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SearchToday in Islamophobia: In the UK, a man has been jailed for nine years on Friday for arson at a hotel housing asylum seekers last month, by far the longest sentence imposed over a wave of anti-Muslim riots in the country, meanwhile in India, the killing of a 12th-grade student in the outskirts of the capital New Delhi raises concerns on attacks targeting Muslim youth or in the case of Aryan Mishra, a Hindu youth who was perceived to be Muslim, and in the US, analysts are raising concerns about how state domestic terrorism laws are beginning to encroach on first amendment protections. Our recommended read of the day is by France 24 on the pressure and intimidation facing many Indian Muslims to relocate from Hindu majority communities, such as those who were forced to displace from the town of Purola in 2023, and how similar forced relocations are becoming increasingly more common across the country. This and more below:
India
India's far-right Hindus seek to drive Muslims out of 'holy land' | Recommended Read
Mohammad Salim shudders when he remembers the campaign that erupted in May 2023 against his Muslim minority community in Purola, a seemingly sleepy town surrounded by forested hills in the northern state of Uttarakhand. "If I had not escaped that day, they would have killed me along with my family," said Salim, 36, a married father of three young daughters. Rakesh Tomar, 38, is one of those who celebrated his departure. The hardline Hindu nationalist activist, based in state capital Dehradun, spouts hate-filled rhetoric against a minority he feels threatens him. "Uttarakhand is the holy land of Hindus," Tomar said, referring to the shrines around the sacred headwaters of the Ganges river in the state, an area larger than Switzerland. "We will not let it become an Islamic state under any circumstances, even if we have to sacrifice our lives for it." Only 13 percent of Uttarakhand's 10 million people are Muslim, according to the last census in 2011. Much of the hatred last year was fuelled by "love-jihad" conspiracies, claiming predatory Muslim men wanted to seduce Hindu women to convert them. read the complete article
What killing of Hindu teen by India cow vigilantes tells us about Modi 3.0
At about 1am on August 24, Aryan Mishra, a 19-year-old 12th-grade student received a phone call. Two of his friends, both sons of Mishra’s landlord, wanted him to join them for a late-night snack – noodles, according to reports. Mishra soon joined them, grabbing the passenger seat in the landlord’s red SUV in a middle-class neighbourhood in Faridabad, a city in Haryana state on the outskirts of the national capital, New Delhi. What is known is that a 40-kilometre (25-mile) chase followed. During the chase, a gunshot fired from the car behind hit Mishra on the shoulder. Harshit stopped the car. The men behind pulled up. One of them walked up to the car and pumped another bullet into Mishra’s neck from close range. The teenager was rushed to a local hospital, where he died. Mishra had been killed in cold blood. But it is not that alone that has caused the outrage. It is the fact that Mishra was Hindu, killed by another Hindu – who thought he was Muslim. The suspects were cow vigilantes, members of a nationwide right-wing Hindu militia, Gau Raksha Dal (GRD or Cow Protection Association), that claims to protect cows – considered holy by many Hindus – from slaughter, mainly by Muslim cattle traders. read the complete article
United States
The Growing Threat of State Domestic Terrorism Laws to the First Amendment
While there is no separate federal crime of “domestic terrorism” in the United States, there is a crime of domestic terrorism in many U.S. states. In recent years, the use and content of these state terrorism laws have witnessed a significant shift, raising new threats to First Amendment rights. The International Center for Not-for-Profit Law (ICNL), where I work, released a new report on these laws today. A majority of states – 32 states and Washington DC – have the crime of domestic terrorism. Further, 21 states and DC criminalize assisting or supporting terrorism, and 25 states have a separate crime of terroristic threat. Most of these state domestic terrorism laws were enacted in the wake of 9/11. They traditionally were relatively rarely enforced as crimes of political violence can, and have been, prosecuted by federal or state officials using other criminal law provisions. However, as concerns about terrorism have evolved in the United States, these laws have taken on an increasingly prominent and often politicized role. Those on both sides of the aisle have reasons to be concerned about the increasing turn towards state domestic terrorism laws. After the September 11th attacks, the Muslim, Arab, and South Asian communities bore a disproportionate brunt of surveillance and investigations in the name of fighting terrorism, often based on thin evidence and racial or religious profiling. In recent years, the label of terrorism has been applied by federal officials and politicians against members of a varied range of groups, including Black Lives Matter activists, abortion activists, environmental activists, anti-government proponents, Trump supporters, white supremacists, individuals associated with antifa, and pro-Palestine protesters. This labeling of a broad set of groups and individuals by officials as potential terrorists is a source of concern as more groups and individuals may become targets of state domestic terrorism laws in a politicized manner. read the complete article
Can Kamala Harris win back the Arab American vote?
In the aftermath of the October attacks in Israel, the disappointment of Arab Americans with President Biden’s administration continues with no end in sight. If Kamala Harris doesn’t show a readiness to depart from her predecessor’s stances, she could see herself outvoted in the swing states of Michigan and Ohio come November. The Arab American community has been repeatedly silenced, and today they feel a deep sense of resignation and betrayal. Their disappointment is indeed double: Not only has Biden been unequivocally supporting Israel in the killings and destruction of their home countries, he has also been using their hard-earned tax dollars to fund those acts. For these Americans, democracy today is but a facade, behind which they see themselves powerless in the face of public policy that systematically undermines their countries of origin, depriving them of natural resources and impoverishing their people. In an attempt to gauge Arab American sentiment ahead of the 2024 election, I interviewed members of the community in Northern Virginia. During their daily visits to a Middle Eastern coffee shop, where patrons come to relax and spend time in a place that reminds them of home, they talked to me about their malaise. They expressed their daily frustration trying to navigate their busy lives in a country where they feel they have been cast to the margins of political life. read the complete article
United Kingdom
Man jailed for 9 years for arson at asylum seekers' hotel in UK riots
A British man was jailed for nine years on Friday for arson at a hotel housing asylum seekers last month, by far the longest sentence imposed over a wave of anti-Muslim riots. Thomas Birley, 27, pleaded guilty to arson with intent to endanger life after stoking a fire in a bin by an entranceway to a hotel near Rotherham in northern England on Aug. 4. Prosecutor Elisha Kay said Birley added wood to an already-flaming industrial bin which had been placed in front of a fire door of the hotel while staff and guests sheltered inside. Kay said hotel staff barricaded themselves in a panic room and "thought they were going to burn to death". Birley, who also pleaded guilty to violent disorder and possessing an offensive weapon, was sentenced at Sheffield Crown Court by Judge Jeremy Richardson, who said Burley's actions were "suffused with racism from beginning to end". Richardson said Birley had been encouraged to join the disorder "by malicious and ignorant posts" on social media. read the complete article