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SearchToday in Islamophobia: In the United States, Rep. Lauren Boebert has refused to publicly apologize to Rep. Ilhan Omar for her anti-Muslim remarks, with Rep. Omar claiming that Boebert “doubled down on her hurtful and dangerous comments,” meanwhile Argentina’s justice system will investigate allegations of war crimes committed by the Myanmar military against that country’s Rohingya Muslims, and in the United Kingdom, a new report on press coverage finds that right-wing and religious publications have a “higher percentage of articles either demonstrating a bias against, or generalizing or misrepresenting, Muslim belief or behaviour.” Our recommended read of the day is by Patrick Wintour for the Guardian on newly leaked documents that demonstrate how the highest levels of the CCP leadership are directing the repression targeting Uyghur Muslims in China. This and more below:
China
Leaked papers link Xinjiang crackdown with China leadership | Recommended Read
Excerpts from previously unpublished documents directly linking China’s crackdown on Uyghur Muslims and other minorities in Xinjiang province to speeches by the Chinese leadership in 2014 have been put online. The documents – including three speeches by Chinese president Xi Jinping in April 2014 – cover security, population control and the need to punish the Uyghur population. Some are marked top secret. They were leaked to the German academic Adrian Zenz. In the documents, the highest levels of the Chinese Communist party (CCP) leadership call for Uyghur re-education and relocation to rectify an imbalance in the Uyghur and Han population in Xinjiang. Zenz said the top secret and confidential documents are significant because they show multiple links between the demands of the Chinese leadership of 2014 and what subsequently happened in Xinjiang, including mass internment in re-education camps, coercive labour transfers and optimising the ethnic population by increasing Han population shares. Zenz alleges that the documents show the leadership’s long-term intent to commit cultural genocide with the specific purpose of safeguarding the rule of the CCP. read the complete article
United States
Lauren Boebert's apology for her blatantly Islamophobic 'joke' is pure theater
A Republican congresswoman calling a Muslim colleague a suicide bomber isn't actually that surprising. After all, this is a member of the same GOP whose leader Donald Trump declared during his 2016 presidential campaign that “Islam hates us”; claimed that Muslims knew where the terrorists were but refused to turn them in; and called for a “total and complete ban” on Muslims entering the United States. But the response from the Republican Party — or, rather, lack thereof — is a clear statement about the kind of hate speech that is tolerated by the GOP. Only 11 House Republicans of over 200 voted to condemn Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., for her bigoted comments about Muslims, Jews, Blacks as well as her embrace of political violence versus Democrats. To Boebert, who has publicly demonized groups that seek to end discrimination against Black Americans and has peddled the white nationalist “great replacement theory” about the threat immigrants allegedly pose to “white America,” smearing Omar, a Black Muslim immigrant, is right on brand. Omar is all the things the GOP despises rolled into one. (It’s also why Trump made her a frequent focus of his attacks.) the reality is that for months, Boebert has been smearing Omar and fellow Muslim Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., calling them part of the “jihad squad.” In June, Boebert tweeted that Omar was an “honorary member of Hamas” and a “terrorist sympathizer.” Omar noted at the time that Boebert’s comments had led to death threats against her. Boebert is a lot of things. But one thing she is not is an outlier in today’s GOP. In fact, the deafening silence from the GOP’s leadership in response to her conduct tells you all you need to know about where today’s Republican Party stands. read the complete article
Rep. Lauren Boebert refuses to publicly apologize to Rep. Ilhan Omar for anti-Muslim remark
Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn, said she had an "unproductive" call with Rep. Lauren Boebert, R-Colo., on Monday over her anti-Muslim remarks and claimed the Colorado Republican refused to publicly apologize for suggesting she was a terrorist. Instead, Omar claimed in a new statement that Boebert "doubled down on her hurtful and dangerous comments," which led Omar to "end the unproductive call." Omar hung up on Boebert after the Colorado Republican refused to make a public apology to her, according to a statement from Omar and Boebert's account of the call. read the complete article
Rep. Lauren Boebert renews Islamophobic attack on Rep. Ilhan Omar, rebuffs call for public apology
Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.) refused to publicly apologize Monday in a phone call with Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) for her Islamaphobic comments about the Muslim congresswoman and instead accused her of “anti-American and anti-Semitic” rhetoric, prompting Omar to end the call. The exchange is likely to spur more calls for Republican leaders to condemn Boebert’s remarks and publicly address her behavior. Last week, House Democratic leaders denounced Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy’s (R-Calif.) “repeated failure to condemn inflammatory and bigoted rhetoric” from fellow Republicans, including Boebert. In a statement Monday, Omar said that it is time for McCarthy “to actually hold his party accountable.” read the complete article
