China’s Ban On Islamic Veils Sends Uighurs Westward To Pray

A veiled Muslim Uyghur woman walks passed a statue of Mao Zedong in Kashgar, Xinjiang Province, China. Last month the Urumqi legislature banned the wearing of veils in public areas. Photographer: Kevin Frayer/Getty Images

The Imam at one of Almaty’s biggest mosques gets busy around Ramadan when his Uighur “brothers and sisters” from China flock to the Kazakh city to pray, finding it increasingly difficult to practice Islam at home.

As the western Chinese region of Xinjiang grapples with ethnic tensions between Uighurs and Han Chinese, and President Xi Jinping vows to crush separatist activity, more Uighurs are finding a warmer reception about 235 miles (380 kilometers) away. In some parts of Xinjiang, Uighurs risk fines or detention for wearing veils or growing beards and some are warned against observing Ramadan -- Islam’s holiest month.

“Uighur Muslims want their religion and want to practice their religion freely,” Imam Knanat Ali said outside the blue-domed Prophet Muhammad Mosque in the industrial north of Almaty. “In China this is strictly controlled, so we see many Uighurs come here during Ramadan to pray, to fast, to learn more knowledge about Islam,” said Ali, who has presided over the mosque for three years.

The flow of worshippers to Kazakhstan, which has the biggest Uighur population outside Xinjiang, persists even as China is boosting ties with its neighbor, a gateway to the west in Xi’s plan to rebuild the ancient Silk Road route. China has displaced Russia as Kazakhstan’s biggest trading partner -- the two-way relationship accounts for around 70 percent of China’s trade with central Asia, and China is the biggest foreign investor in the country’s oil and gas sector.

China’s crackdown on violence in Xinjiang, which authorities have linked to Islamic extremism and terrorism, is driving Uighurs to come across the long, shared border with Kazakhstan. Uighurs have “quite a balanced position” with other ethnic groups in Kazakhstan, said Konstantin Syroezhkin, chief research fellow of the state-sponsored Kazakhstan Institute for Strategic Studies.

‘Fully Assimilated’

“They’re not restricted here,” Syroezhkin said. “There are around 260,000 Uighurs living in the country and they’re fully assimilated in the Kazakh society. Kazakhstan doesn’t support a policy of ethnic separatism.”

Many Uighurs have family in Xinjiang, the Imam said. There are around 10 million Uighurs in China’s western province, according to the Xinjiang Statistics Bureau. About 1.5 percent of Kazakhstan’s population are Uighurs, a Turkic language-speaking group, and many live in the Almaty area, says London-based Minority Rights Group International.

“We Uighurs are brothers and sisters; we care a lot about what’s happening in Xinjiang,” Ali said. “The Uighur rebellion” in Xinjiang has sprouted because “the Chinese government punishes them for their religion.”

Han Chinese

Uighur communities in Almaty, the former capital of Kazakhstan, live in compact, closely-knit neighborhoods where they have their own cafes, restaurants and mosques. That kinship prompted hundreds to rally in Almaty after riots in Xinjiang’s capital Urumqi in July 2009. The most violent clashes between Uighurs and Han Chinese in decades left nearly 200 dead, most of them Chinese.

Even though about 92 percent of China’s 1.3 billion population is Han, more than 45 percent of Xinjiang’s 22 million people are Uighurs.

Violence picked up in Xinjiang in 2014 and spilled to other Chinese cities such as Kunming and Guangzhou. In November, 15 people, including 11 assailants, were killed after a group hurled explosives at a food court in Kashgar in south Xinjiang. In September, 50 people, including 40 that police identified as rioters, were killed in what authorities called a terrorist attack in Luntai county, while in July, 96 people died in an assault on government offices in Shache county.

‘All Uighurs’

“During the 2009 riots, Uighur prayers here were crying because we all had relatives in Xinjiang,” said a 65-year-old mosque worker known as “Auntie Sonya” who moved to Almaty from Xinjiang in the late 1960s. “We didn’t know who was responsible for this conflict and who was guilty, but we felt for them because all Uighurs are family.”

