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Is there a difference between the two? Both antisemitism and Islamophobia seem to be closely connected. In Europe where antisemitism rises, Islamophobia rises and vice versa.
One difference is I think that antisemtism targets a ethnicity, while Islamopohobia targets a religion, or it might be argued an ideology.
Both phenonomen are also used incorrectly IMO. Critics of Islam are quickly accused as Islamophobes. Critics of Israel are often branded as antisemites. There are even people who see a pro-Israel attitude as anti-Islam, Islamopohic.

For me the following constite warning signs that criticism of Israel stems indeed from an antisemitic attitude:

-Out of all proportion singling out Israel especially compared to any other party in the Middle East.
-Comparing Israel to the Nazi's
-Exaggerating the influence of the Jewish state on world affairs, like controlling the media and the financial markets
-Denying, minimizing, or trivializing the Holocaust.

Three strikes and you are out!

Israel and its fanbois regularly try to divert attention away from Israeli crimes (real ones) by playing the anti-semite card.

Islamophobia is part of the disinformation campaign designed to portray the occupying power who is breaking the law as superior than the victims. The issue is over colonisation and greed and the spin presents it as a clash of civilisations etc. Israeli religous terrorists are 'exceptions' whilst Muslims are following Islam's teachings. When irgun was blowing up hotels and booby trapping soldiers bodies - that was a fight for national self-determination, whenhezbollah kick butt, they are evil.

Also, the labeling of criticism of Israel as anti-semitic is a self-serving feature of the surveys monitoring anti-semitism. They use the press reports of criticism of Israeli actions and say this is a sign of increased anti_semitism! Most peple would conclude that the increased condemnation has more to do with Israeli injustices, but most don't question the 'stats' that are put out by groups such as ADL, or the blatant disinformation from MEMRI et alM

At the end of the day, those speaking out against injustice - B'tselem, Chomsky, finkelstein etc - are all smeared as anti-semites by the fanbois.

At least we now know that FD does indeed view criticism of Israel as equal to anti-semitism and probably thinks I one of them.

I am as much an anti-semite as Gideon Levy or Noam Chomsky - but I guess everyone is entitled to their quaint views.

Cheers
Shafique

shafique wrote:Israel and its fanbois regularly try to divert attention away from Israeli crimes (real ones) by playing the anti-semite card.

Some do, I agree

shafique wrote:Islamophobia is part of the disinformation campaign designed to portray the occupying power who is breaking the law as superior than the victims.

Are you trying to say that Israel is the source of Islamophobia? seems like it. Another conspiracy theory you want to share?

shafique wrote:At least we now know that FD does indeed view criticism of Israel as equal to anti-semitism and probably thinks I one of them.

Nope, read again:

For me the following constite warning signs that criticism of Israel stems indeed from an antisemitic attitude:

-Out of all proportion singling out Israel especially compared to any other party in the Middle East.
-Comparing Israel to the Nazi's
-Exaggerating the influence of the Jewish state on world affairs, like controlling the media and the financial markets
-Denying, minimizing, or trivializing the Holocaust.

Another feature of israeli spin and beloved of fanbois is the weird self-serving definitions and twists of logic.

Eg. Point out that Israel uses Islamophobic spin to disguise the fact the conflict is over colonialisation and suddenly you are accusing Israel of eh-oh's quaint beliefs!

Anti-semitism isn't actually on the rise when you look at the stats - it is just that the oppressors are losing the propaganda war at home and abroad, and the justified criticism cannot be addressed head on.

Hence why fanbois are very quick to launch ad hominem attacks.

Cheers
Shafique

and twists of logic.

Speaking of twists of logic, the phrase 'Islamophobia' is illogical. Just as 'Homophobic'. Are people really afraid of Islam/gays (redundant)?

Doubtful.

As for the stats. Well, they actually show that Jews receive a disproportionate amount of attacks against them - both in Europe and in the United States.

But hey, I'll leave that to the forum's victim merchants to deflect and deflate.

Eh - you and stats don't have a good trackl record - just see how your theory that Muslim converts carried out more terrorist acts than other groups crashed and burned (when you could only find 4 compared to my 242)

And I see you are up to another fanboi tactic - giving opinions or pastes without reference and without context.

