Islamophobia: The Way Forward

Recently, France has unveiled draft law to fight islamist radicalism. The bill came in the wake of a series of terror attacks in recent years. This has explicitly tried to target the Muslims freedom under the pretext of laicite (France secularism). For instance, there would be a clamp- down on home schooling for children over age three. Furthermore, the government would be able to exercise supervision over the training of imams and many more.
This is the flagrant manifestation of islamophobia in the country. Islamophobia, however, is not only confined to France but it is also prevalent in whole Europe and the US. In the United Kingdom, for example, record number of islamophobic hate crimes were recorded in 2017.
A definition published by the All- party parliamentary Group on British Muslim in November 2018, which states, “Islamophobia is rooted in racism and a type of racism that targets expressions of Muslimness or perceived Muslimness”.
According to Albert Camus, we cannot escape history as we are up to neck in it. As it’s not a new phenomenon and is evident from hatred of pagans towards Islam since its very inception. But prophet Muhammad PBUH had not tackled it through extremism rather he impressed them through peace.
Similarly, when Indian-sub-continent was under the control of the British. William Muir has criticized the life of Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him in his book the life of Mohmet. Sir Sayyid Ahamd Khan decided to write such an authentic book which could provide satisfactory answers to all those questions Muir had raised. It seemed a monumental task which needed comparable efforts and research work. Therefore, sayyid Ahmed travelled all the way to England to collect material for his book. The level of his love and the spirit of preservation of islamic civilization can be sensed from the fact that on Aug 20, 1869, he wrote to Mohsin ul Mulik. “These days, I have feelings of heart-burning. I am going through Muir’s book which he has written about the life of the Holy Prophet. It has broken my heart and his bigoted views and injustice have grievously hurt me. I have resolved as decided earlier that I will write a book on the life of the Holy Prophet even if all money is spent and I become a pauper __ fit only to bag, yet, no harm, as at least, I shall be called up on Doomsday as the Beggar Ahmad who lost every penny in the name of his Grandfather.”
SIR Sayyid Ahmad khan knew that fundamentalism and extremism were not its solution and he unraveled this Gordian knot through writing. He paid William Muir in the same coin and tried to clear his doubts. This is food for thought for Today’s Muslims.
In my opinion islamo phobia is a symptom rather than a cause. Hence, muslim should think Where does they stand in 21st century?
All Muslim countries collectively cannot compete India alone in research and technology. Take, for instance, according to the Islamabad policy research institute, Pakistan’s allocation for Science and Technology that stood at 0.00025 on Research and development in 2018. Although it is now enhanced 600 percent under present government, it still stands at 0.15 per cent of GDP. IN contrast, Israel and India spent about 4.8 and 0.7 per cent of their GDPs to R&D respectively.
Such miserable condition paints very bleak picture of Muslims future __ no research means no innovations. People in such societies resort to extremist ideology which further tarnishes the image of Islam and increases the phenomenon of islamophobia.
We cannot tackle it through fanaticism and fundamentalism rather we need to exploit our cognitive abilities in order to thwart the proliferation of the phenomenon. As the ink of the scholars is more sacred than the blood of the martyrs. Therefore, Muslim should present a soft image of Islam by making counter narratives and mobilizing the opinions of the people across the world. They should also make R&D their priority in order to equip Muslim with modern knowledge and innovation. This would not only breed the culture of innovation among ignorant people but also give them prestige in the world.