Anti-Left smear campaigns against Islamists were cited to justify mass murder

Evidence

One example illustrates how Islamophobic propaganda is amplified in the mainstream media. The new McCarthyites have long claimed that 80 percent of mosques are controlled by jihadists. In 2004, Republican congressman Peter King stated on the Fox News network’s Sean Hannity Show that “eighty to eighty-five percent of mosques in this country are controlled by Islamic fundamentalists.” He backed up his claim by citing the research of Emerson and Pipes. This story was repeated again and again by the Islamophobes, even in the mainstream media. In 2010, Pamela Geller stated that “four out of five mosques preach hate” on CNN. In March 2011, Republican representative Peter King held hearings on the supposed radicalization in American Muslim communities. A few months later, in June 2011, Yerushalmi made the same claim in the spurious report mentioned above. Gaffney immediately endorsed the findings in his column in the Washington Times. The upshot of this propaganda is that few in the media challenged the King hearings, giving credence to the notion that Muslims are in fact being “radicalized” and need to be questioned and monitored in ways similar to the “reds” in the Cold War era. This was also the year when Obama unveiled his Countering Violent Extremism program, which set out to uncover radicalization by deputizing members of the Muslim community to act as surveillance agents. — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 697 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

This conference was a response to various resolutions that were passed by the UN General Assembly that legitimated the use of armed struggle in ending colonialism and that validated Palestinian self-determination. Benjamin Netanyahu thus characterized the UN as being “incapable” of dealing with terrorism. For Netanyahu the UN’s “legitimation of terror groups” was an “intolerable spectacle” that necessitated the 1979 conference. One presenter at the conference argued that the PLO had served as an intermediary between Moscow and Iran’s Ayatollah Khomeini in the plot to overthrow the US-backed Shah. At this stage, the emphasis was on the PLO and the conflation of Arabs with terrorism. “Islamic terrorism” was barely referenced, and overall, Islam was marginal to this conference. — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 454 (#complicates, via linked claim)

Killing an Arab is central to the geopolitical dramas of the last two decades. It formed the mandate of the American War on Terror, which weaponized law and rhetoric to legitimize the mass execution of Arabs and Muslims and other peoples in foreign wars. In the popular imagination, “Arabs” and “Muslims” and “Middle Easterners” are one and the same, blurred together by the blinding force of Orientalism and the Islamophobia it spawned after the 9/11 terror attacks. — Khaled A. Beydoun, The New Crusades_ Islamophobia and the…, 1175 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Anti-Islamist books framing a Left-Islamist conspiracy inspired Breivik’s massacre; F.L.N. targeted killings aimed to sever European-Muslim contact and spread mutual suspicion — Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Algeria 1954-1962, 420; Neocon smear campaigns have inspired copycat violence by figures like Breivik (+10 more)

Broader Connections

• Neocon smear campaigns have inspired copycat violence by figures like Breivik #corroborates (0.95)
• Rhetorical conflation of Arabs, Muslims, and Middle Easterners legitimized mass execution. #corroborates (0.95) — Khaled A. Beydoun, The New Crusades_ Islamophobia and the…, 1175
• Liberal Islamophobia legitimizes and amplifies right-wing anti-Muslim conspiracy theories #corroborates (0.95)
• Anti-Muslim fear-mongering empowered by right-wing foundations fuels mainstream hatred. #corroborates (0.95) — Arsalan Iftikhar, Fear of a Muslim Planet_ Global…, 626
• Islamophobic propaganda about mosques seeded hearings and counterterror surveilling of Muslim communities #corroborates (0.95) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 697
• Anti-Muslim hate replicates anti-Semitic tropes and spreads between targeted groups #corroborates (0.95) — Arsalan Iftikhar, Fear of a Muslim Planet_ Global…, 210
• Anti-Muslim polytheism charges were deliberate Crusade propaganda #complicates (0.95)
• Anti-Islamic propaganda reached tens of millions of voters through shadowy funding #complicates (0.95)
• Anti-Arab terrorism framing preceded and prepared anti-Islamic framing #complicates (0.95) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 454