The latest attacks on a mosque and the community in Toronto “have once again shown that Muslims are being targeted by people with deadly intentions”, a Canadian Sociologist has said, days after a man of Indian-origin drove his vehicle into a faithful.
The comments by Dr Jasmin Zine, a lecturer at the Department of Sociology at Wilfrid Laurier University in the city of Waterloo, come in the wake of the attack on the Markham Islamic Society Mosque in the York region in Canada on April 6.
The attacker, Sharan Karunakaran, first insulted the mosque’s congregation during morning prayers, then proceeded to tear the holy Quran and drove his car into a Muslim man at the mosque parking lot. Karunakaran fled after the incident but was arrested by the local police a few days later.
Zine explains that the first attack on April 6 triggered another “seemingly unrelated hate crime” when another assailant, identified as Mohssen Bayani, entered the parking lot of a separate mosque, got out of his car and began harassing worshippers on April 9.
“Both the attacks took place during the holy month of Ramadan when Muslims spend most of their time in mosques,” she says, adding that Montreal police are investigating yet another man who entered the Al-Omah Al-Islamiah Mosque with a stone.
Evaluating the anti-Muslim discourse and actions that set the scene for the attacks, Zine explained that hatred against Muslims “in Canada has reached deadly dimensions”.
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While it is not yet known whether the perpetrators of the attacks are linked to any anti-Muslim hate groups, “they may have been inspired by the Islamophobic rhetoric and anti-Muslim disinformation campaigns spread by these groups on social media,” according to Zine.
"There are many examples of anti-Muslim racism, from deadly hate crimes and mosque vandalism to systemic discrimination in employment,” Zine says, noting that there has been an increase in anti-Muslim incidents in Canada in recent years.
On January 29, 2017, six Muslim men were shot dead at the Quebec City Mosque after evening prayers. This was followed by another attack in Ontario on June 6, 2021, when a truck mowed down four members of a Canadian Muslim family of Pakistani descent.
“Both attacks were carried out by men with white nationalist beliefs,” Zine adds.
She underlines that anti-Muslim sentiments are spread through social media, adding that globally the hateful sentiments “continue to thrive through anti-Muslim horror stories and conspiracy theories that are widely circulated online, reinforced by negative tropes that portray Muslims as a threat to Western society and civilisation”.
According to Zine, government policies and practices that target Muslims as potential security threats or characterise them as incompatible with secular democracy also create moral panic about the Muslim presence in Western countries.
“In Quebec, there is Law 21, which prohibits civil servants from wearing religious clothing, and security practices by the Canada Revenue Agency that monitors Muslim charities ... These policies and practices need to end, given their harmful effects on society.”
