Saddened by the terror attacks in New Zealand, he thinks they could have been prevented with security measures against far-right extremists and terrorists instead of focusing only -or mainly- on radicals favouring Daesh [ISIS in its Arabic transcription]. At the same time, he warns about hate speech contributing to an atmosphere that encourages more violence from all sides.

Salam Plan has talked to this researcher of the international SETA think tank during his visit to Madrid where he presented the results of the report at Casa Árabe (Arab House), an institution which is part of the Foreign Affairs Ministry of Spain. He gives some hints to prevent Islamophobia from rising more and calls up on everybody to tackle the problem.

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How do you feel some days after the New Zealand attacks happened? Do you think the international community has reacted as expected, as it should have done?

I feel saddened by this very tragic event, of course because of the lives which have been lost, some of them children. But at the same time, I feel saddened that this could have been prevented, if the necessary precautions had been taken before.

Why do I say this? Because this has happened before, with Anders Breivik in Norway, and this should have been a wake-up call for everybody of how far the far-right terrorism advanced, not only in Europe, but internationally. We see the results of this in the United States, the attack against a synagogue carried out by a far-right terrorist. And there were other attacks also against Muslims in Canada[, UK]…

“The security apparatus in Europe has to take this issue seriously, tackle the far-right radicalisation. This way we will prevent not only future attacks by the far-right but also future attacks by Daesh, because they are feeding each other”

If the necessary precautions had been taken against the far-right rise and the far-right radicalization had been taken seriously, I think this could have been prevented. Because, consider: if you are a radical Muslim and you are searching on the internet or watching the videos of Daesh [Arabic name for ISIS], you will be in trouble quite easily: the intelligence services will detect you. But this is not the case with the far-right. They operate more freely, and I think that’s why these attacks are happening. That doesn’t mean that you can prevent everything, because there will be some lone wolves all the time.

I hope the future attacks will be prevented, because the atmosphere is quite ripe for these attacks. Unfortunately, this might happen anywhere in Europe nowadays. I think the security apparatus in Europe has to take this issue seriously, tackle the far-right radicalisation. This way we will prevent not only future attacks by the far-right but also future attacks by Daesh, because they are feeding each other. After this attack [in New Zealand], Daesh called for fresh attacks against the West or the Christians. This is a vicious circle and innocent people are getting killed.

>>> You may also read: Attacks against mosques are more usual than you might think: they are committed by anti-Muslim terrorists and also by groups like ISIS <<<

You talk about security measures, but what about the discourse to help prevent this? You just mentioned Daesh itself called for revenge, but Daesh itself attacks Muslims.

Yes, the majority of the victims of Daesh are Muslims. After these attacks [in New Zealand] there were some calls, especially in Turkey [, where I am based]: some people would say we should call this “Christian terrorism”.

I objected this, and many people objected this, because this doesn’t have anything to do with Christianity. You can justify violence with anything. There are some radical Buddhists, and some radical Orthodox… that doesn’t mean we blame all the Christians. That is why we need to be really careful about the rhetoric, because the rhetoric makes this kind of attacks possible.

People would think ‘Islamophobia is only hate speech, what’s the problem? I don’t like Muslims’. But it’s not just the rhetoric. Rhetoric, with time, turns into action and creates violence. The rhetoric has to change and there is a need for a political acknowledgement of the problem.

“The problems with Islamophobia and the far-right need to be acknowledged. Unfortunately, mainstream politicians are adopting the far-right ideas and their narratives”

First Islamophobia has to be acknowledged as a problem; many of the European countries are refusing the fact that there is a problem with Islamophobia. Even the European Union has now a coordinator on anti-Muslim hatred, but not anti-Muslim racism or Islamophobia.

Also, the problem with the far-right needs to be acknowledged. Unfortunately, mainstream politicians are adopting the far-right ideas and their narratives, and they are reluctant to challenge the far-right directly.

