Herman Brusselmans is a popular Flemish writer who is known for foul language in his regular columns in Humo, a weekly in the Dutch language. On 4 August, he caused an uproar in Belgium with a column on his fear for a third world war and the killing of children in Gaza.
The column included the following sentence: “I see an image of a crying and screaming Palestinian boy, completely out of his mind, calling for his mother who is lying under the rubble, and I imagine that boy is my own son Roman, and the mother is my own girlfriend Lena, and I get so angry that I want to ram a sharp knife through the throat of every Jew I meet.“
The writer continued. “Of course, you always have to remember: not every Jew is a murderous bastard, and to give shape to that thought I imagine an elderly Jewish man shuffling down my own street, dressed in a washed-out shirt, fake cotton trousers and old sandals, and I feel sorry for him and almost get tears in my eyes, but then I wish him to hell, and yes, that is a mood swing.”
After protests and legal complaints, the column was deleted four days later from the on-line version of Humo but remained in the printed magazine until 13 August when it was removed from the shelves by next issue including a new column by Brusselmans. In an editorial on 16 August, Humo explained why it had published his column and what had gone wrong.
While the editors admitted that this was not the most brilliant column by Brusselmans, they claimed that his column was misunderstood by those who are not familiar with his style and way of writing. The bloodthirsty sentence was not meant to be taken literally and was taken out of context. Bottom-line: Brusselmans is not an antisemite and continues to enjoy the support of Humo.
The magazine apologized to those who took offense of Brusselmans’ column and blamed the confusion on “opinion traders, politicians, ambassadors and self-proclaimed champions of free speech, by isolating twenty words out of context and pumping them around on social media.” The director and responsible publisher of Humo is confident that a judge will soon come to the same conclusion.
Brusselmans’ column does not mention Hamas’s terrorist attack on Israel on 7 October and its hostage-taking of children, women and elderly people. His despair and anger at the on-going war was not directed at the Israeli army. The first thing that came to his mind were the “Jews”, who could be his own neighbours, whom he wants to slaughter.
The weekly argues that his column was “satire”. But satirical writing makes fun of political figures, religion or whatever needs to be changed in society. The writer ridicules them, not threatens to cut their throats as Brusselmans did.
Asked for clarifications about its editorial, Humo told The Brussels Times that it for the time being does not see any reason to add anything to that response.
Humo is not the only Flemish example of black humour and satire deteriorating to antisemitism. It happened also in the annual carnival in Aalst, where participants were dressed as caricatures of orthodox Jews. It came to an end after UNESCO denounced the carnival and stated, “The satirical spirit of the Aalst Carnival and freedom of expression cannot serve as a screen for manifestations of hatred”.
After that the City Council of Aalst decided to withdraw the carnival from the UNESCO List of Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity before being delisted. Humo risks being convicted in a Belgian court for publishing hate speech and inciting to violence against a minority group under the same disguise as Aalst used.
