A Fox News foreign affairs analyst and a former staffer for the Trump 2016 campaign condemned the attacks, but told Fox News’ Bill Hemmer on Friday that it was “very understandable” what the shooter in the New Zealand mosque massacre was “trying to do on a political level.”
“It is very understandable what he is trying to do on a political level, obviously it’s horrific and it should be condemned completely on the action level,” Walid Phares told Fox News on Friday, before discussing the attention the shooter likely wants to bring to his ideological beliefs through the attack and trial.
It is unclear what Phares was trying to express in the eyebrow-raising remarks. Phares tweeted that he thinks his words were twisted.
The #IranRegime & #Ikhwan propaganda are trying to play with my words on FoxNews because I identified an #Islamophobia trend that we need to denounce while they want to control the narrative. They don't have the intellectual power to win this one. More arguments are coming soon
— Walid Phares (@WalidPhares) March 15, 2019
Phares went on to express that it is the responsibility of the New Zealand government and governments around the world to “take action against” the ideologies that promote “violent action” and fight terrorism “from any side and all sides,” a remark that resembles President Trump’s response to the racist violence in Charlottesville.
“Unfortunately New Zealand has joined the community of probably a hundred countries, victims, countries that are fighting terrorism from any side and all sides,” Phares said. “Mosques, churches have been attacked by extremists on all sides. But what is interesting here is that this individual allegedly has been inspired by an ideology that claims that you should take action, violent action, against immigrants or members of the Islamic faith, that is something that the government in New Zealand and around the world both in the Arab world, Muslim world needs to take action against.”
Fox analyst condemns NZ attack, says it is "very understandable" what shooter was trying to do on a "political level" pic.twitter.com/x8rJQsm9jm
— TPM Livewire (@TPMLiveWire) March 15, 2019
These people are as deranged as Trump. Must have been some contagion at CPAC. Or it’s in the water.
Faux: It’s truly horrible that he named the abomination as an influence, but at least his heart is in the right place.
Walid Phares was in that now famous photo of Trump’s FP team in which George Papadopoulos, Sessions and Trump also appeared. He has been questioned by the Special Counsel about the campaign’s Russian contacts. His views on Islam appear to align with those of Michael Flynn.
“it was “very understandable” what the shooter in the New Zealand mosque massacre was “trying to do on a political level.””
Understandable political motive? What, to terrorize an entire group of innocent people?
Unbelievable.
The best I can say is that at least this racist trash was willing to put his demented cards on the table.
Un f_ckin’ believable!