Amira Elghawaby, Canada’s Special Representative on Combatting Islamophobia, is proud to announce the Government of Canada’s first-ever publication on Islamophobia – the Canadian Guide to Understanding and Combatting Islamophobia: For a More Inclusive Canada. Developed with extensive input from experts on Islamophobia, members of Canadian Muslim communities, civil society organizations, and government partners, this new guide serves as a comprehensive resource for combatting Islamophobia across Canada.

This guide intends to raise awareness on Islamophobia, explain its various manifestations and provides practical strategies for Canadians to counter Islamophobia in their lives. The Guide supports the objectives of Canada’s Anti-Racism Strategy 2024-2028 and the Action Plan on Combating Hate, to strengthen social cohesion and build a more inclusive society.

The Guide provides a contemporary perspective on Islamophobia, exploring its adverse impacts on individuals and communities, and how these impacts can be compounded for people with intersecting identities. It spotlights the diversity of Canadian Muslims, addresses common misconceptions and challenges harmful myths.

Empowering Canadians to Recognize and Dismantle Islamophobia

The Canadian Guide to Understanding and Combatting Islamophobia: For a More Inclusive Canada aims to familiarize, empower and equip the public including educators, employers, law enforcement, students, decision-makers, community leaders in their journey towards addressing Islamophobia. The Guide provides practical recommendations to enable Canadians to counter anti-Muslim discrimination by:

• Raising Awareness and Understanding: Educating people about Islamophobia, challenging stereotypes, and promoting religious literacy.
• Supporting Communities: Sharing resources, being allies, and reporting Islamophobic incidents.
• Underscoring Institutional Change: Implementing training programs, creating clear and safe reporting systems, and auditing workplace cultures for inclusivity.
• Providing Resources: Ensuring that those affected by Islamophobia have access to support networks and inclusive leadership.

For more information and to access the Canadian Guide to Understanding and Combatting Islamophobia: For a More Inclusive Canada, please visit: The Canadian Guide to Understanding and Combatting Islamophobia: For a more inclusive Canada – Canada.ca

Quotes

“I am proud to introduce a new reference tool to combat Islamophobia in Canada. Establishing a shared framework for action is essential, and this educational guide will help us drive meaningful change at the national level. This is an important step in our collective efforts to ensure that Canadian Muslims can live with dignity and respect, free from harassment and discrimination. Together, let’s build a Canada where everyone belongs.”

– Amira Elghawaby, Canada’s Special Representative on Combatting Islamophobia

“This guide is an important contribution to understanding the specific experiences of Muslims in Canada, amidst a broader rise of hate and intolerance in Canada. Identifying and combatting racism, hate, and discrimination is key to protecting fundamental human rights and building a Canada where everyone is valued and respected and has access to equal opportunities, free from discrimination.”

– Charlotte-Anne Malischewski, Interim Chief Commissioner of the Canadian Human Rights Commission

“This Guide is a vital resource to help all Canadians better understand Islamophobia and its harmful impacts in the workplace and society. Islamophobia continues to be a significant barrier to equity and inclusion. This resource will help ensure that Muslim workers are treated fairly, with dignity and respect, fostering a more inclusive and equitable workplace for everyone, and contributing to greater community inclusion and safety for all.”

– Bea Bruske, Canadian Labour Congress President

“Islamophobia is on the rise in Canada. Our members have experienced discrimination in schools and workplaces or support clients who have faced disproportionate harm from anti-Muslim hate and discrimination in all areas of life. This Guide comes at a pivotal moment—it’s more important than ever for Canadians to understand this widespread form of racism and take action to address it.”

– Husein Panju, Canadian Muslim Lawyers Association

Quick Facts

The Guide supports Canada’s broader efforts to build an inclusive society, contributing to the objectives of the Anti-Racism Strategy 2024-2028 and the Action Plan on Combating Hate. Budget 2024 increased funding to bolster the capacity of the Office of the Special Representative on Combatting Islamophobia ($7.3M over 6 years and $1.1M ongoing) to meet its mandate commitments.

