More than 8,000 anti-Muslim complaints were recorded across the United States last year, the highest number in the 30 years the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) has been tracking complaints.
in that reportCAIR announced on Tuesday that it had received 8,061 complaints of anti-Muslim incidents, surpassing the previous record in 2021, when 6,720 incidents were reported. This number represents a 56 percent increase from 2022, the first year CAIR began tracking complaints in 1995 when the number of complaints declined.
According to the report, CAIR received the highest number of complaints in the last three months of the year, accounting for 44% of the total number of complaints for the year.
CAIR, a leading Muslim advocacy nonprofit, links the year-end spike to the domestic fallout from Israel’s war with the Palestinian militant group Hamas.
The conflict began in October after the group launched a surprise attack on southern Israel, killing about 1,200 people and taking 250 hostages. About 100 of the hostages were returned to Israel during a week-long ceasefire in December, and another 100 are believed to still be alive in Gaza.
Over the past five months, Israel has launched a retaliatory military operation to destroy Hamas, the US-designated terrorist organization that has controlled the Gaza Strip since 2007. More than 32,800 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since early October. According to the Gaza Ministry of Health, Meanwhile, aid groups say hundreds of thousands of people face running out of food, water and medicine.
CAIR noted that the three-month spike in complaints saw the highest number of complaints at 3,578, with employment discrimination being the leading cause of complaints, followed by hate crimes and incidents, and education discrimination. did.
Tensions quickly spread beyond the Middle East in early October, and pro-Palestinian and pro-Israel protests increased in the United States and across Western countries in the months that followed. Some of these protests took place on university campuses, where students and administrators were faced with addressing issues of free speech and the language used by both sides.
“Employers, universities and schools must suppress the speech of those who speak out against Israel’s onslaught of genocide in Gaza and who seek to draw attention to the human rights of Palestinians, especially Muslims, Arabs and Palestinians. It was one of the main actors.”
The report mentions various schools that have banned Palestinian student groups from their campuses following the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war. along with the report Rate of employers not hiring prospects because of their activities against Palestinians.
Immigration and asylum cases accounted for the highest number of total complaints last year. CAIR claimed that cases “may be delayed or deliberately stalled due to fears that individuals may be ‘terrorists’ or ‘engaged in terrorist activities.'” .
CAIR has cataloged a series of high-profile anti-Muslim incidents nearly a week after the October 7 attacks, including the alleged murder of a 6-year-old Palestinian American and the attempted murder of his mother in Illinois. . The nonprofit also pointed to a Georgia teacher who was charged in December with threatening to behead a 13-year-old Muslim student who he said was offended by an Israeli flag in his classroom.
CAIR said last month’s three-month spike saw more complaints than in the months following former President Trump’s travel ban, which targeted several Muslim-majority countries (about half, or about 1,813). , he pointed out.
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