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Articles by Matthieu Demeestere

Academics & Education

Holocaust remembrance and Gaza collide in Brussels schools

April 15, 2025 Matthieu Demeestere  

(AFP) A few months ago in Brussels, Arthur Langerman was telling high school pupils about losing family members in the Holocaust and escaping a Nazi raid himself, when he was cut short by two Muslim teens wanting to talk about Gaza. “It’s […]

Animals

Rising Belgian politician courts Muslim vote — and controversy

October 11, 2024 Matthieu Demeestere  

(AFP) Weaving between market stalls in the working-class Brussels district of Molenbeek, Fouad Ahidar likes to remind voters he was a market vendor himself as a teenager — driving home his credentials as a people’s politician. Something of a rising star on […]

Legal

Belgian court sentences 8 over Brussels terror attack

September 15, 2023 Matthieu Demeestere  

(AFP) A Belgian court on Friday handed out sentences ranging up to life in prison to eight men for the 2016 jihadist bombings in Brussels, ending the country’s largest-ever criminal trial. The suicide bombings on March 22, 2016, at Brussels’ main airport […]

Legal

Six found guilty of murder at Brussels 2016 attack trial

July 25, 2023 Matthieu Demeestere  

(AFP) A Brussels court on Tuesday convicted French citizen Salah Abdeslam and Belgian-Moroccan Mohamed Abrini for 2016 jihadist bombings in the Belgian capital that killed 32 people, after the country’s largest-ever criminal trial. The high-profile pair — already sentenced to life in […]

Law Enforcement

Belgium arrests eight in ‘terror attack’ probe

March 28, 2023 Matthieu Demeestere  

(AFP) Police have detained eight people during investigations into an alleged jihadist plot to commit “terrorist attacks” in Belgium, authorities said Tuesday. Raids were conducted late Monday on homes in the capital Brussels, the port city of Antwerp and the border town […]

Legal

Brussels attacks trial stirs painful memories

December 1, 2022 Matthieu Demeestere  

(AFP) Many hundreds of those who survived the 2016 jihadist attacks on Brussels’ metro and airport were left maimed, traumatised or bereaved. As the trial begins for defendants accused of plotting Belgium’s worst peacetime massacre — which left 32 dead — some […]

Legal

Belgium starts trial over 2016 suicide bombings

November 30, 2022 Matthieu Demeestere  

(AFP) Belgium launched its biggest-ever criminal trial on Wednesday, the landmark prosecution of alleged jihadists accused of directing or aiding 2016 suicide bombings in Brussels’ metro and airport that killed 32 people. The prime French suspect in the dock confirmed his identity […]

Legal

Six years after bombings, Belgium readies for biggest trial

November 28, 2022 Matthieu Demeestere  

(AFP) Belgium’s worst peacetime massacre left 32 dead and hundreds marked for life. Now, six and a half years later, Brussels will host its biggest ever criminal trial. Jury selection begins on Wednesday ahead of hearings into the charges against the nine […]

Legal

Belgium’s biggest trial opens, six years after worst bombing

September 10, 2022 Matthieu Demeestere  

(AFP) Six years after Belgium’s deadliest peacetime attack, a Brussels court will this week host a landmark trial that survivors hope will mark a step forward in their recovery and that of their nation. The case against alleged members of an Islamic […]

Legal

Belgium trial for alleged accomplices of 2015 Paris attacks

April 15, 2022 Matthieu Demeestere  

(AFP) Fourteen people charged as accomplices to jihadists who carried out deadly bomb and gun attacks in Paris in 2015 will go on trial in Belgium from Tuesday. Proceedings will take place under high security in NATO’s former headquarters and are expected […]

Children & Teens

European jihadists’ children ‘at risk of radicalisation’

March 28, 2021 Matthieu Demeestere  

(AFP) The children of European jihadists left trapped in a Syrian camp after their fathers’ defeat on the battlefield now face radicalisation in their turn, a Belgian expert warns. Heidi De Pauw, director of the association Child Focus, has visited orphans and […]

News: Europe

Five years after attacks, Belgium remembers its dead

March 22, 2021 Matthieu Demeestere  

(AFP) “Aline, Patricia, Leopold, Gilles, Johanna, Loubna …” Five years on, the 32 victims of the Brussels bomb attacks were the focus of Monday’s national day of commemoration. The March 22, 2016, bombings were the worst massacre in the country’s modern peacetime […]

Government & Politics

Five years on, former PM remembers bombings that changed Belgium

March 20, 2021 Matthieu Demeestere  

(AFP) It has been five years since Islamist bombers slaughtered 32 people in the Belgian capital Brussels, in an attack then-prime minister Charles Michel says changed the country forever. In an AFP interview, Michel — now the president of the European Council […]

