CAIR Report Indicates Nearly 30 Percent Increase in Anti-Muslim Bias Incidents

September 18, 2006

Source: CAIR Press Release

http://www.cair.com/default.asp?Page=articleView&id=2270&theType=NR

On September 18, 2006 a CAIR Press Release reported, "A report released today by a prominent national Islamic civil rights and advocacy group indicates an almost 30 percent increase in the total number of complaints of anti-Muslim bias from 2004 to 2005.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations' (CAIR) report - the only annual study of its kind - outlines 1,972 incidents and experiences of anti-Muslim violence, discrimination and harassment in 2005, the highest number of civil rights cases ever recorded in the Washington-based group's annual report. (Hundreds of anti-Muslim incidents reported immediately following the 9/11 attacks were detailed in a separate report.) According to the study, called 'The Struggle for Equality,' that figure is a 29.6 percent jump over the preceding year's total of 1,522 cases.

CAIR also received 153 reports of anti-Muslim hate crime complaints, an 8.6 percent increase from the 141 complaints received in 2004. As in past years, CAIR said factors contributing to the sharp increase in reported incidents included the lingering impact of post-9/11 fears, increased awareness of civil rights issues in the Muslim community and a general increase in anti-Muslim rhetoric in American society.

'We believe the biggest factor contributing to anti-Muslim feeling and the resulting acts of bias is the growth in Islamophobic rhetoric that has flooded the Internet and talk radio in the post-9/11 era,' said CAIR Legal Director Arsalan Iftikhar, the report's author."