Fitna the Movie: Geert Wilders' film about the Quran (English)

Video: Fitna the Movie: Geert Wilders' film about the Quran (English)

Fitna is a film by Dutch politician Geert Wilders, leader of the Party for Freedom (PVV) in the Dutch parliament. The movie offers his views on Islam and the Qur'an. The film's title comes from the Arabic word fitna which is used to describe "disagreement and division among people", or a "test of faith in times of trial". The movie was released to the Internet on 27 March 2008.

Wilders released the film on March 27, 2008 at 7PM local (Dutch) time on the video website Liveleak. The Dutch version of the movie reportedly received 1.6 million pageviews in 2 hours.The English version reportedly garnered over 1.2 million in 5 hours.

Wilders originally negotiated a possible broadcast of the film on Dutch television. The contents of the film were not known at the time. None of the Dutch broadcasting companies would agree to show the film in its entirety, without editing. Wilders then said that he would "Rather have [the film] entirely on the Internet, than half on television"[citation needed].

Later the Dutch press centre Nieuwspoort was reported to be willing to show the film, as long as Wilders would pay for the increased security during the press conference and the weeks after it, which he declined to do.

On March 22, the Dutch Muslim Broadcasting Association (NMO) offered to air the film if they could preview the film for any possible illegal material and Wilders would take part in a debate after the airing with proponents and opponents. Wilders declined, saying "No way, NMO."