Last month the Urumqi legislature banned the wearing of veils in public areas. Communist Party members, civil servants, teachers and students are “encouraged” to eat during the day over Ramadan “for the sake of their health, work and study,” state media reports say. Some officials must sign a document pledging not to observe Ramadan, according to the website Uighur Online, whose founder Ilham Tohti is serving life in jail for promoting separatism.

Source: Business Week

Myanmar Plans To Eradicate Rohingya Identity

Authorities sealed off villages in Myanmar's only Muslim-majority region and in some cases beat and arrested people who refused to register with immigration officials, in what may be the most aggressive effort yet to force Rohingya to indicate they are illegal migrants from neighboring Bangladesh.

Immigration officials, border guards and members of the illegal-alien task force in the northern tip of Rakhine state — home to 90 percent of the country's 1.3 million Rohingya — this year, in addition to questions about marriages, deaths and births, people were classified by ethnicity.

Residents said those who refused to take part suffered the consequences.

"We are trapped," Khin Maung Win said last week. He said authorities started setting up police checkpoints outside his village, Kyee Kan Pyin, in mid-September, preventing people from leaving even to shop for food in local markets, work in surrounding paddies or take children to school.

"If we don't have letters and paperwork showing we took part — that we are Bengali — we can't leave," he said.

Chris Lewa of the Arakan Project, which has been advocating on behalf of the Rohingya for more than a decade, said residents reported incidents of violence and abuse in at least 30 village tracts from June to late September. 

Most worrying to many, the government has largely stood by as Buddhist extremists have targeted Rohingya, sometimes with machetes and bamboo clubs, saying they pose a threat to the country's culture and traditions.

Denied citizenship by national law, members of the religious minority are effectively stateless. They feel they are being systematically erased.

Almost all Rohingya were excluded from a U.N.-funded nationwide census earlier this year, the first in three decades, because they did not want to register as Bengalis. And Thein Sein is considering a "Rakhine Action Plan" that would make people who identify themselves as Rohingya not only ineligible for citizenship but candidates for detainment and possible deportation.

Most Rohingya have lived under apartheid-like conditions in northern Rakhine for decades, with limited access to adequate health care, education and jobs, as well as restrictions on travel and the right to practice their faith.

In 2012, Buddhist extremists killed up to 280 people and displaced tens of thousands of others. About 140,000 people of those forced from their homes continue to languish in crowded displacement camps further south, outside Sittwe, the Rakhine state capital.

Many villages were placed under lockdown, with police checkpoints set up to make sure only those who have cooperated could leave, more than a dozen residents confirmed in telephone interviews with The Associated Press.

In other villages, the names of influential residents were posted on community boards with verbal warnings that they face up to two years in jail if they fail to convince others to take part in the registration process, Lewa said. Other Rohingya say officials forced them to sign the papers at gunpoint, or threatened that they would end up in camps like those outside Sittwe if they didn't comply, she said. In some cases residents say authorities have shown up after midnight and broken down doors to catch residents by surprise and pressure them to hand over family lists.

Villagers also have been kicked and beaten with clubs and arrested for refusing to take part, according to Lewa and residents interviewed by the AP.

Rohingya said they didn't want to register family members because they worry the information might be used to deny them citizenship.

As international pressure mounts to end abuses against Rohingya, the government has agreed to provide citizenship to anyone who qualifies. But many Rohingya say they cannot meet the requirements, which include submitting documents proving that their families have been in Myanmar for at least three generations. And under the plan Thein Sein is considering, even that would not be enough for people who insist on calling themselves Rohingya rather than Bengali.

The Persecution Of Iraq's Sunni Muslims

This is a video of a young Sunni Muslim from Iraq. The shia rafidah (rejectors) murdered him in cold blood, then dragged him by the neck with a rope, at the same time, other shia animals repeatedly kick him, some hurl rocks at his head until part of his head caves in. Finally, they douse  him gasoline and set him on fire.

The reason this Sunni teen was murdered, was because his name was "Omar," after the Sahabi (Companion) of the Prophet Muhammed, and the Second Caliph of the Muslim nation.

This is what the Sunni Muslims have been dealing with, since America Saddam and handed the country to the Iraqi shia and Iran.

