Source / Credit: CNN
July 23, 2011 — Oslo, Norway (CNN) — The death toll in the mass shooting and bomb attack in Norway rose to 92 Saturday, as leaders and the public alike tried to make sense of what the prime minister called the country’s “worst atrocity” since World War II.
New details emerged surrounding Friday’s attacks, as a fuller picture of the suspect charged in the crimes came to light. The man faces charges related to terrorism, which carry a maximum sentence of 21 years in prison if convicted. The charges may change, police said.
Norwegian television and newspaper reports have identified the suspect as 32-year-old Anders Behring Breivik.
An employee at a Norwegian agricultural cooperative told CNN that the man identified in media reports as the suspect bought six tons of fertilizer from her company in May.
Oddmy Estenstad, of Felleskjopet Agr, said she did not think the order was strange at the time because the suspect has a farm, but after Friday’s explosion in Norway’s capital, Oslo, she called police because she knew the material can be used to make bombs.
Norway in shock “We are very shocked that this man was connected to our company,” said Estenstad. “We are very sad about what happened.”
Official sources and social media indicate that Breivik might be a right-wing Christian fundamentalist who may have had an issue with Norway’s multi-cultural society. The attack may have been politically motivated, one official said.
“I think what we have seen today is that politically motivated violence poses a threat to society and I commend the police for carrying out a very swift and effective investigation, but that is still ongoing,” Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Store told reporters.
Read about latest update on CNN:
OSLO (Reuters) 7/22/2011- A huge bomb devastated the main government building in Norway’s capital Oslo on Friday, and state radio said two people were killed and several others wounded.
Though the attack was on the very heart of power in the small Nordic state, Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg was safe. There was no claim of responsibility.
“This is very serious,” Stoltenberg told Norwegian TV2 television in a phone call. He added it was too early to say if the blast was a terrorist attack. He said that police had advised him not to say where he was speaking from.
NATO member Norway has been the target of threats, if not bombs, before, notably over its involvement in conflicts in Afghanistan and Libya.
The attack came just over a year after three men were arrested on suspicion of having links to al Qaeda and planning to attack targets in Norway.
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Latest Updates: Source: Times of Malta
Seven dead in Oslo terror blast
80 feared dead in camp shooting
A Norwegian who dressed as a police officer to gun down summer campers killed at least 80 people at an island retreat, police said today.
It took investigators several hours to realise the full horror of yesterday’s massacre, which followed an explosion in nearby Oslo that killed seven, set off, police said, by the same suspect.
Police did not release his name, but Norwegian national broadcaster NRK identified said he was 32-year-old Anders Breivik and said officers searched his Oslo apartment overnight. NRK and other Norwegian media posted pictures of the blond, blue-eyed Norwegian.
Read more:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3pt6-XCAVc8
The mass shooting and bombing suspect arrested on Utoya Island near Oslo had purchased six tons of fertilizer from a farm supply company in May, an employee for the Felleskjpet Agr company told CNN.
[Update: 7:09 a.m. ET, 7/23/2011 — 1:09 p.m. Oslo] Norwegian television and newspaper reports have identified the suspect in the attacks as 32-year-old Anders Behring Breivik.
Police have not released the identity of the man, telling reporters Saturday they detained a 32-year-old Norwegian man who is being questioned in both the Olso bombing and the shooting attack at the youth camp on Utoya island, about 20 miles from the Norwegian capital. Police spokesman Are Frykholm told CNN Saturday that authorities are investigating further, based on information provided by the man in custody.
A victim who was shot during the attack on the island told CNN Saturday that he had seen pictures of Breivik taken from what is believed to be his Facebook page and shown on television stations NRK and TV2. The victim said he recognized the man from news reports as the gunman.
http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2011/07/23/norway-attacks-latest-developments/?hpt=hp_p1&iref=NS1
Categories: Islamophobia, Norway
Norwegian state broadcaster NRK says at least one person has died after a huge explosion rocked the center of the capital, Oslo. Dozens more are being treated in hospitals, NRK said, and all roads leading to the center of Oslo have been blocked.
http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2011/07/22/blast-rips-through-norways-capital-injuries-reported/?hpt=hp_t1
We have always condemned all and any acts of terrorism and any loss of innocent human life, as human ethics explode into existence, only from sacredness of all and every human life.
Ahmadiyya Muslim Jamaat Malta condemns the terror attack and also the shooting of the camp, resulting many deaths and injuries. We categorically condemns all such actions of killing innocent human beings. God is love, God is peace, God loves His people, so killing innocent human beings is a grave crime and to call the wrath of God. Our sincerest sympathies are with the victims’ families. And we pray may peace prevail on earth.
It reminds us once again that terrorism and extremism has no color, faith or region. The more we label terrorism and extremism with these labels, farther we go from addressing the real issue.
