There are worries that Libya could turn into a long war and explanations about a Dutch rescue fiasco. Some bankers are embarrassed into handing back bonuses, soccer celebrations get out of hand and a mother gives birth at 63. It’s all in the Dutch dailies.

Libya – gloomy forecasts
Libya is still monopolising most of the front pages today, and the general mood is gloomy. “The first blow is easy” warns Trouw. The initial air attack on Libya was successful, it says, but it wasn’t as difficult as the coming fight will be. The paper quotes an advisor of French President Nicolas Sarkozy: “It could turn into a long war”.

De Volkskrant accuses the “fragile coalition” of operating in a “messy and rash way”. It argues that Colonel Gaddafi’s threatening rhetoric against the people of Benghazi brought “Rwandan terror images” to mind and led to an impulsive decision for military action. The international coalition did not seem to know what it was beginning, and certainly not how the adventure would end.

Nrc.next agrees and quotes a retired British marine officer who says: “This could well become the next Iraq”. The paper informs its highly educated young readership that most politicians are sidestepping questions about what the final aim of the military intervention is. Will the rebels be given active help? At the moment, the paper argues, they are not strong enough militarily to bring down the Gaddafi regime themselves.

Helicopter rescue ‘leaked out’
Both De Telegraaf and AD also feature Libya on their front page but they both lead with the same very Dutch Libyan story. At the end of February, a helicopter was dispatched from a Dutch navy vessel in the Mediterranean to rescue a Dutch citizen from Libya where the situation was getting worse by the hour.

The expedition ended up a fiasco, with Gaddafi loyalists capturing the helicopter and its three-man crew. The Dutch government was forced to apologise to the Gaddafi regime for failing to ask permission to enter its air space. Ministers have now written to MPs explaining why it all went so horribly wrong.

AD’s headline explains what many may consider the main revelation of the government’s letter: “Rescue operation in Libya leaked out”. Ministers believe the Libyan authorities knew about the operation beforehand and had troops waiting to intercept the helicopter. How the information got out remains a mystery. MPs are not happy with the letter and are demanding to know more details about the affair.

The mass-circulation De Telegraaf gives a slightly different twist to the story, choosing another revelation from the official letter as its banner headline. “Heli crew member assaulted”, it screams. One of the captured helicopter crew members was apparently mistreated by his Libyan captors. He did not tell his crew mates in order not to worry them and only talked about his ordeal after returning home to the Netherlands.

No bonus for some bankers
De Volkskrant clears a corner of its front page for something of a scoop. Jan Hommen, the boss of ING bank, has told the paper he and his fellow top ING executives will not take any bonuses while the company still owes the state money from a 2008 bailout. ING has only paid back half of the 10 billion euros it received from the government during the economic crisis.

There was a public outcry when it was announced that Mr Hommen was to receive a bonus which would have brought his 2010 total earnings to a cool 2.6 million euros. He and his colleagues have now decided to do without the extra cash because the fuss about the bonuses “threatened new damage to the recovering trust of customers and society” in ING. Mr Hommen admits “underestimating the signal the payments would send to Dutch society”.

ING, says the left-of-centre daily, plans to pay back the outstanding state support in 2011 and 2012. This means Mr Hommen and his pals will not be getting any bonuses next year either. But don’t feel too bad for them – Mr Hommen’s ‘ordinary’ salary is still a tidy 1.35 million euros.

Soccer celebration turns nasty
The enthusiasm of football fans for their team can often go too far, but De Telegraaf has a front-page report of two soccer professionals who seem to have let things get seriously out of control. The incident took place while ADO The Hague faithful were celebrating their 3-2 win over Amsterdam’s Ajax squad.

Because Amsterdam historically had a thriving Jewish community and its nickname is Mokum (derived from the Yiddish for ‘place’), Ajax are often referred to as ‘Jews’. This is sometimes meant in a friendly way, indeed Ajax fans use the term as a rallying cry, but the Jewish association can also be used insultingly.

During the ADO celebrations which were filmed by one supporter, midfielder Lex Immers says: “We’re going to hunt down Jews”. The film has since been published. Jewish organisations are threatening legal action, not only against the player, but also ADO’s coach, John van den Brom, who failed to stop the incident taking place. Mr Immers has been fined the “highest possible amount” by ADO and is facing fierce criticism including from MPs.

Mother at 63
Both AD and De Telegraaf run front-page pictures of 63-year-old Tineke Geessink with her newly born daughter Meagan. She is the oldest woman to have become a mother in the Netherlands and got pregnant after receiving egg cell donation in Italy. IVF treatment in the Netherlands is only available to women under 45.

According to AD, she seems more than aware of the problems ahead. “Of course I’ve thought: during nursery school, I’ll be so old, and during secondary school, students will say – wow, you’re mother’s really old. I hope they’ll say – wow, your mother’s really nice, you can have such a laugh with her.”