Alt-right pushes Jihad terrorism theory
Vocal advocates suggest Canadian authorities are covering up an Islamist attack
When a van plowed into pedestrians over a long stretch of Toronto sidewalk Monday, many immediately assumed it was the work of a terrorist following in the tracks of lone-wolf jihadists in Europe and the United States.
A portrait has since emerged of the accused, Alek Minassian, as someone motivated not by radical Islam but more likely by sexual frustration and social awkwardness.
Yet in the darker corners of the web, where conspiracy theories take hold, alt-right voices cling to the flimsiest evidence to suggest Canadian authorities are covering up what was actually an Islamist attack.
On Tuesday afternoon, Robert Spencer of the Jihad Watch website drew on courtroom sketches to imply that the man who was charged Tuesday was not the same one arrested Monday. The key for him was that the sketches showed the suspect with hair while the man arrested had appeared bald.
In an earlier post, Spencer had written that it is “likely that this was not a jihad attack.” But after being asked on Twitter Wednesday whether he thought the man arrested and the man in court were different people, he replied, “I have no idea. But something very odd is going on.”
The internet provides fertile ground for those inclined to see a jihadi in every corner and a false flag on every ship. American mass shootings from Sandy Hook to Parkland have been fodder for conspiracy theorists, and Canada is not immune.
After the 2017 attack on a Quebec City mosque by a white francophone gunman, Alexandre Bissonnette, a theory stubbornly took hold that there had been a second, Muslim, gunman. Police clarified that the arrest at the scene of a Muslim man was a mix-up — he was a worshipper who had been helping vic-
tims and ran off thinking the police officer was the gunman returning. But the Canadian right-wing news site The Rebel repeatedly peddled the theory that there was more to the story. Even today, after Bissonnette pleaded guilty and a courtroom saw security video of the attack, the Rebel site asks, “What are the facts? And can we trust the mainstream media to tell us the truth about such a controversial and sensitive subject?”
The most vocal advocate of the theory that Toronto suffered a jihadi attack has been Alex Jones, whose Infowars site is a breeding ground for alt-right conspiracy theories.
Jones was in the middle of a Periscope live-stream Monday when Minassian’s name was first reported. He had been analyzing cellphone video of the arrest, concluding that the suspect spoke with “a classic Middle Eastern accent.”
When the name was published, and an associate informed Jones it was a common Armenian surname (less than one per cent of Armenians are Muslim), Jones dismissed the information and said it was an Iranian/Turkish name.
As more of the truth came out in the following hours, indicating no Islamist connection, Jones stuck to
his “Islamic terror attack” narrative. Pronouncing Minassian’s first name “Aleek” to make it sound Arabic, he suggested there was something suspicious in the fact that the arresting officer had not killed him: “I’m asking the question, why is this guy not dead? And why haven’t we learned his religion?”
On Wednesday afternoon, the fourth most popular item on the Infowars site was: “Video of Truck Attack: Suspect Has Middle Eastern Accent.”
The fomenters of conspiracy theories often rely on the tactic of simply “asking the question,” letting their
followers fill in the desired answer.
In Canada, a contributor to the Vlad Tepes blog — run by a frequent Rebel contributor who writes there under the name Victor Laszlo — commented Tuesday that the Toronto attacker followed the Islamic State modus operandi to the letter.
“(He) looked like an IS jihadi but our government released the clean cut school photo to push the mental illness narrative, which is patent BULL----,” wrote contributor Eeyore, who is described as a “counter-jihad and freedom of speech activist.”
Many alt-right commentators were quick to declare the attack the work of a jihadi, including Rebel and Infowars contributor Paul Joseph Watson, who accused Toronto Mayor John Tory of “virtue signalling” after “a jihadist has just killed nine people.”
His Rebel colleague Katie Hopkins, a Brit, tweeted Tuesday morning mocking a message of sympathy from Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and reinforcing the notion that it was an Islamist attack.
On Wednesday, Trudeau declined to comment on the ongoing police investigation.