Theo van Gogh
November 2nd, 2004 by Andre Soares
Provocative Dutch filmmaker Theo Van Gogh, the great-grandnephew of the painter Vincent Van Gogh, was shot and stabbed to death on an Amsterdam street on November 2. Following a shootout, the Police arrested a 26-year-old man of Moroccan-Dutch nationality, who is supposed to have ties to radical Muslim groups. Van Gogh was 47 years old.
Van Gogh had received death threats because of his English-language film Submission, a critique of the treatment of women under Islam. The film, which was aired on Dutch television in August, was reviled by the Netherlands’ Muslim community, including some Muslim women’s groups.
In Amsterdam, about 20,000 people gathered to protest director Theo Van Gogh’s murder, allegedly by a Muslim fanatic. The crowd stood on the central Dam Square banging pots and pans and blowing horns and whistles.
Van Gogh’s family had called for the noisy wake, which was supposed to symbolize Dutch freedom of speech.
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