Rise in Number of Muslim Women Reporting Hate Crimes in UK in Past Two Years
The number of women wearing the Niqab, face veil, reporting hate crimes has doubled in the past two years. These statistics have been provided by TELL MAMA, a national project which measures anti-Muslim incidents. They claim there has been a 5-10% increase in the past 18 months.
Director of TELL MAMA, Fiyaz Mughal, stated he is unsure whether hate crimes are becoming more prevalent or reporting has increased. “Over the last two years our data has shown that women suffer more incidents of hate and they also suffer more aggressive incidents of hate,” she said.
“The veil seems to delegitimise the sense of femininity of that person in the eyes of the perpetrator.
“It seems to become something they become fixated upon rather than the individual, the female behind the veil.”
The research shows that women are mostly subject to verbal and physical attacks by men on the street. 21-year-old Yasmeen Khalid from Bromsgrove said that although she has always endured abuse, the problem has escalated recently. She admits that out of 30 different incidents she has been through she has only reported two and that wearing the hijab has made her a target.
“By looking, they instantly know I’m Muslim… sometimes people call me a terrorist, sometimes they say ‘Paki’, sometimes someone has called me ‘Taliban’ or stuff like that,” she said.
“Sometimes I walk off humiliated – I shouldn’t be humiliated but I am humiliated.
“Sometimes I speak up, sometimes I just cry, go away somewhere, and cry because I don’t know what to do.”
Another victim of abuse, Shalina Litt from Birmingham, shares her views, “Actually we are mothers, we are daughters, we are sisters,” she said.
“I really just hope that any mothers, any daughters etc., can speak to their sons and say actually it’s not right and we do need to change how we approach this.”
Mughal says there’s, “been an enormous shift in the language of anti-Muslim hate. International and national incidents create differences in the way narratives are set.”
However TELL MAMA state hate crimes are still under reported by Muslims, they aim to work with different agencies through community outreach and education.
