Cries and Whispers

Bizarre news from Sweden. (Hat tip: M.S.) A preacher in Stockholm is under
police protection after being threatened with death for calling the prophet
Mohammed a pedophile. The newspaper Aftenposten
reports:

Celebrity Pentecostal preacher Runar Søgaard is under protection by
Swedish police after receiving death threats. A high-profile sermon where
Sögaard called the prophet Mohammed "a confused pedophile" has
triggered fears of religious war. ... "Even if I see Runar while he has
major police protection I will shoot him to death," a radical Islamist
told Swedish newspaper Expressen. Persons connected to the Kurdish group Ansar
al-Islam claim to have received a fatwa, a decree from a Muslim religious
leader, to kill Søgaard.

Swedish experts claim that Søgaard is at fault.

Islam expert Jan Hjärpe at the University of Lund told Expressen that such
an assassination is a real risk, and he wondered if conflict was the motive
for the sermon. ... "It was a statement from an odd man in an odd sect but the effect is stronger antagonism between different groups. It becomes a pure religious polemic and is extremely unpleasant," Hjärpe told the newspaper.
Hjärpe saw the incident as a type of beginning of a religious war in Sweden. "It (Sögaard's sermon) has power and influence. It seems to have been Runar's intention to provoke and promote antagonism," Hjärpe said.

Blogger The
Fjordman takes a different view. He regard's the Søgaard incident as part
of a wider breakdown in the civility between Muslim immigrants and native
Swedes. He paints a bleak picture.

Rock throwing and attacks against buses and trains are increasing problems
in some suburbs. In Malmö the bus lines in the area of Rosengård have been
cancelled. In Stockholm, the authorities went even further and stopped both
the bus traffic in the Tensta suburb and the train to Nynäshamn. Head of the
bus company in the city of Uppsala, Claes-Göran Alm, is considering doing the
same, as the harassment is costing too much money and is putting their
employees at risk. Benny Persson is selling window glass in the areas south of
Stockholm. According to him, they sometimes have to jump into the car and
leave the spot, as they are met with the harassment that some of the bus
companies in the suburbs are experiencing: Stone throwing and threats. The
same thing is reported from Gothenburg, Sweden’s second largest city. The
company Hemglass are now attempting to run double crews in their cars to face
the problems, but they still have had to completely abandon an area outside
Södertälje. If you get stuck in an elevator outside Stockholm, you risk
staying there for a long time. The repair personnel now demand security guards
present when they arrive, since several of their employees have been
physically attacked. The most serious problem, however, is the delay of
ambulances and the fire department. According to the Emergency Central,
attacks against them have become commonplace in the cities. Every Saturday, at
least five to ten times emergency personnel are asking for police escort to be
able to do their job.

Quoting a New York academic now living in Sweden, The Fjordman
believes part of the problem is that Swedish public figures have been studiously
avoiding noticing the elephant in the living room. "No debate about
immigration polices is possible, the subject is simply avoided. Sweden has such
a close connection between the various powerful groups, politicians,
journalists, etc. The political class is closed, isolated."

These are powerful accusations. Part of the challenge facing the new Internet
media is to find a robust method for collaterally confirming such reports, which
are sparsely covered in the regular media. The Fjordman's post is
liberally sprinkled with links (many of which are unfortunately, for me at
least, in Swedish) so there is little doubt that many of the individual
incidents he refers to are true. So it's a good start. But in order to really
gauge the magnitude and severity of the situation there is really a need for
more investigative blogging. It's a fair bet that the MSM, which still provides
the bulk of primary reporting, has gaps in its coverage and there are some --
such as this one -- which are too important to miss.