BRUSSELS—Belgium’s foreign minister summoned the U.S. envoy over comments Ambassador Bill White made regarding the country’s treatment of Jews, marking at least the third dispute in recent months between an American ambassador and the country of his posting.
U.S. Ambassador to Belgium Bill White
The U.S. ambassadors to France and Poland have also gotten into disputes with the countries in which they are stationed, drawing rebukes from Paris and Warsaw.
White, who took up his post in November, over the weekend criticized Belgium for its approach to Jewish ritual circumcision and linked it to a rise in antisemitism in the country during an interview on Newsmax. On Monday, Belgian Foreign Minister Maxime Prévot publicly rejected White’s comments.
“Any suggestion that Belgium is antisemitic is false, offensive, and unacceptable,” Prévot said Monday on X. “Belgium condemns antisemitism with the greatest firmness. The fight against antisemitism, and all forms of hatred and discrimination, is an absolute priority for our country.”
Antisemitism has increased across Europe over recent years, particularly since the Hamas attack on Israel in October 2023 sparked a crushing response by Israel that has killed more than 67,000 Palestinians, according to local health authorities, who don’t say how many were combatants.
White, in his Newsmax interview, raised the case of an investigation in Antwerp into circumcisions by a small number of mohels, Jewish specialists who perform circumcisions. Prosecutors said last spring that they had searched three houses as part of an investigation into the practice by people without medical training.
In Belgium, circumcision is legal “when performed by a qualified physician under strict health and safety standards,” Prévot wrote on X.
White wrote on X on Monday that Belgium “MUST DROP THE RIDICULOUS AND ANTI-SEMITIC ‘PROSECUTION’ NOW OF THE 3 JEWISH RELIGIOUS FIGURES (MOHELS) IN ANTWERP!” He also said that Belgium’s health minister, whom he called “very rude”, should change the law to allow mohels to perform circumcisions.
He called the prosecution “unacceptable harassment of the Jewish community here in Antwerp and in Belgium.”
White’s accusation of Belgian antisemitism is notable because during his nomination process last year, Sen. Tim Kaine (D., Va.) said he opposed White for the role of ambassador because he “repeatedly amplified posts of a convicted Belgian white nationalist influencer and Holocaust denier,” Dries Van Langenhove.
Van Langenhove, a Belgian far-right leader, was convicted in 2024 of inciting violence and denying that the Holocaust occurred. White retweeted a post of Van Langenhove’s before he was sent to prison.
Under questioning from Kaine about the link, White said during his hearing that “when my team told me about some of the various things that he may have been involved with or not—and I am not sure of all of the things he has been involved with or not—the tweet was removed.”
White said on X Monday that “Anti Semitism is UNACCEPTABLE in any form & it must be rooted out of our society.”
