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The Preventable Death of Salwan Momika — and How It Exposed the Weaknesses of Sweden’s Immigration System
Salwan Momika. Photo: Screenshot
The Jan. 29 murder of Iraqi refugee and activist Salwan Momika — killed in his Stockholm apartment while live-streaming on TikTok — has sparked crucial questions about Swedish immigration policy. Momika, who had gained global notoriety for publicly burning the Quran, became a flashpoint in Sweden’s ongoing struggle to balance free speech, religious sensitivity, and immigration security.
While Momika’s death was widely reported, few media outlets have gone on to ask about the ways his death, or the tumult brought about by his actions in life, could have been avoided by the Swedish immigration system. At a time when European nations are reeling from poorly managed immigration policy — which has led to migrant violence and social disorder, with widely different solutions proposed — Momika’s story provides a microcosm for some of the issues these countries face.
Momika was a controversial figure in life and death, championed by some as a hero of free speech and a prophet foreseeing the threat of radical Islam in Europe. To others, he was a hideous blasphemer, a radical hatemonger on a mission to incite against his countrymen and their coreligionists, or just a fraudster looking for attention.
Born in 1986 to a Catholic Assyrian family in northern Iraq, Momika’s path to Sweden was marked by conflict. During the heyday of Islamic State (ISIS), he commanded a Christian brigade within the Iran-affiliated Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF). A dispute with fellow Assyrian PMF commander Rayan al-Kildani prompted his flight in 2018 to Sweden, where he secured refugee status by 2021. This background would later raise questions about the thoroughness of Sweden’s asylum vetting process.
Sweden’s handling of Momika’s case exposed critical weaknesses in its immigration system. While Swedish law prohibits entry to those who have committed “serious crimes” or pose security threats, significant oversights occurred.
First, despite Momika’s involvement with the Iran-linked Imam Ali Brigades, his military background received insufficient scrutiny. Second, his false statements on his asylum application regarding persecution and prior activities weren’t discovered until after his controversial actions began. These systemic failures became more apparent as Momika’s public provocations escalated.
In Sweden, Momika was sentenced to community service after threatening to kill a man while holding a knife. Two years later, in 2023, he began publicly burning the Quran, attracting crowds. His actions triggered diplomatic crises, forcing the Swedish ambassador out of Baghdad at the hands of an angry Iraqi crowd, as the burning also drew furious demonstrations in other Muslim countries. But Sweden chose not to take any decisive action against him under its highly permissive free speech laws.
After Momika’s anti-Islam activities intensified, the Swedish government considered deporting him, noting he had lied on his application about his former activities with the Imam Ali Brigades. Due to lack of sufficient security and background checks, Sweden demonstrated an abject failure of immigration policy by allowing a former pro-Iran brigade commander to seek asylum, without further questions asked.
Sweden only provided a verdict on Momika’s anti-Islam demonstrations once he had died. On Feb. 2, following Momika’s murder, his co-activist, 50-year-old Iraqi-Swede Salwan Najem, was fined 4,000 crowns for the pair’s activities, classified as hate speech by the court, which concluded that Momika and Najem had exceeded the line of protected speech by a wide margin and had engaged in incitement against an ethnic group.
While Momika’s murder is still being investigated, with five suspects released from custody two days after his death, it is in line with other crimes committed by Muslim vigilantes against perceived opponents of the faith. It’s possible that Momika’s murderer was another Middle Eastern refugee in asylum who had taken advantage of Sweden’s lax vetting and arrived under similarly questionable circumstances. Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson even said that a “foreign power” may have been behind the activist’s death.
Sweden’s lax security regarding Momika’s entry and residence in Sweden raise important questions. For example, to what extent have affiliates of Iran managed to gain asylum in Sweden and other Nordic countries? While Momika was clearly not acting on behalf of the Iranian government, it appears possible that Iranian agents could take advantage of similarly lax immigration policies to further Iran’s agenda in Europe.
In short, there are serious weaknesses in the Swedish immigration system, where accurate background checks need to be enacted to keep out hostile agents seeking to further a nefarious agenda.
