Hirshi Ali wipes the floor with Premier Balkenende

H/T NIS News

AMSTERDAM, 20/11/07 - Islam critic Ayaan Hirsi Ali fiercely criticised Premier Jan Peter Balkenende yesterday. "He does not behave like a premier but like little Jan Peter. If something happens to me, he is responsible,' she told De Pers newspaper.

The cabinet, with the approval of the Lower House, decided last month no longer to cooperate with the protection of Hirsi Ali in the US. She moved there in September 2006 after resigning as a conservative (VVD) MP following a conflict with then Integration Minister Rita Verdonk over her integrity as a former asylum seeker.

When in the Netherlands, Hirsi Ali is still protected, but she says Balkenende has openly suggested that she would be better to stay in the US than to come back to the Netherlands. Hirsi Ali calls it immoral that Balkenende advises her to stay away. "This is not Zimbabwe, this is a constitutional state." With sarcasm, Hirsi Ali challenges the premier to withdraw her Dutch citizenship. This is the only thing he can do to prevent her coming to the Netherlands, in her view.

"I became a Lower House member in the Netherlands, and there, my profile became so sharp that I was seriously threatened." According to the Somalia-born apostate of Islam, the Netherlands is therefore morally responsible for her protection. "If things go wrong, Balkenende is responsible, absolutely."

"What he does not understand is that this is no ordinary row between 'Jan Petertje' and 'Ayaantje' (little Jan Peter and little Ayaan). He is premier. He wants to be premier so dearly. This has a number of advantages, but also restrictions. I have often been accused of not behaving like a parliamentarian. He does not behave like a premier," says Hirsi Ali in De Pers.

Hirsi Ali suggests that Balkenende does not speak like a premier but "like little Jan Peter." In that case, "my answer is that he should not interfere with my agenda. That is indecent. Although I am still assiduously looking for a good secretary. He can apply."

Last Saturday, Hirsi Ali already said in NRC Handelsblad that Balkenende has damaged the credibility of politics with the attitude to her protection. "With this man, the entire political profession is denigrated." (...) "This concerns all Dutch citizens who will be threatened in the future," according to Hirsi Ali.