Iran-affiliated actors have used social media to recruit children as young as 13 to carry out attacks on Jewish and Israeli targets in Nordic countries, according to a report.
Swedish investigators have linked at least three separate incidents involving teenagers this year to the Iranian regime, Bloomberg reported on Saturday.
In one May incident, a 15-year-old boy allegedly hopped into a taxi cab with the intent of shooting up the Israeli embassy in Stockholm.
The teen was being tracked by Swedish authorities, who thwarted the plot.
Two other Iran-backed attacks were carried out against Israeli defense firm Elbit Systems in Gothenburg – one case involved a 13-year-old caught firing shots at the facility and in another instance a 16-year-old allegedly assisted an adult plant home-made explosives outside the building’s main entrance.
Officials believe all three teenagers were local gang members hired by Iran as part of a covert effort to escalate operations in Europe in response to Israel’s war in Gaza.
Earlier this month, Sweden’s Minister of Justice Gunnar Strommer, Norway’s Minister of Justice Emilie Enger Mehl and Denmark’s Minister of Justice Peter Hummelgaard warned that minors were being actively recruited by gangs on social media apps such as TikTok, Snapchat and Telegram to carry out shootings and bombings.
The same platforms are being used by Tehran to hire potential assassins, with prices starting at about $1,560 for a murder and $125 for a bombing.
The governments of Sweden and Norway have both warned their citizens that Iran is conducting operations in the region. In October, Norway even raised its terror alert to high from medium and enhanced border control measures in response to the threat.
Nordic countries are particularly vulnerable to terror plots due to low-levels of policing, high societal trust, a rise in gangs in immigrant communities and thousands of miles in open borders between Sweden and Norway.
Nordic officials argue that anger within immigrant communities over civilian deaths in Gaza and Lebanon have made it easier for Iran to recruit.
But sometimes the hitmen are not even aware that they are being used by the Iranian regime.
“There are cases where the proxies aren’t aware or don’t realize that they are acting on behalf of a foreign power,” the Swedish Security Service said in a statement earlier this year, according to Bloomberg.
A senior European official told the outlet that despite Israel’s crippling strikes against Iran proxies in the Middle East since the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack on the Jewish State, the threat of Iran-backed terror attacks in Europe hasn’t lessened.
Israel’s continuous blows against Iranian proxy groups may actually cause the regime “to try to create more havoc” in Europe, Peter Nesser, a terrorism researcher at Norway’s defense research institute, told Bloomberg.