In your report you mention that Islamophobia does not only affect far-right politicians, but the whole range of them. How come?

Mainstream politicians are now under a lot of pressure in Europe. They cannot find a solution to the far-right; the only solution they see is what happened in Austria. The Christian democratic party ÖVP were a mainstream, reasonable party with a long tradition, but when the far-right started rising, they chose a young leader, [Sebastian] Kurz. He has muted his party more to the far-right. That was his solution to the problem, and he has become now a kind of the far-right leader. And that’s replicating itself in other European countries.

Now the three secret services in Austria are in the hands of the far-right [Government ally, Heinz- Christian] Strache.

For a certain amount of time the politicians were silent about the problem and at a certain point, they realized it’s unstoppable. (…) Islamophobia we find it also in the left party, in the Christian democrats… it has become a new form of racism that is acceptable to people.

“Islamophobia has become a new form of racism that is acceptable to people. We have far-right Islamophobia, but we also have Liberalist Islamophobia and Leftist Islamophobia”

May you give some examples?

Some people in the Green Party [in Germany] are calling for the headscarf ban. Or the former candidate of CDU, Friedrich Merz, said “We cannot allow Muslim children to get indoctrinated in Q’ran schools”.

Of course, we have far-right Islamophobia, but we also have Liberalist Islamophobia and Leftist Islamophobia.

Many feminists are in favour of banning the headscarf by saying ‘we are empowering the Muslim women’. Ok, there might be some Muslim women, youngsters, who may be forced by their families, but the overwhelming majority of them are choosing it by their own will. In France they are not allowed to study at the universities. Is this empowering women?

>>> You may read: Muslim European women claim their place in feminism<<<

In Spain now there is much of a debate going on whether the conservative Popular Party and liberal Ciudadanos should establish a cordon-sanitaire against far-right Vox in the next general election.

I think they should [establish a cordon sanitaire]. The cordon sanitaire [in Europe] was there, but it has disappeared. Look at the Austrian example. In the year 2000 [far-right leader] Jörg Haider became part of the [governing] coalition with his party. There was a big outcry in Europe, there was a diplomatic embargo against Austria.

” The ‘cordon sanitaire’ in Europe was there, but it has disappeared. Islamophobia is a threat to the democratic foundations of Europe”

Today, his party is again part of the coalition in a much stronger way. Nobody says a thing. The cordon sanitaire has disappeared. Why? Because of the Islamophobic narrative and discourse. If this is the problem of Muslims, I think everybody needs to rethink about it. If you let the far-right become normalized, it will just ruin the European Union. So, who is going to lose from this? Muslims? Not only. Islamophobia is a threat to the democratic foundations of Europe. We see the results. I hope New Zealand is a wake-up call for measures to be taken (…).

We need courageous leaders and civil society activists to tackle this problem. But many people think Islamophobia is a Muslims problem, it’s not our problem. Well, I don’t think so. If you allow this fire burn here, it will affect others (…).

Common people might have a prejudice against Islam and Muslims and common people in Turkey also have prejudices against Germans or Christians. This has to be tackled, of course, (but) that’s normal. The problem starts when this starts to become a policy and made into law, based on these notions of segregating people. We are talking more of a political problem.

>>> You may also read: Alicia and Aladdin, the beautiful love story of a Catholic and a Muslim<<<

In your report you call for Islamophobia to be approached in the laws, just like the UN and OSCE ask. But from what you are telling me, it doesn’t seem this could become real any time soon.

No, I don’t think so. There is a strong opposition. Islamophobes say Islamophobia is a combat term developed by Islamists to reject any kind of criticism against Islam. Of course, we can critize Muslims and Islam, but the important thing is how we do this.

Why do you think it is so important that Islamophobia is put on paper, what would it help?

