Ex-Berlusconi minister defends Anders Behring Breivik | World news | The Guardian

There is a reason I keep bringing up the European context of the Norway killings, especially considering Breivik was so keen on this trend of a pan European populist movement rooted in deeply xenophobic and Islamophobic ideas. Breivik is the violent, extreme manifestation of these ideas, but certainly, they are not bred in isolation. On the contrary, there is an entire set of extremist politicians feeding European Breiviks with more hatred.

Also, from the article, more Italian politicians justifying these ideas:

The Italian politician was endorsing the comments of another high-profile member of the league who had drawn fierce criticism for arguing that the killings might have been part of a plot to discredit hardline conservative thinkers. Like many in his party, Mario Borghezio, who sits in the European parliament, is an admirer of the writings of the late Italian journalist and author Oriana Fallaci, who popularised the term Eurabia to describe a future, supposedly Islamised Europe.[…]

While describing the Norwegian killer as “unbalanced”, Borghezio said: “Christians ought not to be animals to be sacrificed. We have to defend them.”

I’ll leave the chilling implications of “Christians being worth defending” (which, in case someone wants to pin some dirt on me, let me vehemently clarify, OF COURSE THEY ARE), coming from politicians who have made a career out of the dehumanization of Muslims and other minorities.