Dutch politics got a blast from the past on Monday when a right-wing politician was assaulted. The country goes to the polls tomorrow and the hospitalisation of Thierry Baudet, attacked with a bottle in a bar in the northern city of Groningen, is a reminder of what happened to Pim Fortuyn in 2002.

After being assaulted in the weeks leading up to the Dutch elections, the flamboyant right-wing Fortuyn was then shot dead nine days before voters went to the polls. His assassin was an animal rights extremist who told a court he didn’t like the way Fortuyn talked about Muslims.

Many people on the left long ago gave up protecting free speech and a growing number appear prepared to tolerate violence

Baudet is a repeat victim of left-wing aggression. Last month he was struck by a man wielding an umbrella and shouting anti-fascist slogans. ‘Completely unacceptable what happened to Thierry Baudet tonight,’ tweeted Frans Timmermans, running on a Socialist ticket in the Dutch elections. ‘Violence should never be tolerated. Free speech must be protected and the perpetrator prosecuted.’

A worthy sentiment, and doubtless a genuine one from Timmermans, but many people on the left long ago gave up protecting free speech and a growing number appear prepared to tolerate violence – provided it’s the right getting whacked.

A fortnight after Baudet was struck with an umbrella, a prominent figure on the Spanish right, Alejo Vidal-Quadras, of the Vox party, was shot on a street in Madrid by a masked gunman. Vidal-Quadras survived the attack and to date no one has been arrested for the attempted assassination. Police are investigating several possible motives. The European mainstream media that bothered to cover the incident speculated that the gunman may have been sent from Iran to silence a man who has been a long-standing supporter of Iranian dissidents.

Would Iran really despatch one of its spooks to shoot dead a 78-year-old who wields no power or influence in Spain? According to reports, Vidal-Quadras told police that the Iranian link was a possibility because he ‘has no other enemies.’

He might not have personally, but his party, Vox, is loathed by the left across Europe. Earlier this year, the Scottish newspaper, the National, ran a piece in which it said that Vox was the inheritor of Franco’s fascism of the 1930s, a view echoed by the Independent. A more balanced analysis was written by Jim Lawley, Coffee House’s man in Spain, who wrote in May that ‘Vox is not fascist but it is always happy to challenge consensus.’

Claims of fascism have become the favourite tactic of the European left when faced with any popular right-wing politician or party. There were numerous references to Benito Mussolini last year when Giorgia Meloni was campaigning to become Prime Minister of Italy, and Marine Le Pen is repeatedly portrayed as a 21st century Marshal Petain.

The irony is, of course, that many on the left today act like the fascists of yesteryear. This intolerance comes in different forms: the physical intimidation visited on the likes of Thierry Baudet, Eric Zemmour, Filip Dewinter, a Belgian right-wing politician, and Nigel Farage. The former Brexit party leader was hit by a milkshake as he walked through Newcastle in 2019. ‘It’s a right of protest against people like him,’ said the man who threw the milkshake. ‘The bile and the racism he spouts out in this country is far more damaging than a bit of milkshake to his front.’

Much of the political and cultural left in Britain found the assault funny. The television personality Jo Brand told the BBC it was a shame it had been a milkshake and not battery acid. ‘This is incitement of violence and the police need to act,’ tweeted Farage in response.

But nothing was done about Brand because, well, it’s Farage, and his views are beyond the pale of the bien pensants. So, too, are those of Marine Le Pen, despite the fact that 13 million people voted for her in last year’s presidential election. This mattered not a jot to the left last week, who en masse, demanded that she and her 87 MPs be excluded from a rally in support of French Jews. No, said French Jews, they have every right to be there, pointing out that the most virulent anti-Semitism these days come from the far-left.

In August this year the German president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, gave a remarkable speech to mark the 75th anniversary of the drafting of the modern German constitution. The nub of his address was that democracy was once again imperilled in Germany. Although Steinmeier didn’t name the right-wing AfD (Alternative for Germany), everyone knew who he had in mind when he talked of the ‘enemies’ of democracy. And what is his democratic solution to thwart these enemies, whose nationwide approval rating is at 20 per cent? Ban them.

Clearly, Herr Steinmeier doesn’t do irony, just as many on the left no longer do democracy. Instead, they resort to physical and ideological intimidation as the only way to make their voice heard in a Europe whose voters are increasingly rejecting the intolerance of the left.