It would mean that the problem is acknowledged, it would help to record Islamophobic hate crime into a separate category. We would have statistics of what is going on the streets in terms of hate speech and attacks against Muslims and then we can talk about the problem. But if you don’t acknowledge the problem politically, then you are not willing to tackle the problem (…) and no actions are taken against this.

“Of course, we can critize Muslims and Islam. Common people might have a prejudice against Islam and in Turkey also against Christians. This has to be tackled, but the problem starts when this becomes a policy and turns into law”

According to a European survey promoted by the European Union and mentioned in your report, 12% of Muslims have reported discrimination to the authorities. Do you think that number is according to reality?

I think that’s only the tip of the iceberg. In Germany, we have 900 cases reported to the police. Many Muslims are not really reporting these cases to the police in Europe. First, many are not aware of the reporting mechanisms. Second, they might be socially isolated or very close to the people who are attacking them: the employer, teacher… Also, they are not really trusting the authorities due to fear that they will not be taken seriously, which happens.

In that survey it also came out 76% of Muslims feel attached to the country they live in. Well, I guess it’s because in many cases -may be most of them- it is because it is their own country, isn’t it? And there is always this idea of talking about Muslims as strangers or foreigners.

This is the main notion you hear: Muslims are living in ghettos, they’re not integrated, they’re not part of the society… well, look at the numbers. We are talking about 3^rd and 4^th generations living in Europe, they’re already European Muslims.

Which country would you say is the more Islamophobic European country?

It is really difficult to assess, we need to establish criteria. We’re just at the beginning of the process of uncovering the problem. I can tell the situation in France is quite bad for Muslims, in terms of political representation, which is quite low compared with the population. They’re not represented.

The rhetoric in Hungary and the Czech Republic is really radical against Muslims and there are almost no Muslims there, it’s like 0.001% of the population. But if you look at the rhetoric of the leaders of those countries it is as if next day the Muslims will take over Hungary or the Czech Republic.

You are presenting the third annual report on European Islamophobia and in June you will present the next one. Have you noticed a rise in these years?

What we’re seeing is that there are more violent attacks against Muslims. There is a case in Czech Republic, where a far-right person has tried to fake a terror attack against Czechs, he cut down trees on train lines twice and then he wrote fake letters in Arabic in order to fake a Daesh attack. He was arrested but was given a really minor sentence in the Court, because he had to take medicines for his high blood-pressure problem and that might affect his ability to think. That does also show the legal aspect of this issue.

“There are worrying signs that the far-right is increasing its activity to carry out attacks. The far-right is organized, there are training camps in Russia and Ukraine. There might be more terror attacks against Muslims in Europe”

There are worrying signs that the far-right is increasing its activity to carry out attacks. And that’s why I say, and I warn that there might be more (terror) attacks against Muslims in Europe and precautions must be taken.

So Muslims cannot feel safe in Europe?

The don’t already after what happened in New Zealand. It might happen everywhere.

It already happened in Europe as well but in a lower scale when it comes to the number of victims. In the UK there were two terror attacks against mosques…

Atmosphere is ripe, the infrastructure is there, far-right is organized, there are training camps in Russia and Ukraine… It’s just a matter of time.

That’s scary.

It is scary, yes.

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La entrada Expert warns about more terror attacks against Muslims in Europe if politicians don’t tackle Islamophobia se publicó primero en Salam Plan.

Donald Trump as well as Attorney General Jeff Sessions prefer to speak about “political violence” or “despicable acts” instead of “terrorism”, when referring to the bomb mailings presumably sent by Sayoc. New York governor Andrew Cuomo did talk about “terrorism” from the beginning. Sessions left the door open to broaden up the five current charges against Sayoc as the investigations unfold. For now, they include illegal mailing of explosives and threats against former presidents.