Government & Politics

Belgium tries Iranian diplomat over bomb plot

November 27, 2020 Matthieu Demeestere  

(AFP) An Iranian diplomat went on trial in Belgium on Friday accused of plotting to bomb an Iranian opposition rally outside Paris, in a case that has stoked tensions with Tehran. Assadollah Assadi, formerly based in Vienna, faces a 20-year prison term […]

Interfaith

Frenchman convicted of Belgium Jewish museum murders

March 7, 2019 Matthieu Demeestere  

(AFP) A jury found Frenchman Mehdi Nemmouche guilty Thursday of the “terrorist murders” of four people at Brussels’ Jewish museum, in the first case of a Syria jihad veteran to stage an attack in Europe. Nemmouche, 33, now faces a life sentence […]

Interfaith

Prosecutors slam Jewish museum suspect’s ‘indecent’ silence at trial

February 25, 2019 Matthieu Demeestere and Clément Zampa  

(AFP) Prosecutors on Monday poured scorn on the “indecent” silence of a Frenchman accused of shooting dead four people at the Jewish museum in Brussels as they began their closing summary. French national Mehdi Nemmouche, 33, could face life in prison if […]

Interfaith

Alleged Brussels museum killer was ‘sadistic’ Syria jailer

February 7, 2019 Matthieu Demeestere  

(AFP) Two French journalists on Thursday told a terrorism trial in Brussels that they had “no doubt” the accused Jewish museum killer is the man who imprisoned and tortured them in Syria. The former hostages came to Brussels to testify against Mehdi […]

Interfaith

Jewish museum attack families tell court of grief

January 31, 2019 Matthieu Demeestere  

(AFP) The Israelis orphaned by the murderous gun attack on Belgium’s Jewish Museum testified on Thursday in the trial of the accused attacker. The defendant, Frenchman Mehdi Nemmouche, 33, appeared in the dock to insist that he was not behind the four […]

Interfaith

Frenchman denies Jewish museum murders

January 15, 2019 Matthieu Demeestere and Clément Zampa  

(AFP) The Frenchman on trial accused of murdering four people at the Jewish Museum of Belgium denied Tuesday he was the gunman and alleged the court had robbed him of defence witnesses. Asked by the judge whether he accepted the evidence linking […]

Interfaith

Jewish museum terror attack trial opens in Brussels

January 10, 2019 Matthieu Demeestere  

(AFP) A Frenchman accused of shooting four people dead at a Jewish museum in Brussels went on trial on Thursday, allegedly the first Syria jihad veteran to stage a terror attack in Europe. Mehdi Nemmouche, 33, who was in court, faces a […]

Interfaith

French jihadist in court over deadly Brussels Jewish museum attack

January 7, 2019 Matthieu Demeestere  

(AFP) A French jihadist appeared in court on Monday as a jury was chosen for his trial for shooting dead four people at a Jewish museum in Brussels in 2014. Mehdi Nemmouche, the first jihadist to return from Syria’s battlefields to allegedly […]

Interfaith

Radicalised in jail, teen thug becomes hardened jihadist

January 6, 2019 Matthieu Demeestere  

(AFP) Mehdi Nemmouche stands accused of carrying out Europe’s first attack by an Islamist fighter returning from the war in Syria. But his journey from a French foster home to a Brussels court began not in a Middle Eastern desert but in […]

Interfaith

Belgian Jewish museum attack suspect appears in court

December 20, 2018 Matthieu Demeestere  

(AFP) An alleged French jihadist accused of returning from Syria and shooting dead four people in an attack on the Jewish Museum of Belgium in central Brussels appeared in court Thursday. Mehdi Nemmouche, allegedly the first foreign fighter to return to stage […]

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Recent Posts

  • Mallorca far-right party Vox calls for ban on hijabs and Islamic religion classes in Balearic schools October 9, 2025
  • Belgium says foiled jihadist plot for drone attack on PM October 9, 2025
  • Man appeals Quran burning with ‘free speech’ October 9, 2025
  • Islamic State supporter ‘hero-worshipped’ mastermind of 2015 Paris attacks, court told October 9, 2025
  • Man ‘expressed wish to kill Jews,’ court hears October 9, 2025
  • Two men planned ‘untold harm’ with attack on Jewish community in Manchester, jury told — as defendant shouts out in court October 8, 2025
  • Manchester synagogue killer ‘pledged allegiance to Islamic State’ during attack, police say October 8, 2025
  • Austria suspends state security employee who spied for Muslim Brotherhood, allegedly October 8, 2025

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