تمت الجريمة في مدينة الشعلة ببغداد، والتي تعد معقلا ومنطلقًا للمليشيات الشيعية الطائفية التي نشطت مؤخرًا لتنفيذ اعتداءات طائفية ضد أهل السنة في بغداد.

ويُظهر الفيديو عددًا كبيرًا من شباب الشيعة وهم يتناوبون على جثمان الشاب "عمر المفرجي" بمختلف صنوف الضرب والركل والتنكيل، وقد ربطوه من عنقه بحبل وسحلوا جثمانه، حتى انتهى بهم الأمر إلى إضرام النار في جسده.

وكشف المقطع المصور أن الجريمة تمت بجميع تفاصيلها تحت أعين عناصر الشرطة، التي تغض الطرف بشكل واسع عن هذه الجرائم الطائفية، فضلاً عن تورطها نفسها في العديد من تلك الجرائم.


 إن عملية قتل هذا الشاب والتنكيل بجثته جرت على خلفية كون اسمه (عمر)؛ ما يشير إلى أن طائفية الجريمة وأن عملية القتل تمت على الهوية كونه سنيًّا يحمل اسم أمير المؤمنين (عمر بن الخطاب) الذي فتح بلاد فارس وأطفأ نيران مجوسيتهم؛ الأمر الذي جعل الشيعة يحملون حقدًا وبغضًا لكل من يحمل اسمه رضوان الله عليه. وقد شهد العراق العديد من الجرائم الطائفية التي تمت فيها عمليات القتل على الهوية، ولمجرد أن الضحية يحمل اسم (عمر) أو (عائشة).

4 Men Who Converted To Islam Arrested In India

Four members of a family arrested in Madhya Pradesh under the Freedom of Religion Act.

Four members of a family who have converted to Islam were arrested last night in Madhya Pradesh, hours after they told a court that they had not been forced into adopting another religion. Seven others have been held for questioning.

Tularam Jatav, his son Keshav and relatives Manikram and Makhubhai Jatav were arrested on Wednesday under the state's Freedom of Religion Act, which allows conversions only if the district administration has verified that they are not forced. Those wanting to change their religion have to seek the state's permission.

All four, if found guilty, face two years in jail.

On Tuesday, when the Jatav family went to a district magistrate with affidavits affirming that they were converting willingly, a large group of activists from the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) and Bajrang Dal arrived too, and started protesting and chanting slogans. 

Later, an FIR was filed against the Jatavs and a team was sent to their house.

The VHP and Bajrang Dal are both part of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh-led pro-Hindu conglomerate that includes the state's ruling BJP. 

Officials say the Jatavs appear to have violated the law, as the probe team had learnt that they had switched to Islam months ago without informing the government.

Others in their village went to the police on August 28 and alleged that forced conversions were taking place in the family. The Jatavs denied it twice, but yesterday, shortly after they tried to submit affidavits in a court, they were held.

"We have not been forced to convert; we were inspired by the teachings of Islam. This is an unnecessary controversy," said Keshav Jatav, before being taken into custody.

A police team will now investigate the villagers' allegation.

Source: NDTV

This Why There Is A Sunni Uprising In Iraq

This is just one of the many violent acts that the Shia are doing to the Sunni's of Iraq on a daily basis.

When Buddhists Go To War

On October 1, Muslims in the coastal village of Thabyuchaing in the northwest of Burma fled into the surrounding forests as their homes were torched and left to burn by a sword-wielding Buddhist mob. Not everyone was lucky enough to escape: five Muslims, including a 94-year-old woman, were killed in the attack. 

The incident was an all too familiar reminder of the ethno-religious tensions and sectarian violence that continue to plague Burma’s nascent democracy. While Nobel Peace Prize winner and Burmese MP Aung Sung Suu Kyi has become the face of a liberalized Burma in the West, her domestic dominance is being increasingly challenged by Ashin Wirathu, a monk Time magazine described as the “face of Buddhist terror. ” Wirathu and his followers have been at the forefront of a campaign of ethnic and religious violence that has threatened to derail the country’s already fragile democratic transition.

