London - Asharq Al-Awsat

A total of 685 reports of racially aggravated incidents, with 608 being anti-Muslim in nature, were recorded between January and June 2018, a report revealed.

The report published on Thursday by Tell MAMA (Measuring Anti-Muslim Attacks), a group which records anti-Muslim incidents in the UK, found that the majority of the 608 incidents occurred on the streets.

The group said offline attacks make 45.3 percent of reported incidents, that means they occurred in-person between a victim and a perpetrator, or include acts of property damage or discrimination.

However, the report found that incidents of an online nature totaled 34.207 percent, of verified cases in this reporting period, with the majority (59 percent) taking place on Twitter and the rest taking place on Facebook and other social media platforms.

Other than publishing the general data on Islamophobia, the report also focused on the gendered nature of anti-Muslim hate crimes, with 58 percent of victims being Muslim women.

The analysis reveals how Muslim women who wear hijab are seen as “others” in society and that due to the visibility of the headscarf, the stereotype that Muslim women are weak, meek and submissive is heavily enforced, thus allowing such attacks to occur against Muslim women more than against their male counterparts.

“Such acts of hatred, discrimination, and racism are not solely the actions of violent bigots who exist on the margins of society – we must instead examine the everyday nature of Islamophobia which curtails the agency and mobility of Muslims when they access public transport, go shopping, are at work, or traveling on holiday,” revealed the report.

In April 2018, the “punish a Muslim day” campaign saw Islamophobic literature that threatened violence against Muslims, mailed to Muslim MPs, mosques, businesses, and ordinary British Muslims.