Belgium

The conviction by a Belgian court of far-right activist Dries Van Langenhove has alarmed both the country’s right and left. Van Langenhove – let there be no doubt – belongs to some of Belgium’s darker far-right movements. He has previously been convicted of racism and Holocaust denial. Yet he has now been fined €4,000, for what the judge described as  "apparently having the intention' to incite hatred and violence, rather than for a crime he was clearly proven to have committed. Bart Eeckhout, chief commentator of Belgium’s left-leaning daily De Morgen – certainly no friend of Van Langenhove – unexpectedly described the conviction for incitement to hatred, violence and racism as an injustice.

It’s not uncommon to see camouflage on the high street in Belgium. It is a peculiarly Belgian reflex: when the state feels the strain, it reaches for the army. This week, the federal government has done so once more. Soldiers have been deployed to bolster security around Jewish sites and neighborhoods in Brussels and Antwerp, following a spate of clumsy but troubling attacks across Belgium and the Netherlands. Synagogues have been targeted with arson and a Jewish school struck by an explosion. Mercifully, no one has been injured and the damage has been minor. Yet the intent is clear, and the authorities have been quick to identify the incidents as anti-Semitic acts.

Russia started the war on Ukraine, so Russia should pay for the damage it has wrought. Such was Volodymyr Zelensky’s forceful message to European leaders last night as he pleaded for a "reparations loan" backed by the €190 billion ($222 billion) of Russian Central Bank capital frozen in a Belgian clearing bank since Putin’s full-scale invasion. "Just as authorities confiscate money from drug traffickers and seize weapons from terrorists, Russian assets must be used to defend against Russian aggression and rebuild what was destroyed by Russian attacks," Zelensky told his European allies. "It’s moral. It’s fair. It’s legal." But after negotiations that went late into the night, Europe ultimately shied away from grabbing Russia’s money.