It finally happened. I feel like part of me never believed it would, that terrorism was some distant concept that may never strike close to home, but Saturday night, in what was described as a terrorist act in Edmonton, defied that expectation.
I feel for Edmontonians, and for those injured in such a vicious attack. I respect the injured police officer who fought to keep his gun, fending off the attack and keeping his wits about him enough to tell other officers arriving on the scene information about the attacker, that allowed police to stop the suspect.
But it seems like it’s second nature for me to scan stories like this, looking for confirmation of my worst fear, that this suspect will again be someone with a Muslim name who espouses some warped radical ideology. For me, I fear this because I believe it will stoke already existing anger and Islamophobia, the kind of hatred that has people afraid of Sharia law taking over our country, the kind of hatred that saw an enraged woman ranting in the face of (now) federal NDP leader Jagmeet Singh, despite the fact he’s not even Muslim.
In this case, I can see there may be extra room for that anger, because the accused, Abdulahi Hasan Sharif, is also a Somali refugee, who was investigated in 2015 for allegedly espousing extremism. It stings, it hurts that someone who was accepted as a refugee could potentially be a person that would commit this kind of crime. There is a legitimate question as to what happened when the investigation was dropped for lack of evidence and what happened to his refugee claim status. That’s obviously a matter of an internal investigation within the RCMP and Public Safety. If the federal government would like their feel-good stories - of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau handing out winter coats and hugging refugees arriving at airports – to make people actually feel good, it must be able to stand by its vetting and security protocol and defend it.
While terrorism is the prevailing narrative of our times, that radical extremists supposedly acting in the name of Islam are a threat to us, we can’t just look at all the instances that verify that narrative, without looking at all the instances that don’t – a young white man entering a Charleston church and killing nine people or an anti-racism protestor being killed at a white nationalist rally in Virgina. On Sunday, the U.S. saw its most deadly mass shooting in Las Vegas – a ‘lone wolf’ attack by a 64-year-old white man that killed more than 50 people, and injured hundreds of others.
Here in St. Paul, we’re also aware of incidences of random violence, unconnected to radical Islamic ideology – from more likely threats such as domestic violence and substance abuse. And of course, most of us can not forget the events of May 2014, when St. Paul man John Quadros killed a priest and engaged in a shoot-out with police, that left three RCMP members injured.
Terrorists or criminals, however, you brand attackers, it is their actions that are detestable and vile, and it is they who should be held accountable – not others who happen to share the same race or religion as them.
Following the Saturday evening attack, I was amazed to read coverage of the Edmonton response, to hear of hundreds of people coming out on a truly miserable Sunday, linking arms and voicing the sentiment that this will not divide them, that they stand united. It seems to me this was the best response to anyone who would attack this country or its people, that we are too strong together to be beaten.
