European-Style Gun Control: In Brussels, "just about anybody can get hit by a bullet"

Next time you hear somebody (American or foreign) deploring America's "love affair" with guns in spite of the scandalous number of killings in the United States, remind them that the situation in Europe is hardly as pristine as the Europeans like to claim. 

In the Belgian capital, nobody less than the King's Prosecutor for Brussels (one of the most important attorneys general in the country) was upfront Friday regarding the reality. "I am a prosecutor concerned for the citizens," Julien Moinil said, immediately setting the tone for his press conference. "Since February 8th, there have been more than 150 shootings. We cannot therefore say that this phenomenon is abating. It occurs in waves, but with such extreme danger. And today, what I previously stated [in January 2025], namely that 'anyone can get hit by a bullet,' has proven true."

"Brussels is once again the target of gunfire," reports RTBF. "In five days, seven shootings have broken out in Anderlecht and Saint-Gilles, the majority of which are linked to the drug trade." Indeed, ballistic experts complain that they are not numerous enough to respond to every demand by a judge.

As I have pointed out in the past, regarding Belgium's neighbor, which makes the same (alleged) contrasts between Europe's wise men and America's neanderthals, you can hardly open Le Monde during a single week without seeing shootings (usually with… Kalashnikovs — which fires a type of bullet far more lethal than America's AR-15) in Marseilles, Corsica, or elsewhere. To the point that ten years ago saw the publication of a book called Génération Kalachnikov (Les nouveaux gangsters):

Frédéric Ploquin, the author of a new book about the evolution of organized crime in France, said that the robberies reflected a new wave of gangsters who have emerged since 2005 — a “Kalashnikov generation” with a zest for weapons, no fear of death, and a taste for quick and easy profits, usually through drug trafficking.

The European reply is that in Brussels and elsewhere, the murders are linked to drug trafficking, i.e., the European defense/excuse is that in the Old Continent, the culprits are part of the gangster underworld. 

Well, hey! Hello! Wake up! Who — who on Earth — do you think is involved in shootings in America?! Indeed, if you remove the four top cities with murders — all run by Democrats — the death toll by guns falls to the level of Europe.

As I wrote in 2015,

In the land that is always giving clueless Yanks lessons on gun control and on remaining civilized and in a Zen state of conscience, Le Monde features on its front page the photo of… a 17-year-old gunned down by a Kalashnikov burst.

Indeed, while Frenchmen remain blinded (or because they remain blinded) to all types of crimes — as noted in Pamela Gellar's Atlas Shrugs story on the Serial Rapist in France [Who] Asks Victims Their Nationality and Religion Before Raping Them (hmm — what religion might he be part of?!) — we learn that homicides and attempted homicides are rising amidst bursts of Kalashnikov fire and spectacular murders.

Moreover, it is easy for leftists, American or foreign to tout the success of the gun control laws in the rest of the Western world when you (or they) ignore the 1996 massacre of 16 children at a Scottish primary school; the 2000 killing of eight kids in Japan; the 2002 deaths of eight people in Nanterre, France; the 2002 killing of 16 kids in Erfurt, Germany; the 2007 shootings to death of eight people in Tuusula, Finland; the killing of 10 people at a Finnish university less than a year later; the 2009 killing of 15 people in Winnenden, Germany; and, needless to say, Anders Breivik's 2011 mass murder of 77 Norwegians, most of them teenagers.

Related: 
• T'is easy to tout the success of gun control laws in the rest of the Western world when you ignore certain pertinent facts from Europe

• For a Nation Used to Giving Americans Lessons on Firearms and Police Trust, France Has Been Amassing Quite a Collection of Bullet-Ridden Bodies

• For a Country Always Giving Yanks Lessons on Civility and Gun Control, There Has Been an Amazing Amount of Kalashnikov-Related Killings

• "Unlike the U.S., guns are tightly regulated in Europe, but the French gangs have armed themselves with weapons obtained on the black market"

• In a Country with Gun Controls Like France, the Kalashnikov Has Become the Thug's Rolex of Choice

• PLUS: this lengthy, dispassionate, in-depth discussion on the issue of gun control:
What Is to Blame for the Connecticut Shooting? Does the Blame Lie with the Right to Bear Arms Or Can It Be Found Elsewhere?