Attack in Brussels: why was Sweden targeted by the Islamist terrorist?

Monday evening, October 16, two Swedes were killed by an Islamist terrorist who opened fire in the center of Brussels, shortly after 7 p.m. In protest videos cited by Attorney General Frédéric Van Leeuw, the attacker, then on the run, explained that he was specifically targeting Swedes, many of whom were present in the capital for a football match between Belgium and Sweden.

In another video taken before the attack this time, the same individual, who claims to be from the Islamic State, “appears hooded and declares that ‘the book of Allah is a red line for which he sacrifices himself’” , said the prosecutor. The alleged assailant, who died in the morning after being neutralized in Schaerbeek, was probably referring here to the Korans burned in Sweden in recent months.

On June 28, a 37-year-old Iraqi, who had left his country for Sweden, had in fact burned pages of a copy of the Koran in front of the largest mosque in Stockholm during an authorized “gathering”. And this, on the first day of the Muslim festival of Eid al-Adh, arousing the anger of many Muslim countries. Iraq, the desecrator's country of origin, but also Saudi Arabia, Iran and Turkey were quick to sanction the Nordic country, with the expulsion of Swedish ambassadors, the suspension of commercial licenses, or even calls to demonstrate.

A few weeks later, in July, other burnings of the Koran in Sweden again outraged many states in the Middle East. On July 20, the Swedish embassy in Iraq was set on fire during a demonstration, while the next day, hundreds of people took to the streets of Baghdad to show their discontent, chanting: “No, no to Sweden . Yes, yes to the Koran.

The Swedish police, who had affirmed a few weeks earlier that these book burnings had made the country “a more priority target for attacks”, were then on alert. During the month of August, this threat materialized: on Thursday the 10th, a Molotov cocktail was thrown against the Swedish embassy in Beirut, without the projectile exploding. On August 17, the head of the Swedish intelligence services, Charlotte von Essen, therefore decided to raise her terrorist alert level, from “high level” to “critical level”, for the first time since 2016.

And the threat was more than real. Last September, Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) threatened to destroy a “Swedish embassy” and strike a “ministry” in Paris, Le Figaro learned.

In one of the issues of its magazine Sada al-Malahim, the terrorist organization claimed to want to target countries accused of being "against Islam and Muslims": "It is now clearly apparent that Sweden has chosen to take the lead in the war against Islam and Muslims among European Union countries, thus vying with France, Denmark and others for first place in the race to oppose God and his messenger ".

“Sweden, France and other countries that fight God (...) do not understand (...) and will ignore, until they hear news like “The Swedish Embassy has was razed following a violent explosion” (...) Do you think that Sweden and its allies are safe from God's punishment? Do they think that the hands of the fighters will not reach them at home, or will not touch their interests and their embassies?”, we could also read in the pages of this “magazine”, which Le Figaro consulted.

In Lebanon, the leader of Hezbollah Hassan Nasrallah also called for “punishing” the authors of the Koran burnings, reports Le Monde.

The day after the terrorist attack, this Tuesday, October 17, Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson declared that his country was more threatened than ever during a press conference. “Never in recent history have Sweden and Swedish interests been as threatened as they are today,” he continued.

On the social network He called for unity in “the fight against terrorism”.

Faced with the danger, the Belgian national crisis center declared that it had taken emergency “security measures” “in order to best protect the Swedish supporters” who were on site for the football match.