Theo van Gogh

The murder widened and polarized the debate in the Netherlands about the social position of its more than one million Muslim residents. It also put the country's liberal tradition further into question, coming only two years after Pim Fortuyn's murder. In an apparent reaction against controversial statements about the Islamic, Christian, and Jewish religions—such as those van Gogh had made—the Dutch Minister of Justice, Christian Democrat Piet Hein Donner, suggested Dutch blasphemy laws should either be applied more stringently or made more strict. The liberal D66 party suggested scrapping the blasphemy laws altogether.

When I asked Jayasekera if he had any regrets, he said he had none. He told me that, like many other readers, I shouldn't have made the mistake of believing that Index on Censorship was against censorship, even murderous censorship, on principle – in the same way as Amnesty International is opposed to torture, including murderous torture, on principle. It may have been so in its radical youth, but was now as concerned with fighting 'hate speech' as protecting free speech.

On 18 March 2007, a sculpture honoring Theo van Gogh, entitled De Schreeuw ("The Scream"), was unveiled in Amsterdam. It is located in the Oosterpark, a short distance from where van Gogh was murdered. A private trust, the Foundation for Freedom of Expression, was established to help fund protection for critics of Islam and Muslims.

Bouyeri, a 26-year-old Dutch-Moroccan citizen, was apprehended by police after a chase. Authorities alleged that he had terrorist ties with the Dutch Islamist Hofstad Network. He was charged with the attempted murder of several police officers and bystanders, illegal possession of a firearm, and conspiring to murder others, including Hirsi Ali. He was convicted at trial on 26 July 2005 and sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole.

At the same time, starting with four attempted arson attacks on mosques in the weekend of 5–7 November, there were retaliatory violent incidents against Muslims, including a bomb that exploded at a Muslim school in Eindhoven. The Dutch Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia recorded a total of 106 violent incidents in November against Muslim targets. The National Dutch Police Services Agency (KLPD) recorded 31 occasions of violence against mosques and Islamic schools between 23 November and 13 March 2005. An arson attack destroyed a Muslim primary school in Uden in December 2004. By 8 November, Christian churches were reported as targets of vandalism and arson attacks in turn. A report for the Anne Frank Foundation and the University of Leiden, accounted for a total of 174 violent incidents between 2–30 November; it said that mosques were the target of violence 47 times, and churches 13 times.

In August 2004, after the movie's broadcast on Dutch public TV, the newspaper De Volkskrant reported that the journalist Francisco van Jole had accused Hirsi Ali and van Gogh of plagiarism, saying that they had appropriated the ideas of Iranian-American video artist Shirin Neshat, whose work used Arabic text projected onto bodies.

Van Gogh was shot and stabbed by Mohammed Bouyeri while cycling to work on 2 November 2004 at about 9 o'clock in the morning. Bouyeri also injured some bystanders and left on the scene a note containing death threats to Ayaan Hirsi Ali, who went into hiding. The note also threatened Western countries and Jews, and referred to ideologies of the Egyptian organization Takfir wal-Hijra.

Both left- and right-wing commentators criticized the article. In December 2004, Nick Cohen of London's Observer wrote:

His last book (2003) was Allah weet het beter ("Allah Knows Best"), in which he strongly condemned Islam. He was a well-known critic of Islam, particularly after the Iranian Revolution and the September 11 attacks. He supported the nomination of writer Ayaan Hirsi Ali for the Dutch parliament, who was elected. Born in Somalia, she had immigrated to the Netherlands to escape an arranged marriage. She became a writer and liberal (former PvdA Labour Party) politician.

Van Gogh was a member of the Dutch Republican society Republikeins Genootschap, which advocates the abolition of the Dutch monarchy. He was a friend and supporter of the controversial Dutch politician Pim Fortuyn, who was assassinated in 2002.

He was awarded a Gouden Kalf for Blind Date (1996) and In het belang van de staat ("In the Interest of the State," 1997). For the latter, he also received a "Certificate of Merit" from the San Francisco International Film Festival. As an actor, he appeared in the film, De noorderlingen ("The Northerners", 1992). He made numerous films (see below), many on political themes. From the 1990s, van Gogh also worked in television.

After dropping out of law school at the University of Amsterdam, van Gogh became a stage manager. His self-proclaimed passion was film-making, and he made his debut as a director with the movie Luger (1981).

In the 1980s, van Gogh became a newspaper columnist. Through the years he used his columns to express his frustration with politicians, actors, film directors, writers and other people he considered to be part of "the establishment". He delighted in provocation and became a controversial figure, frequently criticizing Islamic cultures. He used his website, De Gezonde Roker ("The Healthy Smoker"), to express harsh criticism of multicultural society. He said the Netherlands was so rife with social turmoil that it was in danger of turning into "something Belfast-like".

Theodoor "Theo" van Gogh (Dutch: [ˈteːjoː vɑŋ ˈɣɔx] ; 23 July 1957 – 2 November 2004) was a Dutch director and film and television producer, actor and author. He directed "Submission: Part 1", a short film written by Somali writer and politician Ayaan Hirsi Ali, which criticized the treatment of women in Islam in strong terms. On 2 November 2004, van Gogh was assassinated by Mohammed Bouyeri, a Dutch-Moroccan Muslim who objected to the film's controversial message. The last film van Gogh had completed before his death, 06/05, was, ironically, a fictional exploration of the assassination of Dutch politician Pim Fortuyn (1948–2002). It was released posthumously in December 2004, a month after van Gogh's assassination.

Theo van Gogh was born on 23 July 1957 in The Hague, Netherlands, to Anneke and Johan van Gogh. His father served in the Dutch secret service ('AIVD', then called 'BVD'). He was named after his paternal uncle Theo, who was captured and executed while working as a resistance fighter during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands during World War II. Theo van Gogh was a great-grandson of Theo van Gogh, art dealer and brother of painter Vincent van Gogh.