Some conservatives, in America and abroad, are defending the ideas, if not the actions, of Norwegian terrorist suspect, Anders Behring Breivik.
Patrick Buchanan, perennial American conservative commentator, calling the Norway terrorist attacks "a fire bell in the night" for Europe, wrote that while he condemned Breivik as "evil" and "a cold-blooded, calculating killer", he nevertheless acknowledged that Breivik "reveals a knowledge of the history, culture and politics of Europe."
Further, Buchanan said that Breivik's critique of multiculturalism was consistent with the views of Angela Merkel, Nicolas Sarkozy, and David Cameron, all of whom, Buchanan said, "had declared multiculturalism a failure".
By multiculturalism is mainly meant tolerance for Europe's immigrant Muslim population, which is viewed by conservatives, including Anders Behring Breivik, as a threat to the cultural identities of the various European states.
Buchanan agreed with Breivik that "Europe faces today an authentic and historic crisis" of "a burgeoning Muslim presence"
Meanwhile, at the Wall Street Journal, Bruce Bawer, author of Surrender: Appeasing Islam, Sacrificing Freedom, a work openly critical of many of the same things, such as multiculturalism, as Breivik, expressed in an article that he was stunned to learn his writings had been quoted repeatedly by the suspected terrorist in Breivik's 1500-page manifesto.
Bawer, a resident of Oslo, said he "wept for the city that has been my home" when he first heard the news of the attacks, assuming he said that they were the work of Islamic terrorists. Bawer said he was hopeful "Norwegian leaders would respond to this act of violence by taking a more responsible approach to the problems they face in connection with Islam."
Bawer said, when he learned that the attacker was instead a native Norwegian, "it was immediately clear…that his violence will deal a heavy blow to an urgent cause."
Echoing Buchanan, and again Breivik, Bawer said "Norway, like the rest of Europe, is in serious trouble" from "[m]illions of European Muslims."
And, in an editorial, the Jerusalem Post said of the potential impact of the Norway terrorists attacks: "It would be wrongheaded, however, to allow the fact that this terrible tragedy was perpetrated by a right-wing extremist to detract attention from the underlying problems faced not only by Norway, but by many Western European nations."
Acknowledging that there might be a real threat from right-wing extremism in Norway, the Post said this was an opportunity "to seriously reevaluate policies for immigrant integration in Norway and elsewhere" and that "discontent with multiculturalism’s failure must not be delegitimatized or mistakenly portrayed as an opinion held by only the most extremist elements of the Right."