Amira Elghawaby, Canada’s first ever Special Representative on Combatting Islamophobia was appointed in January 2023, to provide guidance and support to the Government of Canada on policies and programs impacting Canadian Muslim communities, raise public awareness on Islamophobia and work with diverse stakeholders to develop community-informed solutions to challenges facing Canada’s Muslim communities.

Budget 2024 provides funding of $273.6 million over six years, starting in 2024-2025, and $29.3 million thereafter, for Canada’s Action Plan on Combatting Hate, to support community outreach and law enforcement reform, combat radicalization, and increase assistance to victims of discrimination and violence.

Source: Canada Newswire

Article by Nadeine Asbali

You would have thought that the victims of the horrific grooming gangs scandal have been through enough without being used as a political football to further the Islamophobic agenda of the far right. Yet, once again, this is what we are seeing. With grooming gangs back in the headlines, anti-Muslim sentiment is again dominating political discourse. It seems that justice for the victims – as well as preventing this from happening again – falls by the wayside when there are political points to be scored.

I’ve lost count of the number of headlines and social media posts I’ve encountered this week referring to “Muslim grooming gangs”, peddling the damaging myth that the organized child sexual exploitation occurring in countless cities across the UK in the early 2000s was somehow tightly linked to a religion peacefully followed by a billion people around the world.

Elon Musk has led this most recent wave of virulent Islamophobia, pushing disinformation on his X (Twitter) account about grooming gangs being a Muslim issue, a sign of failed multiculturalism and accusing Labour politicians like Keir Starmer and Jess Phillips of being “rape genocide apologists” and “complicit” in the “rape” of Britain.

Musk’s language is hard to ignore here. To talk about Britain itself being “raped” perpetuates this idea of violent, perverted foreigners (read: Muslims) coming to Britain and attacking native Brits. It paints all Muslims and all migrants as the enemy of Britain, ignoring the fact that Muslims like me have been part of the fabric of Britain for centuries.

When you consider Musk’s track record of peddling far-right, anti-migrant and Islamophobic narratives, like false reports claiming that the Southport attacker was Muslim last summer – which fuelled riots and widespread violence including hotels housing refugees being torched and mosques being attacked (as well as his ongoing support for the likes of Tommy Robinson who is known for his own anti-Muslim views) – it seems that this is less about securing justice for the victims of grooming and more about finding yet another way to demonize Muslims.

Of course, we have seen this misconception about grooming gangs presented as fact before. Consider when then-home secretary Suella Braverman claimed that the perpetrators of grooming in the UK are “almost all British-Pakistani men”. Yes, some of the crimes were carried out by British men of Pakistani heritage, but not “almost all” of them. In fact, a 2020 report conducted by the government concluded that most child sexual abuse gangs were made up of white men.

In fact, reports that the police were overly cautious about investigating the grooming gangs at the time due to fears of igniting community tensions or appearing racist have long been used to promote the idea that political correctness and pandering to the feelings of “foreigners” is repeatedly put before the safety of “native” Brits. Just last week, shadow justice secretary Robert Jenrick suggested that Britain should cap immigration for those from “alien cultures” with “medieval attitudes towards women”, pointing to the grooming scandal as evidence.

But it’s not just about the widespread, unchecked Islamophobia that is regurgitated every time grooming gangs are back in the news and its impact on everyday Muslims going about their lives. As a secondary school teacher of eight years, I have received regular training on identifying and preventing child sexual exploitation –and when you see how devastating the impact is on a young person’s life, it’s impossible not to feel as though the victims of these crimes are being let down once again.

First, they were failed by those who should have kept them safe, but now they are being failed for a second time by a system so fractured that it would rather exploit those suffering for political point-scoring than come together to stop this ever happening again. Those who are the most outspoken about this scandal are simply shouting over the voices of the victims, and jumping on the anti-Muslim bandwagon is only utilizing the trauma of vulnerable young girls to sow public discord.