Regarding the shooting of Robert Bowers in the Tree of Life sinagogue in Pittsburgh which resulted in 11 deaths, the public safety director of the city Wendell Hissrich confirmed in a press conference the massacre “falls under hate crime” (which in Pittsburgh can lead to a death penalty, The New York Times said). The Antidefamation League (ADL) itself -an organization founded to fight antisemitism which now fighst as well against other sorts of hatred- called on authorities “to investigate (the attack) as a hate crime”.

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So, what is the right way to call these attacks? One of the major researchers on terrorism in the US and a leading expert worldwide is Bruce Hoffman, a professor at Georgetown University and director of the Center for Security Studies. He said to Salam Plan: “Hate crimes and terrorism are not mutually exclusive. They are the same and it baffles me why such distinctions are made. Certainly, the mail bombs and Pittsburgh shooting, according to my definition, are acts of terrorism.”*

“The mail bombs and Pittsburgh shooting are acts of terrorism”

— Bruce Hoffman, Georgetown professor

Let’s see how he comes to that conclusion, which is not only his at all. Experts from around the world have been trying to get a straight answer to the meaning of “terrorism” for decades and there is still no final consensus. But they agree on basic common characteristics and an essential aspect that differentiates the terrorist attack from what is not.

Hoffman recognizes there are many different visions. In his book Inside Terrorism (Ed. Columbia University Press), he devotes up to the first 44 pages to, literally, “defining terrorism”, the very title of the first chapter. A historical review of the phenomenon, which emerged with the anarchist movement at the end of the 19th century, demonstrates the changing meaning of the word and the way it is carried out. But at the same time it confers clarity on characteristics which have remained over time.

Political or ideological motivation is essential

Hoffman concludes that for an act to be described as a terrorist attack nowadays, the following aspects must converge:

• “ineluctably” political in aims and motivations, it is “propaganda by deed”;
• violent or with threat of violence;
• planned to achieve “far-reaching” psychological repercussions beyond the immediate victim or target;
• carried out by an organization “with an identifiable chain of command or a conspiratorial cell structure” or by individuals or a small group of them inspired by a terrorist group;
• perpetrated by a “subnational” group or a non-state entity.

Hoffman also cites a detailed study carried out in the 1980s by Alex P. Schmid in which that researcher compared more than 100 definitions of “terrorism” in an attempt to come up with the final definition. He did not succeed, but he did draw up a list of the concepts that appeared most often as part of those definitions. The three most mentioned and coinciding were in the following order:

• violence or force (83.5%)
• political (65%)
• fear or emphasis on terror (51%).

Other concepts, such as “threat” or “psychological effects” only appeared in less than half of those definitions, although these two were those which followed in frequency to the ones previously mentioned.

So the concept “political violence” used by Trump and Sessions to refer to the frustrated attacks of Sayoc would directly fit into the common charasteristics of what terrorism is, according to more than 100 definitions. Also the explosive devices were not a hoax, as the FBI director Chris Wray confirmed.

The three most mentioned concepts in more than 100 definitions of “terrorism” are: “violence”, “political” and “fear”. So the concept “political violence” used by Trump and Sessions to refer to the mail bombs of Sayoc would directly fit into it.

Lieutenant-Colonel Manuel González Fernández, analyst professor of geopolitics and the so-called “jihadist” terrorism at the Spanish Gutiérrez Mellado Institute, argues that a terrorist is someone who carries out “acts of indiscriminate violence to modify or change political wills, organizations or societies.” In his opinion it is a concept that is based more on the aims than the actions themselves: “If by attacking a mosque you get people to fear going to the mosque or you provoke the need of a stronger police deployment, you are a terrorist,” he explains in his classes.

González Fernández offers another note that helps understand how terrorists act: “We see a squared chessboard with limitations, while they see a clear board. They can appear on any square of the board.” Thus, he agrees with Hoffman, who also points out the absence of the rules of war in his book, because a conventional war must be produced respecting aspects such as: not killing civilians, respecting countries and neutral actors, not taking enemy hostages, giving a correct treatment to war prisoners… Rules which, by the way, are similarly defined in the Q’ran.

