Thank you very much. Thank you for inviting me and thank you US border police for allowing me to enter this country. These are dramatic times. Europe might be very well on its way to destruction. We are now witnessing the largest influx in human history. This is endangering our heritage, our freedom, our prosperity and our culture.
I wish I had come to a place they call the sunshine state with better news, but it would be unwise to deny the situation is gloomy.
It might take a while to have you understand the situation we are in now. Maybe you as Americans still think of Europe as a place with great culture, and a profound way of looking at things. Maybe you see immigration as something that is inherently good for a country, as it contributed so much to the United States.
The Europe you know from a tourist visit, or from the story of your grandparents, is on the verge of collapsing. We are now witnessing profound changes that will forever alter Europe’s destiny and might send the continent in what Ronald Reagan once called ‘a thousand years of darkness’.
The take-over of Europe is part of the global fight of Islam for world domination. Islam is a political ideology. Islam’s heart lies in the Koran. The Koran is a book that calls for hatred, violence, murder, and submission. The Koran calls upon Muslims to kill non-Muslims. The Koran describes Jews as monkeys and pigs. Churchill compared the Koran to Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf.
The core of the problem with the Koran is twofold. First, the commands in the Koran are not limited by place or time, they apply for all time, to all Muslims. Second, the Koran is Allah’s personal word. That leaves no room for interpretation. Therefore, there is no such thing as a moderate Islam. Of course, there are many moderate Muslims, but there is no moderate Islam. As the Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan once put it, “There is no moderate Islam, Islam is Islam.”
Apart from the Koran, the life of the prophet Muhammad plays a crucial part in Islamic ideology. Muhammad is the model for all Muslims. He was a conqueror and a warlord. In establishing Islam he preached violence and the slaughter of non-Muslims. He took part in 78 battles and slaughtered the Jewish tribe of Banu Qurayza. Mohammed said, “I have been ordered by Allah to fight against people until they testify that there is no God but Allah and that Muhammad is his messenger.” Muhammad’s behavior inspired Iran’s former Ayatollah Khomeini to say, “The purest joy in Islam is to kill and to be killed for Allah.” And Muhammad’s behavior - and the Koran - inspired Jihadists that slaughtered innocent people in Washington, New York, Madrid, London and Mumbai.
Ladies and gentlemen, Islam has always attempted to conquer Europe. And it has done so for centuries. The Christian city of Constantinople fell in the fifteenth century. And now, in the twenty-first century, Islam is trying again. This time not with armies, but through the application of Al-Hijra, the Islamic doctrine of migration. As expounded so masterfully by my good friend Sam Solomon in his book Al-Hijra, this doctrine is based on the example of Muhammad, who himself migrated from Mecca to Medina.
Libyan leader Muammar al-Gaddafi said, “We have 50 million Muslims in Europe. There are signs that Allah will grant Islam victory in Europe - without swords, without guns, without conquest. The 50 million Muslims of Europe will turn it into a Muslim continent within a few decades.”
Gaddafi is right. The Al-Hijra doctrine is, and has been, very successful. For the first time in world history there are dozens of millions of Muslims living far outside Dar al-Islam, the Islamic world. And that poses enormous problems to the West. Ladies and gentlemen, Al-Hijra may be the end of Western civilization as we know it.
The most dramatic situation is the one in Europe. My country is in the process of becoming Hollandistan, and Europe, Eurabia. Only 12% of German Muslims see themselves as more German than Muslim. Churches are emptying out, whereas mosques are shooting up like mushrooms. Medieval phenomena such as burkas, honor killings and female genital mutilation are becoming more and more prevalent. Sharia testaments, Sharia mortgages, Sharia schools, Sharia banks, Sharia courts and even Sharia Barbie dolls - Europe has them all. And I have not even mentioned the fact that more than 70% of all crimes in Copenhagen are committed by Muslims. We let in the Trojan horse.