Not only does this do nothing to heal the pain of those who lived through it, but it also makes meaningful change more difficult. Education secretary Bridget Phillipson has spoken openly about how the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill is being delayed by renewed calls for a public inquiry by those on the right. Considering how the bill includes propositions like a unique identifying number for every child, something that would revolutionize how authorities work together to protect those who need it most, it is clear that this Islamophobic wave sweeping our national politics is a direct danger to the nation’s most vulnerable children.

Rather than descending into divisive rhetoric, what the nation needs at a time like this is genuine systemic change. As a teacher, I see firsthand how the fragmentation of public services lets down the most vulnerable children every day. The horrific consequence of this failing is clear, too, in the tragic Sara Sharif case, where pulling their child out of school was enough for her parents to obscure the horrendous abuse they were inflicting upon her, despite teachers reporting bruising and her family being known to social services since before her birth.

Whatever they may claim, those latching onto this scandal as an opportunity to demonize Muslims and further their problematic agenda cannot really care about the victims of this public failure. If they did, they would be calling for genuine change, for authorities that are better connected, and for a more centralized system to keep the most vulnerable safe – rather than simply pitting one disenfranchised group against another.

Source: The Independent

Article by Aftab Malik, the Special Envoy to Combat Islamophobia

Five years ago, then prime minister Scott Morrison stated on national television: “I don’t know if Australians understand Islam very well.”

It seems this is still the case in 2024.

After spending five weeks travelling across this nation as the new special envoy to combat Islamophobia, defined broadly as anti-Muslim hate or prejudice, I have heard heartbreaking stories that illustrate how Islamophobia manifests in everyday life, and negatively affects the lives of everyday Australians.

Sometimes it manifests as discrimination or harassment. Sometimes as abuse. Sometimes outright hatred. And sometimes violent acts or vandalism.

The offensive graffiti discovered on a busy underpass in Sydney’s west over the weekend is just the latest visible reminder of Islamophobia in Australia.

It puts into context just how wrong Senator Dave Sharma was stating that Islamophobia is “fictitious”.

Every day, Islamophobia affects children, teenagers at their most vulnerable, and adults alike.

The fact is that there has been a 600% increase in reports of Islamophobia since the 7 October atrocities last year and it wasn’t uncommon beforehand.

The evidence documenting anti-Muslim hate is overwhelming. Over the past decade, countless studies have detailed incidents of anti-Muslim crime and discrimination, and analysed the media tropes that perpetuate stereotypes about Islam and Muslims.

This body of work paints a troubling picture of a world in which harassment and abuse of Muslims are equal parts common and perceived as socially acceptable.

Many of the reports of abuse and violence take place in ordinary settings, where bystanders rarely intervene, and in the main, the victims are identifiable Muslim women.

These are common outrages. They’re everyday discrimination. They have all been reported to the Islamophobia Register Australia. They deserve our collective condemnation.

As an aside, the fact there are Muslim community organisations documenting Islamophobia on a register, and a special envoy to combat it, is a clue as to whether Islamophobia exists.

The offhand dismissal of the everyday abuse of our community juxtaposes awfully with the recent commentary by some of our leaders, and it’s dangerous. It tests us as a community and it tests Australia as a society.

I understand emotions are high right now. All Muslims do. But we should treat people the way we want to be treated.

In that spirit I offer this: attacks on any places of worship are horrendous – especially because they are sacred spaces for people to worship in the knowledge that they free and safe to do so.

I condemn the recent antisemitic attacks in Melbourne and Sydney.

I also condemn the incidents of arson, graffiti and vandalism which have haunted mosques across Australia that have largely gone unnoticed without any outrage from our leaders.

I urge our politicians and community representatives not only to be passionate but also empathetic. We cannot condemn one form of hate and then deny the existence of another.

There are some who believe Islamophobia is a concept designed to shut down freedom of speech and stop criticism of Muslims or Islam. That’s not the case. People are free to dislike Islam, or any other faith.

