Police threatened over video of cop throwing pregnant woman to floor in asylum shelter

The police received multiple threatening and insulting comments on social media after footage surfaced of a violent arrest in an asylum shelter in Zeist last month. Among other things, the video shows a police officer with a dog roughly throwing a pregnant woman to the floor.

The police have turned off comments on its Facebook and Instagram posts regarding the incident, a spokesperson said. “Criticism and dialogue are good and important, but all standards of decency have been violated,” she said.

According to the spokesperson, there were “the most severe threats” on the posts, among other things. She does not know whether the police will investigate whether the comments contain punishable statements. “It is still too early for that.”

The arrest in Zeist happened last month, but the police went public with it this weekend after footage started circulating on social media. The international news website Al Jazeera also shared the footage. According to the media outlet, the police were called to the asylum shelter because a Palestinian resident became enraged after hearing about the death of a family member in Gaza and caused damage in his room.

Francesca Albanese, the Special Rapporteur for the United Nations on human rights in the Palestinian territories, also reacted to the arrest. “Dutch friends. ‘If you tolerate this, then your children will be next,’” she wrote on X.

On Saturday, the police said that the Rijksrecherche, the department that handles internal investigations within government services such as the police, would review the officers’ use of force during the arrest. This is standard procedure whenever police officers use violence.

The police also said that the footage only shows “part of the event.”