Some believe that prejudice against Muslims has increased since the September 11, 2001 attacks. Dr Abduljalil Sajid, an adviser to the Commission on British Muslims, an anti-racism group, has said he believes many organizations are "institutionally Islamophobic". He has said that "since the 11 September attacks the single most important concern has been Police harassment of Muslims. Even one of [Britain's] Muslim peers ... has been stopped twice by police." United Nations
Many human rights organizations have documented this recent increase in Islamophobic events and hate crimes against Muslims and Islamic organizations have done the same . Secretary-General Kofi Annan told a December 7, 2004 UN conference on the emergence of Islamophobia that "[w]hen the world is compelled to coin a new term to take account of increasingly widespread Bigotry - that is a sad and troubling development. Such is the case with 'Islamophobia'."
American journalist Stephen Schwartz has defined Islamophobia as the condemnation of the entirety of Islam and its history as extremist, denying the existence of a moderate Muslim majority, regarding Islam as a problem for the world, treating conflicts involving Muslims as necessarily their own fault, insisting that Muslims make changes to their religion, and inciting war against Islam as a whole.
The concept of Islamophobia has been questioned, with some commentators arguing that the term can also be used to censor legitimate criticism of Islam and of individuals.
The term 'Islamophobia' is a Neologism dating from the early 1990s and is formed with the suffix -phobia in a similar way to Xenophobia or Homophobia. As such, it reflects the influence of such 1990s movements as multi-culturalism and Identity politics. During this period, some sociologists and cultural analysts argued that there was a shift in forms of prejudice from ones based on race to ones based on notions of cultural superiority and otherness. [:Islamophobia}}#endnote_Seabrook] [:Islamophobia}}#endnote_Rudiger]
Actions and beliefs typically described as Islamophobic range from systematic discrimination to physical assault. Hate crimes against Muslims are commonly categorized as Islamophobic, as is inflammatory hate speech, and criticism. The UK Minister Peter Hain's statement that Britain's Muslim community is "isolationist" was met with accusations of Islamophobia, and Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi's statement that Western civilization is "superior" to Islam was similarly deemed Islamophobic.
The term most often appears in discourse on the condition of immigrant Muslims living as minorities in the United States, Europe, and Australia, although it has also been used in recent years in countries such as India, and occasionally in connection with non-immigrant Muslim communities or individuals. In the most prominent cases, however, experiences of immigrant communities of unemployment, rejection, alienation, and violence have allegedly combined with Islamophobia to make integration difficult. [:Islamophobia}}#endnote_Radman] It has been argued that this has led, in the United Kingdom for example, to Muslim communities suffering higher levels of unemployment, poor housing, poor health, and levels of racially motivated violence than other communities. [:Islamophobia}}#endnote_Malik]
After September 11, Given the strong association between Arabs and the religion of Islam, Islamophobia is often expressed as a form of anti-Arab racism, though not all Arabs are Muslim and the majority of Muslims are not Arab. Anti-Muslim bias has occasionally been expressed in violent attacks on Sikhs who were mistaken for Muslims on account of their distinctive turbans. Many human rights organizations have documented this recent trend of Islamophobic events and hate crimes against Muslims.
The Runnymede description of Islamophobia was accepted by the European Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia Citation needed and by numerous Muslim organizations such as FAIR UK, the forum against Islamophobia and racism. British columnist Josie Appleton criticized the definition and wrote:
This [Runnymede] report talked about a rising 'anti-Muslim prejudice' that needed addressing in policy. But the section titled 'The nature of Islamophobia' suggests a very broad notion of prejudice - examples of Islamophobia included people seeing Islam as inferior to the West, rather than just distinctively different; seeing Islam as monolithic and static, rather than diverse and progressive; seeing Islam as an enemy, rather than a partner to cooperate with (7). This also seemed to be founded on an over-sensitivity, an attempt to stem any kind of criticism of Islam. Rather than engage Muslims in debate, non-Muslims are supposed to tiptoe around them, for fear of causing offence. Since 11 September we have seen how this attitude can stifle discussion.
Religious politics scar India, Kashmir, Northern Ireland, Sri Lanka, Sudan ... the list of countries wrecked by religion is long. But the present danger is caused by Islamist theocracy … There is no point in pretending it is not so. Wherever Islam either is the government or bears down upon the government, it imposes harsh regimes that deny the most basic human rights.
Toynbee has rejected the label of "Islamophobe" and argued that her comments must be judged on their truth or falsity, not on the offence they might give to most members of the Muslim community.
Civil-rights activist Bahram Soroush views the term Islamophobia as a meaningless deflection. He claims the term is a means of avoiding legitimate criticism of Islam and Islamic history by means of name-calling, or is used to create the appearence of widespread hatred against Muslims.
Aside from this many Islamic organizations in the west have taken step forwards to correct certain misconceptions about Islam that have become more prevalent in the post-9/11 world.
(*) These articles do not specifically use the term 'Islamophobia'