Fact check
Is it true: Utøya / Breivik solo-actor vs Knights Templar Europe network (Jul 22 2011)?
No — this has been debunked.
Debunked. The claim that Breivik carried out the attacks as part of an operational Knights Templar Europe network is not supported. Oslo police told his trial (30 May 2012) that "no evidence in this case suggests any physical or psychological accomplices" and that they had not found evidence the group existed in the shape he suggested; prosecutors have said they believe it does not exist "in the way he describes it"; and the researcher Jacob Aasland Ravndal wrote in October 2012 that the trial evidence "strongly suggests that Breivik’s Knights Templar network did not exist before the attacks." The Gjørv Commission (Aug 13 2012) reviewed official preparedness rather than the network question; its account of his preparations rests on the police material and describes one man preparing the attacks. Separately, Breivik drew on real online far-right writing, but ideological influence is not an operational network.
The claim
Breivik did not act alone on 22 July 2011: the Oslo bombing and the Utøya massacre were carried out as part of an operational pan-European "Knights Templar Europe" network of cells, handlers or co-conspirators, as his manifesto claimed.
Key evidence
Manifesto claim: a 2002 London meeting founded 'Knights Templar Europe' with commanders from several countries
Gjørv Commission: attacks reconstructed as one man's preparations; the network question left to the police
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