Rena Netjes is running as a candidate in the European Parliament elections on June 4. She visited the Arab-West Report office at the end of December to discuss her ideas and ambitions. In particular she focused on the need to improve relations and understanding between Europe and the Middle East.
On December 27, 2008 Rena Netjes, Dutch politician and expert on the Middle East, visited our office to talk about her ambitions, initiatives and ideas to improve relations between the Netherlands, Europe and the Middle East. Rena Netjes is a co-member of Amsterdam city council, and a member of the CDA party (Christian Democratic Appeal), but is looking forward to bringing her knowledge of the Arab and Islamic world into service to help the broader general public. Rena is running as a candidate in the European Parliament elections on June 4. She has a lot of ideas about improving relations between Europe and its Mediterranean neighbors which of course effects relations between Europeans and immigrants from these countries in Europe. She seeks to decrease tensions and stress the importance of improving relations for all European citizens.
Together with her impressive history of studies of Middle Eastern languages, cultures and politics as well as having lived and studied in Middle Eastern countries and her experience in language training, journalism and politics, there were a vast array of fascinating topics that we were able to talk about with her.
Rena Netjes developed her interest in the Middle East at a very young age. Her parents closely followed the politics of the Middle East. They were involved in an Arab-Israeli reconciliation project, offering hospitality to children who first attended a program in Germany, and then came to the Netherlands. Rena had already started to meet people from the Middle East when she was 15 years old. So she has always been used to spending time with people from different cultures and backgrounds.
After spending time with Middle Eastern teenagers Rena started to like the languages of the region so much that she decided to study them. She applied to the University of Nijmegen, and after her first year she enjoyed studying the Arabic language and so she moved to Amsterdam to study Arabic and Hebrew. She started her own language school in Amsterdam, Rena Lingua, which she still runs successfully.
During a working holiday in Jordan she met an Egyptian, a pilot who later became her husband, who was also there for work. They are both open-minded, interested in the politics and development of the Middle East and in dialogue between Arabs and the West. But he is from an Eastern background and she is a Westerner. Although for many people this might sound like something that could cause friction, they do not see it as a problem, they see it as an enrichment. Two cultures know more then one. “We learn from each other, we can open each other’s eyes to different point of views."
She started her political career when she joined the CDA at a municipal level in 1994. For Rena the CDA was an obvious choice. “The CDA takes values out of the Bible and puts them into principles translated into the daily reality of politics. We want to apply these values and principles to politics.” she said. For Rena values and principles are important. “People might have different backgrounds, origins, opinions and point of views, but it is sharing the same values that brings them together.” Everyone who wants to live according to these values is welcome to join the CDA.
Because of her knowledge of the Arab world and Islam, which became popular issues for discussion in Dutch society, she was asked to join the CDA in Amsterdam as a part-time council member. There is an equal number of Dutch born citizens and immigrants in Amsterdam and the gap between both groups is growing. Therefore they needed her to explain things and to supply her council with useful information. Because of her experience and knowledge she can reflect on what should and should not be done about this problem, on how both groups will respond and on what ideas and initiatives will be useful.
After terrorist attacks such as September 11, 2001 in the United States of America, March 11, 2004 in Madrid and July 7, 2005 in London, citizens became afraid and started to connect worldwide problems with national problems in the Netherlands, such as racism, discrimination and a fear of Islam. The larger national problems are, the more people will link these to worldwide problems.
With her knowledge of the Arab and Islamic world Rena Netjes tries to show her willingness for dialogue and desire to contribute toward forging encounters between people with different backgrounds and origins, especially between native Dutch and immigrants. To decrease tensions Rena tries to keep in touch with people from different civilizations living in the Middle East. She organizes debates and events with them, and in doing so tries to connect people and ease tensions in Dutch society. Her political party is supporting her in many ways, but it seems that not everyone is taking the initiative. She is now working on getting Muslim citizens who share the values of working and participating in a constructive way together on the side of the party as well, since she is convinced that Christian-democrats are, concerning values and standards, much closer to the basic principles of Muslims than any political non-believers party. “Therefore I am willing to keep in touch and take the initiative, we have a lot in common.”
After working on dialogue and bringing citizen groups together for a couple of years, Rena Netjes became more and more ambitious and prominent members of the Christian Democratic Party such as Arie Oostlander, former member of the European Parliament who recommended that she participate in the European Parliament elections. Hans van de Broek, the former minister of foreign affairs and former commissioner of the European Commission gave her his support as well. Rena believes that in this position she could play a much greater role in Arab-West relations and intercultural dialogue. She discovered that there were a lot of people who were willing to support her and so she decided to go for it. ”I feel that a great deal of people are waiting for someone who wants to work together, instead of against others, and I want to connect all those people who are looking for a constructive way to live in harmony together” she said.
While the importance of the European Parliament in politics is growing every day, people still do not seem to be conscious of the changes and legislations this parliament is able to bring about. Rena Netjes wants people to be aware of this and to use this European level and influence to ease the tensions between Europe and the Middle East, one of her main goals.”Trying to realize dialogue between the Arab world and the West is after all much more effective on a common European level than when every European country does this by themselves.” she said. She also wants to address the lack of knowledge that there is about the Arab world in the West and encourage values as democracy in Arab countries.
As an important item on her agenda Rena Netjes mentions the Arab-Israeli conflict. ”People can count on the fact that I will use my position to stress the importance of sensitive conflicts such as this one. I speak different Middle Eastern languages, I know a lot about the countries and the different sides of this issue, there must be something possible. This conflict has already been going on now for such a long time, we need to do something.
Rena Netjes also stressed the important role of the media. “The Western media very often makes the mistake of talking about the Islamic and Arab world, instead of talking to them” she said. “The language barrier and the lack of knowledge journalists suffer from does not help to support dialogue and understanding. Speaking a little bit of Arabic is not enough; we need real experts on the Middle East.”
Rena Netjes also explains why she thinks organizations such as AWR are important for better understanding between the Arab world and the West. “To foster a better understanding through accurate reporting we need someone who is making clear what information is right, someone who makes comments and adds critique. A certain media watch system is necessary. Every story has more than one side, every issue has several points of view and someone needs to make this very clear. This is why an NGO such as AWR is doing important work.” Rena Netjes also states that AWR is important for the Western world because they cannot follow the Arabic media. “The Arab world has access to Western media such as the BBC or CNN, but we don’t have this vice versa. So the translations provided by AWR are useful and very important” she said. “Because people in the West sometimes really have no idea what is going on in the Middle East. A lot of people think that the Arab world wants to Islamize the whole universe. But we should not forget that to a large extent everyone, from East to West, just simply wants the same: a job, if possible a nice one, and a good future.”
