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SearchToday in Islamophobia: In the Netherlands, Dutch voters rebuked a far-right party in Wednesday’s national elections after it had caused months of political upheaval, meanwhile in the United Kingdom, a priest from St. John Lloyd Catholic church in Cardiff, who admitted to discussing bombing mosques and shooting black people in neo-Nazi online chat rooms, has been sentenced to a 12-month community order, and during a UN Committee briefing on Palestinian rights on Thursday, UN Special Rapporteur Reem Alsalem said that Israel’s attacks in Palestine have “normalized atrocities worldwide”. Our recommended read of the day is by Teo Armus for The Washington Post, who writes on the Gubernatorial candidate, Ghazala Hashmi, who, if elected lieutenant governor of Virginia, would be the country’s first Muslim woman in statewide office. This and more below:
United States
This Muslim candidate hopes to break another barrier in November | Recommended Read
Inside the strip-mall gurdwara in the D.C. suburbs, Ghazala F. Hashmi snaked through the winding line of people sitting cross-legged in this Sikh house of worship. The state delegate leading her through, JJ Singh (D-Loudoun), introduced Hashmi — a Democrat seeking to become Virginia’s lieutenant governor — the same way to each one. “She’d be the first Indian to hold statewide office in the entire state,” Singh said, crouching down to greet one woman eating lunch. She would also notch an even bigger first if she wins Tuesday’s election: She would be the first Muslim woman elected statewide anywhere in the country. But her faith and ethnicity, she said, are not the driving forces behind her campaign. Hashmi, 61, has focused on health and education issues in her five years serving in the state Senate. She’s seeking the part-time lieutenant governor role to bolster Virginia from what she called “the chaos” of President Donald Trump’s administration — not to be the first of anything. Nonetheless, those identities have run through her campaign, bringing her support from South Asians and Muslims who want to see her make history as well as attacks from Republicans weaponizing her religion. Those attacks often tie her to polarizing New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani, who is also a Muslim immigrant of Indian descent. read the complete article
Mamdani’s Speech About Being Muslim Resonates Beyond New York City
It was a moment that some have compared to Barack Obama’s landmark 2008 speech about race, inequality and unity in American politics. In the closing weeks of the mayoral campaign, Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic front-runner, veered off from the economic message he has clung to doggedly for more than a year. “I want to use this moment to speak to the Muslims of New York City,” he said. Standing outside the Islamic Cultural Center of the Bronx, Mr. Mamdani spoke, sometimes tearfully, describing his experiences with his faith, identity and Islamophobia, and the tendency among Muslims, including himself, to feel they need to play down their identity to succeed. “No longer will I live in the shadows,” he said. For the candidate, who would become the first Muslim mayor of New York, it was a topic he had rarely addressed since he entered the race last October. But now, he said, he wanted to talk about what he described as anti-Muslim animus in the mayoral campaign, arguing that he had seen evidence of it in recent remarks by his two main opponents, Andrew M. Cuomo and Curtis Sliwa, and by the current mayor, Eric Adams. It is the one form of bigotry that remains largely accepted, he said. read the complete article
United Kingdom
Police investigate alleged racial abuse of Green deputy leader
The Metropolitan Police are investigating reports a man racially abused Green Party deputy leader Mothin Ali and told him he should be "deported". Leeds councillor Ali said on social media he was wearing Islamic clothing on his way through Earl's Court Station in West Lodon, on Wednesday, when a "racist thug" threatened to "smash my head in". The 43-year-old said he went to police after a friend urged him to speak out, adding this is "too much of a regular experience for Muslims in Britain". The Met Police said it had launched an investigation into "allegations of racial abuse" and was reviewing footage from Ali and station CCTV. No arrests have been made. The police are encouraging "anyone with information" to come forward. read the complete article
Catholic priest admits sending racist messages in neo-Nazi chat
A Catholic priest who admitted discussing bombing mosques and shooting black people in the head in neo-Nazi online chatrooms has been sentenced to a 12-month community order. Father Mark Rowles, 57, went by the name "skinheadlad1488" in a chatroom called Aryan Reich Killers to write offensive messages about Muslims. On Thursday, Rowles, of St John Lloyd Catholic church in Cardiff, admitted three counts of sending menacing or offensive messages using the Telegram app in May and June 2024. He will serve 150 hours community service, pay £199 in costs, and be bound by a Criminal Behaviour Order for three years. The Catholic Church in Wales will be carrying out its own review. Rowles was arrested during an investigation by counter-terror police into extreme right wing activity using social media apps. Rowles wrote offensive messages about Muslims, including a message where he said "bomb mosques". In one expletive-filled message which included an extreme racial slur, he wrote, "they should all be strung up or shot". read the complete article
