Last Monday night, drug gangs turned Salvatore's pizzeria in Brussels into a crime scene. "We dropped to the floor. I had clients eating on the terrace with children.
Look, we can see the bullet impacts everywhere." His restaurant sits on a pretty little square in St Gilles. It's a central area of the city, close to the international Midi train station, where passengers arrive on trains from London and Paris. Shootings related to drug trafficking have become routine in the Belgian capital over the past couple of years.
There were over 100 in 2025 alone, and more than 65 shootings so far this year. This was the third shooting in this neighbourhood in just three days. "Are we in an American gangster movie?
This needs to stop," Salvatore says. A suspected drug dealer was shot in the leg in the same area the day before. Now Murielle and her dog Chéva are sitting at that exact spot, just across the street: "We can still see the trace of the pool of blood." Murielle is 70, and hopes peace soon returns to her street.
It's like a little village inside the city. Even the drug dealers used to be polite and decent. I would just tell them to go further away and they'd say, 'Yes, ok mama!'" Drug dealing is happening in plain sight here.
Only five minutes after I arrive, I witness a transaction. A buyer walks up to the seller, shakes their hand, and walks away with the drugs. Crack has become widely consumed amongst the poorest in this area of Brussels.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
