As the U.S. paused Sunday to mark the 21st anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, the Iran Fars news agency claimed Muslim Americans suffer daily from the ramifications of Islamophobia sparked by the terrorists’ deadly work on the World Trade Center in New York.
Disrespect continues to be a overwhelming problem for U.S. Muslims, according to a published article on the Fars site, with former President Donald Trump labelled as a chief cause for the lack embrace of Islam and its followers.
“Muslims continue to be the target of hate, bullying, and discrimination as a result of the stereotypes that were perpetuated by Islamophobes and the media in the years following the 9/11 attacks,” Hussam Ayloush, executive director of the Los Angeles chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, told the outlet.
“Twenty-one years after the attacks, Muslims continue to face the threat of targeted violence,” Ayloush further claimed.
After September 11, Ayloush continued, there was “a perfect storm of the American people and its government needing a common ‘enemy’.”
Police officers rush to help after terrorists crashed two planes into the World Trade Center on Tuesday, September 11, 2001. In a horrific sequence of destruction, terrorists hijacked two airliners and crashed them into the World Trade Center in a coordinated series of attacks that brought down the twin 110-story towers. (AP Photo/Diane Bondareff)
“The unfortunate reality is there are people and organisations that benefit from perpetuating Islamophobia, bigotry, and war,” he said.
Zahra Jamal, associate director of Rice University’s Boniuk Institute for Religious Tolerance in Houston, told Fars some 62 percent of Muslims report feeling religion-based hostility and 65 percent felt disrespected by others.
“That’s almost three times the percentage among Christians,” said Jamal, adding, “Internalised Islamophobia is more prevalent among younger Muslims who have faced anti-Muslim tropes in popular culture, news, social media, political rhetoric, and in policy. This negatively impacts their self-image and mental health.”
She said the numbers related to discrimination against Muslims are alarming and show just how much Islamophobia has increased in the U.S. over the past 20 years.
Firefighters salute each other outside the FDNY Engine 10, Ladder 10 fire station near the commemoration ceremony on the 21st anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terror attacks on Sunday, Sept. 11, 2022 in New York. (AP Photo/Stefan Jeremiah)
First responders stand in a driving rain as a U.S. flag is unfurled at the Pentagon in Washington, Sunday, Sept. 11, 2022, at sunrise on the morning of the 21st anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)
People gather on Cedar Street by the perimeter of the commemoration ceremony during a moment of silence on the 21st anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terror attacks on Sunday, Sept. 11, 2022 in New York. (AP Photo/Stefan Jeremiah)
Ayloush said the U.S. statistics “were not surprising considering the current volatile political climate in the U.S. perpetuated by former President Donald Trump during his term in office.”
“Trump’s presidency normalised being an anti-Muslim bigot. He made it socially acceptable to be overtly anti-Muslim,” Ayloush alleged.
“Besides constantly retweeting anti-Muslim rhetoric from Islamophobic entities from his now-permanently suspended Twitter account and stating during his campaign that he thinks ‘Islam hates us’, he also made multiple xenophobic commentary and policies about Muslim immigrants and refugees … with very little regard to their discriminatory intent,” she added.
Fars went on to further claim the U.S. is a natural home to discrimination against minorities.
It claimed the U.S. has a long history of “dehumanising and marginalising” ethnic and religious groups, including Native Americans, African Americans, Jews, and Asian Americans.