No sooner had the first lines of news come out of Norway – with regards to the horrific massacre which claimed the lives of 76 people in a usually calm and peaceful country – than news agencies, newspapers and TV stations stressed the high “probability” that Islamic extremist groups were behind the massacre, and began to provide grounds for the story. However, it quickly turned out that the man behind the attack was a 32 year old Norwegian blonde named Anders Behring Breivik, a hard-line radical Christian who always boasted of his affiliation to right-wing fundamentalist groups. According to his manifesto which he revealed later, he was looking forward to being immortalized as the most brutal Nazi in history since the end of World War II. In his final post on the Twitter website, he said “One person with a belief is equal to the force of 100,000 who have only interests”.

The events in Norway reveal what was already known; that radicalism extends and spreads for several reasons, and it has hotspots and is located in different parts of the world. Renowned French writer Gilles Kepel, in his important and famous book entitled “The Revenge of God”, argues that in 1970s the world witnessed three pivotal incidents that contributed to the formation of the present day hard-line radicalism. In 1977, Menachem Begin came to power in Israel as the first head of a fundamental, radical party, drawing its political tendencies from the Torah, Talmud and the teachings of the rabbis. In 1978, John Paul I assumed the position of Pope of the Vatican, being the first non-Italian pope [since the 16th century] and hailing from Eastern Europe, which was then under Soviet occupation and influence. In 1979, a revolution broke out in Iran against the Shah, thus establishing the conservative Mullah regime. Subsequently, a series of highly serious incidents followed, in which religion was abused.

Begin invaded Lebanon under the pretext of liberating the Galilee, the land mentioned in the Torah, and he used all his religious “tricks” to evoke his nations’ feelings. The Pope entered into an alliance with Ronald Reagan, the conservative US president who wanted to overthrow the evil Soviet empire, whereas the Pope wanted to liberate his country Poland, a mission which they succeeded in achieving. Al-Khomeini devoted himself and his authority to both the war against Iraq and the exportation of the Iranian revolution by all means possible, including Sukuk al Ghufran [absolution certificates]. Judaism became even fiercer and gave rise to violent organizations and parties such as the Jewish Defense Organization, Shas, and Yisrael Beiteniu, as well as a host of terrorist names such as Maer Kahana, Barukh Goldstein, and others. The victory achieved by the Pope in Europe, combined with the increase of Muslim and African migration to the Old Continent [Europe], fueled fear and caused a state of fierce counter-reaction. At the time, Christian Nazi extremist organizations were represented in European parliaments, yet still they burned the houses, shops, and cars of minorities. Of course, some extremists reached power in the West, as was the case with George W. Bush, who was known for his radical Christian orientation. Of course, right and left wing organizations spread everywhere in Islam, many of which are known for their extremism, violence, and terrorism. They caused bloodshed and left their fingerprints as evidence for the crimes they committed in their own countries, rather than in the lands of their enemies.

This atmosphere was further provoked by the media and its key figures such as Rupert Murdoch, whose name was circulated recently in the press following the phone hacking scandal which his newspapers carried out against politicians and citizens. Murdoch has long stirred up the feelings of the radicals against each other, and has exploited his newspapers and television channels, such as “Fox News”, “The Wall Street Journal”, “The Times” and “The New York Post”, for the aim of promoting certain political stances to serve his interests, as was proven later. This increased the number of his readers and audiences, and strengthened his influence as a result.

Radicalism has emerged from the bottle neck and has now reached the most liberal and civilized societies. In fact, extremism is not limited to the three main celestial religions, but also exists with Hinduism in India, as we can see by the numerous businessmen and political parties who have been involved in terrorist activities there, a major cause for the [Hindu nationalist] Bharatiya Janata Party’s failure in the last elections. Terrorism has emerged once more but this time with a white face, blonde hair, blue eyes, and speaking a Norwegian language, but it still poses the same danger. Yet I wonder why the Western media outlets have so far been hesitant to use the word “terrorism” to describe what happened, or the word “terrorist” to describe the killer?