Burma’s progress is vulnerable due to the lingering legacy of decades of military rule. The country’s first foray into democracy began in 1948, when it gained independence, bringing an end to over a century of British imperial rule. However, in 1962 a military led coup succeeded in overthrowing the civilian government, beginning a period of socialist military rule that ended in 1988. That year there was another coup establishing the State Peace and Development Council (or the military junta, as it is more commonly known) as the ruling body of Burma. The Buddhist establishment remained a bastion of Burmese national identity and security throughout this turbulent half-century. During this time, religious leaders were only occasionally critical of these successive regimes. It wasn’t until the last decade that religious leaders within various communities began to take a significant role in the country’s political development.

The 2007 Saffron Revolution demonstrated the capacity for change that these Burmese Buddhists wield. In what began as a student led protest against rising costs of living, monks across Burma began a campaign of civil resistance that brought the government to a standstill. Throughout the summer and early fall, monks marched through the cities and sat en masse in public squares and historic sites in defiance of the junta. In September, monks across the country suspended spiritual services to the military, a powerful symbolic move for a devoutly Buddhist country. When the government responded with force and brought the short-lived revolution to a bloody end, the crackdown was met with both domestic and international outcry as well as an outpouring of support — particularly for the monks who had dared to stand up to the military regime.

Burma’s history of ethnic and religious struggle extends beyond Buddhist political protest. Even before the 1962 coup, the central government had been in a near perpetual state of conflict with a variety of secessionist groups, perhaps most notably the Kachin people of northern Burma, who have been sporadically fighting a war of independence from the country since 1948. Within the last decade in particular, these conflicts have taken on a decidedly more internal character. The state of Rakhine, an epicenter of ethno-religious violence on the Bangladeshi border, has a history of Mujahedeen-inspired Muslim separatist movements. Recently, however, the violence has been predominantly Buddhist-on-Muslim. Oppression of the Rohingya, an ethnically Bangladeshi Muslim group who primarily reside in the state of Rakhine, has reached largely unprecedented levels, as Buddhist extremists have started burning Muslim holdings to the ground and forcing the Rohingya from their land.

The conflict between the Buddhist majority and Muslim minority in Burma appears to be ethnic cleansing in the making. Muslims make up only 4 percent of Burma’s population of approximately 55 million people. However, they are heavily concentrated in the country’s western half — comprising 40.75 percent of the total population of Rakhine  and 96 percent of the population along the border with Bangladesh. As of June this year, an estimated 200 Muslims have been killed and 150,000 have been displaced. Even more worrisome is the fact that Buddhist extremism in Burma is widespread. Other extremist Buddhist movements, such as the GAM in Aceh and the Buddhist radicals in Sri Lanka are relatively minor. In Burma, however, this manifestation of radical prejudice is just the latest chapter in a history of abuses.

Muslims have long been perceived as culturally and socially separate from the rest of Burma. While the country has never been culturally or ethnically homogeneous, the Rohingya have attracted an unusually fierce vitriol due to their practice of Islam, leading to historical and systematic discrimination. The laws in place restrict the number of children they are permitted to two per couple. Even more disheartening, many Burmese see the current anti-Muslim violence as an inevitable and justified backlash against Bengali land-grabbers.  Prominent members of the Buddhist institution, especially Ashin Wirathu, have only encouraged this attitude.

Always traveling in a motorcade with 60 of his closest followers, Wirathu — the self described “Burmese bin Laden”  — is at the heart of the growing tide of anti-Islamic rhetoric. While his self-assigned title may seem something of a paradox given his mission to drive Muslims out of Burma, the charismatic 45-year-old has proven himself as masterful and adept as his namesake at inciting religious hatred. A fierce polemicist who described coexistence with Muslims as “sleep[ing] next to a mad dog,” he describes the threat posed by Muslim communities in apocalyptic terms. “They will overwhelm [Burma] and take over our country,” said Wirathu, adding that they will “make it into an evil Islamic nation.” And like bin Laden, he has a keen eye for his media presence. DVDs of his speeches are sold on street corners. An enthusiastic user of YouTube, his followers post his fiery, anti-“Islamification” sermons, which Atlantic columnist Alex Bookbinder has noted “would not be out of place at Nuremberg.”

