An alarming picture of the physical violence, intimidation and discrimination faced by many of Britain’s two million Muslims on a daily basis, was portrayed yesterday in new academic research.
The 224-page report from the European Muslim Research Centre, based at the University of Exeter, said that the bulk of incidents went unreported by communities who had lost faith in the authorities to do anything about them.
EDL protestors confront police in Dudley, July 2010
Three men have been arrested this morning in connection with an English Defence League protest in Dudley Town Centre.
Police executed warrants across Dudley and Walsall as part of their ongoing investigation into criminal damage and disorder following the EDL protest and counter protest by the Dudley Interfaith Alliance on July 17.
The men, aged 18, 20 and 26, were arrested on suspicion of violent disorder. They were questioned by police before being released on bail pending further enquiries.
A number of criminal offences have been recorded to date from the protests, including criminal damage caused to cars and premises in the town including homes, businesses and the Hindu Temple.
Market towns pose a threat to small Muslim communities
Muslims and their mosques face a higher level of threats and intimidation in UK suburbs and market towns than in big cities, according to a new report. Case studies reveal that examples such as a Muslim woman who was punched and called a “terrorist” in front of her petrified daughter are not uncommon.
Such attacks often go unreported, and in this case the woman was too scared to inform the police. She also played down the incident to reduce her child’s distress, and avoided explaining why she was singled out for wearing a burka and being a Muslim woman.
A Muslim academy in Portsmouth has been the target of two hate crimes in the past fortnight, police have said. In the first incident, a brick with a racist message on it was thrown into the Portsmouth Muslim Academy, on Old Commercial Road, on 13 November. A beer bottle was then thrown through a window at the front of the building last Friday.
The city’s Jami Mosque was also targeted twice in two days on 12 and 13 November. The mosque was first attacked a day after an Islamic group, Muslims Against Crusades, burned remembrance poppies in London during a two-minute silence to mark the anniversary of Armistice Day. A poppy was subsequently painted on the front of the mosque, on Victoria Road North in Southsea, and 100 people staged a demonstration outside.
The mosque’s imam, Muhammad Muhi Uddin, said he had condemned the poppy burning and was mystified as to why the building had been targeted. One man was arrested on suspicion of a public order offence.
Police said they were treating the incidents of criminal damage at the Portsmouth Muslim Academy as hate crimes. Insp Fiona Quade, of Hampshire Constabulary, said: “My officers regularly conduct patrols in the area around Old Commercial Road, but if you saw what happened, could identify a suspect or know who did this, please get in touch. We’ve already got an investigation ongoing into the disorder at demonstrations outside the Jami Mosque.”
Police patrols are to be stepped up around Preston’s mosques on Saturday as around 1,200 protesters head into the city to take part in two demonstrations.
Chief Supt Tim Jacques, head of Preston Police, revealed the plans ahead of the demonstration by the English Defence League and counter demonstration by Unite Against Facism and the Trade Union Council.
Police officers’ days off have been cancelled and specially trained public order officers are being drafted in from other parts of the county to support the policing operation, which will see the mounted branch, road police and other units taking to city centre streets.
Today Chief Supt Jacques said it would be one of the biggest police operations seen in Preston in recent years but insisted the city was “open for business as usual” on Saturday – the fourth week before Christmas and the first official Christmas shopping weekend.
He said: “We are working with the community and police officers are going to be in the areas where the mosques are on Saturday to reassure people. We have had lots of meetings with the mosques and are working with the demonstration organisers in terms of minimising the impact. There are no planned demonstrations outside any mosques but it is in our minds.”
Lancashire Evening Post, 23 November 2010
Details of the Unite Against Fascism protest can be found here.
Update: It is good that the police appear to have accepted that the EDL represents a violent threat to the Muslim community in Preston – previously they argued that the EDL is a peaceful, non-racist organisation. This reluctance to recognise the real character of the EDL is unfortunately not restricted to the police in Lancashire. See also the Morning Star, which reports that the new head of police domestic extremist units, DCS Adrian Tudway, has claimed that the EDL is not a far-right group.
Masked men threw bottles of beer and urinated on a mosque following a march against Muslim extremism.
Bacon was also left on cars near Kingston Mosque during the attack by a group of 10-15 youths on Sunday.
Kingston Mosque claimed baseball bats were also used in the incident on East Road, but this was not confirmed by police. However officers did recover two pieces of wood near the scene.