Muslim woman ‘racially abused and spat at’ as she shopped with young baby in Walsal
A Muslim mother was racially abused and spat at while shopping with her ten-month-old baby in a deplorable anti-Muslim attack in Walsall. The woman was walking towards a shop at a retail park near Bescot Crescent when she was approached by a man. She says he made a noise, spat at her, his saliva landing on her coat, and then shouted a racial slur. The mother says she was left frozen in fear, calling the abuse “completely unprovoked” and “terrifying.” As I came out of one shop and headed to another, I saw a tall white man walking towards us. I thought nothing of it. When he got closer, I noticed he was staring straight at us. Then he made a noise, spat at me, it hit my coat. I was in shock. It was completely unprovoked, and I had my baby with me in the pushchair. At first, I thought it must’ve been an accident. Then he called me a dirty ****. I froze. He just kept walking, like nothing had happened.” “It was Islamophobic and racist. I was scared he might turn back, so I went straight to my car. read the complete article
Head of UK government’s anti-Islamophobia partner ‘refused service in shop for being Muslim’
The chief executive of the government’s new official partner in tackling Islamophobia has spoken about being refused service in a shop for being Muslim, amid concerns about a rise in insidious anti-Muslim “microaggressions”. The British Muslim Trust (BMT) is launching a government-backed telephone and online reporting service for hate crimes. In July, the trust was selected as a recipient of the government’s “combating hate against Muslims fund”, and in the months since its chief executive, Akeela Ahmed, has been meeting members of Muslim communities, including in Bradford in West Yorkshire, East Sussex, Greater London and Greater Manchester. Ahmed said it seemed the “gap is closing” between hate speech and inflammatory comment online – from social media groups to newspaper comment sections – and anti-Muslim hatred in real life, which remained “underreported and underrecognised.” As a result, BMT hopes to research the impact of online discourse and “call on ministers if research showed social media companies are not being held to account” under existing legislation, she said. “We’re not even just talking about content that could be racist or anti-Muslim in nature. We’re talking about content that is inciting violence, that is actually breaking the law,” Ahmed said. “We would not be asking for any special favours or special measures just for Muslim communities. This is literally about upholding the law as it is and enacting it.” read the complete article
International
UN experts warn Israel's attacks in Palestine normalise atrocities, expose global inaction
Israel's attacks in Palestine have normalised atrocities worldwide, according to a UN expert. "What happens in Palestine does not stay in Palestine," UN Special Rapporteur on violence against women Reem Alsalem said during a UN Committee briefing on Palestinian rights on Thursday. "The killing of Palestinian women and girls in the thousands, and the infliction of horrors on them is really the most defining moment that declares that the world no longer cares," said Alsalem. She said the situation has been so normalised "that no one now bats an eyelid about what is happening to women and girls in conflict and crisis elsewhere." Alsalem acknowledged that the scale of atrocities defies existing frameworks. "The current legal terminology, the concepts and the legal frameworks that we have are inadequate in front of the monstrosity and the scale and the horrors of what Palestinians have been going through," she said. read the complete article
Netherlands
‘Not So Bulletproof’: A Far-Right Party Faces Rebuke in the Netherlands
Dutch voters rebuked a far-right party in Wednesday’s national elections after it had caused months of political upheaval, and they unexpectedly threw support to a center-left party that ran on promises of stability and hope. That sudden reorientation is likely to usher in a more centrist government in the Netherlands, which says something about the state of not only Dutch politics but of populism in Europe more broadly. It shows that the far right, even in a place that had once seemed to be on an inexorable march toward greater power, is capable of hitting a roadblock. “We thought it was almost a deterministic thing, that the radical right was always going to become bigger — that they were bulletproof,” said Kristof Jacobs, a political scientist at Radboud University, which sits near the German border. “Not so bulletproof after all.” On Thursday, official counts showed that Geert Wilders’s far-right Party for Freedom, which had swept into power in 2023, had lost 11 seats in the Dutch House of Representatives. It was projected to tie with the center-left party Democrats 66, or D66, to be the largest group in the legislature. That vote amounted to a rebuke of Mr. Wilders’s party, which in 2023 had captured the largest share of seats by a wide margin. Mr. Wilders, a populist firebrand with stridently anti-Islam views, had himself spurred this election. read the complete article