NOS Nieuws•vandaag, 21:58
In Leiden, hundreds of people came to a memorial for the victims of last Friday’s stabbing. A 66-year-old man was killed in the stabbing and two others were injured. The police arrested a man the same day after a manhunt, but cannot yet confirm whether he is also suspected of the stabbing.
The meeting was held in the Hooglandse Kerk, near the De Bakkerij diaconal center on the Oude Rijn, where the stabbing happened. Several aid organizations are located in the building. The killed victim was an employee of one of the organizations.
The commemoration was open to everyone. “For everyone who wants to reflect, be quiet or light a candle,” says Jacqueline Rijsdijk, chairman of the Leiden church board. There was no memorial or service, she says. “Because we want to open the church to all religions, and people without religion. All Leiden residents and people outside are welcome.”
The high turnout does not surprise her. De Bakkerij is a household name in Leiden, she says. “Everyone knows it. Help is being given to everyone who needs it. It is very terrible that an organization where this beautiful work is being done is so affected.”
‘Think about the perpetrator’
“Where no one helps, De Bakkerij helps,” says Lex Ras, secretary of the Council of Churches in Leiden. “The bitter thing is that De Bakkerij is a place of peace and of helping people. That this enormous evil happened there is incomprehensible.”
Ras hopes that the perpetrator was also thought of at the meeting. “We pray almost every Sunday: ‘forgive us our debts, so that we can also forgive our debtors’. We can think: you have done something, but we still embrace you,” says Ras. “But that will take some time.”
NOS
Candles were lit at the commemorations
NOS
Flowers at the center, where the stabbing happened
NOS
Hundreds of people attended the commemoration
A motive for the stabbing is not yet known. The center previously said that the perpetrator is a client of one of the organizations in the building, “who saw no other way out than this”.
Fundraiser
A collection campaign by De Bakkerij rose to more than 2600 euros on Sunday evening, more than double the target amount. The center wants to use the proceeds to compensate for “significant material damage” to the property.
2023-07-16 19:58:50
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