A Hanukkah concert organised by Amsterdam’s Jewish community was abruptly cancelled this week by a local concert hall after it learned that Lt. Col. Shai Abramson, the Israel Defence Forces’ Chief Cantor, was scheduled to perform. The decision provoked widespread condemnation in both the Netherlands and Israel, with many calling it discriminatory and antisemitic, reports YNETNEWS.
Israel’s Ambassador to the Netherlands, Zvi Aviner-Vapni, called the move “shameful and appalling,” saying: “In Israel, military service is a duty shared by all as we need to defend our democracy and people. By excluding an artist for his service, they betray their own stated mission to unite through music. This hypocrisy and discrimination are not culture — it looks more like caving in to some hateful crowd.”
The controversy deepened when Dutch-Jewish lawyer Oscar Hammerstein revealed that the grandfather of the concert hall’s director had signed the 1940 Nazi occupation order expelling Jews from public positions in the Netherlands.
Israel’s Diaspora Affairs Minister, Amichai Chikli, also condemned the decision in a statement that went viral, viewed hundreds of thousands of times.
“Seventy-five per cent of Dutch Jewry was murdered in the Holocaust,” Chikli wrote. “Out of 140,000 Jews, 102,000 were killed — most of them in Auschwitz, Bergen-Belsen, and Sobibor. And yet, human nature does not change — and perhaps the character of that place has not changed either.”
Chikli warned that Dutch Jews, now numbering around 35,000, increasingly fear expressing their Jewish identity. He cited the violent attack on Maccabi Tel Aviv fans by “jihadist mobs” in Amsterdam last year as another example of the rising hostility.
“The Netherlands is now moving rapidly in the footsteps of Belgium, becoming a place where Jews are no longer safe and where they are increasingly forced to hide their identity in public,” he said. “With pain, I say to the Jews of the Netherlands: consider carefully your future in a country that shows little intention of protecting your lives, your rights, and your identity.”
His message was echoed by Dutch MP Claudia van Zanten, who shared the statement, saying she “completely understood” Chikli’s warning. Van Zanten described how a Jewish family she knew had emigrated to Israel earlier in the year, fearing a worsening climate of antisemitism.
“The Netherlands has learned nothing and is once again abandoning the Jews,” she said.
Doron Sanders, president of the Mizrachi movement in the Netherlands, said the cancellation reflected a disturbing trend: “More and more venues are refusing to host events involving Israelis because of their connection to a state they claim is committing genocide. The atmosphere right now is very difficult, and it’s unclear what the future holds. Despite the ceasefire, things don’t seem to be improving here.”
The cancellation has reignited debate about antisemitism and double standards in Dutch cultural life, with critics warning that hostility toward Israel is increasingly being used to justify discrimination against Jews in the Netherlands.
Photo credit: Ramon van Flymen / ANP / AFP
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