After the killing of 6 men in deadly shooting at a Sikh temple, a mosque burned to the ground in the Midwestern United States. The building was completely destroyed. The blaze followed an attack on July 4, when an unidentified suspect threw a petrol bomb onto the roof of the same mosque, causing minor damage. The mosque’s surveillance cameras captured an image of the assailant’s face, and the FBI recently offered a $50,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of the man behind the July incident, but no one has been apprehended. Ironically, an advocate of Washington-based ‘Sikh Coalition’ said that Sikhs are not Muslims, but their long beards and turbans often cause them to be mistaken for Muslims.
This growing indiscrimination against Muslims and hate crimes against them in the west needs to be challenged. It is important to mention here that during the aftermath of September 11, media has increasingly been criticized for supporting negative stereotypes against Muslims, instigating hate attacks on Muslims and preventing them from attaining their rights. Vicious attacks against Muslims reached its climax in US-Israeli Media. Islamophobia is growing and spreading prejudice against Muslims in the US and is being repeated in Europe and elsewhere also. Unfortunately, American Muslims face a rising tide of religious discrimination in U.S. communities, workplaces and schools nearly a decade after the September 11 attacks.