Born in the small town of Kyaukse in central Burma, Wirathu is no stranger to controversy. In 2001, he became involved with the 969 movement, a Buddhist nationalist organization. Two years later, he was found guilty by the military junta government for giving critical speeches that allegedly incited religious conflict. In 2010, he was released from prison as part of a conciliatory gesture by the military junta, and ever since, Wirathu has come to be seen as the 969 movement’s spiritual protector and leader.

The 969 movement purports to be a non-violent organization that stands for the protection of Buddhist values and national identity in Burma. But their actions reveal that their mission is in fact a narrowly defined racial and religious jingoism. The movement has its origins in a book written in the late 1990s by U Kyaw Lwin, a religious official in the military junta. Throughout Southeast Asia, the number 786 has special significance for many Muslims as a numerical representation of the phrase “In the Name of Allah, the Compassionate and Merciful.” In his numerological treatise, Lwin makes the argument that Muslims are in fact conspiring to take over Burma in the 21st century — premised on the absurdly conspiratorial fact that 7 plus 8 plus 6 equals 21. The number 969 has a similar significance. It was chosen as a cosmological defense because of its allusions to the “three jewels” of Buddhism: Buddha’s nine attributes, the six principles of his teachings, and the nine attributes of monastic order. Emblems of the 969 Movement are increasingly popular throughout Burma, with supporters proudly displaying the iconography in their homes, businesses and on their vehicles. Some stores juxtapose their emblems with signs proudly claiming that they do not stock Muslim goods.

As is often the case in states with uncertain futures, minority groups are scapegoats for the nation’s economic woes. Comparisons of modern day Burma to Nazi Germany are not entirely unwarranted. Wirathu has pointed to the affluence of a few Muslims as proof that the Burmese economy is at the whim of Islam, conveniently overlooking the legacy of crony capitalism that has enriched the military administration, none of whom are Muslim.The Burmese population at large, however, has seized upon these claims, and there is swelling support for Wirathu’s call to boycott Muslim businesses. His goal is to cut off the ability of Muslims to engage in commerce. By depriving them of their means of subsistence, Wirathu and other members of the 969 movement ultimately seek to drive Muslims from the country.

As is common among ethno-nationalist movements, Wirathu’s proclaimed goal is simply to protect the purity and integrity of the Burmese state. In a February speech he warned that if Muslims are allowed to become too wealthy their “money will eventually be used against you to destroy your race and religion.”  At the same rally, Wirathu also invoked the need to protect the innocence of Burmese women who would be “coerced or even forced to convert to Islam.”  It hardly needs restating that  the protection of women is compelling rhetoric that has been used by movements from the KKK to the National Socialist party. Its efficacy in Burma, unfortunately, has been readily apparent.

This insular notion of purity is common among many Asian states due to their shared religion. Buddhism has played an influential role in many countries throughout the region, and it has particularly helped unify Burma, a country cut off from much of the world by geography and political circumstance. Despite the fairly diverse ethnic makeup of Burma, Buddhism has proven to be the country’s most significant integrating factor. Its near-complete dominance and perceived cultural integrity explain in large part the hostility displayed toward Muslims who are branded perennial outsiders. The significance of monasticism to Burmese society cannot be overstated. There are over 500,000 monks in Burma  and an additional 75,000 nuns, meaning that roughly one percent of the population is part of the Buddhist institution. Furthermore, since monastic education in Burma is free, many of the poorest families will opt to send their children to study in monasteries. Buddhist religious education is commonplace amongst all strata of society, as almost all Burmese children receive a supplementary Buddhist education akin to Sunday school. This overwhelming preponderance of not merely Buddhist observance, but also Buddhist veneration, helps to explain the religion’s central role in Burmese identity and the enormous impact that it has on average citizens.

In June 2012, Burma experienced a paroxysm of ethnic riots in Rakhine, and it’s not hard to link the corrosive influence of Buddhist institutions to the widespread violence.  While the proximate cause of the 2012 June riots was the rape and murder of a Rakhine woman by a group of Rohingya Muslim men, the ensuing attacks and counterattacks by Rakhine and Rohingya communities were the inevitable product of pent-up frustration in an unequal system. Buddhist mobs in Rakhine, whipped into a frenzy by extremists like Wirathu, began indiscriminately attacking Rohingya men in a search for the perpetrators. The Rohingya responded with violence fueled by years of discrimination and neglect of their own.