Likewise, Momika’s attacker, while not yet identified (and who may never be identified), was likely an Islamist vigilante looking to punish him for his public blasphemy against Islam, in line with the opinions of multiple high-profile Islamic scholars and in keeping with the opinions on the street in much of the Muslim world. Multiple sources on Iraqi social media named Omar al-Aani from Fallujah as a suspect in the murder who was temporarily detained, although authorities in Sweden have not disclosed the names of those who were questioned.
Iraqis angry at Momika’s behavior for religious reasons also had extra motivation to target him. Indeed, the city of Kufa in Iraq offered a bounty of $2 million and a 2kg gold Quran to anyone who killed Momika. His extradition had also been demanded by the government in Baghdad.
Following Momika’s death, Muslims of many different backgrounds — including some of his fellow Iraqis, a member of the Indian National Congress, and others — celebrated and gloated about what happened.
If the killer turns out to have been another migrant, it will highlight the potential danger of migrants to each other. Throughout Europe, much anger has been voiced around crimes by immigrants against native locals, but little attention has been given to the potential for exporting sectarian conflicts from the Middle East and elsewhere to Western soil, among citizens of the same home country living abroad. For example, should Momika’s murderer turn out to be a Sunni Iraqi, it would represent a frightening extension of Iraqi sectarian violence into the borders of a country thousands of miles away.
On top of all this, consider the Swedish Prime Minister’s suggestion that a foreign country may have been involved in the killing of Momika. Was there no prior intelligence to suggest the magnitude of danger he was in, even as he warned both the public and the authorities of the threats against him? Was the Swedish government afraid of being seen as sheltering him? If so, who were they afraid of?
The Swedish government’s indecision between security and tolerance, combined with its “please-everybody-and-nobody mentality,” were directly responsible for Momika’s death. Had they refused him asylum or expelled him quickly on account of his past in Iraq or the diplomatic liability and civil unrest he generated, they would have demonstrated a cohesive policy. On the other hand, had they doubled down on the importance of free speech and recognized the imminent threats to Momika’s life, they also would have demonstrated a cohesive policy — and possibly saved his life. The Momika case illustrates the urgent need for reform in Swedish (and broader European) immigration policy. Three specific areas require immediate attention:
- More rigorous background verification systems for asylum seekers
- Clear protocols for handling cases involving potential security risks
- Consistent policy application balancing free speech protection with public safety
Sweden’s experience offers crucial lessons for other European nations grappling with similar challenges. The goal must be to develop immigration policies that maintain humanitarian commitments while ensuring public safety and social cohesion. Otherwise, Momika will certainly not be the last to be denied justice in the midst of Europe’s immigration crisis.
The post The Preventable Death of Salwan Momika — and How It Exposed the Weaknesses of Sweden’s Immigration System first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Trump Defends Plan to Accept $400 Million Jet From Qatar
US President Donald Trump speaks to reporters at the White House in Washington, DC, US, April 23, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque
US President Donald Trump on Monday defended his controversial decision to accept a $400 million luxury jet from Qatar, lauding the overture from Doha as “a great gesture.”
“I think it’s a great gesture from Qatar. I appreciate it very much,” Trump said while speaking to reporters in the Oval Office. “I would never be one to turn down that kind of an offer. I mean, I could be a stupid person and say, ‘No, we don’t want a free, very expensive airplane.’ But it was — I thought it was a great gesture.”
The US president argued that the Qatari government gifted him the jet because he has “helped them a lot over the years in terms of security and safety.”
Trump announced on Sunday night that the US Department of Defense would receive a luxury Boeing 747-8 jumbo jet as a “gift, free of charge” from Qatar. According to Trump, the jet will serve as a replacement to “the 40-year-old Air Force One.” The jet will be considered property of the US federal government until the end of Trump’s term in office, after which ownership of the aircraft will be transferred to the Trump presidential library foundation.
Trump’s decision to accept the gift from Qatar sparked immediate backlash, with critics accusing the president of violating the Emoluments Clause of the US Constitution, which prohibits federal officials from accepting gifts from foreign countries without the consent of Congress, and compromising national security.
