FAIR on the rush to pin the Oslo bombing on Muslims

FAIR has an excellent analysis of the rush in the MSM to declare the shocking terror attack in Norway the work of Muslims. From "Seeing 'Islamic Terror' in Norway":

Right-wing terror suspect Anders Behring Breivik reportedly killed 76 people in Norway on Friday, by all accounts driven by far-right anti-immigrant politics and fervent Islamophobia. But many early media accounts assumed that the perpetrator of the attacks was Muslim. [MORE]

It's a very useful round-up that you should read.

Now, given the tragic conflicts that wrack our world I frankly understand the temptation to assume it was perpetrated by Muslims--not that this justifies disgarding basic journalistic standards or gratuitiously fanning prejudices or fears--but in a way what's most scandalous is the foul mix of Orwelian rationalizations and shameless indifference to facts on display by the many pundits and politicians who are now refusing to own up to their undeniable mistake and the obvious concerns it raises about their assumptions and understanding of basic issues. Even when they dead wrong, they're somehow "right."

I especially "like" the Norwegian security analyst who confidently declared the man's manifesto to be strikingly similiar to OBL's rants. From "Oslo Suspect Wrote of Fear of Islam and Plan for War" (The New York Times, 7/23/11):

Thomas Hegghammer, a terrorism specialist at the Norwegian Defense Research Establishment, said the manifesto bears an eerie resemblance to those of Osama bin Laden and other Al-Qaeda leaders, though from a Christian rather than a Muslim point of view. Like Mr. Breivik’s manuscript, the major Qaeda declarations have detailed accounts of the Crusades, a pronounced sense of historical grievance and calls for apocalyptic warfare to defeat the religious and cultural enemy.

"It seems to be an attempt to mirror Al-Qaeda, exactly in reverse," Mr. Hegghammer said.

Wow, what powerful analysis. Why, the scales have been removed from my eyes. This eagle-eyed observer is obviously intimately acquainted with the strange ways of Muslim extremists.

There's just one problem, though: It turns out that the document from which Islamofascism allegedly drips from every line was cribbed not from Osama bin Laden or one of his insane colleagues, but from an infamous American non-Muslim eco-terrorist! From "Norway's mass murder and the Unabomber (SFGate.com, 7/25/2011):

If ["Unabomber" Ted]  Kaczynski weren't doing life in a federal prison, he might have had plagiarism lawyers look at the document. It apes his 1996, 63-page manifesto in many ways. That document, "Industrial Society and Its Future," was a typewritten cry for revolution against modern technology, ranting against all who promoted anything other than a Luddite life.

Breivik's paper lifts some bits wholesale from the Unabomber, such as this one passage: "Feminists are desperately anxious to prove that women are as strong and capable as men." Other parts are disturbingly similar to Kaczynski's writing, swapping out jibes against leftists for jibes against Marxists or multiculturalists.

My god, do these clowns get paid to spout such uninformed nonsense?

Comments

[Waqas Zia Chaudhry]

Salam
On the bright side, none of the statements made by the police or other government officials did at any time conclude that this was the work of Muslim extremists.

Also, by in large, the Norwegian press acted quite responsably by not jumping to conclusions.
This is more than can be said of Fox news and other of Rupert Murdoch's media outlets who kept hammering in that this was a Muslim terrorist attack even when after it was established that it wasn't.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lmxt3NUx4YQ&skipcontrinter=1

Nevertheless I was very happy to read the following:
"The jump to conclusions after Friday's attack has given us a powerful lesson", said Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Store.
He along with the mayor of Oslo, the crown prince of Norway and the Bishop of Oslo visited the biggest mosque in the capital.

The foreign minister also stated:" This is a reminder that many of the reflexes many could have had, have been wise to hold back. No one in the mosque today is accusing all white ethnic Norwegians of being terrorists because one person committed such atrocities. There is lesson of wisdom to be learned here."

The original article can in Norwegian can be found here:
http://www.aftenposten.no/nyheter/iriks/article4184781.ece

[svend]

Thanks for sharing that, Waqas. Unfortunately, the influence of various lobbies in this country prevents our government from learning ideologically-inconvenient lessons. Witness the idiocy of Peter King's hearings and the kid glove treatment this myopic (and ultimately dangerous) posturing got. The Oklahoma City bombing proved once and for all that this is not simply a Muslim issue, but the conventional wisdom on security in Washington was barely affected.

[Waqas Zia Chaudhry]

It hasn’t effected Europol’s perception either. Just today they announced that the danger from Muslim extremists is still the primary threat despite this attack, while in the same breath they said they would now be working to get an overview of right-wing extremist groups. How nice of them...

Their own statistics show that “Islamic” terrorist attacks only amount to a few percentages of the total number of attacks in Europe. They point out that attacks by Muslim extremists tend to be far more deadly with mass carnage as a result.
That was until last Friday anyways.

[muhammad usman]

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[rc helicopter]

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[Pandora Charms Beads]

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