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SearchToday in Islamophobia: In India, widespread detentions and demolitions of property targeting Muslims have provoked concerns that right-wing Hindu nationalists are exploiting last week’s terrorist attack in Kashmir to deepen a campaign of oppression against the country’s largest minority group, meanwhile in France, the fatal stabbing of a Muslim worshiper in a mosque has prompted heated criticism of government officials who did not initially treat it as a possible hate crime, and in the United Kingdom, a series of Facebook groups set up and administered by Reform UK officials are full of racist and Islamophobic posts and conspiracy theories, according to new reporting from Byline Times. Our recommended read of the day is by Andy Rose, Amanda Musa and Elizabeth Wolfe for CNN, who write on the biggest takeaways from two new reports out by Harvard University on campus antisemitism and anti-Muslim racism. This and more below:
United States
The biggest takeaways from Harvard’s task force reports on campus antisemitism and anti-Muslim bias | Recommended Read
As its legal battle over critical federal money plays out in court, two Harvard University task forces have released a pair of long-awaited internal reports: one on how antisemitism and anti-Israeli bias are handled on campus, and another on anti-Muslim, anti-Arab and anti-Palestinian bias. The reports released Tuesday afternoon included accounts of both Jewish and Muslim students juggling profound grief over the deaths of loved ones in Gaza and Israel, coupled with fear for their safety and deep feelings of alienation and academic censorship on campus. They include several broad recommendations and policy changes for Harvard’s programs, admissions and academic programs. Members of both pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian communities expressed concern over doxxing: the university’s Presidential Task Force on Combating Anti-Muslim, Anti-Arab, and Anti-Palestinian Bias found pro-Palestinian students’ faces and private information were plastered on box trucks and their information was published online, often labeling them as antisemites or terrorists. One faculty member told the task force a doxxed student had received death and rape threats after their face and phone number were put on a “doxxing truck” and shared online. Muslim, Arab and Palestinian faculty and students at Harvard overwhelmingly reported feeling “abandoned and “actively silenced” as they voiced concerns over the mounting death toll and unfolding humanitarian crisis in Gaza, according to the report from the task force on anti-Muslim, anti-Arab and anti-Palestinian bias. “Many participants reported feeling a profound sense of erasure – that they, and the cause they feel strongly about, were silenced,” the task force wrote. read the complete article
‘Sense of fear’: Harvard reports find anti-Jewish and anti-Muslim bias
Students and staff at Harvard University have faced both anti-Semitism and Islamophobia amid a deeply polarised atmosphere on the campus of one of the top universities in the United States, separate reports have found. The release of the reports on Tuesday follows the establishment of separate task forces on combating anti-Jewish and anti-Muslim sentiment last year amid campus protests over Israel’s war on Gaza. In a statement announcing the findings, Harvard president Alan Garber said that Jewish, Israeli and Zionist community members reported hiding “overt markers of their identities to avoid confrontation”, while Muslim, Arab and Palestinian community members described feeling “judged, misrepresented, and silenced”. The task force on combating anti-Muslim, anti-Arab and anti-Palestinian bias found a similar climate of hostility, describing a “deep-seated sense of fear” among students and a state of “uncertainty, abandonment, threat, and isolation” on campus. “Muslim women who wear hijab and pro-Palestinian students wearing keffiyehs spoke about facing verbal harassment, being called ‘terrorists,’ and even being spat upon,” the task force said. “The issue of doxxing was particularly highlighted as a significant concern that affects not only physical safety and mental well-being, but also future career prospects,” it added, referring to the practice of disclosing a person’s personal or identifying information online. Nearly half of Muslim students and staff surveyed reported feeling physically unsafe on campus, while 92 percent said they believed they would face professional or academic penalties for expressing political views. “As Muslim students we have been living in constant fear,” the taskforce quoted an unnamed student as saying. read the complete article
Torture and Secret C.I.A. Prisons Haunt 9/11 Case in Judge’s Ruling
When a military judge threw out a defendant’s confession in the Sept. 11 case this month, he gave two main reasons. The prisoner’s statements, the judge ruled, were obtained through the C.I.A.’s use of torture, including beatings and sleep deprivation. But equally troubling to the judge was what happened to the prisoner in the years after his physical torture ended, when the agency held him in isolation and kept questioning him from 2003 to 2006. The defendant, Ammar al-Baluchi, is accused of sending money and providing other support to some of the hijackers who carried out the terrorist attack, which killed 3,000 people. In court, Mr. Baluchi is charged as Ali Abdul Aziz Ali. The judge, Col. Matthew N. McCall, wrote that it was easy to focus on the torture because it was “so absurdly far outside the norms of what is expected of U.S. custody preceding law enforcement questioning.” “However,” he added, “the three and a half years of uncharged, incommunicado detention and essentially solitary confinement — all while being continually questioned and conditioned — is just as egregious” as the physical torture. The 111-page ruling was the latest blow to the government’s two-decade-old effort to hold death penalty trials at Guantánamo Bay by sweeping aside a legacy of state-sponsored torture. read the complete article
United Kingdom
Police and prosecutors’ details shared with Israel during UK protests inquiry, papers suggest
