Muslim New Yorkers have gathered for prayer services at Washington Square Park for years during the Eid holidays, showcasing the city’s diverse religious and ethnic backgrounds.
Right-wing influencers have been revealing photos of the gatherings this year, portraying them as a heinous “invasion” of the Muslim American candidate for mayor of New York City Zohran Mamdani.
Asad Dandia, a local historian and Muslim American activist who backs Mamdani’s campaign, called the fear-mongering “insane.” “I believe our leadership and the community are aware that we are currently on the radar.”
In response to Mamdani’s victory in the Democratic primary, Muslim Americans in New York and elsewhere in the country reported a rise in Islamophobic rhetoric.
Advocates claim that the wave of hateful comments shows that bigotry in the US is still tolerated despite having resisted in recent years.
Dandia said, “The more things change, the more they stay the same.”
Islam is not a religion, according to the statement.
Mamdani and his identity are being attacked by a number of unidentified online anti-Muslim people, including anonymous internet users and online anti-Muslim activists. A flurry of politicians, some of whom are in President Donald Trump’s orbit, has sprung up.
While Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene posted a cartoon of the Statue of Liberty wearing a burqa on X, Congressman Randy Fine went as far as to suggest that Mamdani would install a “caliphate” in New York City without supporting any evidence.
The mayoral candidate was attacked by former NSA agent Michael Flynn, who claimed Islam is a “not a religion” and was a political ideology.
While right-wing commentator Angie Wong told CNN that New York residents are “concerned about their safety, living here with a Muslim mayor,” conservative activist Charlie Kirk made reference to the attacks on September 11 and called Mamdani a “Muslim Maoist.”
The mayoral candidate was baselessly called a “jihadist Muslim” by far-right activist Laura Loomer, a trusted advisor to Trump, making blatant claims that he has connections to both Iran and the Muslim Brotherhood.
And Andy Ogles, a Republican representative, wrote to the DOJ to request that Mamdani’s citizenship be revoked and that he be deported.
Congressman Brandon Gill called on him to “go back to the Third World” on Sunday by posting a video of Mamdani eating biryani with his hand. He claimed that “civilized people” in the US “don’t eat like this.”
calls for condemnation
Shahana Hanif, a member of the New York City Council, said, “I’m getting flashbacks from after September 11”. “When I was a kid, bigotry and Islamophobia still haunt me as a child,” I recall.
In a race focused on her support for Palestinian rights and calls for a ceasefire in Gaza, Hanif, who represents a district in Brooklyn, comfortably won re-election last week.
She claimed for Al Jazeera that Mamdani’s victory will derail the progressive drive that led to his Democratic nomination.
There is “so much more work to do” in the US to eradicate racism, Hanif said, adding that any comments that are offensive should be condemned across the political spectrum.
While a number of Democrats have criticized the Mamdani campaign, some influential New Yorkers have not made official statements on the subject.
In a statement, US Senator Chris Van Hollen said, “We should all be disgusted by the flood of anti-Muslim remarks spewed in the wake of Zohran Mamdani’s victory in the NYC mayoral primary. Some of them were blatant, and others were latent.
“Shame on Congress members and anyone who doesn’t object to such bigotry.”
Trump and Muslims who support them
Democratic Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, a representative from New York, has also been accused of promoting bigotry against Mamdani. She falsely claimed last week that Mamdani had “references to global jihad.”
Later, her office later revealed to US media that she was “misspoke” and that Mamdani’s refusal to support the use of the Arabic word “uprising” to call for activism.
The chant’s critics claimed that because it invoked the late 1980s and early 2000s, which saw both peaceful opposition and armed struggle against the Israeli occupation, that it makes Jews feel unsafe.
While Mamdani, who is of South Asian descent, put his support for Palestinian rights at the center of criticism against him, he was criticized for making New York affordable. Since the election, it appears that he has assumed a Muslim identity in the attacks, particularly those against the right.
Following Trump’s and his supporters’ courting of Muslim voters last year, there has been a backlash. In fact, the US president has appointed two Michigan-based Muslim mayors as ambassadors to Kuwait and Tunisia.
Trump referred to Muslim Americans as “smart” and “good people” in the run-up to the election.
As it sought the votes of the socially conservative electorate, the Republican Party appeared to tone down the anti-Muslim language.
However, Council on American-Islamic Relations research and advocacy director Corey Saylor claimed that Islamophobia has multiple roots.
Saylor told Al Jazeera, “Islamophobia has kind of been ingrained into American society.
“We’re seeing that once more,” said one witness, “but all it needed was something to flip the switch right back on.”
‘industry’ of Islamophobia
Arabs and Muslims have been the subject of derogatory portrayals for decades in American politics, pop culture, and media.
Following the attacks by al-Qaeda on September 11, 2001, that trend became more significant. Right-wing activists began to warn about what they believed were plans to implement Islamic religious law in the West in subsequent years.
Additionally, conspiracy theories focused on Muslims, which warned against immigration’s “Islamization” of the US.
In a loosely connected network that community advocates have referred to as an “industry,” provocateurs, “counterterrorism experts,” and think tanks were established in the early 2000s to demonize Islam and stoke fear among the religion.
That atmosphere frequently permeated political discourse. For instance, Trump’s predecessor called for “a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States” in 2015.
The Muslim community faced repression even in liberal New York, where more than 2,600 people were killed at the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001.
The Muslim community’s mosques, businesses, and student associations were monitored by the New York Police Department through an undercover network of informants following the attacks.
In 2014, the city agreed to put more stringent surveillance on police investigations to stop abuse, and a few years later, the city settled legally with the Muslim community.
After plans for a Muslim community center in lower Manhattan faced intense opposition due to the building’s proximity to the World Trade Center, the Muslim community in the city re-entered national consciousness in 2010.
Numerous Democrats and the Anti-Defamation League, a well-known pro-Israel organization, joined them in opposing the project, which was eventually abandoned, while many Republicans whipped up conspiracy theories against the community center.
“We are above this,” the statement read.
Muslims in New York are once more the target of a wave of Islamophobia. Advocates claimed that their communities are stronger than ever this time, though.
“We feel more confident in the voices of our community, our institutional power, and the support we will receive from allies,” Dandia said.
“Yes, we’re experiencing this Islamophobic backlash, but I don’t want to make it seem like we’re just victims because we can now fight back.” The largest Muslim voter mobilization in American history is a proof of that.
Hanif echoed his sentiments.
