War on Iran fuelling Islamophobic social media surge in US: Report
Al Jazeera
US study reveals more than 25,300 Islamophobic posts on X since war began and intensifying hate speech against Muslims.
The United States and Israel’s war on Iran has “accelerated” the spread of harmful content targeting American Muslims on social media platforms, a study by the US Center for the Study of Organized Hate (CSOH) finds.
The centre found that on X alone from February 28, the first day of the war, to Thursday, users posted more than 25,300 Islamophobic remarks.
The report, which was released on Monday, also found that Islamaphobia was present on social media before the war. The dataset examined original posts, quotes and replies containing Islamophobic content from January 1 through Thursday, noting that the reach of such posts expanded “significantly once reposts are included” to more than 279,000 mentions of Islamophobic content.
The analysis showed that such posts surged from February 28.
Users turned to using “dehumanizing language”, referring to Muslims as “pests”, “rats”, “vermin”, “parasites” and an “infestation”, the CSOH said.
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