The perpetrator of the New Zealand shootings “recently said that he and his actions were influenced by (US President Donald) Trump and what he has done were (inspired by) Trump's thoughts and policies,” Moqaddamfar said, addressing a scientific conference titled “Terrorism: A Common Worry, A Study on the Dimensions of the Terrorist Incident against Muslims in New Zealand” in Tehran on Monday.
“Today, Trump is a symbol of politics in the Western culture and one introduced by anti-Islamic terrorists as their spiritual mentor,” he added.
Moqaddamfar further emphasized that the terrorist attack in New Zealand showed that “a new racist thinking” is emerging in the world.
This thinking is spreading at a time when the Westerners are claiming to support human rights but they act in the opposite way, the cultural figure went on to say.
At the conference, hosted by the Cultural Institute of the Islamic Revolution, lecturers discussed the main causes of the terrorist move in New Zealand and ways to prevent similar events in future.
The event came days after at least one gunman killed 50 people and wounded more than 40 during Friday prayers at two New Zealand mosques in the country’s worst ever mass shooting, which Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern condemned as terrorism.
A gunman broadcast livestream footage on Facebook of the attack on one mosque in the city of Christchurch, mirroring the carnage played out in video games, after publishing a “manifesto” in which he denounced immigrants, calling them “invaders”.
New Zealand was placed on its highest security threat level, Ardern said, adding that “this can now only be described as a terrorist attack”.
The number of people killed in the massacre rose to 50 when another body was discovered at the Al Noor mosque, where most of the victims were killed.