A 30-year-old man from Gouda has been arrested following the laser projection of antisemitic messages onto a building in Capelle aan den IJssel, according to the police. The arrest took place
on Thursday evening, and the suspect is now in custody, facing charges of discrimination and incitement to hatred.
The incident occurred on Thursday night when reports were received about the projection of a blue laser text on a white office building in the Rivium business park in Capelle aan den IJssel. A video posted on Twitter revealed the slogan "Joden runden de slavernij, blanken schaften het af," which translates to "Jews ran slavery, whites abolished it."
The language used in the projection is associated with white supremacy and far-right nationalism, falsely blaming Jews for all instances of slavery and wrongly suggesting that white people were not involved in the history of slavery. Last week, King Willem-Alexander officially apologized for the Netherlands' historical involvement in the slave trade.
After an investigation into the source of the projection, the police located a man in close proximity with the necessary equipment. The 30-year-old suspect was apprehended and taken into custody. The police will question him regarding the incident.
Agnes Maassen, chairwoman of the D66 party in Rotterdam, condemned the offensive text on Twitter, describing it as "repulsive." She expressed the need for the perpetrators to be identified swiftly and announced her intention to address the issue in the council with written questions.
This is not the first time a laser projector has been used to display hate speech and discriminatory messages in the Netherlands. Similar incidents occurred during the New Year's Eve countdown on the Erasmus Bridge in Rotterdam, as well as the projection of racist texts on the Eindhoven city hall in February. Photo by Peter Dorsman, Wikimedia commons.