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strong>Nov. 18, 2015

Muslims around the US are facing a backlash following the deadly attacks in Paris, including vandalism to mosques and Islamic centers, hate-filled phone and online messages and threats of violence.

Advocacy leaders say they have come to expect some anti-Muslim sentiment following such attacks, but they now see a spike that seems notable, stirred by anti-Muslim sentiment in the media.

'€œThe picture is getting increasingly bleak,'€ said Ibrahim Hooper, a spokesman for the Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations. '€œThere'€™s been an accumulation of anti-Islamic rhetoric in
our lives and that I think has triggered these overt acts of violence and vandalism.'€

He said the rise in the level of anti-Muslim sentiment was reflected by some Republican presidential candidates, governors and others speaking out in opposition to the US accepting more Syrian refugees.

Hooper said the council was seeing an increase in anti-Muslim incidents since Friday'€™s attacks in Paris that killed 129 people and wounded more than 350.

Your comments:

Actually, come to think of it, by way of an analogy, what a lot of Japanese and German Americans did was to enlist and fight to prove which side they were on. Maybe this would be a good idea.

These are difficult times. To use an analogy, the US is often derided for its decision to detain Japanese-Americans. They were only detained in California where it was feared an attack was imminent.

Meanwhile in Japan, captured Westerners were bayoneted. Downed pilots used for live vivisection. To this day there is considerable debate over whether it was the correct thing to do, incarcerating Japanese-Americans, while in Japan there is simply denial or the blanket excuse '€œwe were not party to the Geneva Convention'€.

One thing people tend to forget though is that incarcerating them was also for their own protection. It was a race war with no prisoners taken. For the Japanese it was a war of extermination. Obviously there would be a backlash in the US.

In the same vein, we are seeing the backlash against Muslims in the US which, although unacceptable, is very much predictable.

World leaders have an interest in solving the Middle East situation as soon as possible. US President Barack Obama'€™s current policy is obviously non-functional.

Chris Jakarta

The West should stop trying to use human rights as a political tool against nations they perceive as a threat to their colonial ambitions. And second why did those Western American terrorist extremists attack and vandalize an Ahmadiyah mosque?

What did the Ahmadi Muslims ever do to America? I can bet the American government will call this a criminal act instead of calling it what it is '€” a terrorist attack with racist motives against peaceful Ahmadi Muslims.

The True Patriot

Does anyone here know Jonathan James? Or Kevin Mitnick? Or Albert Gonzalez? Kevin Poulsen? Gary McKinnon? Could we hire them? Perhaps that fantastic five could give some suggestions to paralyze the Islamic State (IS) movement'€™s technology before it'€™s too late.

Gregdaru

I watched Al Jazeera America this morning and they reported that hundreds of Indian Muslims marched against Islamic terrorism. It'€™s about time and perhaps American Muslims should follow suit as it would signal to Americans a sincere and shared outrage to the violence being committed by terrorists.

Dick Tracy