Cheers
Shafique

shafique wrote:Eh - you and stats don't have a good trackl record - just see how your theory that Muslim converts carried out more terrorist acts than other groups crashed and burned (when you could only find 4 compared to my 242)

And I see you are up to another fanboi tactic - giving opinions or pastes without reference and without context.

Cheers
Shafique

What context? You mean like crashing a bunch of commercial airliners into buildings? Your usual flag burning, death to America rally? Bombing/burning down Western embassies? Calls for the death of all Americans? Religious fatwas issued by Saudi clerics who give the 'green light' for religious nutters to detonate nuclear weapons in American cities (I refer you to the CNN documentary 'God's warriors' for the last statement).

Don't see Jewish religious radicals doing that to Americans - yet attacks against Jews in the US (and the US Jewish and Muslim populations are around the same in number) is significantly higher than attacks against Muslims.

All of this talk of Islamophobia, and I don't see Muslims bearing the brunt of hate crimes in the US or Western Europe. Unsurprisingly, the proportion of hate attacks against Jews compared to Muslims in France is even higher than in Britain or the US (I was a little surprised in Britain, actually).

But hey, I guess that's why the victim merchants are now resorting to filing false charges and claiming the BNP kidnapped them because the figures of faith based attacks against Muslims look so anaemic.

Ok - yes I would indeed be interested in you showing us the statistics of physical attacks against Jews by non-Jews and physical attacks on Muslims by non_Muslims.

When you post these let us know which period and which country you are referring to.

Note you are the one saying anti-smitism is rising - so let's see whether this belief is based on credible data or skewed surveys as I mentioned above.

Cheers
Shafique

shafique wrote:Ok - yes I would indeed be interested in you showing us the statistics of physical attacks against Jews by non-Jews and physical attacks on Muslims by non_Muslims.

When you post these let us know which period and which country you are referring to.

Note you are the one saying anti-smitism is rising - so let's see whether this belief is based on credible data or skewed surveys as I mentioned above.

Cheers
Shafique

Let me know where I said that.

My bad - I confused you with other fabois who say anti-semitism is increasing - so I take it you agree with me that these are just fantasies that don't stand scrutiy?
Or do you indeed BELIEVE anti-semitism is on the rise, but just haven't said it here?

Which is it?


You do say however that attacks against jews are 'significantly' more than attacks against Muslims. I'd be very interested in comparing the number of physical attacks against Muslims vs those against Jews - perhaps yiou are only looking at the minority of violence against Muslims around the world?

Cheers
Shafique

Right, so difference #1 is that antisemtism is based on ethinicity and Islamophobia is a fear of a certain ideology. Much like a fear for communism or fascism.

My proposal for #2: Islamphobia is based on a book perceived as the truth by its believers (the Quran), while the summit of antisemtism is based on the Elders of Zion, a book considered uther non-sense by Jews (and I agree).

You do say however that attacks against jews are 'significantly' more than attacks against Muslims. I'd be very interested in comparing the number of physical attacks against Muslims vs those against Jews - perhaps yiou are only looking at the minority of violence against Muslims around the world?

I'm looking at faith based attacks in the United States and I see that Jews account for around 65% of these attacks whereas Muslims account for 7% of these attacks.

It should be interesting once we move onto France - where in one year, I believe, there were more than 900 faith based attacks against Jews even though France's Jewish population is one tenth the size of the United States'.

Hey, I'm rooting for you. I really am. I'll try and help you find a Western nation where attacks against Muslims is proportionally higher than attacks against Jews. From my research, we'll have to exclude Britain (where Jews are four more times to be victims of attack), France (where Jews are more likely to be attacked than Muslims by many fold) and the United States (where attacks against Jews is around seven times higher than attacks against Muslims).

Other than these three countries, where do you want to start?

eh - I'm travelling this week and internet connections aren't the best where I am and will be. Why don't you present the numbers, and by all means start with the US. Show the like for like physical attacks against Jews and Muslims.

If you have stats for other countries (you mention France), by all means move on to those too. Just post links where I can verify the numbers and criteria used (I would just check that the numbers are like for like).

