Washington:
Data from an advocacy group revealed on Tuesday that reported incidents of discrimination and violence against Muslims and Palestinians in the US in 2023 reached a new high, fueled by an increase in bigotry and Islamophobia as Israel’s war on Gaza raged late in the year.
In 2023, there were 8,061 complaints, up 56% from the previous year and the most since the Council on American-Islamic Relations started keeping track of them almost 30 years ago. According to CAIR, over 3,600 of those occurrences happened between October and December.
Human rights activists have also noted an increase in antisemitism, Islamophobia, and anti-Palestinian prejudice worldwide following the most recent escalation of hostilities in the Middle East.
A number of US events have been reported, including the murder of 6-year-old Palestinian American Wadea Al-Fayoume in Illinois in October, the shooting death of three students in Vermont in November, and the stabbing death of a Palestinian American man in Texas in February.
According to CAIR’s study, there was a “resurgence of anti-Muslim hate” in 2023, following the first-ever yearly decline in complaints in 2022. These occurrences occurred on average 500 times per month in the first nine months of 2023, but in the final quarter, that number shot up to about 1,200 times per month.
“The primary force behind this wave of heightened Islamophobia was the escalation of violence in Israel and Palestine in October 2023,” the paper stated.
According to CAIR, the most common complaint categories in 2023 were immigration and asylum, employment discrimination, hate crimes, and discrimination in education.
On October 7, Israel was assaulted by the Palestinian rebel organization Hamas. According to the local health ministry, Israel’s following military assault on Gaza resulted in almost 32,000 deaths, forced virtually all of the 2.3 million residents to flee, left the region on the verge of starvation, and sparked accusations of genocide—which Israel disputes—as well as other consequences.
According to CAIR, it examined videos and statements made in public, as well as reports from emails, calls, and an online complaint system. It got in touch with folks whose stories ended up in the papers.
