Alwaght- Muslims across the world are preparing for the next phase of Islamophobia following the recent Brussels terrorist attack blamed on people with Muslim sounding names.
Despite condemning terrorist attacks, Muslims, especially in the West, are under attack across social media, in public forums on college campuses, and in mainstream political rhetoric from leading United States presidential candidates.
Outrage over the Tuesday deadly terror attacks in Brussels has spawned discontent and suspicion directed at Muslims.
The ball was set rolling by leading US Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz’s call for law enforcement to “patrol and secure Muslim neighborhoods”.
Cruz called for a freeze on any new refugees from areas affected by Al Qaeda and the ISIS terrorist group, as well as new powers for law enforcement to patrol “Muslim neighborhoods.”
His remarks came hours after two terrorist attacks on Tuesday in Brussels, the EU’s de facto capital. ISIS terrorist group claimed responsibility for the carnage.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization called on Cruz to retract and apologize for his unconstitutional policy proposal.
Nihad Awad, the executive director of CAIR, warned that Cruz’s plan is “unconstitutional, un-American and dangerous.”
In Spain members of the far-right “Madrid Social Home” group attacked Madrid’s main Mosque M-30 with firebombs on Thursday evening. Besides setting fire at the mosque, the radicals hung a banner on the wall of the mosque, reading: “Today Brussels, tomorrow Madrid?” The also called as “Ramiro Ledesma” group was proud of the attack, posting it on Twitter and saying that it has launched a “campaign against radical Islam.” The radicals claimed that all mosques, including the M-30, finance ISIS. Following the brutal Paris attacks in November, Spanish reporters interviewed dozens of Muslims pouring out of the M-30 Mosque following Friday prayer. They all condemned November’s barbaric attack and they stressed that Spain is their home and they would never harm anyone. After the fatal terrorist attacks in Brussels, the Madrid mosque and Centre for Islamic Culture wrote in a statement that: “Without a doubt, what happened in Brussels on March 22nd is unacceptable, nor is it accepted within our logic or religion to commit such nefarious attacks…Muslims all around the world have condemned this terrible event that took the lives of innocent victims, including Muslims as well.”
The statement, was sent by Imam Hussam Khoja, who also condemned the terrorist attack by the Spanish far-right group. “We also condemn the reactions of extremists following what happened, including what took place yesterday afternoon by an extremist group that tried to attack our great mosque and cause damage to it…We ask for the public to condemn this event and every other extremist act, reaction or prejudice against a religion.”
The mainstream media has worsened the situation by producing an Islamophobic imaginary that is dominating society's discourse and view of Islam and Muslims.
In this imaginary, Islam and Muslims are viewed by the already constructed imaginary. Here Islam and Muslims becomes what is imagined, dreamed and incepted in the confines of a closed-circuit internal reproduction system that always points back to the imagined.
What people see and experience daily about Islam and Muslims is a choreographed Islamophobic imaginary. Accordingly, the "news" and society's "leaders" end up reproducing what the well-stitched imaginary dictates on a daily basis. This imaginary reduces everything related to Islam and Muslims into a singular frame that is negative and constructed solely in relation to terrorism and violence.
Western media outlets rarely post or air positive stories about Muslims and Islam. A glance into Western news media coverage of Islam reveals deeply problematic patterns - negative, stereotypical portrayals, almost no Muslim sources, and few mention of Muslims or Islam in the context of positive news. Western media apply the “terrorism” description almost exclusively to violence by people thought to be Muslims or persons with Muslim names.
The fact of the matter is that ISIS terrorist group is not at all representative of Islam or majority of Muslims in the world. ISIS has killed more Muslims than Christians and brought more carnage and destruction in Muslims countries than other regions of the world.
The world should not forget that ISIL terrorists were initially trained by the United States through a CIA run camp in Jordan in 2012 to destabilize the Syrian government, now control parts of Syria and Iraq. They have been engaged in crimes against humanity in the areas under their control.
The US and its allies claim they are fighting against terrorist groups like ISIS while in fact helped create and train those organizations to maintain their hegemony the West Asia region. Muslims around the world are under attack from Western countries which directly or indirectly encourage terrorism and also from cruel terrorist groups such as ISIS wrecking havoc globally and especially in Muslim countries.
