Authorities in the Flemish cities of Antwerp and Vilvoorde discontinued welfare benefits for some 29 Belgian jihadists in Syria. The authorities had found that the jihadists were accessing their government benefits through banks in Turkey. In April the federal prosecutor’s office said it was aware that 33 persons from Antwerp and Vilvoorde had traveled to Syria for jihad; almost all were linked to the Islamist group Sharia4Belgium, whose leader, Fouad Belcakem, remains in custody.