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Georgetown professor Hoffman admits that also in the conventional wars these rules are sometimes breached, but he indicates that those cases qualify as a “war crime”. In the case of terrorists, they violate these basic rules systematically.

“We see a squared chessboard with limitations, while terrorists see a clear board. They can appear on any square of the board”

— Manuel González Fernández, Gutiérrez Mellado Institute

Rafael Calduch is professor of International Public Law and International Relations at the Complutense University of Madrid. International terrorism is among his main research approaches. He defines terrorism through six conditions:

“1. Political relationship strategy based on

2. the use of violence and threats of violence by

3. an organized group, in order to induce a

4. feeling of terror or extreme insecurity in a

5. non-belligerent human collectivity and

6. thus, facilitate the achievement of their demands”.

What about ‘lone wolves’ or ‘lone actors’?

For Calduch, the so-called “lone wolves” commit acts of terror, but they are “fanatics who act at their own risk” and do not consider them terrorists, because he attributes to the latter a strategy, with “planning, tactics and logistics”.

The differentiation between “wolf” (non-terrorist act) and “lone actor” (in a terrorist context) extends among researchers: Hoffman’s definition of terrorism includes precisely the lone actors and avoids the concept of “wolf”.

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Lieutenant González Fernández reminds that Osama bin Laden already incited to the solitary action in 1993. This military professor also redefines the attackers usually called “lone wolves” in the media to “coyotes”. From his point of view, a “coyote” is an actor who is part of an operative cell, because they do not self-finance, they do not use means autonomously, they do not radicalize themselves, but rather with books and the internet.

The researchers on global terrorism of the Elcano Royal Institute, Fernando Reinares and Carola García-Calvo, also prefer to talk about lone actors for similar reasons.

What stays clear after comparing the analyses of all these terrorism experts is that for a violent attack to be described as a “terrorist attack” there must be a political or ideological motivation behind it.

Neo- nazi and ISIS terrorists

So not any massive attack against civilians by a group or a person can be described as a terrorist act, even if Daesh (ISIS name in Arabic) assures that it was carried out in its name. This was the case in Las Vegas attack on October 1st 2017, where the FBI dismissed the vindication of this terrorist organization. Although it is known that its author, Stephen Paddock, planned the attack, the absence of his motivations prevents his classification as a terrorist.

As for the investigation on the van strike in Toronto carried out by Alek Minassian on April 23rd 2018, authorities spoke about it as an “incident” at that time. The suspect killed ten people and injured another 13 in what appeared to be a “deliberate” act, according to Toronto Police, but no political or ideological motivations seemed to be behind this tragedy. Therefore, he was charged with counts of murder and attempted murder, not terrorism.

Terrorist attacks were committed by Anders Breivik in Norway -who with neo-Nazi ideology killed 77 people (mostly young people of the Norwegian Socialist Party) in July 2011- or Ali David Sonboly in Munich in 2016, also with neo-Nazi ideology. Those were terrorist attacks just as the ones perpetrated by followers of ISIS terrorist group.

“All the attacks that have taken place lately (in the West) have had two types of reaction: if the author was from a European (non-Muslim) family, a reason for mental illness has been sought, or a rare situation… But name a Muslim as a possible author of an attack, then there is no need to explain more,” professor Emeritus of Arab and Islamic Studies at the University of Barcelona, ​​Dolors Bramon, complains.

This happened in the case of Breivik (the court which tried him, assessed the possibility of a mental illnessand but ended up dismissing it and he has to serve a prison sentence) and in Sonboly (killed in the attack). For Bramon, this is a sign of the Islamophobia implicit in the West societies which appears after each new attack and she asks to avoid it.

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* This article was first published in Decembre 2017. It has been updated on Octobre 29th of 2018.

La entrada Why some attacks are considered terrorist acts and others not se publicó primero en Salam Plan.