But it manifests as Islamophobia when dislike turns into harassment, intimidation and abuse of Muslims, and discrimination against them. That’s real and it should be a concern for all members of society.

Senator Sharma has agreed to meet me this week. By no means is understanding alone the cure for Islamophobia, but it is a first step towards change.

It is imperative that we stop politicising suffering and work towards a more inclusive society, where every person, regardless of their faith, can feel safe and valued.

Source: The Guardian

The 64-page document, which maps out more than 100 executive branch actions, comes weeks before the inauguration of former President Donald Trump, who imposed a travel ban on people from some majority Muslim countries during his first term that Biden rescinded on his first day in office.

It mirrors a comprehensive strategy to fight antisemitism released by the White House in September 2023, and comes more than a year after death of six-year-old boy Wadea Al-Fayoume, stabbed by a man who targeted him and his mother because they were Palestinian-American.

In a foreword to the strategy, Biden called the attacks on the Chicago boy and his mother “heinous acts” and noted a spike in anti-Muslim and anti-Arab hate crimes, discrimination and bullying that he called wrong and unacceptable.

“Muslims and Arabs deserve to live with dignity and enjoy every right to the fullest extent along with all of their fellow Americans,” Biden wrote. “Policies that result in discrimination against entire communities are wrong and fail to keep us safe.”

The Council on American Islamic Relations, a Muslim civil rights group, called the strategy “too little, too late” and faulted the White House for not promising any changes to a federal watchlist and “no-fly” list that includes many Arab and Muslim Americans, and for failing to end the war in Gaza, which has been driving Islamophobia.

Jim Zogby, founder of the Arab American Institute, predicted the incoming Trump administration would disown the strategy, but welcomed the White House’s expansion to include anti-Arab hate instead of focusing solely on acts directed against Muslims.

The Trump transition team had no immediate comment on the strategy or whether it would support it.

Trump, who won support from some Muslim voters angry about Biden’s support for Israel’s war in Gaza, has said he will ban entry to the U.S. of anyone who questions Israel’s right to exist and revoke visas of foreign students who are “antisemitic.”

Tensions between pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian groups surged on some U.S. campuses after the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks in Israel, with human rights advocates warning of rising antisemitism, Islamophobia and anti-Arab hate.

Source: Reuters

Islamophobia Awareness Month was founded in 2012 by a coalition of Muslim organizations, including the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) and Muslim Engagement and Development (MEND).

The All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on British Muslims defines Islamophobia as rooted in racism and a type of racism which targets expressions of Muslimness or perceived Muslimness.

CEO of The Runnymede Trust Dr. Shabna Begum said: “Islamophobia has become the normalized currency of political conversation.”

The Runnymede Trust is the UK’s leading race equality think tank and was established in 1968, notably the same year as the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.

According to Dr. Begum, there is an overt belief that Muslim communities are a threat to Britain and she believes that from the benches of parliament to mainstream headlines, this sentiment no longer lurks euphemistically.

She noted that in the last year there has been a significant step-change in the normalization of Islamophobia.

Dr. Begum said: “Islamophobia has reached fever pitch in the UK and it is time that we put a rational conversation back on the agenda.”

The Home Office also observed a significant rise in religious hate crimes towards Muslims following the Israel-Hamas conflict with 3,866 offences reported in the last year, an increase of 13% from the previous year.

The Home Office further reported that in the last year 38% of all reported religious hate crimes were targeted against Muslims.

Home secretary Yvette Cooper said: “The appalling levels of Islamophobic hate crimes outlined in [Home Office] figures are a stain on our society, and this government will work tirelessly to tackle this toxic hatred wherever it is found.”

Baitul Futuh in Morden, South London, is the largest mosque in Britain and recently received a distressing bomb hoax call.

They were very grateful for the continued support of the Metropolitan Police, but the incident underscored the need for continued vigilance, following recent events this year such as the Southport riots.

