There were several events in the Netherlands this weekend to commemorate 70 years since Kristallnacht – the night of 9 to 10 November when Nazis in Germany attacked Jewish homes and shops, marking the start of the Jewish persecution.

Many Jews fled to Holland, where they were housed in the specially-built refugee centre at Westerbork which later became a concentration camp.
During a speech in Amsterdam, Ed van Thijn, former home affairs minister and city mayor, gave a strong warning against accepting racism in Holland today.
‘Expressing hatred of Muslims… is the order of the day,’ the Telegraaf quotes Van Thijn as saying. ‘You are not allowed to demonise the radicals of the right even if they demonise others. In fact you are not allowed to use the term racism, because spreading hatred of Muslims is [seen as] something else.’
Elsewhere in the country Ruth Wallage-Binheim spoke of how she watched as her father’s shop was plundered in Hannover in 1938. ‘What really hit me was that so many people stood around watching, even my father’s customers. No-one interfered,’ the paper reported her as saying.