After Burning the Quran, This Is How Sweden Put Itself in Front of Hard-to-Bear Consequences

Islamic countries did not expect the recent Swedish storm, laden with racism and hatred, after the authorities’ permission, on January 21, 2023, for the leader of the Danish far-right Hard Line Party, Rasmus Paludan, to burn a copy of the Quran in front of the Turkish embassy in the capital, Stockholm.

The Stockholm police announced that Paludan had obtained government permission to organize a demonstration near the Turkish embassy, during which the Quran would be burned. This sparked outrage in the Islamic world and increased tension between Turkiye and Sweden.

The Scandinavian country, known for its stunning scenery and long history of avoiding taking stances in international conflicts, is currently seeking to join NATO at a time when it is facing a number of challenges due to the Russian–Ukrainian war.

However, Stockholm’s attempts to obtain the protection of the NATO alliance led by the United States were smashed against Turkiye’s refusal to support it.

 

Turkiye Vows

Ankara did not stand idly by for long in front of the disgraceful act; President Recep Tayyip Erdogan responded on January 23, 2023, to the incident, vowing that “Sweden will not get support from Turkiye to join NATO because it does not respect our Islamic beliefs.”

In Erdogan’s speech after a government meeting at the presidential complex in the capital, Ankara, the Turkish president said: “If you do not respect the religious beliefs of Turkiye and Muslims in general, do not expect any support from us regarding your membership in NATO.”

He stressed that “this ugly act in Sweden is an insult to everyone who respects people’s basic rights and freedoms, especially Muslims.”

He explained: “The Holy Quran, which God preserves, will never be harmed if a copy of it is burned by one of the remains of the Crusaders.”

On January 22, 2023, Istanbul witnessed protests in front of the Swedish Consulate General over the burning of the Noble Quran in Stockholm.

The demonstrators, in front of the consulate headquarters located on the famous Istiklal street in the city center, expressed their disapproval of Sweden’s permission to burn the Quran.

They also recited verses from the Holy Quran and chanted anti-Swedish slogans, on top of which was the demand to sever ties.

On January 26, 2023, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said: “The Swedish government is a partner in the incident of burning the Holy Quran after it allowed this despicable act to be committed near the Turkish embassy in Stockholm.

“This incident is a hate crime and a racist act, and it is not freedom of expression as some want to interpret it,” Cavusoglu declared during a press conference with his Serbian counterpart, Ivica Dacic, in Ankara.

He continued: “If Sweden says: ‘I am now a radical racist country, therefore I have become a country hostile to Islam, and Islamophobia and racism are permissible,’ then this is its business, but it also violates the agreements of the European Council.”

 

Islamic Anger

Anger spread from Turkiye to various parts of the Islamic world; on January 23, 2023, demonstrations broke out in Jordan, Lebanon, and Yemen, refusing to allow Sweden to burn the Quran.

In Jordan, a protest was held near the Stockholm embassy in the capital, Amman, to condemn the incident.

In a speech in the parliament, Jordanian Parliament Speaker Ahmed Safadi described the incident as an “extremist act,” calling on his country’s foreign ministry to address the Swedish embassy to offer an “immediate apology.”

Tripoli, in northern Lebanon, also witnessed a protest against the incident, and angry youths burned the Swedish flag.

The Tunisian Foreign Ministry issued a statement condemning the incident, stating that it was “a flagrant provocation to the feelings of Muslims all over the world” and warned of “the danger of these rejected and condemned practices on world peace.”

On January 24, 2023, 41 deputies in Kuwait called on all parliamentarians in the world to boycott Sweden in protest against the burning of a copy of the Holy Quran.

The statement, signed by the deputies, said: “We, the members of the National Assembly, strongly condemn and denounce the burning of a copy of the Holy Qur’an in Sweden, and we demand a boycott of the latter, and the boycott of every country that does not respect Islamic values and constants.”

Al-Azhar al-Sharif in Egypt, the largest global Islamic institution, issued a statement on January 25, 2023, calling on the Arab and Islamic peoples to boycott Swedish and Dutch products of all kinds in support of the Holy Quran.

