BRUSSELS — Belgian leaders on Friday sought sweeping new powers to monitor and punish their citizens for involvement with terrorism, joining France in an effort to rewrite laws just hours after dozens of arrests across Europe offered dramatic evidence of the threats security officials say are facing the continent.
Belgian leaders said Friday that they would seek to expand the list of offenses for which they could strip some people of their citizenship. France has fast-tracked the convictions of those accused of hate speech, handing down years-long prison sentences within hours of the initial offense. British Prime Minister David Cameron called for eagle-eyed surveillance of social networks.
European leaders have since moved to expand those powers with a degree of political unanimity reminiscent of the bipartisan U.S. passage of the USA Patriot Act after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
“As a result of the events in Paris, combined with what happened yesterday in Belgium, the political unanimity is quite great,” said Rik Coolsaet, a terrorism expert at Ghent University. “It is a bit of 9/11 syndrome.”
France is also charging forward with attempts to expand government powers to monitor threats — and to punish those who praise or do not readily condemn terrorism. Leaders this week called for new legislation to significantly bolster domestic intelligence agencies.
In recent days prosecutors have filled the dockets with more than 100 cases that are speeding through courtrooms. People who have expressed support for the attacks have been sentenced to as much as 15 months in prison.
A top French opposition politician, Éric Ciotti, said this week that the government should withhold social benefits from the parents of children who failed to observe moments of silence in schools.
