© Terje Pedersen/AFP/Getty Images
Baerum’s al-Noor Islamic Centre, where the attack occurred on Saturday.
The suspected gunman in an attack on a mosque in Norway on Saturday was inspired by recent white extremist attacks in New Zealand and the US, online posts suggest.
Police in Norway have so far only said the attack in Baerum, a town 20km from Oslo, the capital, will be investigated as a possible act of terrorism.
In messages posted on the day of the attack,
Philip Manshaus, a 21-year-oldman who has been named by local media as the main suspect, described himself as "chosen" by "Saint [Brenton] Tarrant", the gunman who killed 51 people at mosques in New Zealand in March.
"My time is up, I was chosen by Saint Tarrant after all ... We can't let this continue,
you gotta bump the race war threat in real life ... it's been fun," one post reads.
In a meme also posted by Manshaus, three rightwing extremists suspected of being responsible for other attacks this year are depicted and praised as heroes of the white nationalist movement.
Tarrant is described as having "addressed the Muslim problem"
while Patrick Crusius, who has been charged with the attack in El Paso, Texas, in which 22 people died, is praised for "fighting to reclaim his country".
A third attacker suspected of killing a woman during a Passover celebration at a synagogue in California in April is also praised, alongside antisemitic abuse.
Comment: Attacks like this tend to occur in clusters, along with seemingly unrelated outbreaks of craziness. The psychological explanation is social contagion. See the Truth Perspective discussion on social contagion here:
But even social contagion probably can't provide a full explanation, as discussed in the show. Are the initial triggering events completely random? And is there something in addition to media coverage that 'amplifies' the signal, so to say? The dynamics of social contagion are not a mystery. That means there are individuals and groups who are aware of how it works, and who can shape events in a manner of their choosing. Could that be what has been going on for the past week or so?
Comment: See also: