Perspective: How white supremacy and Islamist terrorism are strengthening each other, as each cites the other as a rationale to commit violence
This past week, after attacks on two mosques in New Zealand that left 50 dead, the Islamic State appealed for retribution. Calling the shootings an extension of the U.S.-led military campaign against the group in Syria and Iraq, the group’s spokesman, Abu Hassan al-Muhajir, said they “should wake up those who were fooled and should incite the supporters of the caliphate to avenge their religion.” The faithful cannot stand by, he said, while “Muslims are burned to death and are bombed.
This mutually reinforcing cycle suggests that more attacks from both sides will come, as each incident radicalizes a new cohort of believers. Political rhetoric around Islamist terrorism fuels the white-supremacist fixation on “white genocide.
That’s because it works, particularly among aggrieved people immersed in certain ideological climates. Lauren Manning, a former member of a violent neo-Nazi gang in Canada, says she was recruited on an Internet forum for death-metal music fans. Her recruiter began taking her for drives through areas of Toronto that were mostly populated by Muslims to demonstrate the “white genocide” notion.
YouTube videos glorify Hitler and obsess over the “extinction” of the white race; his posts there reek of paranoid bigotry. This disparity in legal designations also seems to affect de-platforming efforts by tech companies like Facebook and YouTube. Concerns about freedom of speech dominate the conversation around limiting white nationalism online, and the sites aren’t always sure what qualifies as white-supremacist propaganda.
Another problem is the lack of political consensus about the scope of the white-supremacist threat. President Trump, the leader of the executive branch and, ostensibly, all federal law enforcement, said after the New Zealand massacre that he doesn’t think white supremacy is rising globally. “I don’t, really,” he told a journalist. “I think it’s a small group of people that have very, very serious problems.” Compare that with the blame he placed immediately after the San Bernardino attack.
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