The amount of religious prejudice Muslims face in Western countries has drastically increased. Before classifying terrorist as “horrible Muslims” who commit “horrible crimes” in foreign countries, it’s important to understand the factual reasons and underlying causes of terrorism rather than assuming the worst for the scapegoat. We tend to classify terrorists as radical Sunni Muslims and yet fail to understand that terrorists are an unimaginably violent and criminal group of people who use the religion of Islam as a “permissible” reason to bomb countries that do not follow their values/ideas/traditions. In reality,  the Quran clearly disapproves the use of any type of violence as a way to convert other human beings.

Many Westerners fail to understand terrorism is a movement against humanity, not other Muslims.

It’s hypocritical how in major Western cities, attacks such as in Boston, Paris, and San Bernardino are heavily covered in the media and yet attacks in Syria, Kabul, Lahore, and Istanbul in which hundreds are found dead are considered minor because the citizens of those countries are blamed for those tragedies. Clearly, this is a highly ignorant idea that has spread because of political candidates like Donald Trump.

The executive director of the Arab American Association of New York, Linda Sarsour, became a victim of a hate crime because of the terrorist group ISIS. Sarsour wrote on social media, “My deputy director and I were harassed by a bigoted drunk who hurled hateful Islamophobic and anti-Arab epithets…[he said] you are cutting people’s heads off, sharmoota, I’m going to cut off your head and see how you will feel, you Arab b…..’”

Ultimately, Muslims living in Western nations are faced with great amounts of prejudice and hatred simply for being Muslim. It is important for society to understand that terrorism should be fought by all of humanity together rather than blaming innocent Muslims who are fighting the same battle.

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