I believe the Danish and Norwegian Vikings were more into raping and pillaging in the west whilst the Swedish Vikings were happy to trade and do some R&P with the east. These "Varangians" as they were called, went on to become the Kievan Rus and were the first to establish outposts in Novgorod and Kiev and from there they opened up the way to Constantinople with the odd Rus-Byzantine war along the way. No doubt the odd seed would have been shared with the Byzantine ladies along the way
The Rus ( a Finnish term for Swedish) eventually founded the Tsardom of Russia.
So the Sweden and Middle East connection goes back over a 100o years. The scimitar is on the other hand now
