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TORONTO – Members of Canada’s Muslim community came forward Tuesday to say that Raed Jasar and Chiheb Esseghaier were not in any way representative of the larger Muslim community in Canada.

Jasar and Esseghaier were taken into custody Monday and have been charged with allegedly attempting to attack a railway between New York and Toronto.

Little is known about the two suspects: Jasar had previously operated an unsuccessful limousine company and Esseghaier worked as a researcher in Montreal.

But both suspects have been identified as Muslim and Tuesday prominent members of the Canadian Muslim community stepped forward to denounce violent extremism.

“It’d be sticking your head in the sand if you don’t acknowledge that fact that these individuals identify themselves or are identified as Muslims,” Ihsaan Gardee, Executive Director of the Canadian Council on American-Islamic Relation (CAIR.CAN) said Tuesday, adding that mainstream Muslim beliefs do not promote violence.

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“The harm that they were plotting doesn’t discriminate, so we’re just relieved period that they were stopped period before anything could happen,” Gardee said.

Jasar, who was living near Victoria Park Avenue and Finch Avenue in Scarborough at the time of his arrest, went to a nearby mosque every morning with his wife, Global News has learned.

Officers said Monday that it was a tip from Toronto’s Muslim community that initiated the investigation into the two suspects.

University of Waterloo Professor Lorne Dawson said homegrown terrorism has been a priority for Canadian security officials for the last five years.

Community leaders said the inroads made by the RCMP to Canada’s Muslim communities in recent years has helped make the community more comfortable in reporting people to law enforcement officials.

“They’re actually going there, giving speeches, interacting with the community, so they’ve built in inroads,” Muhammed Robert Heft, a local community leader said. “So it’s not just individuals who call a 1-800 number; now they have sort of the eyes and ears on the ground, and that’s basically what we are.”

Negative stereotypes continue

Gardee said he’s confident the majority of Canadians know the two suspects “are in no way representative of the vast majority of Canadian Muslims.”

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However, vandalism, discrimination, harassment and physical assaults do tend to spike after high-profile arrests of Muslims allegedly involved in terrorism.

Within hours of the Boston Marathon bombings, “Muslims” was trending on Twitter with many arguments sparked about the potential religion of the yet-to-be-named suspects.

After 9/11, there was a spike in racism against Muslims worldwide.

And the assaults and harassment stemming from racism is not limited to outside of Canadian borders.

Following last week’s Boston Marathon bombings, Muslims in Toronto bore the brunt of negative stereotypes.

“Usually, when media speaks about it in a certain way, there’s backlash,” said Hamid Slimi, the chairman of the Canadian Council of Imams.

“A lot of f-words, ‘go back to where you came from,’” are the usual abuses hurled at Canadian Muslims despite many of them being born in Canada.

Slimi added that a Toronto woman was allegedly beaten on the subway soon after the Boston Marathon bombings because of her religion.

According to Statistics Canada the rate of hate crimes motivated by religion dropped by 17 per cent from 2009 to 2010.

But metropolitan areas with the highest rates of hate-crimes were all in Ontario.

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You can get more of Global’s up-to-the-minute coverage of the VIA Rail terror plot by clicking here.

– With files from Anna Mehler Paperny and Mike Drolet