Attitudes in the United States toward Islam have come unhinged, with
Islamophobia stoked lately by the campaign rhetoric of practically all
Republican presidential hopefuls.
This is leading America and
the world in a wrong and dangerous direction. Donald Trump, the leading
Republican candidate, who last September declared “I love Muslims,” has
made a full pivot after the terrorist attacks in Paris and San
Bernardino, California, by militants.
He is now calling for a
database for tracking the 3 million plus Muslims in America. He would
not rule out making them carry a special ID showing their faith and
feels that “there is absolutely no choice but to close some mosque.”
More
recently, he called for the United States to bar all Muslims from
entering the country until the “country’s representatives can figure out
what the hell is going on.”
Other Republican candidates
generally went along or outbid him with Islamophobic statements of their
own. Marco Rubio, for example, announced that he would not only close
mosques but also Muslim cafes and diners.
Ben Carson declared
that he is opposed to a Muslim becoming president of the United States
because Islam is “inconsistent” with the US Constitution. Ted Cruz
claimed that Shariah law “is an enormous problem” in the United States.
Mike Huckabee called Islam “a religion that promotes the most murderous
mayhem on the planet.”
These attitudes toward Islam are not,
unfortunately, out of line with the opinions of many American voters,
especially Republicans. When Trump made his proposal on the temporary
ban on Muslims entering the US, his public support was falling, but
immediately after, his rating among likely Republican voters rose
significantly.
A Rasmussen poll last December showed that 66
percent of likely Republican voters favored such a ban. Among all
voters, the poll showed that 46 percent favored the ban while 40 percent
were opposed (14 percent undecided).
A YouGov poll taken
toward the end of last December showed that 83 percent of Republicans
agreed with Carson that a Muslim should not be president. The most
disturbing poll, however, remains that taken by Pew Research Center in
July of last year, in which respondents were asked to rate from zero to
100 (from least positive to most positive) their feelings toward
different religious groups in the country. The highest ranking was
received by Jews (63 over 100) and the lowest by Arabs and atheists (40
over 100).
Concomitantly, there have been an increasing number
of extremist organizations known for using violence in the pursuit of
their stated goals, spreading anti-Muslim propaganda. More than 20 of
these are classified by the reputable Southern Poverty Law Center as
“white supremacist,” “neo-Nazi” or “racist skinheads” or
“anti-immigration.” An increasing number of them now target Muslims in
addition to Jews, African Americans, Latinos and almost everyone not of
West European origin.
There are, in addition, scores of other
organizations that are Islamophobic but are not classified as extremist
who are denouncing Islam. One of those, DefendChristians.org, has an
article on its website suggesting three solutions to the Muslim problem:
conversion, deportation or violence, but concludes that the only
practical one is the latter.
This crescendo in Islamophobic
statements by politicians, organizations and other individuals is
reflected in a skyrocketing increase in the number of hate crimes
against Muslims in America. According to the FBI, the hate crimes
against Muslims before 9/11 averaged around two a month, but rose to
slightly less than 13 a month after 2001. During that year they reached
around 40 a month.
However, according to a study undertaken by a
California State University research group reported in the Washington
Post, the number of hate crimes against Muslims rose three-fold after
the attacks in Paris last Nov. 13, reaching 38 during the subsequent 30
days, almost equaling the monthly rate of 2001.
Furthermore,
according to the FBI, while the attacks against Muslims did not include
murder until the end of 2013, but only assault, arson, vandalism of
mosques and death threats, the latest attacks did.
This kind of
hysteria has even reached the school system. Last September a young
high school boy, Ahmed Mohamed, was arrested, handcuffed and detained in
Dallas, Texas, for bringing to school a homemade clock that he made for
a tech class. When this reaction provoked criticism, he was invited to
the White House. Two months later, a 12-year-old, Armaan Singh Sarai (a
Sikh who apparently looked like a Muslim) was arrested, also in Dallas,
and detained for three days for carrying a school bag that had a
built-in charger for his telephone.
In a public debate with
Bernie Sanders in December, Democratic presidential hopeful Hillary
Clinton warned that Daesh (ISIL) is “going to people showing videos of
Donald Trump insulting Islam and Muslims in order to recruit more
radical terrorists.
Earlier this month, a recruiting video by
the Al-Shabaab group in Somalia, affiliated with Al-Qaeda, surfaced. It
included a clip of Trump announcing his proposed temporary ban on
Muslims entering the United States. Clinton had said that Trump is
becoming the best Daesh recruiter. He is apparently also being used as
an Al-Qaeda recruiter as well.
Until elections next November
and probably beyond, we will undoubtedly witness an increase in hate
crimes against Muslims in the United States and a surge in recruitment
to Daesh and Al-Qaeda. The damage that this will do to the relations
between Muslims and Christians globally will be unprecedented and
durable and will translate into more violence worldwide.
It is
time for reasonable Americans to openly and forcefully denounce this
bigotry and act decisively to stop it. After all, this is what they are
demanding from reasonable Muslims to do with regard to extremism.
