THE HAGUE, the Netherlands (JTA) — An anti-Zionist rabbi said he was attacked in Amsterdam because of Israel.

Josef Antebi, an anti-Israel Zionist and Orthodox Jew who lives in Amsterdam, told JTA he was assaulted on June 23 in the Dutch capital by a young man who “had relatively dark skin and didn’t look very Dutch, or at least didn’t look like his family has been living in Holland for centuries.”

Antebi said he was walking down the street when a car almost hit him. The attacker exited the vehicle and threatened to hit Antebi, who then took a picture of the attacker with his cellular phone. “He shouted negative things about my religion and about my people,” said Antebi, who was born in Israel but says he does not recognize that country’s right to exist and describes himself as a Palestinian Jew.

According to Antebi, he turned to a fishmonger operating a street stall and asked him to call the police as the attacker was approaching, but the fishmonger “just motioned ‘no.’” The attacker caught up with Antebi and kicked him in the stomach, the rabbi said. “You could see it wasn’t the first time he did this, he had obviously trained in martial arts,” added Antebi, who said he collapsed to the ground unable to breath. Antebi, 50, was taken to hospital, examined and released with minor injuries after filing a complaint with police.

“People hear about the atrocities, the way the Zionist state is treating the nations around them, and they are angry about it,” Antebi told JTA. “I’m not surprised he did what he did, it’s human behavior. The one to blame is the Zionist state, which is doing a lot of bad things to people.”

A spokesperson for the Amsterdam police told JTA police are investigating but are not certain the attack was anti-Semitic. “Currently, we are assuming it is an argument about traffic that got out of hand,” she said.