The free world is now facing a ‘stealth Jihad’, the Islamic’ attempt to introduce Sharia law bit by bit. Allow me to give you a few examples of Islamization in the United States: Muslim taxi drivers at Minneapolis airport have refused over 5,000 passengers because they were carrying alcohol; Muslim students are demanding separate campus housing; Muslim women are demanding separate hours in gyms and swimming pools; schools are banning Halloween and Christmas celebrations - indeed, schools are taking pork off their cafeteria menus to avoid offending Muslim students. Ladies and gentlemen, be aware that this is only the beginning. If things continue like this, you will have the same problems as we are currently faced with in Europe.
If we do not stop the Islamization, we will lose everything: our identity, our culture, our democratic constitutional state, our freedom and our civilization. In Europe we are already losing the right to free speech, the right to criticize Islam. I think criticisms of religions or ideologies always ought to be possible in a free world. Human rights exist for the protection of individuals, not religions and ideologies. I propose that all laws concerning hate speech be repealed in Europe. Europe ought to defend freedom of speech with at least as much passion as the United States. In fact, Europe should adopt the US as its model in this respect. The difference between the United States and Europe in the area of free speech is shown by my movie Fitna; a few months ago I was invited by Senator Jon Kyl to screen Fitna in the US Senate. In contrast, screening of my movie has been banned twice by the European Parliament. Let us see to it that freedom of speech is exercised not only in Washington DC but also in Brussels and Strasbourg. For this purpose I propose an European First Amendment.
Ladies and gentlemen, there is one Western country that has been forced to fight the forces of jihad for its values since the very first day of its existence: Israel, the canary in the coal mine. Let me say a few words about that country.
I had the privilege of living in Israel for a few years, and since then I have visited Israel many, many times. I love Israel. However, in Europe being pro-Israel makes you an endangered species. Israel is a beacon of light in an area - the Middle East - that is pitch black everywhere else. Israel is a Western democracy, while Syria, Saudi Arabia, Iran and Egypt are medieval dictatorships.
The so-called ‘Middle East conflict’ is not about land at all. It is a conflict about ideologies; a battle between Islam and freedom. It is not about some land in Gaza or in Judea and Samaria. It is about Jihad. To Islam the whole of Israel is occupied territory. They see Tel Aviv and Haifa as settlements too. I am very much in favor of a two-state solution. I mean Churchill’s 1921 two-state solution, when Palestine was partitioned in a Jewish and an Arab part. Arab Palestine is now called Jordan, and therefore, there is already a Palestinian state. With eighty percent of the population having roots on the other side of the Jordan, there is no doubt Jordan is truly the state of Palestine. I hope Israel’s government will start telling that to the world.
Islam forces Israel to fight and Israel is not just fighting for itself. Israel is fighting for all of us, for the entire West. Just like those brave American soldiers who landed in Sicily in 1943 and stormed the Normandy beaches in 1944, young Israeli men and women are fighting for our freedom, our civilization.
Like Bosnia, Kosovo, Nigeria, Sudan, the Caucasus, Kashmir, southern Thailand, western China and the south of the Philippines, Israel is situated exactly on the dividing line between Dar al-Islam, the Islamic world, and Dar al-Harb, the non-Islamic world. It is no coincidence that it is precisely this dividing line where blood is flowing and war is raging in many areas. We have to get rid of that politically-correct fallacy that it is all about separate conflicts. Let us, please, allow ourselves at last to see the big picture, which is that those conflicts all have to do with Jihad; Jihad in the spirit of Muhammad. Ladies and gentlemen, Europe ought to fully back Israel to the hilt in its relentless fight against those that threaten it, whether it is Hezbollah, Hamas or a nuclear Iran. Also, because of its history, Europe certainly has the moral obligation to prevent at all cost another Holocaust against the Jewish people.
Islam is not our number one problem. Cultural relativism is. The crazy idea that all cultures are equal. Let me tell you they are not. Our culture based on Christianity, Judaism and humanism is far better than the Islamic culture, and I am proud to say so. The elites have converted to this philosophy a long time ago - government leaders, judges, churches, trade unions, universities, the media - all of them are blinded by political correctness and have chosen the side of Islam. They feel sorry for Muslims and pity them. Cultural relativism is weakening the West day by day. As a result of cultural relativism a little bit of the free West dies each day. Many politicians seem to believe that their job is not to defend democracy but to help make the transition to Sharia law as smooth as possible.