The stats may well show that I'm wrong to hold the belief that attacks against Muslims are a bigger issue that anti-semitic attacks - but I'm ready to admit that I'm wrong should the stats prove otherwise. When the facts change, so do my opinions! I think I'm being fair to ask for numbers, that they are like-for-like and that they are verifiable (some link to the survey/official site etc).

FD - don't get me wrong, in principle Anti-Semitism and Islamophobia are part of the same family of hate crimes. I condemn both. I only object to the anti-semitism card being misplayed as part of a disinformation campaign by Israel when they label criticism of Israel as anti-semitic.

I have no hesitation in condemning anti-semitism, even where the cause appears to be Israeli crimes. I point out to those who hold these views that there are anti-Zionist Jews who campaign against Israeli aggression (and have met with Ahmadinejad, support Hezbollah's actions and generally make the point that the Israeli/Palestinian issue is about land not religion) - and also that there are many Israeli and other Jews who are fighting against the aggression - eg B'tselem, Noam Chomsky, Finkelstein etc.


I totally agree with the UK Muslim politician is quoted in the BBC news item about anti-semitism in the uk:

Earlier this year, Muslim leaders issued a joint statement denouncing anti-Semitism, amid fears that violent elements from within their own communities were responsible for the increase in attacks.
Cohesion minister Shahid Malik, one of two Muslims in government, said: "This rise in anti-Semitism is not just concerning for the British Jewish communities but for all those who see themselves as decent human beings.
"The fight against anti-Semitism is a fight that should engage us all. This country will not tolerate those who seek to direct hatred towards any part of our community.
"It may be legitimate for individuals to criticise or be angry at the actions of the Israel government but we must never allow this anger to be used to justify anti-Semitism."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/8166173.stm

(eh, you may also want to look at the stats in the UK survey referred to in the article. It states that 77 violent anti-semitic attacks took place in the UK last year.)

Cheers,
Shafique

The link has already been provided - it shows that attacks against Jews account for 65% of all faith based attacks in the US whereas Muslims account for 7% of all faith based attacks.

In theory, clicking on links prevents posters from asking the same question twice when the answer has been provided already. In theory.

Here is a good article about the subject:

KLAUS FABER: ISLAMOPHOBIA IS NOT THE SAME AS ANTI-SEMITISM

The Center for Research on Anti-Semitism at the Technical University of Berlin has compared it with hostility against Islam in a conference called "Perceived Enemy Muslim - Perceived Enemy Jew." This attempted comparison has met with rejection, since the term "Islamophobia" is primarily used during anti-Western and anti-Israeli agitation in Islamic countries.

Islamophobia does not refer to actual discrimination against Muslims, but to allegedly inappropriate criticism of Shari'a law and Islam in general.

One finds a close cooperation between aggressive anti-Semitic Islamists and equally anti-Semitic neo-Nazis.

Some argue that the tendency to hold a collective accountable for the wrongdoings of individuals is a quality of hostility toward Islam, and this is also claimed to be an example of structural similarity with anti-Semitism. But considering the varying nature of "wrongdoing" involved, this would mean equating alleged Jewish wrongdoing in the financial market or the media with indisputable Islamic terrorism, jihadism and threats to eliminate Israel. To put these facts on the same level as theories is unacceptable and cannot be justified by the claim that one thereby aims to avoid a "hierarchy of victims."

In addition, one common side effect is that justified criticism of the conditions in Islamic societies is branded as Islamophobic

Oh dear, will the victim-merchants be able to use the victim card anymore?

Jews far more likely to be victims of faith hatred than Muslims

Jewish people are four times more likely to be attacked because of their religion than Muslims, according to figures compiled by the police.

One in 400 Jews compared to one in 1,700 Muslims are likely to be victims of "faith hate" attacks every year. The figure is based on data collected over three months in police areas accounting for half the Muslim and Jewish populations of England and Wales. The crimes range from assault and verbal abuse to criminal damage at places of worship.

Police forces started recording the religion of faith-hate crime victims only this year. They did so on the instruction of the Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpo), which wanted a clear picture of alleged community tensions around the country, following reports of Muslims being attacked after September 11 and the July 7 London bombings last year.

.......

The figures also suggest that many faith-hate crimes remain unsolved, contrary to the picture painted by the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) in a report this month. The CPS said only 43 people were charged with "religiously aggra-vated" offences last year, and concluded that the large rise expected after the July 7 bombings had not materialised.