The president’s plan to accept the lavish gift from Qatar has raised concern among foreign policy experts who worry that Doha could influence American policy in the Middle East. Qatar, a wealthy Gulf nation with substantial investments in US real estate and infrastructure, maintains a complex relationship with the Trump administration. Last month, Trump struck a deal to build a full 18-hole golf course in Qatar.
Moreover, Qatar maintains extensive financial links with Hamas, the terrorist group that triggered the ongoing war in Gaza after slaughtering 1,200 people in Israel and taking 251 hostages on Oct. 7, 2023. Qatar has transferred an estimated $1.8 billion to the Hamas terror organization, according to reports. Doha also contributed $30 million per month to Hamas from 2012 to 2023, according to a Qatari official interviewed by Der Spiegel.
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Students for Justice in Palestine Awarded ‘Best’ Campus Group by University of California, Davis Newspaper
University of California, Davis in Davis, California, on May 28, 2024. Photo: Penny Collins/NurPhoto via Reuters Connect
The University of California, Davis’s (UC Davis) official campus newspaper has named the school’s Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) chapter the “Best Student-Run Organization or Club” for the second consecutive year, despite the group’s history of calling for violence against Jews and Israelis.
The Aggie defended granting SJP one of its highest annual honors, describing it as having “led some of the most prominent political organizing efforts at UC Davis” and fostering students’ interest in “global justice and university accountability.” The paper did not mention SJP’s links to Islamist terrorist organizations or its efforts across the US to advocate for the destruction of both America and Israel.
It continued, “Their advocacy, however, goes far beyond protest. Throughout the year, SSJP hosted film screenings, teach-ins, and information panels aimed at educating students on the historical and ongoing occupation of Palestine. They also continued to call out the University of California system’s financial ties to companies profiting from violence against Palestinians — pressuring administrators to divest and pushing for transparency in how student tuition is spent.”
SJP thanked The Aggie for the award.
“We are honored to receive this acknowledgement and humbled to be held in the high esteem of our peers,” the group said in a statement. “This acknowledgement is not ours alone — it belongs to everyone who continues to show up, speak out, and do the vital work in their communities. It is their dedication that shapes who we are.”
The Aggie has not responded to The Algemeiner‘srequest for comment on this story.
As previously reported by The Algemeiner, UC Davis is a hub of anti-Zionist extremism in which faculty and staff regularly call for the destruction of Israel and acts of violence cheered as “resistance.” Following Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, massacre across southern Israel, for example, the university kept on staff a professor who appeared to call for violence against Jewish journalists and their children.
“One group of ppl [sic] we have easy access to in the US is all these Zionist journalists who spread propaganda & misinformation,” American Studies assistant professor Jemma Decristo wrote on the X social media platform. “They have houses [with] addresses, kids in school. They can fear their bosses, but they should fear us more.” The message was followed by images of a knife, an axe, and three blood-drop emojis.
In 2024, UC Davis’s student government (ASUSD) passed legislation adopting the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement and falsely accusing Israel of genocide.
“This bill prohibits the purchase of products from corporations identified as profiting from the genocide and occupation of the Palestinian people by the BDS National Committee,” said the measure, titled Senate Bill (SB) #52. “This bill seeks to address the human rights violations of the nation-state and government of Israel and establish a guideline of ethical spending.”
Puma, McDonald’s, Starbucks, Airbnb, Disney, and Sabra are all named on Students for Justice in Palestine’s “BDS List.”
Powers enumerated in the bill included veto power over all vendor contracts, which SJP specifically applied to “purchase orders for custom t-shirts,” a provision that may affect pro-Israel groups on campus. Such policies will be guided by a “BDS List” of targeted companies curated by SJP. The language of the legislation gives ASUCD the right to add more to it.
Students for Justice in Palestine at the University of California, Davis is one of many SJP chapters that justified Hamas’s Oct. 7 terrorist attacks In a chilling statement posted after the world became aware of the terrorist group’s atrocities on that day, which included hundreds of civilian murders and sexual assaults, the group said “the responsibility for the current escalation of violence is entirely on the Israeli occupation.”