And now the death toll is more than 80… We cannot ignore that Muslims sort of feel a little ‘relief’ when all of a sudden a terrorist attack is carried out by a non-Muslim (although probably it will not be called a terrorist attack, the press might find another word for it…)…
I second the insightful comments of Rafiq A. Tschannen and Amtul Q Farhat. Thank you.
I also added this Post to Islamophobia page. This unfortunate tragedy and loss of innocent human life, is also a trial and test for the news media. Do they precisely define terrorism, as killing and terrorizing of innocent for political or other gains, or only use the label as a propaganda, when Muslims are guilty of this heinous crime? If the media underestimates the wisdom of general public, sooner or later they will see through the dishonesty of some of the media in favor of those who have better integrity, God willing!
Terrorism is terrorism, even if Muslim Mullah, Christian priest, Jewish Rabbi or an atheist denies it. We, Ahmadi Muslims (Muslims who believe in Messiah) categorically reject terrorism in any form and shape, regardless of its acceptance by any group.
From Dr. Salee Amina Mohammed: It disturbs me to repeatedly read about insanely vicious attacks against innocent people, the majority of which are committed by deranged people of various social, national and religious backgrounds. However, it seems that the ONLY time that such heinous actions are called “terrorist” acts is when the perpetrator happens to be a Muslim. I am disgusted with the amount of prejudice, discrimination and labeling that has become common place and acceptable in the world today. It is no different than the attitude of the general public during the Nazi regime, when Jews were labeled as unwanteds, and nothing done or said against a Jew was considered wrongful. At what point might Muslims be subjected to a similar kind of mass extermination that the world blindly allowed during the Hitler’s fanatic annihilation of human beings? Or, some might say it is already happening: When a Palestinian youth throws a rock at an Israeli soldier, he is committing a “terrorist act,” but when the soldier shoots and kills Palestinians or wipes out entire neighborhoods of peaceful Palestinians, it is labeled a defensive action. The double standard stinks of social prejudice. I am beyond disgusted at the kind of unjust labeling that Muslims endure. I am also tired of being searched whenever I go on a plane, simply because my last name is “Mohammed.” I am a 4th generation American citizen and my father was a U.S. Marine. This wave of Hateful injustice and discrimination against Muslims is insanity. The proof of how vicious the mind-bending indoctrination against Muslims really is can be seen through the kind of acts as occurred in Norway, when Anders Behring Breivik, a RIGHT winged CHRISTIAN anti-Muslim opened fire on innocent Norwegians and bombing a building in Oslo, after issuing an anti-Muslim manifesto, attacking multi-culturalism and Muslim immigration into Norway. The manifesto also recommended violence and educated its readers on how to make explosives. Yet, he is not called a terrorist. No, it takes having a Muslim name to get that label. Every day, ‘terrorist acts’ are perpetrated, all over the world, by all kinds of violent malcontented and maladjusted social misfits, who are typically criminally insane anti-social hate-mongers. Yet, they are not labeled as terrorists unless they are Muslims. If the international press had not done such a gargantuan anti-Muslim slander campaign, this kind of hateful misunderstanding and wrongful labeling of Muslims would not be so pervasive. Crazy people and criminals come in all denominations. As Muslims, we are tired of being constantly labeled and discriminated against, due to the isolated actions of a handful of insane hate-filled fanatics, pretending to represent Islam. Islam is a religion that mainly promotes peace and unity with all good people. It is a religion that reveres and admires Jesus, as being divinely created by God, as the Messiah, as one who resurrected from the dead (body and soul,) as one who will come again, as one born of the Virgin Mary, without a human father. Yet, most Christians see us as “anti-Christs.” It’s shocking what a black-propaganda campaign of mis-information can do to distort the facts, slander a religion and defame an entire populace. And such malicious slander campaigns are the fuel which set off such maniacal reactions as was seen in Oslo Norway on July 22, 2011. The Oklahoma City bomber was Christian, the Unabomber was a Mormon, Hitler was a Christian, the Tamil Tigers are Hindus and Buddhists (who kill mainly Muslims) and this fanatical killer in Norway was a right-wing Christian anti-Muslim. Yet, none of them are labeled in the newspapers as “terrorists,” unless they are Muslims. The Norwegian maniac who killed at least 92 people in Oslo and Utouya Island is a terrorist. All things being equal, he should wear the label, “Fundamental Christian-ist fanatic terrorist” in the same way as society would label any Muslims who might commit similar crimes.
Dr. Salee Amina Mohammed is an American convert to Islam.
Our sympathies once again are with the victims and their families but at the same time we cannot help but try to address all different injustices in the world, including Islamophobia.
Brother Rafiq thank you for sharing the comments of Dr. Salee Amina Mohammed.