Islamophobia

Our analysis shows that almost two-thirds of articles paint Muslims in a negative light.

Miqdaad Versi is the founder of the Muslim Council of Britain’s Centre for Media Monitoring

‘Muslims have been compelled to take libel action against newspapers and have won.’ Photograph: Terry Harris/Alamy

Last week, the Labour MP Naz Shah observed that “Islamophobia has now passed the ‘mainstream media test’”. The report published this week by the Muslim Council of Britain’s Centre for Media Monitoring shows that she’s right.

Consider some of the most egregious cases cited in the report. There was the Times, Telegraph, MailOnline and Express libelling a Scout group leader, Ahammed Hussain, in 2019, using a laundry list of anti-Muslim tropes; these included “allegations about using the Scout group to promote extremism, segregation of children, extensive links to antisemitic groups, and inviting banned preachers to the Mosque”. 

Or take the Mail on Sunday, which called council worker Waj Iqbal “a fixer” for paedophile taxi drivers in Rochdale. As he put it, his whole world crumbled, he lost his job, his “marriage ended and [he] couldn’t see [his] kids”. The impact of this kind of reporting cannot be overstated. While nothing can repair the harm caused, in both cases, the publishers had to pay very substantial libel damages and print apologies.

Many other similar examples published in the report show how Muslims have been compelled to take libel action against newspapers, and have won. If one considers the hundreds of thousands of pounds paid to settle these claims, what does this tell us about the price they are willing to pay to misrepresent Muslims?  READ MORE...