In October of the same year, riots broke out again, but the cause was unclear. By the end of 2012, an estimated 168 people had been killed in the riots with a further 150,000, mostly Rohingya, displaced. While camps have been set up to aid in the resettlement process, they present only a stopgap solution, a temporary bandage for the scars of ethnic conflict. To many observers, the question is, “Why now?”

Burma stands at a precarious moment in its history. For the first time in over 50 years, democracy seems like a real possibility. However, internal and external forces have proven a stumbling block for suffrage. The discovery of vast natural resources in Burma, ranging from precious stones to fossil fuels, has elevated the democratic movement to one of global concern. Foreign actors have not undervalued Burma’s resource wealth. While the United States has approached Burma with a soft touch, China has taken a far more aggressive track, particularly in regards to securing resource extraction contracts.

Burma’s newfound riches will only stoke the flames. Militant ethno-nationalism often has arisen as a symptom of sudden resource wealth in emerging states around the world. Developing states with plentiful natural resources are often heavily exploited by foreign powers. Coupled with the possibility of enormous wealth, foreign exploitation might only produce an even more aggressive nationalism that endangers Burma’s ethnic and religious minorities.

Mongolia today is one of the fastest growing economies in the world, in large part due to its massive copper and coal reserves; it’s also home to a fledgling neo-Nazi movement. As paradoxical as a Mongolian neo-Nazi movement may sound, it is no more contradictory than militant Buddhists. The Tsagaan Khass, or White Swastika, as the group is known, has tried in recent years to rebrand itself as an environmental movement looking to protect Mongolia’s resource sovereignty, and ensure that the nation’s blood is “pure.” The group’s leaders are concerned that if Mongolian society starts “mixing with the Chinese, they will swallow us up.”  The situation in Mongolia bears more than a passing resemblance to that in Burma. While the White Swastika does not have the same widespread appeal as the 969 movement, they are both indicative of how these ethno-nationalist movements develop in response to perceived threats by historical rivals, particularly during periods of uncertain economic growth. While both Mongolia and Burma have vast resource wealth, they lack domestic extractive capabilities, forcing them to rely on foreign investment. This loss of resource sovereignty produces anger and resentment, particularly in economically marginalized groups who are susceptible to the scapegoats proffered by the likes of Ashin Wirathu and the White Swastika.

While transitional instability and resource nationalism may have played a role in Wirathu’s growing support, his success is still contingent on deeply held racial and religious prejudice. The Christian minority in Burma has not been the target of hate crimes, despite being the religion of the Kachin, who have waged a decades-long war of independence. The persecution of Muslims, then, can be seen as the cumulative product of systemic and ingrained bigotry, which has been violently catalyzed by economic and political instability. In other words, there’s a reason that Buddhist attacks have focused on one ethnic minority, rather than all vulnerable groups.

Last July, a bomb exploded a few yards away from Ashin Wirathu as he delivered another sermon on the Muslim threat. Unharmed and undaunted, Wirathu has continued to deliver sermons around the country. In the last year, the 969 movement has gone from fringe extremists to a national movement with growing support. There are even fears that the current administration has intentionally allowed Wirathu’s campaign of violence to proceed unabated in order to justify continued draconian national security measures. As he capitalizes on the underlying racial and religious prejudices that have swirled to the surface of Burmese society, over 150,000 Muslims find themselves without a home. While moderate monks and more liberal citizens have begun to push back against this metastasizing violence, recent events have shown that political circumstances can lead even Buddhists astray from the path to enlightenment, and into the foreboding brambles of racial violence.

(By Edward Clifford)

The War On Islam

Pope Urban II preaches the First Crusade at the Council of Clermont "I, or rather the Lord, beseech you as Christ's heralds to publish this everywhere and to persuade all people of whatever rank, foot-soldiers and knights, poor and rich, to carry aid promptly to those Christians and to destroy that vile race from the lands of our friends..."

