‘Salad bar extremism’ has come to Canada, intelligence report says
Edmonton city hall shooting.“While some extremists are assessed to have a primary motivation, others are influenced by a combination of beliefs,” said the Strategic Threat Assessment.“This phenomenon is occurring in Canada,” according to the June 4, 2024, report by the government’s Integrated Terrorism Assessment Centre (ITAC).Also called composite extremism, it is “driven by a myriad of messaging within mainstream social discourse as well as extremist propaganda that is internalized by an individual,” it said.“Variations of this phenomena have been referred to as composite violent extremism, salad bar extremism, or mixed, unstable, or unclear (MUU) extremism,” the ITAC report said.The Canadian Security Intelligence Service released a redacted version of the document to Global News under the Access to Information Act.The report partly focused on a Jan. 23 attack at Edmonton city hall.
Armed with an SKS-style rifle, a gunman fired shots and lobbed incendiary devices inside the building.Prior to the incident, he had allegedly recorded a manifesto that touched on everything from water quality to the Gaza “genocide.”Bezhani Sarvar, a 28-year-old Edmonton resident, was arrested at the scene and charged with eight offences. The RCMP later charged him with two counts of terrorism.“In a video posted online before the incident, the accused laid out a broad series of likely grievances,” ITAC wrote in its report on “mixed extremist motivations.”The statement evoked themes normally associated with ideological and religious violence, and blended them with inflation and housing issues, it said.“The accused also referenced additional concepts not connected to violent extremism, such as society’s use of phones and the promotion of
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