........

Rabbi Alex Chapper, 33, was the victim of a "faith-hate" crime in July last year. He was returning from a synagogue in Ilford, Essex, with three Jewish friends after conducting a service. All were wearing skull caps. Seven Asian teenagers followed them down the road shouting "Yehudi", which means Jew in Arabic. One of them shouted, "We are Pakistani, you are Jewish. We are going to kill you", before punching Rabbi Chapper in the face and hitting one of his friends over the head with a bottle.

"It was very frightening, we were all very shaken," said the rabbi. "I thought we were going to get seriously hurt but someone threatened to call the police and they ran off.

"We identified the youths and told the police but they were never prosecuted. They just did not seem interested. I feel very let down."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/ ... slims.html

A handy list of anti-Semitic attacks in France for the first four and half months of 2002:

http://www.kintera.org/atf/cf/%7BDFD2AA ... ttacks.pdf

And from this report, which is heavily criticized for its 'overall' conclusions here: http://www.parapundit.com/archives/002026.html ,

In some countries - e.g. France and Denmark - the NFPs conclude that there is indeed evidence of a shift away from extreme right perpetrators toward young Muslim males. In France the Human Rights Commission (CNCDH) notes that the percentage of antisemitic violence attributable to the extreme right was only 9% in 2002 (against 14% in 2001 and 68% in 1994). The CNCDH concludes that the revival of antsemitism can be attributed to the worsening of the Israeli Palestinian conflict, notably in the spring of 2002, correspondng with the Israeli army offensive in the West Bank and the return of suicide bombings in Israel.

p22

For the report itself: http://www.infopartisan.net/document/an ... studie.pdf

Not only do Jews bare the brunt of hate crimes in France, but most hate crimes against Jews are carried out by persons of 'North African' descent.

Well, I have to disagree that hate crimes against Muslims are different from hate crimes against Jews. I don't view the two groups as any different - when it comes to being attacked because of their religion. To be honest I think it is a bit racist to suggest otherwise - but that's just me. I'm sure that many Israelis won't make that distinction - or many Rabbis.

I can only reiterate what the Muslim parliamentarian had to say about anti-semitism.

eh - please post the numbers of the anti-semitic physical attacks and the comparable numbers of those against Muslims, (i.e. for the same period and for the same areas/countries). I can then check your references just to confirm that the comparisons are like-for-like.

I've even helped you out by providing a number of 77 violent attacks in the UK in 2009 according to the survey in the BBC article. So what is needed is the comparable number of attacks against Muslims. (I don't know whether this is less or more, so should you find that - say - there were only 10 attacks against Muslims in the UK last year, then I would have to agree that the stats do show that more Jews are attacked in the UK than Muslims).

Cheers,
Shafique

Just to make the point that we need to look at the statistics carefully - the Telegraph report is actually making conclusions based on 3 months of data - from July to September 2006.

Over that period, a total of 109 faith based attacks took place against Muslims in the the areas picked by the newspaper. In the same period and in the same areas, there were 107 faith based attacks against Jews.

i.e. fewer attacks.

Also, it says that these stats don't record all attacks (hundreds are missing, it says) and does not only include violent physical attacks, but any verbal or other abuse.

So - even in this evidence, more Muslims were attacked than Jews. It is a statistical fallacy (and absurd notion) to argue that if there are more Muslims there will be proportionately more attacks against them - it is the anti-semites and Islamophobes who are being counted, so the numbers of attacks is what counts when assessing the relative severity of anti-semitism vs Islamophobia. Just imagine if there was only one Jewish person in an area (one of the areas listed had a population of zero Jews - see the table in the article) - if there were no attacks against him/her - could we conclude that there is no antisemitism at all, and more to the point, would we conclude that there is 100% anti-semitism if that one person was attacked?

Therefore, we need to look at numbers of attacks. (I don't blame the police, they didn't make the allegations - it was the journalist at the Telegraph spinning the story - and they apparently don't understand how ratios/stats work).

The fact is that in those 3 months, more Muslims were attacked than Jews.

Cheers,
Shafique

That's some interesting spin - one shouldn't take the overall number of Jews and Muslims into account when looking at the stats to see who is more likely to be the target of a faith based attack.

