Jan Keulen, director of The Rights Forum, a Dutch pro-Palestinian advocacy group that was founded by PM Dries van Agt, has made a disgraceful antisemitic statement about the mainstream representative body of the Dutch Jewish community.

The Central Jewish Board had previously made a complaint about antisemitic social media post. Keulen referred to the complaint as a “political smear campaign”, a classic antisemitic canard which paints Jewish complaints of antisemitism as disingenuous and portrays Jews as manipulative and dissembling.

She then said that the “cat is out of the bag”, claiming the Jewish group was a “a pro-occupation lobby that will not rest until the definition of antisemitism is stretched and politicized”.

Despite her disgraceful comments, several of the comments that the Central Jewish Board complained of didn’t even make any reference to Israel. One of the comments complained of read “not so strange that the Jews throughout the centuries were stigmatized as thieves and cheats”, whereas others bordered on blood libel.

Little better can be expected from the Rights Forum, however. Van Agt who founded the group, who is the PM of the country, is on record saying that his party is “is good for the Palestinians despite the strong Jewish lobby” present in it.