Huge rise in Islamophobia since October 7th
JVL Introduction
This statement is from Tell MAMA, a national service supporting victims of anti-Muslim hate highlights the worrying rise in Islamophobia since the October 7th attacks. Tell MAMA describes not only the extent of the attacks but includes examples of their nature. We do not hear about this enough even though we rightly hear about the rise in antisemitism, and seek its reduction and, ideally, its elimination even as we question the extent of the rise since too often, not least using the IHRA Working Definition of antisemitism, criticism of Israel or of zionism as an ideology is counted as automatically antisemitic , which would further inflate the figures.
We feel it is important to highlight the rise in Islamophobic attacks. The government does provide financial support to Tell Mama and has been rolling out a programme worth £24 million to protect Mosques and Muslim Schools. There are 3.87 million Muslims living in the UK and £15 million is spent on the equally necessary protection of UK Jews who number fewer than 300,000. (figures from the 2021 census).
No one should be in danger because of their race, faith, sex or gender; we need better education, more understanding and appreciation of difference and national and international policies that do not demonise Muslim people.
LL
This article was originally published by Tell Mama on Wed 21 Feb 2024. Read the original here.
Greatest Rise in Reported Anti-Muslim Hate Cases to Tell MAMA since Oct 7th
Tell MAMA has recorded a 335% increase in anti-Muslim hate cases, comparing the last 4 months to those in 2022/2023
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I just did a search re >huge rise in islamaphobia< and came across the following HoC debate on December 7th entitled Tackling Islamaphobia, which starts with a contribution from Naz Shah. Her contribution is very long, but just reading the first 7/8 paragraphs says it all. Here are a few clips:
It must be noted, however, that Members of this House have, over several years, repeatedly requested that Government time be granted to debate such a pertinent issue, but those calls have fallen on deaf ears. The Minister will no doubt tell us that the Government take this issue seriously. Oh, the gaslighting.
According to the latest statistics, there has been a 600% rise in Islamophobic incidents here in the UK, including both verbal and physical abuse as well as vandalism, such as the dumping of a pig’s head at a proposed mosque in the market town of Barnoldswick.
The reality is that Islamophobia has become an acceptable prejudice. In fact, you can openly spout Islamophobia and nobody, neither politicians nor journalists, will even bat an eyelid. Sadly, almost no one will speak up or challenge it. In fact, you can be a former adviser to a Prime Minister and the current Conservative parliamentary candidate for West Suffolk and advocate for special laws just to deal with Muslims, including: creating a register of imams and mosques; closing down mosques, Muslim charities and Muslim
TV stations; and banning the burqa and the hijab in schools. You can call for a whole legal structure to deal with those Muslims, as if they are a specific problem. And guess what? You can continue to be a Conservative party member and prospective parliamentary candidate without any consequences.
https://hansard.parliament.uk/commons/2023-12-07/debates/370FAD96-8357-415D-82D7-1ED9ECF0A5B1/TacklingIslamophobia
9/11 was perpetrated by 15 Saudi Arabian Sunni Wahabist Muslims & 4 others. It would have been a bit much to scapegoat every Saudi Arabian on the planet for the criminality of individuals, but Blair and his cabinet went much further. Instead of attempting to deal with the grievances of US imperialism that provoked the attacks, New Labour scapegoated every Muslim diaspora across the globe – and there’s more than one. They whipped up a moral panic about ‘Radical Islam’ & ‘Militant Islam’. This was used as cover for attacking Shia societies that were nothing to do with Saudi Arabia and often adversarial to it. While Blair suppressed a bribery investigation into arms deals with Saudi Arabia home of the attackers. Later Cameron would support the destruction of Libya which is predominantly Berber.
Consider the pro-Israel moral panic that has been cynically generated since the 2014 bombardment of Gaza killing 2000+. Yet has anyone, and would anyone, get away with suggesting the world has problem with ‘Radical Judaism’ or ‘Militant Judaism’?
It’s hard enough attempting to critique Zionism and that is a white colonial ideology that for many years was defined as form of racism by UN resolution 3379.
Muslims have had it very hard and unlike the pro-Israel moral panic have suffered nameable citable national domestic victims of violence some of them fatalities.