Murder in Amsterdam: The Death of Theo van Gogh and the Limits of Tolerance

Murder in Amsterdam: The Death of Theo van Gogh and the Limits of Tolerance

by Ian Buruma

Atlantic Books $144

It's hard to find a more tolerant country than the Netherlands. It tries to accommodate all manner of life- styles. But that may be changing. Ian Buruma's Murder in Amsterdam - The Death of Theo van Gogh and the Limits of Tolerance is a chilling analysis of the failure of multiculturalism and respect of difference. Buruma, who left the country of his birth in his mid 20s and is highly regarded for his writings on Asia, was startled by the murders of Pim Fortuyn, a gay and anti-immigration popularist and potential prime minister in May 2002, and of provocative filmmaker Theo van Gogh in November 2004. It was all so 'un-Dutch'. Fortuyn was killed by an animal rights activist. Van Gogh, though, was shot and nearly decapitated by a Dutch-born Muslim offended by his film Submission, made with former Dutch MP Ayaan Hirsi Ali, which showed the bodies of battered Muslim women overlaid with text from the Koran. Murder in Amsterdam asks where a tolerant and liberal society draws the line at respecting the intolerance of others. Buruma offers no answers, but asks good questions. This edition has a postscript on the fate of Hirsi Ali since the murder.