Islamic State fears take hold in Netherlands

Street tension between radical Muslims and Holland's hard right rises, as Islamic State anxiety grows. Three Dutch citizens were arrested last week on suspicion of recruiting for the hard-line Islamic State (IS) group in its armed struggle in Syria and Iraq, as tensions between radical Muslims and Holland's far-right Pro Patria organisation continue to rise.

The men detained come from The Hague, the city that positions itself as an international city of peace and justice, and which Islamic State sympathisers have also named "Jihad City". According to the Dutch General Intelligence and Security Service, the Islamic State movement in the Netherlands amounts to a few hundred followers and several thousand sympathisers.

Edwin Bakker, director of the Centre for Terrorism and Counterterrorism at Leiden University, estimated that The Hague's Islamic State supporters consists of 200 men.They come from Schilderswijk neighbourhood, which the media have renamed the "sharia triangle". This neighbourhood primarily houses immigrants, as do many neighbourhoods in large Dutch cities - in this case more than 90 percent of the population are immigrants. Dissatisfaction is common and unemployment, crime, and poverty rates are higher than in the rest of the country.

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