Israeli-born politician will not be appointed Dutch deputy prime minister following failed security check

UPDATE: Following publication of this article a report was released that Gideon Markuszower failed a security check and thus will not be appointed a cabinet minister.

The dual Israeli-Dutch citizen Gideon “Gidi” Markuszower may very well become the next Dutch deputy prime minister and immigration minister, according to media reports.

Markuszower is a member of the right-wing Party for Freedom (PVV), a nationalist, right-wing political party in the Netherlands, led by Geert Wilders.

The PVV's strong performance in the Dutch election in November 2023 marked a pivotal moment in Dutch politics. This victory led to significant shifts in voter preferences and political alliances. If the PVV successfully forms the governing coalition, Markuszower is expected to be appointed deputy prime minister.

Like Wilders, Markuszower (47) is pro-Israel and opposed to large-scale Muslim immigration to Europe. He was born in Tel Aviv but grew up in the Netherlands, where he attended the prominent Jewish Rosh Pina and Maimonides elementary school in Amsterdam.

At age 19, Markuszower studied international relations at Hebrew University in Jerusalem. After his return to the Netherlands, he studied law at the University of Amsterdam.

As a staunch Zionist, the Israeli-Dutch politician has a long history of being active in various Jewish organizations in the Netherlands, as well as promoting strong ties with Israel.

In 1999, he served as a spokesperson for Likud Netherlands. After initially serving as an advisor to the Dutch lawmaker Anton van Schijndel, he was eventually elected to the Dutch Senate in 2015. However, in 2017, he resigned from this position and ran for the House of Representatives, where he was ranked fourth on the candidate list of Wilder’s Party for Freedom.

In 2010, Dutch intelligence insinuated that Markuszower had ties to a foreign intelligence agency, most likely Israel's Mossad. While such allegations were never proven, Markuszower was labeled a potential security risk for a period of time, despite close relations between Dutch and Israeli intelligence services.  

Markuszower opposes large-scale Muslim immigration, which he described as "a major crime against the Dutch people." It is currently unclear what Markuszower’s likely appointment as deputy prime minister would mean for Dutch-Israeli relations, which are considered stable. His views on Israel and the Middle East are similar to those of his party chief Wilders.

While critics have accused Wilders of being an “Islamophobe,” he has consistently embraced strong pro-Israel and pro-Western views.

In November 2023, after his party won 37 seats in the Dutch election, Wilders stated, 'Jordan is Palestine.' This brief statement led to strong condemnation from the Arab world.

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) Embassy in the Netherlands condemned Wilder’s statement.

“Irresponsible statements made by Dutch parliamentarian Geert Wilders, in which he incites the displacement of the Palestinian people to Jordan, is considered interference in the internal affairs of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, and is rejected and condemned,” the UAE Embassy wrote on 𝕏.

“The UAE stands in full solidarity with brotherly Jordan and stresses the importance of respecting its sovereignty. It also rejects any denial of the rights of the brotherly Palestinian people and their right to an independent state,” the embassy added.

The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan covers some three-quarters of the original territory that Great Britain originally defined as “Palestine.” In the early 1920s, the British government decided to turn Jordan into a separate political entity.

Furthermore, Wilders views the State of Israel as the Western world’s first defense line against radical Islam and has noted his strong affinity with the Jewish state.

“I have visited many countries in the Middle East – Syria, Egypt, Tunisia, Turkey, Cyprus, Iran – but nowhere have I felt a special sense of identification like the one I always feel when I land at Ben Gurion Airport.”