Human rights advocates have similarly reported a global rise in Islamophobia…reports Asian Lite News
Reported discrimination and attacks against Muslims and Palestinians reached a record high in the US in 2023, driven by rising Islamophobia and bias as the Israel-Gaza war raged late in the year, data from an advocacy group showed on Tuesday.
Complaints totaled 8,061 in 2023, a 56 percent rise from the year before and the highest since the Council on American-Islamic Relations began records nearly 30 years ago. About 3,600 of those incidents occurred from October to December, CAIR said.
Human rights advocates have similarly reported a global rise in Islamophobia, anti-Palestinian bias and antisemitism since the latest eruption of conflict in the Middle East.
US incidents have included the fatal October stabbing of 6-year-old Palestinian American Wadea Al-Fayoume in Illinois, the November shooting of three students of Palestinian descent in Vermont and the February stabbing of a Palestinian American man in Texas.
CAIR’s report said 2023 saw a “resurgence of anti-Muslim hate” after the first ever recorded annual drop in complaints in 2022. In the first nine months of 2023, such incidents averaged around 500 a month before jumping to nearly 1,200 a month in the last quarter.
“The primary force behind this wave of heightened Islamophobia was the escalation of violence in Israel and Palestine in October 2023,” the report said.
The most numerous complaints in 2023 were in the categories of immigration and asylum, employment discrimination, hate crimes and education discrimination, CAIR said.
Palestinian Islamist group Hamas attacked Israel on Oct. 7, killing 1,200 people, according to Israeli tallies. Israel’s subsequent military assault on Hamas-governed Gaza has killed over 32,000 people, according to the local health ministry, displaced nearly all its 2.3 million population, put Gaza on the brink of starvation and led to genocide allegations that Israel denies.
CAIR said it compiled the numbers by reviewing public statements and videos as well as reports from public calls, emails and an online complaint system. It contacted people whose incidents were reported in the media.
Corey Saylor, CAIR’s research and advocacy director says the number of complaints CAIR received after October 2023 surpassed previous spikes of Islamophobia in the U.S., including when Donald Trump proposed a Muslim ban in 2015 and attempted to implement it as president in 2018.
The report also cites a December incident in Georgia in which a middle school teacher was arrested after allegedly threatening to cut off the head of a student who questioned an Israeli flag in his classroom.
Saylor says the number of complaints CAIR received after October 2023 surpassed previous spikes of Islamophobia in the U.S., including when Donald Trump proposed a Muslim ban in 2015 and attempted to implement it as president in 2018.
“By the numbers, it doesn’t even add up to what we’re seeing right now, or what we saw in October to December,” he said.
What’s particularly disheartening, Saylor said, is that 2022 was the first year in CAIR’s history when there was a drop in complaints, with 23% fewer than in 2021. The spike in 2023 was a somber snap back to reality, he said.
“It’s a return to a degree of normalcy for our community,” he said. “Unfortunately, over the last couple of decades, Muslims have come to expect to be targeted. … We have a history of that with minorities in this country.”
He urges anyone who experiences discrimination or a threat to report it, and says these incidents often go unchecked.
“I’ll talk to people and they’ll be like, ‘Oh, I got a bomb threat at the mosque a couple of weeks ago,’” he said. “I’ll say, ‘What’d you do?’ ‘I deleted it, we get them all the time.’”
Reporting an incident will bring visibility and accountability, he said, and it will also mobilize a community to come together. He encourages young Muslim people not to lose hope, saying he sees an interfaith coalition rallying together in support.
“Over the last couple of decades, the community has grown significantly stronger,” he said. “While the community expects to face discrimination, it is far more empowered to defend itself and assert itself than it has been in the past.”
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