According to the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), SJP chapters — which have said in their communications that Israeli civilians deserve to be murdered for being “settlers” — lead the way in promoting a campus environment hostile to Jewish and pro-Israel voices. Their aim, the civil rights group explained in an open letter published in December 2023, is to “exclude and marginalize Jewish students,” whom they describe as “oppressors,” and encourage “confrontation” with them.
The ADL has urged colleges and universities to protect Jewish students from the group’s behavior, which, in many cases, has allegedly violated Title VI of the Civil Rights Act.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
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Jewish Communities in France, Germany, UK Form New ‘JE3’ Alliance Amid Surge in Antisemitism
From left to right: President Phil Rosenberg of the Board of Deputies of British Jews, Josef Schuster of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, and Yonathan Arfi of the Representative Council of Jewish Institutions of France (CRIF). Photo: Screenshot
The leading representative bodies of Jewish communities in France, Germany, and the United Kingdom have formed a new alliance to amplify Jewish perspectives in international debates, amid a troubling rise in antisemitism across all three countries.
On Monday, the Board of Deputies of British Jews, the Representative Council of Jewish Institutions of France (CRIF), and the Central Council of Jews in Germany announced the formation of the new “JE3” alliance during a conference of the Anti-Defamation League’s J7 Task Force — the largest international initiative against antisemitism — held in Berlin.
This new alliance, inspired by the E3 diplomatic format that unites France, Germany, and the UK to coordinate on key geopolitical issues such as nuclear negotiations with Iran and peace in the Middle East, aims to provide a united Jewish communal voice on these and other pressing international matters.
The newly formed group also seeks to strengthen existing umbrella organizations, such as the World Jewish Congress, the European Jewish Congress, and the J7 initiative — a coalition of Jewish organizations in Argentina, Australia, Canada, France, Germany, the UK, and the United States.
“It is our hope that the JE3 will become a powerful voice for our communities on issues that we care about together,” Josef Schuster of the Central Council, Phil Rosenberg of the Board of Deputies, and Yonathan Arfi of CRIF said in a joint statement.
“It is particularly significant that we brought together the new grouping in Berlin, 80 years after the end of the Holocaust,” the statement continued. “This is a show of intent by our three flourishing communities that we are committed to boosting Jewish life in our respective countries, cooperating in the fight against antisemitism, and enhancing bilateral and multilateral relations between our countries and Israel.”
Berlin: The largest representative organisations of European Jewish communities in France, Germany, and the UK have today launched a new ‘JE3‘ alliance. @Le_CRIF @ZentralratJuden pic.twitter.com/hXotcz6RDb
— Board of Deputies of British Jews (@BoardofDeputies) May 12, 2025
This new JE3 initiative comes as France, Germany, and the UK, as well as other countries across Europe and around the world, have reported record spikes in antisemitic activity in recent years, largely fueled by a wave of anti-Jewish sentiment following Hamas’s launch of its war against Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
Last week, the J7 Task Force released its first Annual Report on Antisemitism, coinciding with the 80th anniversary of Victory in Europe (V-E) Day, when Nazi Germany formally surrendered to Allied forces on May 8, marking the end of World War II and the Holocaust.
The report, which echoes findings from recent studies, revealed a dramatic rise in antisemitic incidents between 2021 and 2023. These increases include 11 percent in Australia, 23 percent in Argentina, 75 percent in Germany, 82 percent in the UK, 83 percent in Canada, 185 percent in France, and 227 percent in the US. Those numbers continued to spike to record levels in the aftermath of the Hamas atrocities of Oct. 7.
Additionally, the data showed a concerning rise on a per-capita basis, with Germany reporting over 38 incidents per 1,000 Jews, and the UK seeing 13 per 1,000.
The seven communities identified several common trends, including a surge in violent incidents, recurring attacks on Jewish institutions, a rise in online hate speech, and growing fear among Jews, which has led many to conceal their Jewish identity.
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