A German Muslim leader on Saturday called for better protection of mosques across the country in the wake of the latest arson attack on Berlin’s largest mosque, IRNA office in Berlin reported.
Talking to reporters, the Chairman of the Central Council of Muslims Aiman Mazyek said, “Rarely does a week go by without an attack on a mosque.” “The current terror hysteria exacerbates this climate … and strengthens those people who plans such attacks,” he added.
Mazyek was referring to Friday’s arson attack on the Sehitlik mosque, the fourth of its kind on the worshipping house over the past six months.
The Muslim activist lambasted also Berlin’s interior senator, Ehrhart Koerting for suggesting that Arabs based in Germany were potential terror suspects. Mazyek urged Koerting to step up the protection of mosques in Berlin instead of making such ‘imprudent’ statements.
Last week, in connection with the current terror alert in Germany, Ehrhart Koerting advised Berlin residents to notify officials if they encountered new neighbours who were “strange-looking” or “only speak Arabic or another foreign language that we don’t understand”. As Die Welt observed: “Such neighbours certainly could not have been the terrorists behind the September 11 attacks. They were very Western in appearance and spoke good English or German.”
See also “Muslims victim of suspicion in Germany, says leader”, DPA, 20 November 2010
A fire at Berlin’s largest mosque was probably arson, police said Friday. The fire, which was spotted in the early hours by an employee of the Sehitlik mosque, damaged the facade and one window. Nobody was injured.
Police said their investigations were focusing on an unexploded bottle of propane gas, found by the building. They think the bottle was transported to the mosque in a black rucksack, on a pushcart.
The employee who spotted the fire, at 6:15am (0515 GMT), was able to extinguish it.
The Sehitlik mosque is in the inner-city Berlin district of Neukoelln where many Muslims live. It has room for 1,500 people.
A man who was jailed for two years for ripping off a Muslim woman’s veil in Glasgow city centre has lost his appeal. William Baikie, 28, had claimed that the prison term he was given after admitting the assault at Glasgow Central Station was excessive. But judges at the Court of Criminal Appeal in Edinburgh ruled that a sheriff was entitled to impose the punishment he selected.
Lord Osborne, who heard the appeal with Lord Reed, said Sheriff Lindsay Wood had described the crime as “appalling and deeply intrusive”. The senior judge said: “We are not of the view that that is an overstatement of the character of the offence. We consider that it would require little imagination on the part of anyone to foresee what the likely effect would be of committing an offence of this kind, particularly in the circumstances in which we live.”
Baikie, described as a prisoner in Glasgow’s Barlinnie jail, earlier pled guilty to forcibly tearing off Anwar Alqahtani’s hijab on April 27 this year in a racially aggravated assault at Hope Street.
The married 26-year-old victim, from Saudi Arabia, was studying for a masters degree in English after arriving in Scotland in January. She was entering Glasgow’s Central Station when Baikie came up beside her, seized the veil and tore it from her face before throwing it away. He then ran off. The victim’s hijab was torn and she had to use a piece of cloth to cover her face before catching her train and arriving home very upset.
Staff at an Indian restaurant in Bridgwater believe they are being targeted on religious and racist grounds following a spate of attacks.
This week a man was convicted for religiously aggravated criminal damage and provocation of violence at the Spice Club in Eastover. But there have been further reports of an assault on a waiter, racial abuse and criminal damage. Waiter Mehbub Kamali, 19, who claims he was punched on one occasion, told the Mercury: “I have been attacked for no other reason than the colour of my skin.”
Last Tuesday, Sedgemoor Magistrates heard how Ashley Wilson [pictured], 24, smashed a glass pane at the restaurant and threatened to cut waiters’ faces because they served Halal meat. The court heard he asked Mr Kamali and Sultan Ahmet “Are you Muslim?” When they said yes, he said “I’m going to cut your face” and that it was “because I’m EDL [English Defence League].”
Mr Kamali said: “It’s happening again and again and it’s terrifying. I wonder what’s next?”
Wilson, of Claremont Grove, admitted the attack on September 26 and was ordered to carry out 100 hours of unpaid work and to pay £165 compensation and £85 costs. In mitigation, Crispin Hayllar said he had drunk too much and acted out of character.
Police confirmed this week that a 16-year-old and a 17-year-old were arrested on suspicion of criminal damage for an attack on the restaurant on November 3, and have been released on bail.