Terror in New Zealand

Another day, another white far-right terrorist attack. This time the target was two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand. For those who know little about the growing white fascism in places like Australia, this would be a shock. For those who have reported on growing neo-Nazi rallies in the region, the loss of 49 lives can be blamed squarely on the failure of governments to take far-right terrorism as a serious threat. Lest one forget that for almost two centuries the Australian peninsula has retained some of the most racist migration policies in the so-called developed world. There is little doubt that this is ‘one of New Zealand’s darkest days’ as its Prime Minister Jacinda Arden said. But who could truly say that this was not coming? While Arden herself comes from a more progressive political vantage point, having criticised Australia’s deportation policies, warnings that the far-right in the country was getting stronger were offered by many observers. Christchurch itself has a history of far-right violence, with several violent attacks in the city since the late 1980s. So the shock is more that the Christchurch mayor called it a ‘bolt from the blue in a place like New Zealand.’

While four people have been arrested and explosive devices found, surely this is not enough to erase the horror of what happened in Christchurch. The fact is that none of the suspects was on the terrorist watch list. This is because we live in a world where white extremists apparently cannot be terrorists, where white settler governments continue the legacies of the original displacement and murder of the original inhabitants of the land. While there is little surprise in the failure of the Australian prime minister to call it a ‘terrorist attack’, the main attacker was an Australian citizen and Australia will need to do more to recognise its own legacy of racist violence against non-white populations.

The Christchurch attack has left little doubt that the white far-right presents a very serious terrorist threat in the West. The main attacker, who live-streamed the attack like it was a video game, claimed to be inspired by Norwegian far-right terrorist Anders Breivik. He also claimed that the attack was being planned for two years. The fact is that there are continuities between settler violence and far-right terrorism in Australia, the US and New Zealand. While a crackdown on far-right groups is in order, it is those longer legacies that also need to be rethought and questioned.