The early history of Islam in the Netherlands can be traced back to the 16th century, when a small number of Ottoman merchants began settling in the nation's port cities.

The Netherlands' economic resurgence in the years between 1960 and 1973 motivated the Dutch government to recruit foreign skilled laborers, chiefly from Morocco and Turkey – both majority Muslim countries.

Ottoman and Persian traders settled in many Dutch and Flemish trading towns, and were allowed to practice their faith, although most of them belonged to the Jewish or Greek Orthodox community under the Sultan.

[5] References to the Ottoman state and Islamic symbolism were also frequently used within 16th century Dutch society itself, most notably in Protestant speeches called hagenpreken, and in the crescent-shaped medals of the Geuzen, bearing the inscription "Rather Turkish than Papists".

[9] In the 17th century dozens of Dutch, Zeelandic and Frisian sailors converted to Islam and joined the Barbary Pirates in the ports of North-Africa, where some of them even became admirals in the Ottoman Navy.

The envoys were treated with due respect and given a grand tour of the provinces where they visited important towns and met with local authorities; they were received by the States General and by Prince Maurice.

It was a successful strategy to give publicity to their warm relations with an important Asian ruler and trading partner at a time when Spain was still a menace in Europe.

The eldest of the envoys, Abdul Hamid, died three months after arrival and was buried in a church in the town of Middelburg in the province of Zeeland, in the presence of important dignitaries.

[13][14] In the first half of the 20th century hundreds of Indonesian students, sailors, baboes and domestic workers lived in the Netherlands, thus constituting the first sizable Muslim community.

There, the Nazis managed to take captives, including Hatam Kadirov and Zair Muratov, and transported them to areas like that of Amersfoort concentration camp, where they reportedly persecuted or executed them.

These sectors were short of workers because of swift industrial growth, combined with higher educational levels of the native Dutch who increasingly turned to the service-oriented economy.

These strict laws have caused some Dutch interested in marrying people from other countries to move to Belgium for a temporary period, in what has been called "The Belgian Route".

[24] Because of increasingly restrictive legislation on family formation and reunification, and the economic development of their home countries, the number of immigrants from Turkey and Morocco has decreased sharply since 2003.

[27] On August 1, 2019, a ban on face coverings was implemented, making a full veil illegal on public transport and in schools, hospitals and government buildings.

[20] During the late 1970s, 1980s and 1990s, the Muslim fraction of the population steadily increased due to family reunification, marriage immigration, a higher birth rate and the influx of asylum seekers, reaching about 4.8% in 2000.

The growth then slowed because of stricter immigration laws, dropping birth rates and former asylum seekers emigrating to other Western countries after they had obtained the Dutch nationality.

In the years after 2006 radical activities diminished despite continued military presence by Dutch forces in Afghanistan and material deemed provocative by Muslims, such as Geert Wilder's film Fitna.

[47] In 2015 the AIVD reported that jihadists exploited the boundaries in the Dutch legal framework, by testing the limits of civil rights such as freedom of speech.

[50] In 2009, the AIVD reported that Salafist mosques, while spreading an isolationist and intolerant ideology, no longer functioned as incubators for jihadist terrorism and the movement was not growing.

[51] In 2014, the AIVD reported that the proselyting "dawah" strand of Salafism, though rejecting jihadist violence, is typified by:[51] In 2014 there were 13 Salafist mosques in the country which rose to 27 in 2018.

In an ideal Islamic state operating under sharia law, heretics would be punished by the death penalty, adulterers stoned and magicians killed by the sword.

[60] Muslims in the Netherlands are more likely to be active in municipal and national politics by means of demonstrations, petitions, contacting media outlets and attending meetings than running for office.

Geert Wilders of the Dutch Party for Freedom was put on trial for inciting racial hatred, relating to his inflammatory comments regarding Islam in early October 2010.

About two-thirds of Turks and Moroccans "associate predominantly with members of their own ethnic group," while a similar proportion of native Dutch "have little or no contact at all with immigrants."

[74] The Parliament of Netherlands voted in 2016 for legislation to strip Dutch citizens who join ISIS or al Qaeda abroad of their citizenship, also if they have not been convicted of any crime.

[77] In 2017, imam Fawaz Jneid received an area ban which barred him from visiting Transvaal and adjacent Schilderswijk, due to having expressed an intolerant message which constituted a threat to national security.

Jneid had earlier expressed homophobic views and derogatory comments towards murdered film-maker Theo van Gogh and Islam critic Ayaan Hirsi Ali.

[84]: 397 According to the Open Society Institute, after the murder of Theo van Gogh in November 2004, Minister of Integration and Immigration Rita Verdonk commissioned an inquiry into the radicalisation of young Muslims.

Previous reports had already found that young Muslims don't share the deep ethno-national attachment their parents feel with their country of origin, and instead are coming to identify primarily with their religion.

While prior research found that the degree of religiosity in general decreases among Muslims with higher education and stable employment, the new report noted that highly educated young Muslims can also experience "relative deprivation" all the more strongly - the sense that despite their efforts they receive fewer opportunities than native Dutch people of the same generation - and turn to radicalism in anger and frustration.