Al-Azhar said: “We must take a strong and unified stand in support of the Book of God and our Holy Quran, the holy book of Muslims.”

 

Government Convictions

The position of the Arab governments coincided with the official Turkish position and the mass popular position against the Swedish policy.

On January 21, 2023, the Saudi Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued a statement expressing the Kingdom’s strong condemnation and denunciation of the Swedish authorities’ allowing an extremist to burn a copy of the Holy Quran in front of the Turkish Embassy in Stockholm.

It stressed “Saudi Arabia’s firm position calling for the importance of spreading the values of dialogue, tolerance, and coexistence, and rejecting hatred and extremism.”

The UAE did the same through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which strongly rejected what an extremist in Sweden did, and affirmed in a statement its rejection of all practices aimed at destabilizing security and stability that are inconsistent with human and moral values and principles.

The matter did not stop with the Arab and Islamic worlds only but also reached the European Commission, which announced that the Swedish authorities should take steps regarding the incident of burning a copy of the Holy Quran.

In a press conference in Brussels on January 23, 2023, the European Commission’s spokesperson, Johannes Bahrke, stated that such practices are not in line with the values on which the European Union is based, saying that racism, xenophobia, ethnic and religious hatred have no place in the European Union.

 

Frequent Accidents

Incidents of burning the Quran have been recently repeated in Sweden, and the Swedish government has given the green light to such repeated behavior in a country inhabited by more than 600,000 Muslims.

On August 28, 2020, 3 activists of the Paludan Hard Line party, Rasmus Paludan, burned a copy of the Quran in the Swedish city of Malmo, leading to violent confrontations that broke out between the police and Muslim demonstrators protesting the incident.

On April 14, 2022, Paludan burned a copy of the Holy Qur’an in Linköping, southern Sweden, under police protection.

Violent confrontations erupted between protestors and police, resulting in the injury of 26 policemen and 14 demonstrators, in addition to the destruction of 20 police cars.

The Swedish government is led by the conservative Prime Minister, Ulf Kristersson, who belongs to the Moderate Party and began his term on October 17, 2022.

He took the position after receiving unprecedented support from the far-right party, after he announced an agreement to form a coalition government that includes three parties, and pledged to resolve immigration and asylum files among the new government’s priorities.

It is an explanation of the policy of containing extremists and racists who fight Islam and the Islamic community in the country.

 

Hate War

Commenting on this matter, the imam of the Islamic Center in the German city of Dresden, Ahmed Zaidan, says: “The Swedish government’s disgraceful behavior amounts to a complete crime of hatred and racism towards hundreds of thousands of Muslims on its territory, millions in the European Union, and nearly two billion Muslims around the world.”

Zaidan added to Al-Estiklal: “The existence of a political dispute between the Swedish government and the government of an Islamic country such as Turkiye does not mean that it exploits the rising factor of Islamophobia and allows the agitated extreme right to insult Islamic sanctities and the Holy Quran. This is unacceptable and takes the world back to the Middle Ages despite claims of modernity.”

He explained: “There are different beliefs that European countries are full of other than Islam, Christianity, and Judaism. There is Hinduism, Buddhism, Baha’i, and dozens of religions and sects, so why did they exclude Islam with constant attack and racism?”

He stated that “the Federation of Islamic Organizations in Europe and Islamic institutions in general tend to organize a new policy through a set of steps to unify the word and formulate a legal form that can defend Muslims in all countries of the Union by preserving their rights and protecting them from hatred and racism.”

He continued: “Sweden is one of the countries in which this situation has escalated, and its current government is the most extremist and has turned the country into a hotbed of hatred after it was an example of tolerance and coexistence.”

The Islamic preacher concluded his speech by calling on the Islamic peoples and communities “to activate the boycott of Swedish products as a punishment for the state that violated the sanctities, and as a peaceful expression of the complete rejection of these practices, and victory for our religion and law.”