‘Seen as less human’: Why has Islamophobia surged amid Israel’s Gaza war? | Israel-Palestine conflict News

Hate crimes in opposition to Muslims and people perceived to be Muslim in the UK are up by 140 p.c in contrast with this time final 12 months, based on British police.

The UK anti-Islamophobia organisation Inform MAMA has acquired a sevenfold improve in experiences of Islamophobia since October 7, when Hamas fighters attacked southern Israel, killing 1,139 individuals and taking 240 others captive, together with ladies and youngsters. Since then, more than 20,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s bombardment of Gaza, together with at the very least 8,000 kids, based on well being officers within the enclave.

In the US, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), a Muslim civil rights group, mentioned it had acquired 2,171 complaints of Islamophobia and anti-Arab bias since October 7, a 172 p.c improve for the reason that earlier 12 months.

Final month three men were shot in Vermont, and across the identical interval, Stuart Seldowitz, a former adviser to President Barak Obama, was captured on video taunting and threatening a quick meals vendor in Manhattan with Islamophobic abuse.

Whereas the Workplace of the United Nations Excessive Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) has a lengthier definition of Islamophobia (PDF), the UK’s All-Social gathering Parliamentary Group on British Muslims makes use of the next definition: “Islamophobia is rooted in racism and is a kind of racism that targets expressions of Muslimness or perceived Muslimness.”

The incidents accompanying the latest statistics vary from verbal harassment to violence in opposition to Palestinian human rights supporters and signify “an unprecedented surge in bigotry”, CAIR’s Analysis and Advocacy Director Corey Saylor mentioned in an announcement launched to Al Jazeera.

“Islamophobia and anti-Arab racism are uncontrolled in methods we now have not seen in virtually ten years.”

Saylor says that within the US, the final giant wave of Islamophobia was throughout US President Donald Trump’s announcement in December 2015 of a ban on visitors from a set of Muslim-majority nations.

On October 15, six-year-old Palestinian-American boy Wadea Al-Fayoume was stabbed to dying at his Illinois house by the house’s landlord in what police mentioned was an anti-Muslim hate crime, reportedly in response to the Hamas assault on Israel.

The UK has witnessed anti-Muslim language getting used at universities and colleges, together with individuals being referred to as “terrorists”, experiences Inform MAMA. Different incidents have included acts of vandalism.

It’s alarming that vandals focused Acton Mosque 3 times in simply two weeks.

Vandals additionally focused a Syrian cafe with purple paint on October 23.

Inform MAMA will proceed to have interaction with the Met Police and others to supply our assist and help.https://t.co/RcJDBoxSYq

— Inform MAMA UK (@TellMamaUK) November 8, 2023

Right here, in dialog with Al Jazeera, John L Esposito, writer of greater than 50 books – together with Islamophobia: The Problem of Pluralism within the twenty first Century (2011) – explains what Islamophobia is, and the way Israel’s conflict on Gaza has led to an explosion in incidents.

Esposito can be a distinguished college professor of Faith and Worldwide Affairs, and Islamic Research at Georgetown College in Washington, DC, within the US.

Al Jazeera: We’ve got textbook definitions of what Islamophobia is, however what can it appear like in day by day life?

John Esposito: Islamophobic assaults will be something from abusive language used in opposition to somebody who seems visibly Muslim – like a girl sporting a hijab; or it may very well be extra covert, like not hiring a completely certified skilled primarily based on their perceived Muslimness. Within the present local weather, since Israel’s conflict on Gaza started in October, there have been rising incidents the place individuals have had their employment terminated for exhibiting their assist for a free Palestine.

Islamophobia can after all escalate, within the killing of people just like the young boy in Illinois, and as we’ve seen it violently play out in assaults on communities and mosques, just like the [2019] mosque attack in Christchurch, New Zealand. That’s only one instance; there are such a lot of extra.

Al Jazeera: In your opinion, what would you say are the roots of Islamophobia?

John Esposito: The set off for this narrative goes again to the Iranian Revolution [1979]. Do not forget that was when many individuals additionally lastly had stay TV [news], and would placed on their TV daily. They’d see individuals in Iran shouting “Loss of life to America”, which might lead viewers to assume all Iranians, after which the broader Muslim world, should maintain this perception.

But it surely was actually 9/11 that turned a serious catalyst for Islam and Muslims to be seen as a worldwide risk. We now noticed the “Global War on Terrorism“, [Osama] bin Laden and al-Qaeda, which performed a serious function within the progress of Islamophobia, as Muslims and Islam got here to be seen as violent and harmful. Then after all most just lately there was the Islamic State [ISIL, or ISIS], which had an infinite quantity of media protection, excess of it ever ought to have, primarily permitting a minority to falsely painting who Muslims are.

And now on this latest conflict in Gaza, we’ve seen Hamas being equated to ISIS, which by some means helps gasoline assaults in opposition to Palestinians as they’re being painted with the identical brush as an extremist group.

The consequence has been Israel’s completely disproportionate conflict and genocide.

Al Jazeera: You’ve talked about the media. What function does it play? 

John Esposito: I’d say it’s vastly liable for the rise in Islamophobia.

The media has at all times cared about headlines. There’s a well-known line that I usually quote, “If it bleeds, it leads”, and information organisations’ focusing reporting on “terrorist” assaults has been exploited by far-right political and spiritual leaders and media commentators who’re fast to talk out about Islam and Muslims, with out checks or balances.

An important instance of it’s within the present conflict. Preliminary experiences that had been popping out of Israel talked about the beheading of infants. [US] President [Joe] Biden withdrew his statement confirming its falsehood the day after, however by that time, the story had already been repeated numerous occasions on mainstream media and social media.