Wonder if you'll apply the same tactic when discussing the number of Muslim suicide bombers vs the number of non-Muslim suicide bombers over the last three decades, once it's shown that Muslims make up the vast majority of people who have carried out suicide bombings? Or perhaps the overall number of Muslim terrorists active today?

I can't help but notice your penchant for flip-flopping whenever stats don't go your way. If you want to minimize the scope of Islamic terrorism, you seem to want to talk about the actual proportion of Muslims who are not terrorists vs the number of Muslims who are terrorists. But now that it has been that Jews are four times more likely to be the victims of faith based attacks, you decide to talk of overall numbers.

But hey, perhaps you can keep your flip-flopping to one active thread?

According to page 63 of a study on anti-Semitic attacks, 146 out of a total of 216 recorded racist attacks were carried out against French Jews for the year of 2000.

http://www.infopartisan.net/document/an ... studie.pdf

In France, just like the United States, there are more attacks against Jews than against Muslims.

Let's see the numbers rather than spin.

All I have done is show that your Telegraph article uses data which shows that for 3 months in 2006 there were 109 faith hate incidents against Muslims vs 107 against Jews (this is like-for-like in time and place).

Not a lot of evidence to make a judgement on, but if anything it shows that more attacks were made on Muslims in those 3 months.

Let's see the numbers.

Cheers,
Shafique

Slightly more attacks against a larger population. Jews, however, were more likely to be attacked.

Here's a handy report on hate crimes against Jews in Britain. Page 5 has a graph showing attacks against Jews from 84 to 05 and there is indeed an increase of reported anti-Semitic incidents over the twenty year period.

So, I guess shafique's insistence that there hasn't been a rise in anti Jewish attacks flies in the face of the facts.

http://abs.sagepub.com/cgi/reprint/51/2/232

Why don't you paste the numbers for both anti-semitic attacks and islamophobic attacks for the same periods and regions - that is what I requested.

We can let the numbers speak for themselves - and examine whether your contention that Islamophobic attacks are lower than anti-semitic attacks is borne out in the statistics.

Who knows, perhaps this time round your belief will be borne out by the statistics?

Cheers,
Shafique

I've already provided the links from France and the US which show that anti-Semitic attacks are higher than anti Muslim attacks.

You should click on links rather than asking questions where the answer has been provided. In theory, this should prevent asking repeat questions. In theory.

Why the reluctance to paste the numbers then?

Am I being unfair to just want to check your numbers are like-for-like?

I'd rather see numbers rather than spin - a prime example being the Telegraph article which draws conclusions from a rather small data set (they exclude large parts of the UK and is only for 3 months in 2006 - and still showed more incidents against Muslims).

Numbers dear boy, not opinions.

Cheers,
Shafique

Shafique europe has a long time i.e hundreds of years of antisemitism, muslims only recently have been immigrating in any such numbers into europe, such that 'real muslims' have started organising themselves etc like 9/11, 7/7, madrid bombing etc which has caused any kind of islam backlash.

There used to be organised I cant remember the names that used to go around beating up jews at the start of the century, there was even a british fascist party.

Present day you have far right "white" groups attacking jews, (combat 18 etc) and also 'real muslims' also attacking jews. So its not suprising that jewish attacks are greater than attacks on muslims. To my knowledge I have not heard of jewish gangs attacking mosques in europe.

Latest bbc news on rising antisemitism

BBC news http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/7887511.stm

Here are the numbers for faith based attacks in the US:

There were 1,606 hate crime offenses motivated by religious bias in 2008. A breakdown of these offenses shows:

* 65.7 percent were anti-Jewish.
* 13.2 percent were anti-other religion.
* 7.7 percent were anti-Islamic.
* 4.7 percent were anti-Catholic.
* 4.2 percent were anti-multiple religions, group.
* 3.7 percent were anti-Protestant.
* 0.9 percent were anti-Atheism/Agnosticism/etc

http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/hc2008/incidents.html

Interesting to note that there were more attacks against Christians in the US than attacks against Muslims - so, Christians are even bigger victims than our victim-merchants.

The data for French faith attacks is on a pdf. You'll have to click on that and search for it yourself. I've given you the page number, so a friend may want to scroll to the relevant portion if that is too complicated for you.