A young Muslim today told how he was assaulted by a crowbar-wielding man shouting racist abuse in an attack he fears was linked to Brexit.

Trainee accountant Adil, 23, was attacked in his BMW in Leyton by a stranger just after midnight on Wednesday as he drove his friend back from a Clapton mosque.

The white man, aged in his 40s, attacked him with a metal pole, smashing his windscreen.

He drove off before the man then allegedly tried to attack a Somalian taxi driver whilst shouting racist abuse about Muslims.

An off-duty security guard, who had been in a car behind Adil, tackled the man, handcuffing him and pinning him face down on the floor until police arrived.

Adil told the Standard the man seemed in a “relaxed manner” before he peered into his car.

He said: “He looked at my face and for a split second I saw his eyes light up. He started to run straight at me.

“He was coming towards me brandishing this metal pole in the air in front of him, I knew I was in trouble.

“I didn’t have time to think. I turned to my friend said “He’s got a weapon”, I didn’t know what to do.”

A motorbike coming from behind managed to swerve into the other lane and avoid the on-rushing man.

Adil swerved his black BMW into the other lane to follow the motorcyclist but the attacker swung the weapon smashing the front windscreen, showering them with broken glass.

Adil drove off before returning to the scene to learn he had been hurling racist abuse and trying to attack other drivers before he was arrested.

He said: “I was terrified. The whole thing replays in my mind over and over.

“I’m glad nobody was hurt this is the time where everyone comes out of the nearby mosques, there were loads of people around.

“Since Brexit there seems to be a rise in these attacks and people need to look out for each other no matter who it is.”

He added: "There is always a chance incidents like this can rise after the Brexit vote because of the way the people tried to portray certain parts of the community.

"I think it's always a risk but there's a higher risk of attacks now because a lot of the people who hold racist views believe 52 per cent of the country is with them. Of course that's wrong."

David Cameron has said extra cash for security measures will be available as part of a fresh push to “drive appalling hate crimes” out of Britain.

Reports of hate crime have soared by 57 per cent in the wake of the Brexit vote, according to the National Police Chiefs Council.

While Monitoring group Tell Mama published a report yesterday recording 437 anti-Muslim crimes in 2015 compared to 146 in 2014.

Shahid Malik, chairman of monitoring group Tell Mama, said: “With the backdrop of the Brexit vote and the spike in racist incidents that seems to be emerging, the Government should be under no illusions: things could quickly become extremely unpleasant for Britain’s minorities.”

A Met spokesman said: “We were called to Church Road at 12.45am on Wednesday morning to reports of a man almost smashing a car window.

“A man in his mid-40s was arrested for possibly possessing an offensive weapon.”

* Adil's surname has been removed on request.