Fires of Hate: Tremendous Rise in Islamophobia

The NY Islamic Center, two blocks away from Ground Zero (where the Twin Towers used to stand prior to the September 11 attacks) , has been the cause of growing fear of Islam; which is the fruit of a poisonous controversy that has been only growing bigger.

The number of hate crimes against American Muslims is increasing by the day, especially since plans to build the mosque and a 13 story Center in Manhattan, New York.

According to Press TV, on August 22, around 1,000 people demonstrated at Park Place in New York against plans to construct the Islamic center.
According to Ibrahim Hooper, spokesperson for the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), there has been an opposition to mosques nationwide not only in NY City.

"We have seen hate vandalism at two mosques in California, we have seen now an arson attack on a mosque in Tennessee, so I think we are starting to see the poison fruits of this hate rhetoric that was generated by this Manhattan controversy," Hooper says.

"A protest will occur this Friday in front of the California mosque and the protestors are suggesting that dogs be brought during the Friday prayers so Muslims are offended. So we see a tremendous rise in the level of Islamophobia." He added.

According to Hooper, the 13 story building is a community center to be used by Muslims and people from other faith.

In an interview with Russian TV, Hooper said that the rise in anti-Islam incidents in the US stems from a combination of factors, though it is mainly the right wing politicians that are "stoking the fires of hate" against Muslims.

There have also been reports of suspicious fires at two mosques in Tennessee and Florida, one of which the FBI is investigating as a hate crime, says CAIR spokesman Ibrahim Hooper.

Adding fuel to the fire were plans by an evangelical Church to burn Islam's holy book of Quran on the ninth anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist incidents in a supposed effort to commemorate victims and take a stand against Islam.