Ayman on Boebert’s racist rhetoric: Islamophobia now part of GOP platform
"The normalization of Islamophobia by the Republican Party has been going on for 20 years," says Ayman Mohyeldin on Rep. Lauren Boebert renewing her anti-Muslim attack on Rep. Ilhan Omar. "Now it is an actual part of the platform of Republican politicians. They embrace and run on these bigoted positions without any consequences." read the complete article
India
Interfaith Love a Risk Under Modi’s Rule
While interfaith unions between Hindus and Muslims are rare in India, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s governing Bharatiya Janata Party, or BJP, and other Hindu nationalists have forcefully decried what they call “love jihad.” The discredited conspiracy theory holds that supposedly predatory Muslim men deceive women to coerce them into changing their religion, with the ultimate aim of establishing domination in the majority-Hindu nation. The “love jihad” issue has pitted the BJP against secular activists who warn it undermines constitutional guarantees of religious freedom and puts Muslims in the crosshairs of hard-line Hindu nationalists, emboldened by a prime minister who has mostly stayed mum about rising attacks on Muslims since he was first elected in 2014. “This conspiracy theory demonizes the Muslim as the other and creates victimhood and fears in the Hindus that India is going to be converted into a Muslim country,” said Mohan Rao, a retired professor of social sciences at New Delhi’s Jawaharlal Nehru University who has researched interfaith marriages. “It’s absurd.” read the complete article
Canada
Schools need to step up to address Islamophobia
The inspiration for this article was born of frustration and heartache. It follows the murders of four intergenerational members of the Afzaal/Salman family that left a nine-year-old child injured and orphaned in London, Ont., on June 6, 2021. It also follows ongoing injustice related to state-sanctioned racism of Bill 21 in Québec and a rash of hate attacks in Alberta, most of them targeting Black Muslim women in hijab. This year at least nine attacks in Edmonton were reported to police, seven of which resulted in criminal charges. There is ongoing silence and erasure when it comes to anti-Muslim hate and Islamophobia in the education systems we and our loved ones inhabit. Although there is no one static understanding or definition of Islamophobia, we recognize it as a form of racism, structural and individual, that is rooted in long histories of empire and colonization. We should examine multiple dimensions of Islamophobia that build and shape realities of Muslim people through policy, social and economic structures and public representations across institutions and around the world. These manifestations shape the representations of Muslims, and their embodied experience of “Muslimness” in Canada. It’s important to consider Islamophobia not only in daily hate crimes but also in daily indignities, silencing and injuries to Muslims’ sense of self and well-being. read the complete article
United Kingdom
UK media report finds widespread anti-Muslim bias in press coverage
A landmark report into the British media’s coverage of Muslims and Islam has found shocking levels of misinformation, stereotyping and Islamophobia. Conducted by the Muslim Council of Britain’s Centre for Media Monitoring (CFMM), the report analyses over 48,000 online articles and 5,500 broadcast clips between October 2018 and September 2019, finding that almost 60 percent of the articles and 47 percent of the television clips associated Muslims and/or Islam with negative aspects of behaviour. The report, entitled, British Media’s Coverage of Muslims and Islam (2018-2020), also presents 10 case studies in which Muslims are misrepresented, defamed and libelled in major publications, with damages paid in nine of the cases, alongside public apologies. Right-wing and religious publications were found to have a "higher percentage of articles either demonstrating a bias against, or generalising or misrepresenting, Muslim belief or behaviour". read the complete article
International
Argentina court to investigate Myanmar war crimes against Rohingya Muslims
Argentina’s justice system will investigate allegations of war crimes committed by the Myanmar military against that country’s Rohingya minority under a court ruling upholding the principles of “universal justice”. The appeals court decision, which Agence France-Presse has seen, overturns a lower court ruling rejecting a request for an investigation by the British-based Burmese Rohingya Organisation (BROUK). A 2017 army crackdown on Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar, which the UN says could amount to genocide, has triggered an exodus of more than 740,000 members of the community, mainly to Bangladesh. The legal premise of “universal justice” holds that some acts – including war crimes and crimes against humanity – are so horrific they are not specific to one nation and can be tried anywhere. Argentina’s courts have taken up other universal jurisdiction cases in the past, including in relation to ex-dictator Francisco Franco’s rule in Spain and the Falun Gong movement in China. read the complete article