I used to be informed once I first got here to Washington, “Keep in mind, in case you throw it up in opposition to the wall 3 times, it’ll stick”, and that’s what’s occurred right here. An unverified piece of reports is repeated greater than 3 times, and by the point it’s retracted, it’s already caught in individuals’s heads, feeding into this Islamophobic narrative of who these persons are and what they’re able to doing.

Al Jazeera: However you’ve additionally mentioned it’s not simply mainstream media that’s accountable?

John Esposito: Sure completely, there are additionally well-funded anti-Muslim social media campaigns.

There’s a study by the Heart for American Progress, referred to as Concern, Inc. [August 2011], that paperwork $42.6m flowing from seven foundations over 10 years (the primary decade of the century) to assist Islamophobic authors and web sites. Then there’s one other by CAIR and the Heart for Race and Gender at UC Berkeley. It’s referred to as the Confronting Concern report [2016] and that concluded that between 2008 and 2013, 33 Islamophobic teams had entry to $205,838,077 to reinforce their misinformation.

Al Jazeera: Is social media making it simpler to be Islamophobic?

John Esposito: Social media has had an infinite impression. It might create a actuality the place any claims will be offered as a reality. I definitely see that now with regard to the conflict in Gaza, and the instance I gave about beheading infants.

Al Jazeera: How has the present conflict between Israel and Hamas added, if in any respect, to the Islamophobic rhetoric?

John Esposito: Israeli politics has used the Islamophobic rhetoric to create a devastating impression in portraying Muslims and Arabs because the enemy and denying their elementary rights, and so justifying an indiscriminate conflict whose victims are being seen as much less useful than different human beings.

We all know the October 7 assaults had been carried out by members of Hamas, however [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu claims that these assaults signify all that Hamas is. The truth is, Hamas has additionally been a serious political motion that ruled in Gaza for a few years and continues to be a political motion.

Netanyahu and his Jewish fundamentalist government officials – in addition to a number of European and Western governments, allies with Israel – even equate all Palestinian demonstrations and organised opposition with being supportive [of armed groups].

Sadly, the preliminary unwavering assist of Israeli insurance policies, by the US and UK in addition to different nations, has added to the Israeli narrative that each one Muslims and all Arabs are the enemy.

Early within the conflict, members of the Israeli authorities referred to Palestinians as “human animals“. Netanyahu even quoted from the Previous Testomony, describing Palestinians because the “Amalek”, the Jews’ archetypal enemy. (The Amalek might remodel themselves into animals to keep away from seize). He says this to justify his coverage that has more and more been labelled by many within the worldwide neighborhood as genocide and conflict crimes.

All of those denigrating fees each replicate and feed the damaging progress of Islamophobia in lots of components of the world.

Al Jazeera: Are there another causes that will have led to spikes in Islamophobia?

John Esposito: Sure, Netanyahu’s authorities legitimates this all-out conflict in Gaza by merely evaluating Hamas to ISIL [ISIS], which it’s not. By doing this, Israel is feeding Islamophobia, by fuelling the notion that this can be a conflict in opposition to a Muslim “terrorist” organisation, not Palestinian individuals.

ISIS was a transnational motion whose imaginative and prescient and mission was to create a caliphate within the Center East, whereas Hamas’s roots and points have been an integral a part of the historical past of Palestinians.

It goes again to the violent displacement of 750,000 Palestinians and the destruction of 500 Palestinian villages, their society, tradition, and political rights. The consequence was the Nakba, the disaster. How can individuals on the earth perceive what right this moment many Palestinians consult with because the Second Nakba in the event that they haven’t any data of it?

The worldwide neighborhood’s lack of ability to answer, and object to, Israel’s continued absorption of Palestinian territory that has created an apartheid nation should be recognised and rectified.

Al Jazeera: Are there methods to cease Islamophobia from escalating?

John Esposito: There must be higher schooling, not simply in our colleges and universities and seminaries, but additionally of our political leaders, our policymakers.

It’s necessary to be educated sufficient to have the ability to distinguish between the teachings of Islam and mainstream Muslims and the actions of the militant fundamentalist minority, like al-Qaeda and ISIS [ISIL].

There are people who find themselves very nicely educated – I’m speaking about professionals who’re docs, dentists, legal professionals, et cetera – however their understanding of Islam is restricted to what they’ve seen on TV.

However conversations are being had and understanding is shifting.

Individuals are actually paying consideration.

As well as, inter-faith programmes and dialogue right this moment are growing a multi-faith perspective and understanding and this may result in a discount of anti-religious violence, hostility and crimes. Though the web has been a big supply of Islamophobia, it additionally has been and is usually a supply for understanding, monitoring and countering Islamophobia. This is the reason our centre at Georgetown created The Bridge Initiative: Defending Pluralism and Countering Islamophobia. We monitor and supply info on the globalisation of Islamophobia daily.

Al Jazeera: Is schooling sufficient?

John Esposito: It’s a begin, however different adjustments want to incorporate what our leaders say and the way they are saying it. This issues tremendously.

Governments and political leaders are ready of belief, and in the event that they make anti-Muslim statements, as we’ve seen within the language used on this conflict by Netanyahu and his allies – or create home and international insurance policies that indicate Muslims are the enemy, as we’ve seen throughout Europe in France, Austria, Germany and the US – then it would solely proceed to fire up Islamophobia.

Within the case of the present conflict in Gaza, it’s crucial to keep in mind that “those that don’t bear in mind historical past are condemned to repeat it”. That’s what we’re seeing now.