A spokesperson for the mosque said: “[We] do feel safe in London [as] we have advanced security measures. There is always room for improvement in addressing broader issues that impact [our community’s] safety and well-being. Continued engagement and understanding are vital.”

These heightened security measures include 24/7 on-site security staff, CCTV surveillance, and airport-style security for major events such as Friday prayers.

Meanwhile, a parliamentary drop-in session was held on 20 November led by the MCB, Afzal Khan MP, and Amnesty International as part of Islamophobia Awareness Month.

Many politicians from various parties were in attendance such as co-leader of the Green Party Carla Denyer, Baroness Sayeeda Warsi, and Caroline Nokes MP.

The session was constructive and highlighted the growing systemic crisis of Islamophobia in the UK – an issue that the MCB believes requires immediate and decisive action.

The MCB, the largest and most diverse representative body for the British Muslim community in the UK, have worked relentlessly to tackle Islamophobia and continue to urge the government to officially adopt the widely endorsed APPG on British Muslim’s definition of Islamophobia.

The MCB believe the group offers a crucial definition of Islamophobia which clearly recognizes this specific type of hate.

Source: South West Londoner

Article by Rakib Ehsan

This summer’s rioting across parts of England and Northern Ireland were a watershed moment in community relations – and the fall-out is beginning to emerge.

Fresh British Muslim survey data published by Tell MAMA (which stands for monitoring anti-Muslim attacks) provides much cause for concern. Carried out two months after the start of far-right public disorder following the horrific murder of three little girls in Southport, seven in ten British Muslims surveyed said anti-Muslim hate had become more widespread, with two in three also saying that the potential for risk and harm to their own religious communities had increased. However, it is not all doom-and-gloom and there are also some positive findings which make me feel optimistic. Three in five Muslims said they still feel safe in Britain, with half saying that they felt more open about their religious identity in the aftermath of the riots (especially when talking with friends and work colleagues).

The findings show that while we are a relatively successful multi-ethnic and religiously diverse democracy, there needs to be a more robust approach when it comes to ‘managing’ this diversity – which is not necessarily easy. For the newly elected Labour government, the Southport atrocity and subsequent disorder was quite the baptism of fire – but its response to the far-right rioting was left wanting and appears to have alienated a variety of groups in modern Britain.

The Prime Minister, Sir Keir Starmer, sought to drain the riots of their political and ideological character from the get-go – characterizing them as “mindless racist thuggery”. In the aftermath of Southport, an unfounded conspiracy theory that the suspect was an illegal Middle Eastern Muslim migrant who had arrived in the UK on a small boat from France was allowed to spread like wildfire on social media platforms such as X, with little to no intervention by the relevant authorities.

Dismissing the rioting as “mindless” risks overlooking the fact that there was the deliberate targeting of Muslim communities – including mosques and businesses. This included the attack on the local mosque in Southport and the destruction of a café in south Belfast. In addition to this, in Manvers near Rotherham, a hotel accommodating asylum seekers was set ablaze and had its windows smashed in. The idea that all those involved in the riots were thoughtless racist thugs masks the reality that some have deeply ideological histories which include anti-Muslim hatred. Last week, it was revealed that a man who pleaded guilty to taking part in the disorder was previously sentenced to ten years in prison for deliberately setting fire to a mosque in Stoke-on-Trent. Back in his 2011 trial, Simon Beech – now 36 years old – said that he had been a member of both the neo-fascist British National Party (BNP) and the English Defense League (EDL).

Rebuilding after Southport

Starmer may have deliberately set out to downplay the ideological elements of the rioting because doing otherwise would leave him vulnerable to the accusation that he was justifying such violent disorder. But this strategy has meant that the Labour leader has failed to truly recognize the anti-Muslim nature of much of the rioting which unfolded in the summer – further widening the disconnect between British Muslim communities and their so-called ‘natural party’.

