paty’s murder.

In their complaint, EUJS explained:

Sanctorum creates a parallel between Halloween and a call for stronger responses to radical Islam. He states: “Besides a depiction of evil, isn't that macabre carved pumpkin also a bit of evocation of the effect, the head of Samuel? A warning to the executioners? A signal that not everything can be reduced to dialogue and relativity?” The article continues in a very violent fashion, claiming that “terror can only be fought with counter-terror." In the article, the author discusses the Islamic terrorist attack on Samuel Paty. However, he implies that a violent “solution” must not only be used against Islamic terrorists, but all Muslims in general – “Macron's pumpkin transformation, the decision to hunt down the jihadists and the planners, must go hand in hand with a wholescale intimidation of the radicalized, but also the 'good' Muslims, that one civilized imam against the 999 hate preachers. Don't be sorry if this sounds as wrong now…”

EUJS has not received a reply as of yet - this page will be updated if and when UNIA respond.