Swedish Association of Christian Social Democrats

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The Swedish Association of Christian Social Democrats (Swedish: Sveriges kristna socialdemokraters förbund, commonly known as Broderskapsrörelsen, "the Brotherhood Movement") organizes Christian members of the Swedish Social Democratic Party. The organization was founded in 1929. It is an associate member of the International League of Religious Socialists.

The former Prime Minister of Sweden Göran Persson is a member of the organization.

1 List of chairpersons
2 Controversy
3 References
4 See also
5 External links

[edit] List of chairpersons

Bertil Mogård, 1929-1954
Åke Zetterberg, 1954-1968
Evert Svensson, 1968-1986
Georg Andersson, 1986-1990
Torgneg Larsson, 1990-1992
Berndt Ekholm, 1992-1999
Anna Berger Kettner, 1999-2005
Peter Weiderud, 2005-present

[edit] Controversy

The Swedish Association of Christan Social Democrats has received much criticism for its close cooperation with various alleged islamist and antisemitic groups and people. In November 2005 the organization together with the Social Democratic Students of Sweden and the Muslim Council of Sweden invited the Palestinian-British academic Azzam Tamimi to hold a speech at a seminar at the Stockholm Mosque entitled Islam and Democratic Development (Swedish: Islam och demokratiutveckling).^[1] Tamimi has referred to Israel as a "cancer" and expressed support for suicide bombings against Israeli civilians.^[2]

In March 2007 the Swedish Association of Christan Social Democrats together with the workers' educational association ABF and the journal Folket i Bild/Kulturfront invited the Israeli-born activist and musician Gilad Atzmon to hold a speech at a seminar in Stockholm entitled Iraq, Palestine and Afghanistan: same occupation? (Swedish: Irak, Palestina och Afghanistan: Samma ockupation?). In an article on his website, Atzmon claims that "the Jews were responsible for the killing of Jesus" and that "American Jews (in fact Zionists) do control the world".^[3] The invitation led to strong criticism from the chairman of the Swedish Committee Against Antisemitism, who called Atzmon a "notorious anti-Semite".^[4]

In the summer of 2006, the priest Tommy Sandberg decided to leave the organization. According to the newspaper Dagen, one of the main reasons was that the organization "looks between the fingers on antisemitic occurrences" (Swedish: ”ser mellan fingrarna på antisemitiska företeelser”.).^[5]