As the country looks to rebuild from the trauma of the Southport murders and the subsequent violent disorder, part of that must be reassuring law-abiding, hard-working, and security-oriented British Muslim families of their rightful place in modern Britain. To shore up our national ‘community of communities’, it is vital that we all learn the right lessons from what took place this summer – including the Prime Minister.

Source: City A.M.

A London police hate crime officer is investigating a hate-motivated assault that happened over the weekend in a downtown park.

At approximately, a man was with his family in Ivey Park, in the area of King and Thames streets, when an unknown man approached them, police said. The suspect made derogatory comments toward the man before proceeding to assault him.

In a social media post, the National Council of Canadian Muslims said it was “deeply horrified” to learn the victims were Muslim

“They’re shaken up,” said Nawaz Tahir, a London lawyer who serves as spokesperson for HIKMA Public Affairs Council, which has been in touch with a friend of the family. “Generally, when you go to the park your goal is to have a good time, and this just sort of shatters that.”

The Muslim community is seeing an increase in a compromise of its safety and security, said Tahir, through both verbal and physical forms of hate, despite the City of London’s comprehensive plan to dismantle Islamophobia.

“We’d like to see more action at the provincial and federal level,” he said. “On both fronts, I think the response has been lacking. There are still so many recommendations from the national summit that took place in 2021 that are yet to be implemented. Things like hate crime legislation and the Our London Family Act not have been passed or brought back at all.”

in June, police identified a suspect involved in an alleged hate-motivated arson at a Muslim family’s home in northwest London. It’s believed the suspect has since left the country.

On X, formerly Twitter, London Mayor Josh Morgan condemned Saturday’s incident.

“Islamophobia has absolutely no home in London or anywhere else,” said Morgan. “We must continue to condemn these incidents, and work to ensure everyone feels safe in our city.”

The suspect remained in the area for around 20 minutes before leaving the park on a blue bike-style e-bike. Police were contacted. The victim sustained minor injuries and did not require medical attention.

The suspect has not been identified. He is described as male, white, around 40 years of age, wearing a black toque, black jacket, dark jeans and light-coloured sneakers.

Police are asking anyone with information to contact them.

Source: Canadian Broadcasting Corporation

The panel featured members of the Muslim, Arab and Palestinian (MAP) Communities Committee, including co-chair Alexander Key, a comparative literature professor, and committee member Natalie Jabbar ’09 M.A. ’10, the Public Humanities Initiative associate director. Members of the Subcommittee on Antisemitism and Anti-Israeli Bias (ASAIB) were also on the panel, which included co-chairs Larry Diamond ’74 M.A. ’78 Ph.D. ’80 and Jeffrey Koseff M.S. ’78 Ph.D. ’83. Diamond is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution and Koseff is a senior fellow at the Woods Institute for the Environment.

The panelists addressed student questions on free speech and open dialogue at the event hosted by the Stanford Political Union and moderated by YuQing Jiang ’25, a Stanford Daily opinions editor.

Following Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023 attack on Israel and a reported rise of hate crimes against Jewish, Muslim and Arab students, former University President Richard Saller commissioned the two committees in November 2023 to evaluate antisemitic and anti-Palestinian discrimination in the Stanford community.

Last spring, each committee — composed of faculty, staff, students and alumni — released a 148-page report detailing dozens of instances of restricted speech, harassment and intimidation on campus.

Both committees conducted listening sessions, drafted reports and crafted recommendations for confronting bias and fostering community at Stanford. But “everyone was afraid to have their name attached to their sentiments,” Jabbar said, which made their work “very difficult.”

Diamond said he gained insight into the sentiments shared by members of Stanford’s Jewish and Israeli community during the ASAIB subcommittee’s listening sessions.

“The hardest [part] was having Jewish students tell me what they have been experiencing,” he said.

He recounted “one surprising and very tearful incident” in which a student told him: “‘I haven’t had any trouble. You know, no one’s said anything antisemitic about me’ — and then the tears start forming — ‘but most of my friends don’t know I’m Jewish.’”

