What was left of Rotterdam's city center, 1940.

Many Jews, political opponents, Roma, gays, and others that were not fitting to Nazi ideology were brought to concentration camps. From the 140.000 Dutch Jews living in the Netherlands at the time, 101.800 were killed in this way. Amsterdam used to have a large Jewish neighborhood, but it was emptied en masse in organized raids. Now my city only has an unnoticeable small community of Jews. It is strange to think of what happened to them only a few decades ago, since you don't notice people that are not around. I have been at the humungous extermination factory that the Nazis built in Auschwitz, Birkenau. What struck me was the modern building style of the barracks, a building style that is everywhere to be seen in Western Europe. I realized while walking through this monstrous industrial area, that all of this happened in this time.. my time!

Dramatic representation of the liberation by the Allied Forces on 5th of May 1945.

After five hard years of oppression, hunger, many deaths and a total destruction of the country's functional structures, the Netherlands was liberated by the Allied Forces. The Marshall Plan, while incorporating us into a new, American way of life, helped Europe back on its feet again. A time of prosperity and freedom as never seen before followed; but the war lived on in the traumas of my grandparents' generation. My grandmother is a good example. Her husband was shot dead on our national liberation day. Although her part of the town was freed, a sniper bullet from the other, still occupied side of the river, hit him in the head. This event has had an essential impact on the history of my family. Without it, my Grandma would not have re-married, and I would not even have been born.

Remembrance in Amsterdam's city center, on the 4th of May. The 10 little dots down below are the royal family.  

Every year on the 4th of May, all the people that died during World War Two are remembered across the Netherlands. Queen Beatrix and the royal family visits the war monument in the center of Amsterdam, placing a few large flower garlands there. At 8pm everybody in the country is silent for two minutes. The radio stations stop, the people stand still, and even the public traffic system stops. It's a nice, respectful moment. The Dutch government has been re-branding this day's meaning throughout the years. Since the younger generation doesn't have any feeling of connection with World War Two anymore the ceremony has come to stand for the dead of any war, and as such it became a 'realization' day, to remember what human beings can do to each other and that we should always work hard to prevent this from ever happening again.

The rapper from 'Opgezwolle', a Dutch hip-hop group, rocks the crowd during one of the Dutch Freedom Festivals.

The 5th of May is Liberation Day. State-sponsored freedom festivals are organized in every provincial capital and lots of festivities happen all over the country. School kids have the day off, and a lot of people go out. Even though young people party this day, the festivity in many people's minds doesn't have a large meaning anymore. While officials preach respect, it is sometimes hard to be seen in our modern Dutch society.

Our best, proud example: 17 % of the Dutch voters have put their trust in the hands of one of the biggest assholes on the planet, Geert Wilders. He applies the same tactics as Milosevic and Hitler did to gain power. By framing a designated group of people as alien to us, growing in numbers, and barbaric (say: non-human), he miraculously gains popularity and power. Many people seem to love this neo-racist approach, saying 'it all got out of hand'.

Nothing got out of hand. My city isn't any less safe than before and the best shops in town are Turkish and Morrocan. But people simply forgot the danger in their society, a danger that is residing in their own heads. While complaining in front of their flat screens that it “all became a mess” and we should “clean up” our society, they use the same speech that killed 6 million European Jews and many more others, not even 70 years ago. 

Anyways. Back to Kosovo. Urime Pavaresia e Kosoves!

The article was originally written in English.

Photos: www.animaatjes.nl, www.sandcat.nl, http://jacobhesseling.wordpress.com, http://knifey-knifeyard.blogspot.com/2011/12/familiar-earth.html, DeeEe (Own work) [GFDL (www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html) or CC-BY-SA-3.0-2.5-2.0-1.0 (www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

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