The shock of the massacre comes at a time when Western democracies are being reshaped in line with the image of xenophobic and white supremacist populism. This process has pushed for the imposition of veil and Muslim travel bans, mounting surveillance, en masse bulldozing of Muslim homes, and restrictions on public calls to prayer—all policies that the Christchurch terrorist claimed as inspirations and that the War on Terror facilitated or laid a foundation for.

SEED: Potential essay angle: examining how mainstream policy rhetoric and the War on Terror provided the ideological scaffolding for far-right terrorism.

Khaled A. Beydoun, The New Crusades_ Islamopho…, loc. 1039