Koseff said that Stanford’s Jewish students felt as though they were being held responsible for the actions of the Israeli state, leading to “feelings of alienation.”

Key described the University’s tendency to “assume the position of a neutral container” in light of campus protests in support of Israel and Palestine, as “detrimental to both the community of the University and its scholarly work.” Key added that in order to be welcome in the neutral container, students are forced to “leave their whole selves at the door.”

Diamond emphasized the importance of creating a campus culture of “mutual respect, mutual tolerance, mutual engagement and mutual listening.” The University must continue its work to ensure student safety, Diamond said, citing instances of physical harassment on Stanford’s campus and across the country.

In September, the University published updated policies on the expression of free speech and processes to report discrimination and harassment. The guidelines replaced Protected Identity Harm (PIH) reporting, instead implementing a new means for reporting physical harassment under Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

The panelists criticized a New York Times article that stated the two “dueling reports” illustrate the “rift between Jewish and Muslim groups on campus.”

“It’s not Jews versus Muslims. We say it over and over again, ‘We’re not fighting Jeff and Larry,’” Key said. “The framing just keeps coming back to this binary balance. It instrumentalizes and objectifies. It doesn’t listen [to members of these communities].”

The panelists said both committees plan to present their respective findings with the Faculty Senate. They also plan to discuss the University’s role in facilitating future discussions between Stanford’s Jewish and Muslim, Arab and Palestinian communities on campus.

“Our dream for the report is that we will be able to build a university [culture] where students don’t have to go out and camp on White Plaza to talk about issues [the University] won’t,” Key said.

Diamond underscored the importance of using the University’s academic platform to advance rational debate on all relevant issues, beyond the Israel-Gaza conflict.

“There shouldn’t be an exception to what we can debate and talk about in terms of domestic policy, international affairs, philosophy and basic values,” Diamond said. “Students will find a variety of means to ensure that their voices are heard, that issues are raised, and hopefully that we listen to one another and push the boundaries of our understanding and our arguments with discourse that is both vibrant and mutually respectful.”

Source: The Stanford Daily

At a time when Islamophobic violence, hate crimes, and bias incidents are at an all-time record high, it is especially appalling to see the perpetuation of false and harmful stereotypes accusing Muslim candidates of supporting terrorism or extremist ideologies. These baseless and inflammatory accusations not only poison political discourse but actively endanger the lives of those who are simply exercising their right to participate in the democratic process.

In its 2023 directory of elected Muslim officials, CAIR found that over 235 Muslims are serving at the local, state, and federal levels across the United States. This fact underscores the important role Muslim Americans play in public life and the diversity they bring to their communities. Their service exemplifies the strength of our democracy and the inclusiveness of our nation.

In a statement, CAIR Government Affairs Department Director Robert S. McCaw said:

“Incidents of such dangerous rhetoric and anti-Muslim tropes place Nevada Muslim candidates and their communities in harm’s way. Using Islamophobic smears and falsehoods to undermine the legitimacy of Muslim candidates is not just an attack on an individual but on the democratic principles of fairness and equal representation.

“CAIR calls on all political actors and members of the public to rise above such hateful campaign tactics and uphold the values of inclusion, respect, and safety for all Americans, regardless of their background.”

He noted that earlier this month, CAIR’s Washington state chapter (CAIR-WA) reaffirmed the right of all Americans, including devout American Muslims, to run for and serve in public office.

In every election, including this one, CAIR urges voters to focus on the values, policies, and leadership qualities of candidates, rather than allowing stereotypes or fearmongering to influence decisions.

CAIR remains committed to ensuring that all Americans, regardless of faith, can fully participate in the democratic process without fear of discrimination or bias. The First Amendment guarantees that religious freedom is a right for everyone, and no one should be disqualified from serving the public due to their beliefs.

From January to June 2024, CAIR documented 4,951 incoming bias complaints nationwide, a 69 percent increase over the same period in 2023.