Ladies and gentlemen, I am often asked whether I have any answers to the problem and what those might be. Well, I certainly have some answers. Here are ten things we would have to do to stop the Islamization of the West:
1. Stop cultural relativism.
2. Stop pretending that Islam is only a religion. Islam is a totalitarian ideology. In other words, the right to religious freedom should not apply to Islam.
3. Stop mass immigration by people from Muslim countries. We have to end Al-Hijra.
4. Encourage voluntary repatriation.
5. Expel criminal foreigners and criminals with dual nationality, after denationalization, and send them back to their Arab countries. Likewise, expel all those who incite to a ‘violent jihad’.
6. We need an European First Amendment to strengthen free speech.
7. We need a binding pledge of allegiance in all Western countries.
8. Stop the building of new mosques. As long as no churches or synagogues are allowed to be build in countries like Saudi-Arabia we will not allow one more new mosque in our western countries. Close all mosques where incitement to violence is taking place. Close all Islamic schools, for they are fascist institutions and young children should not be educated an ideology of hate and violence.
9. Get rid of the current weak leaders. We have the privilege of living in a democracy. Let’s use that privilege and exchange cowards for heroes. We need more Churchills and fewer Chamberlains.
In short, we have to go on the offensive and start fighting back. We must no longer allow ourselves to remain seated in our armchairs. If they bombard us with Sharia law, we will bombard them back with our human rights. If they bombard us with court cases, we will bombard them back with court cases. We have to fight back and show that millions of people are sick and tired of it all, and refuse to take any more. We must make it clear that millions of freedom-loving people are saying ‘enough is enough’.
This is the reason why last week I announced the release of another movie in 2010, Fitna 2. This movie will be not about the Koran, but about the Islamization of the West and its consequences, for example, for free speech. I assure you that I will continue my struggle for freedom.
And a struggle it is: After Fitna had been screened for the first time last year, there were threats of economic boycotts and the Dutch flag was burned. After Fitna I am being prosecuted in my own country, while France and Jordan are considering to prosecute me. I have been barred from entering the United Kingdom and Indonesia, and the most radical imam in the Netherlands is demanding compensation and threatening to take me to court. A parliamentary bill is currently being drafted in the Netherlands with the aim of protecting Islam from criticism. On top of all this, because of my views on Islam, Al Qaeda is determined to kill me, I have needed full-time protection for almost five years now and for my own personal safety I have lived in a prison cell and army barracks. Can you believe it?
Ladies and gentlemen, besides all the bad news, fortunately there is some good news. There is no doubt in my mind that freedom will prevail, there are already some hopeful signs: Last week the Dutch Parliament approved a motion proposed by my party seeking to block any dialogue between government officials and Hamas. And according to the most recent opinion polls, if elections were held at this moment, my party, the Freedom Party, would be the largest party in the Netherlands. You might be looking at the next Dutch Prime Minister. And so I ask you, if it can be done in the Netherlands, why not throughout the whole of the Western world?
If the Netherlands were the first country to end up in the multiculturalist swamp, why can’t we be the first country to find a way out?
Finally, ladies and gentlemen, I have not forgotten those to whom we owe our liberties. Our liberties were bitterly fought for. American soldiers fought, bled and died for European freedom. American soldiers did not die for an Islamized Europe, they died for a free Europe. We owe something to these brave men. Their legacy cannot be squandered and given away.
The third President and spiritual father of this great nation once said, “The price of freedom is eternal vigilance.” As so often, Thomas Jefferson was right. Our freedom must be safeguarded. And it is we ourselves who must do so. A period of inattention, of dropping our guard for even a short while, might cost us our freedom. Just like that. It has happened before in our history. Please let us not allow it to happen ever again.
Everything we stand for has to be defended with all our might: our identity, our culture, our democratic constitution, our freedom and our civilization. We owe it to our children.
So, ladies and gentlemen, I leave you with this expression of our determination: We will never give in. We will never give up. We will never surrender.
Acceptance Speech by Geert Wilders, MP upon receiving The Freedom Award from Florida Security Council in Miami, Florida on April 27, 2009.
