Stockholm mosque condemns desecration of Quran in latest Islamophobic attack in Sweden

By Leila Nezirevic

LONDON (AA) - A Stockholm mosque condemned the latest attack on its facility after a damaged copy of the Qur’an was left chained up and hanging outside the mosque’s entrance.

Images released by the Stockholm Central Mosque of the attack last Friday show the damaged Holy book of the Muslims chained up and hanging from an iron railing outside the mosque.

The mosque said it frequently experiences such threats.

Tying a destroyed Qur’an and hanging it to the garden bars next to the mosque door is humiliating for Muslims, the mosque wrote on Facebook.

“Our mosque and our congregation receive threats very widely. Racists always make a new attempt to smear those who are not like themselves,” it said.

A statement said the mosque decided to share photographs and information “to attract the attention of both our congregation and the public, and to prevent hate crime from being normalized,” it said.

But the attack is not isolated as the mosque has been subjected to Islamophobic attacks in the past, including when anti-Islamic graffiti and writings were painted on its door.

The Qur’an has been under attack in Sweden for some time. Swedish and Danish national Rasmus Paludan, who leads the far-right Danish anti-immigration party regularly organizes Quran-burning tours across the two Scandinavian countries despite protests that triggered riots.

Imam and director of the Stockholm Central Mosque, Mahmoud Khalfi, told Anadolu Agency that he “personally witnessed the Quran burning here in Stockholm” last December, “and I remember how hurtful it was.”

“The Quran is sacred in Islam; it is the word of God. Burning the Quran, therefore, becomes enormously hurtful for us Muslims,” he said.