Jewish museums in Norway were closed to the public on Friday, a day after Norway stepped up security in the wake of a possible imminent terrorist attack by jihadists coming from Syria.
The Jewish community seems like a probable target for Islamist terrorists who come back to Europe after fighting in Syria, as underscored by the deadly attack on Brussels' Jewish Museum in May in which four people were killed. The suspected killer, Franco-Algerian Mehdi Nemmouche, who is waiting extradition from France to Belgium, spent one year with the most violent jihadist groups in Syria.
An official from the Oslo Jewish Museum said the museum was closed as ‘’a preventive measure taken in light of the shooting in Brussels."
The museum should reopen on Tuesday, since it is usually closed on Mondays.
Located in a former synagogue in Calmeyer Street, in the middle of a quarter where many Jews settled when they arrived in Norway at around 1900, the Oslo Jewish Museum collects knowledge on Jewish immigration, life and integration into Norwegian society. The museum’s collections are about Jewish culture, tradition, history and Judaism.
According to the Norwegian news agency NTB, the Jewish Museum of Trondheim, in western Norway, will also remain closed until further notice following police advice.
On May 24, a man killed four people when he opened fire at the Jewish Museum in Brussels.
Norway is on alert since Thursday, when its intelligence service (PST) said it had "recently received information that a group of extremists from Syria may be planning a terrorist attack" in the country.
Benedicte Bjoernland, the head of Norwegian security service PST, said the agency has received "reliable information" from a foreign partner about some kind of attack "within days." She declined to identify the source.