AMSTERDAM, 03/11/06 - Aliens Affairs Minister Rita Verdonk unlawfully deported a radical Imam from the Netherlands. The district court in Amsterdam ruled yesterday that there was insufficient evidence that he was undermining state security.
The Imam, Eisha Bersham of the Al Fourqaan mosque in Eindhoven, posed a danger to national security, according to the AIVD secret service. Based on the AIVD's conclusion, Verdonk declared the Imam an undesirable alien on 15 June 2005. This meant she did not renew his residence permit.
The Amsterdam district court yesterday quashed the ministerial decision. The AIVD and the minister may have correctly concluded that the Al Fourqaan mosque was a feeding-ground for Jihad recruitment and that the Imam did too little against this. But deportation was still unlawful.
The AIVD's conclusions are not so unequivocal that it can be said that the Imam was personally and actively involved in the radicalisation of a group of mosque visitors, explained the judge. The Imam could therefore not be called a danger to national security in 2005, ran the verdict.
After being declared an undesirable, the Imam left the Netherlands in December 2005. Bersham, born in Sudan and holder of a Bosnian passport, is likely currently in Sudan. According to the court, he must be allowed to apply for a residence permit again.
The Al Fourqaan achieved notoriety earlier when two young Moroccan youths from Eindhoven were shot dead by border troops in the Indian state of Kashmir. They were said to have been recruited for al-Qaeda in the Al Fourkaan mosque.
In February 2005, Verdonk had already withdrawn the residence permits of two other Imams at the Fourqaan mosque for knowingly contributing to the radicalisation of Muslims in the Netherlands. This had never before happened in the Netherlands. Yesterday's verdict may also have consequences for their deportation.
Verdonk announced immediately she will appeal against the verdict. The ruling comes at precisely the moment that the minister is considering whether she can deport another Imam: Sheik Fawaz Jneid. He cursed filmmaker Theo van Gogh in a sermon a few weeks before he was murdered exactly two years ago yesterday. According to terrorist suspect Soumaya Sahla, the murderer, Mohammed Bouyeri, was present at the sermon.
In his prayer, Fawaz said to Allah: "Cause Van Gogh a disease which all the inhabitants of the earth are unable to cure. Cause him suffering making him long for death. Blind the sight of Ayaan Hirsi Ali, give her brains a cancer. Give her tongue a cancer." Fawaz said this week he had just wanted "to blow off steam".
Ayaan Hirsi Ali, who made a controversial film on women in Islam with Van Gogh, expects Fawaz cannot be prosecuted. The Dutch legal system is "too rational", she said yesterday in De Volkskrant. Hirsi Ali was referring to the freedom of religion, which has proved to be stronger than the ban on discrimination in various court cases in the past.