Earlier this year, CAIR’s national office released its 2024 civil rights report, which revealed the highest number of complaints it has ever received in its 30-year history. Titled “Fatal: The Resurgence of Anti-Muslim Hate,” the report documented 8,061 complaints.

Nearly half of all complaints received in 2023 were reported in the final three months of the year.

Source: Council on American-Islamic Relations

A record amount of security funding has been issued to mosques in the UK via a government scheme to protect places of worship from hate crime.

According to figures obtained by the Guardian via freedom of information requests, almost £3m was issued to mosques and associated sites under the places of worship security scheme from April 2022 to April 2023, a significant increase from the just over £73,000 issued between 2016 and 2017.

There has also been a significant increase in the number of eligible security applications made to the Home Office from Muslim community sites, from 36 in 2016 to 304 from April 2023 to April 2024. These figures do not reflect the number of applications approved by the Home Office.

The UK’s largest Muslim body, the Muslim Council of Britain, welcomed the increase in the amount of funding issued but said the scheme was “failing to capture the true scale of the challenge”, particularly due to the record rise in incidents of Islamophobia in the UK after the 7 October attacks on Israel.

The national monitoring group Tell Mama UK said it recorded 4,971 incidents of anti-Muslim hate between 7 October 2023 and 30 September 2024, the highest total in the past 14 years. The almost £3m in security funding was issued to mosques in the UK before the 7 October attacks.

Although the data reveals more than 304 eligible mosques and associated Muslim faith institutions applied for protective security in 2023, it remains a relatively small proportion of the more than 2,000 mosques and prayer rooms thought to be in the UK, according to the website muslimsinbritain.org.

Zara Mohammed, the general secretary of the MCB, described the low take-up for the scheme as indicative of ”the inadequacy of current engagement efforts”.

She said: “Many mosques aren’t even aware this funding exists due to minimal outreach. Those who’ve applied before and been unsuccessful often don’t reapply. The application process itself can be a barrier – technical jargon and language barriers make it challenging for voluntary organizations.”

The government launched a protective security scheme for places of worship in 2016 before creating a dedicated scheme worth £29.4m for mosques and faith schools in 2023 to provide security to ensure the safety of Britain’s Muslim communities.

A separate government scheme for assisting the Jewish community was set up in 2015 with £18m dedicated to security funding to protect Jewish communities in 2023. The government says the scale of funding is determined by the number of community sites used by each faith.

Mohammed said there needed to be a review of the existing process due to fears that at-risk Muslim faith institutions were missing out on security funding.

This risk was heightened when mosques across the UK were targeted after a knife attack in Southport, after false news spread online claiming the perpetrator of the attack was a Muslim asylum seeker. As a result, the Home Office set up a rapid response process to provide extra security and support for Muslim communities.

Mohammed said: “We need a comprehensive review of the scheme that addresses three critical areas: why take-up remains so low despite the clear need, whether current funding levels are sufficient given recent far-right riots, and how we can better understand the true scale of risk given widespread under-reporting.”

Kamran Hussain, the chief executive of the British Muslim Heritage Centre, said the far-right riots indicated why security for mosques was so essential. “It was inevitable that with the Islamophobia we are seeing, that there should be an increase in the level of protection around Muslim institutes and mosques,” he said.

Hussain said his colleagues who applied for security funding for the heritage center after the riots described the process as “very easy”.

“They put security in place who are constantly here, 24 hours, to make sure everything is OK,” he said. “We have had one phone call, a bomb threat, in the last two weeks so it shows the sentiment that’s out there and the risks.”

Mohammed said the far-right riots were “a stark reminder of the very real threats our mosques face”. She said: “Without adequate protection, these community centers remain vulnerable to attacks, vandalism, and violence. The government’s response must match the severity of these threats.”

A Home Office spokesperson said: “It is paramount every community feels safe, especially in places of worship. That is why we introduced the protective security for mosques scheme.

“In response to public disorder in August we introduced a rapid protective security response process for places of worship and we have provided additional security for hundreds of mosques across the country.”

Source: The Guardian