Anti-Muslim Terrorism in Sweden is a Significant Problem

Source: Reuters

The present controversy regarding immigrant crime in Sweden has been used by various right wing politicians and activists for political capital. The bulk of both mainstream and alternative media has focused on Sweden as a case in debates regarding immigration in general and, at times, Islam in particular. Amidst the all propaganda, however, other forms of crime are neglected, revealing a distinct bias in much of the discourse.

The Swedish Brå (Swedish National Council for Crime Prevention) has been the subject of much attention over the last few days and, to a lesser extent, the preceding year at least. Many references have been made to its statistics on crime, with sexual offences and lethal violence being the near exclusive subject of attention. What has been overlooked, is the extent of anti-Muslim hate crimes in Sweden, which currently stand as the second most frequent, rising to 8% of the total. This comes in addition to a significant portion of hate crimes being committed by those with anti-immigrant sentiments, with 68% (4,765) of all offences being characterised as "xenophobic/racist". Alongside Islamophobia, exist categories such as Afrophobia and anti-Roma attacks.

Source: The Swedish National Council for Crime Prevention

It is a testament to the biased nature of many western political figures and institutions that, whilst seeking to cover offences against those who may be deemed culturally familiar, the suffering of Muslims is routinely ignored. The mainstream media largely overlooks these kinds of offences, whilst stories of Muslim immigrants raping and murdering feature on Fox News, in addition to alternative outlets such as Breitbart, InfoWars, and Rebel Media. It is particularly strange that these alternative media outlets pride themselves on reporting certain facts that others will not acknowledge, yet fail to report others that contradict their narrative.

These forms of anti-immigrant crime are committed primarily by far-right nationalists who have taken this narrative all too seriously. For them, immigrants are a problem such to the extent that punishment is deemed necessary. Largely ignored reports involve 100 masked men distributing leaflets threatening to give “north African street children who are roaming around” a “punishment they deserve”. Attacks against asylum centres were said to have doubled in 2015, with the noted destruction or damaging of at least two dozen centres, given the record acceptance of immigrants that year. These attacks continued into 2016, with an additional 18 incidents of arson since last February.

In January of this year, an asylum centre in Gothenburg was attacked with a home made bomb by three linked to the neo-Nazi Nordic Resistance Movement. This attack was linked to similar incidents in the same locality in previous months. Only last week, another attack occurred in the town of Vanersborg, which left 15-20 injured. Like previous instances, these attacks went largely unreported.

Democracy Now! conducted an interview with comparative religion professor Mattias Gardell, who also functions as head of the Centre for Multidisciplinary Studies on Racism as Uppsala University in Sweden. According to Gardell, terrorist incidents have increased significantly since 2015, with 92 suspected incidents, all conducted against asylum centres and refugees. These attacks were, in his words, "probably made by the same political milieu that supports Trump." In particular, the Nordic Resistance Movement was stated to see Trump as "their man".

It appears that, in dealing with crime as a general phenomenon, right-wing groups and their media associates only have time to cover incidents that involve the victimisation of native Europeans. In general, it appears that people with a foreign background, who do not seem intimately linked with their traditions and communities, are unimportant. Crimes such as these are inexpedient to acknowledge.

#Muslims #Sweden #Islamophobia #HateCrimes #MediaBias