The UK government shared contact details of counter-terrorism police and prosecutors with the Israeli embassy during an investigation into protests at an arms factory, official documents suggest, raising concerns about foreign interference. An email was sent on 9 September last year by the Attorney General’s Office (AGO) to Daniela Grudsky Ekstein, Israel’s deputy ambassador to the UK, with the subject matter “CPS/SO15 [Crown Prosecution Service/counterterrorism police] contact details”. Last August, 10 Palestine Action activists were arrested under the Terrorism Act after a protest at an Israeli weapons factory, and in November a further eight were arrested under the act in relation to the same incident. The email sent by Nicola Smith, the head of international law at the AGO, and obtained through a freedom of information (FoI) request, was sent 11 days after she had met Grudsky Ekstein. It was redacted apart from the subject matter. Lydia Dagostino, from Kellys Solicitors, who represents some Palestine Action activists, said: “The information disclosed in response to an FoI request clearly raises questions and needs further investigation." read the complete article
Prominent Muslim groups call on Starmer to recognise Palestine and cease arms exports to Israel
Hundreds of prominent Muslim organisations and individuals have signed a letter urging UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer to recognise a Palestinian state and cease all military support to Israel. The letter is set to be delivered to 10 Downing Street on Tuesday by the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB). "For the past 18 months, we have seen the indiscriminate slaughter of Palestinians daily and found very little support from the government to take practical steps to prevent this," the letter reads "Beyond vague and equivocating statements, the actions have been the opposite; including the supply of weapons parts, surveillance flights or allowing the free passage of UK citizens to join the [Israeli army]." It goes on to say that while Ukrainian refugees were welcomed "with open arms" following Russia's invasion, Starmer "vowed to close the loophole" when a Palestinian family from Gaza sought to use the same system to find asylum. "Although the two conflicts have their unique features, the Palestinian civilians being killed in their tens of thousands are no less human and no less deserving of the right to self-determination and safety," the letter said. "As British citizens, we cannot in good conscience accept our nation’s involvement or hollow words of condemnation in what is described by multiple agencies, bodies and experts as a genocide." read the complete article
Reform UK Facebook Groups Are Full of Racist Far Right Posts and Islamophobic Conspiracy Theories
A series of Facebook groups set up and administered by Reform UK officials are full of racist and Islamophobic posts and conspiracy theories, which have been left entirely unchallenged by the party, Byline Times can reveal. One such group for the party’s Kent supporters is listed as being “promoted by Carol Comey for and on behalf of Reform UK”. Comey is the Kent County Organiser for Reform. Posts in this group included the claim that it is “hardwired into [Muslims’] belief system to kill non-believers”, that Israel is made up of “people who despise us and haven’t done a single thing for us apart from take our money and dilute our country with foreign invaders”, an iteration of the extreme right ideology of Great Replacement Theory which blames Jews for undermining the white race through migration. The same user posted that “Hitler was a good actor and played his part” and a post appearing to claim that Muslims “will face public lynching one day once everyone gets off the news and starts reading more books”. In the same group Byline Times also found posts claiming that “Keir Starmer has no control” over “subhuman Muslim child rapists” and the “rapid Islamisation of Britain”, and that Keir Starmer does “have control over free speech and imprisoning offenders. Tommy Robinson is one of many examples”. read the complete article
France
A Killing in a Mosque Puts France’s View of Muslims Under Scrutiny
The fatal stabbing of a Muslim worshiper in a mosque in France has prompted heated criticism of government officials who did not initially treat it as a possible hate crime or show the degree of concern they had in other fatal attacks. The victim, Aboubakar Cissé, a 21 year-old from Mali, was stabbed dozens of times Friday morning while he was praying in a mosque in La Grand-Combe, a small town in southern France, about 50 miles northwest of Avignon. The main suspect, who filmed himself standing over the victim, was heard insulting Allah in the video, which was posted on Snapchat, French news media reported. On Sunday prosecutor Abdelkrim Grini, said in a TV interview that the killing was being investigated as an “anti-Muslim act” or “an act with Islamophobic connotations.” Other motives are being explored, he added, including “a fascination with death, a desire to kill and a desire to be considered a serial killer.” “It’s an Islamophobic crime, it’s an act of terrorism, and today we are afraid,” Aminata Konaté-Boune, a spokesperson for Mr. Cissé’s Soninke ethnic group, said at a news conference with the victim’s family on Tuesday. “Tomorrow, what will happen? Will they come knocking on our doors to kill us? Will there be a hunt for Muslims?” Yoro Cissé, the victim’s cousin, told the news agency Agence France-Presse on Tuesday that no member of the government had contacted his family. “We want to feel safe; France is a country we love,” he said. “We want to feel like everybody else.” read the complete article
India
India’s Muslims Fear a Growing Backlash After Kashmir Attack
Widespread detentions and demolitions of property targeting Muslims in India have provoked concerns that right-wing Hindu nationalists are exploiting last week’s terrorist attack in Kashmir to deepen a campaign of oppression against the country’s largest minority group. Public anger has swelled after 26 people — all but one of them Hindu tourists — were killed by militants near the town of Pahalgam in the Indian-administered part of Kashmir, a Muslim-majority region. India has said that Pakistan had a supporting hand in the attack, an accusation that Pakistan denies. India has appeared to be preparing to strike Pakistan militarily in response to the terrorist attack, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi vowing to hunt down the terrorists and “raze” their safe havens. A Pakistani government minister said on Tuesday that Pakistan believed an Indian strike was imminent. So far, India’s central government has been focused on carrying out a series of punitive measures against Pakistan, including threatening to disrupt the flow of cross-border rivers. But officials and right-wing Hindu groups have intensified harassment of Muslims, which they have framed as a drive against illegal migrants. In several states run by Mr. Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party, local officials have used the moment to hound what they call “illegal Bangladeshis” and Rohingya, the Muslim minority who have fled Myanmar. Such labels, including “Pakistani,” are often used to target Muslim migrants from other parts of India. read the complete article