Judge Steenhuis said: “Freedom of speech is one of the foundations of our democratic society.” But he added: “Freedom of speech can be limited, for example to protect the rights and freedoms of others, and that is what this case is about.”

Abdou Menebhi, president of the Euro-Mediterranean Centre for Migration and Development, welcomed the judgment. Wilders, who made the promise during a speech in 2014, will gain five extra seats in the upcoming general election in March following his conviction Friday for incitement to discrimination over that pledge, Esther Voet, the editor-in-chief of Holland’s main Jewish weekly, the Nieuw Israelietisch Weekblad, said. When the crowd shouted back "Fewer! A Dutch court found lawmaker Geert Wilders guilty of hate speech before and after the 2014 civic polls during which he queried his supporters whether they wanted more or fewer Moroccans in the Netherlands. Presiding judge Hendrik Steenhuis however had harsh words for the platinum-blond haired Wilders saying his disparaging comments about judges and the judiciary in The Netherlands "are unworthy of an elected politician." Wilders, who had lived for two years in an Israeli moshav in the Jordan Valley in his youth, has called Israel “a place where I feel home” and said it was “close to his heart.” He has also called Israel a “canary in the coalmine” and “the West’s first line of defense against Islam,” including to his many visits to the Jewish state. Wilders, whose Freedom Party (PVV) is eyeing an upset victory in the March 2017 polls, was charged with two counts arising out of comments he made in 2014 around local elections. “I will continue to speak the truth regardless, including about the Moroccan problem, and no judge, politician or terrorist will stop me,” said Mr Wilders in an interview with a Dutch newspaper this week.
Dutch populist politician Geert Wilders is convicted for hate speech.