Shootings a massacre by a thousand cuts

The findings of the long-awaited Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Terrorist Attack on Christchurch Mosques confirm what New Zealand Muslims have known for a long time: that the agencies responsible for national security grossly underestimated the threat of rising Islamophobia and repeatedly ignored the safety concerns of Muslims.

Islamophobia, as a distinct form of structural racism, has been on the rise globally, affecting millions of Muslims and other communities (those mistaken as Muslims) around the world.

I refer to Islamophobia as a form of racism because it is not just about religious or social exclusion, but, more importantly, it is a form of racial hierarchy used by many political parties, groups and movements around the world to gain and consolidate power.

Harmful assumptions and policies, particularly when made by prominent civil and political figures, play a vital role in perpetuating anti-Muslim feelings.

Before the attacks, Rebecca Kitteridge, current director-general of the Security Intelligence Service, addressing an audience at Victoria University of Wellington, reportedly spoke about the repercussions of a domestic terrorist attack for the Muslim community. She made the statement assuming that such an attack was bound to come from a Muslim terrorist.

We know that when NZ First leader Winston Peters introduced the Kiwi values pledge for new migrants and refugees in 2018 he really had Muslim refugees in mind. It perpetuated the harmful assumption that Muslim refugees were unlikely to respect basic human rights values.

In 2014, when John Key’s government rushed through an anti-terrorism law, allowing for unwarranted domestic surveillance, he reinforced the existing stigmatisation and mistrust of Muslims.

At the time, there was no concrete evidence of increased domestic threat. The omnibus bill, opposed by the Green Party, attracted more than 600 submissions to the select committee. I also wrote to oppose the bill for being counter-productive by eroding the trust of the Muslim community, whose cooperation and engagement, I thought, was vital as part of an effective counterterrorism strategy.

It was clear to me then that the government, instead of listening to its own communities and civil organisations, was following the Five Eyes flawed antiterrorism strategy.

Our media didn’t do enough either. More interested in Muslims when they appear behind the gun than in front of it, the negative reporting on Muslims as terrorists was never balanced with positive stories of Muslims as instruments of peace and charity.

In the days to come, there will be many discussions around strategies and policies to be adopted and pursued to curtail the activities of Right-wing extremist groups and reduce the harmful effects of Islamophobia. That is all well and proper, but we also need to understand some background to the origin of Islamophobia.

Anti-Muslim sentiments have a long and complicated history, unlikely to be included in the almost 800-page report produced by the royal commission.

So there will be nothing in it about the 1953 coup d’etat in Iran and the direct role that the United States and Britain played in removing the first democratically elected prime minister in order to secure oil for their benefit. The coup led to the 1979 Iranian revolution and, shortly after, to America’s first confrontation with the forces of radical Islam during the US embassy hostage crisis.

The 1953 coup prevented the establishment of a thriving democracy at the heart of the Middle East. Just imagine how different our world would have been today without imperialism, without 9/11 and without the so-called war on terror, which led to more wars and more terror.

Yes, Islamophobia has existed in different forms for centuries, and political actors around the world including the US, China, Russia and Israel have used it to expand or consolidate their power.

But since the breakup of the Soviet Union, Islamophobia has become increasingly more lethal as global powers started to search for a new convenient enemy to advance their political and economic self-interests.

What hurts Muslims the most, and what is vitally important for every New Zealander to know, is that our world is this way by design. The violence of war, the sorrow of displacement, the threat of terrorism and the dehumanisation of Muslims that led to the loss of 51 innocent lives in Christchurch didn’t have to happen. And if the report suggests otherwise, then the report is wrong.