The Muslim Times has the best collection to refute Islamophobia. Suggested reading: Baba Guru Nanak: A Saintly Bridge Between Hinduism and Islam
By Mehdi Hasan
If anti-Semitism is the world’s oldest hatred, perhaps Islamophobia is the world’s weirdest.
How else to explain the fact that a pandemic of global and historic proportions, a novel coronavirus that is infecting people in almost every country and territory on Earth, has been weaponized by the far right to attack … Islam and Muslims?
Take India, where the spread of the virus has been dubbed a “corona jihad” by supporters of the far-right BJP government; they claim the pandemic is a conspiracy by Muslims to infect and poison Hindus. The government itself has blamed around a third of India’s confirmed Covid-19 cases on a gathering held in Delhi by a conservative Muslim missionary group called the Tablighi Jamaat; one BJP minister called it a “Talibani crime.” As The Guardian reports, “Muslims have now seen their businesses across India boycotted, volunteers distributing rations called ‘coronavirus terrorists’, and others accused of spitting in food and infecting water supplies with the virus. Posters have appeared barring Muslims from entering certain neighbourhoods in states as far apart as Delhi, Karnataka, Telangana and Madhya Pradesh.” There have even been reports of Indian Muslims being attacked, beaten, and lynched.
Did members of the Tablighi Jamaat behave recklessly? Yes. Do all of India’s 200 million Muslims bear responsibility for their behavior? No. “Virtually overnight,” wrote investigative journalist Rana Ayyub in the Washington Post, “Muslims became the sole culprits responsible for the spread of the coronavirus in India.”
But it isn’t just Hindu nationalist politicians or mobs. The country’s respectable press have joined in too. The left-leaning newspaper The Hindu published a cartoon showing the world being held hostage by the coronavirus — with the virus itself depicted wearing clothing associated with Muslims. (The paper later apologized for its “completely unintentional” decision to link the crisis to Muslim terrorists, and replaced it with a more neutral image.)
Dr. Zia H Shah, Chief Editor of the Muslim Times
Suggested reading by Zia H Shah MD, Chief Editor of the Muslim Times
Baba Guru Nanak: A Saintly Bridge Between Hinduism and Islam
Muslims Should Kill Islamophobia With Kindness
All of humanity are intimate neighbors: Coronavirus proves it once again
BBC: Recreating Muslim sailors’ first voyages to Australia
Growing Islamophobia ‘intolerable,’ UN chief Guterres says
Video: A Christian Scholar About the Quran — The Muslim Times Applauding Garry Wills for Promoting Tolerance
Categories: America, Americas, Asia, Europe, Islam, Islamophobia, The Muslim Times
The Islamophobia gang in India uses COVID-19 as an opportunity to push further their Anti-Muslims agendas and by circulating rumours fake news and in all possible ways blaming Muslims for its spread they are baying for the blood of India’s persecuted community.
What people need to understand is that if Muslims are truly the mastermind behind this pandemic, then they would’ve at least thought out their plan better so that their “own kind” would’t be dying in the process. Unfortunately, this virus, unlike the ignorant people of this world, does not discriminate; Muslims are as much of a victim of this virus as other humans.
Islamophobia has gotten to a point where people will make any excuse to antagonize Muslims. Conveniently, it is the same religion that is mocked that offers practical methods to cope with crises like this.
Islamophobia has caused people to adopt such a negative perspective towards Muslims, that in a crisis like this when Muslims are providing their sincere help they are still seen through the wrong light.
Unfortunately when an opportunity arises for any hate or discrimination towards Muslims people are all in. Usually half or more of the story is false and Muslims once again get put under the limelight.
There are Christian’s out and about during this pandemic. There are Hindus out and about as well. And yes, there are also muslims who are out and not taking the virus seriously. But blaming a whole religion for the issues caused by a few is an unacceptable thing. Many muslims are taking the quarantine seriously and have not left their houses for months. Simply magnifying the bad out of the good is not how one should see another. Focus on what people are doing right and emphasize that.