According to historian R.M. Savory:

"The existence of Islam has always made the West profoundly uneasy. Islam was the only major world religion to be revealed after the rise of Christianity, and consequently it was, from the moment of the revelation of Islam in the seventh century A.D., viewed by Christendom as a direct threat and challenge to itself.

On the theological and religious level, the reaction of the West was strong, sustained and, almost without exception, hostile. Hostility was based on fear, and fear had its roots in ignorance. Christendom feared Islam, and therefore misrepresented it. Christians were ignorant of Islam, at least in part, because Christendom, prompted by odium theologicum had no desire to understand or tolerate Islam.

Co-existence was not permitted to endure. Christendom had not reconciled itself to a permanent Muslim presence in Europe, especially as this presence could not be ignored, for Islam, far from whithering [sic?] away, had produced great philosophers and scientists."

Western imperialism was a new form of the Crusades, "latter-day" imperialism in Muslim lands being "but a mask for the crusading spirit."

This claim appears to have at least some factual historical basis. Savory says:

It is not surprising, therefore, to find a great similarity between the medieval view that it was safe to speak ill of Muhammad because his malignity exceeded whatever ill could be spoken of him, and the tone of nineteenth-century missionary tracts which exhorted the Muslims in India to abandon the false religion which they had been taught.

There were even echos of the old crusading spirit. When the French occupied Algeria in 1830, they declared that they had in mind 'the greatest benefit to Christendom'.

Similarly, Canning's solution to the 'problem' of the Ottoman empire was to bring it into modern Europe under Christian tutelage.

When the French invaded Tunis in 1881, they considered their action a sacred duty 'which a superior civilisation owes to the populations which are less advanced.

Anti-Muslim Monk Wirathu Inciting Hatred

"Whatever (the Muslims) do they do it with their 'national' Muslim interests in mind. They have designs against our country, our faith and our society. They now have monopoly over the construction sector in Rangoon. They have come to dominate Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy. Even she is only riding the niggers' cars. All these national dissidents such as Aung San Suu Kyi and Min Ko Naing dare not speak a word about the Rakhine Crisis (during which our brethen Rakhine are suffering at the hands of the Bangali). Our national political emblem has been replaced by the Islam's symbol of beards! They are the worst violators of human rights and religious freedom. So, you Buddhist lay public must do everything with the (anti-Muslim) nationalist ethos. Only do business and socially interact with those who embrace 969 ethos of economic boycott and societal exclusion and ostracism against the (Muslim) enemy". 

Persecution Of Muslims

Qolsharif and his students defend their mosque during theSiege of Kazan.

Crusades

The First Crusade was launched in 1095 by Pope Urban II, with the stated goal of regaining control of the sacred city of Jerusalem and the Holy Land from the Muslims, who had captured them from the Byzantines in 638. It was also partly a response to the Investiture Controversy, which was the most significant conflict between secular and religious powers in medieval Europe. The controversy began as a dispute between the Holy Roman Emperor and the Gregorian Papacy and gave rise to the political concept of Christendom as a union of all peoples and sovereigns under the direction of the pope; as both sides tried to marshal public opinion in their favor, people became personally engaged in a dramatic religious controversy. Also of great significance in launching the crusade were the string of victories by the Seljuk Turks, which saw the end of Arab rule in Jerusalem.

On 7 May 1099 the crusaders reached Jerusalem, which had been recaptured from the Seljuks by the Fatimids of Egypt only a year before. On 15 July, the crusaders were able to end the siege by breaking down sections of the walls and entering the city. Over the course of that afternoon, evening and next morning, the crusaders murdered almost every inhabitant of Jerusalem. Muslims, Jews, and even eastern Christians were all massacred. Although many Muslims sought shelter atop the Temple Mount inside the Al-Aqsa Mosque, the crusaders spared few lives. According to the anonymous Gesta Francorum, in what some believe to be one of the most valuable contemporary sources of the First Crusade, "...the slaughter was so great that our men waded in blood up to their ankles...."^[4] Tancred claimed the Temple quarter for himself and offered protection to some of the Muslims there, but he was unable to prevent their deaths at the hands of his fellow crusaders. According to Fulcher of Chartres: "Indeed, if you had been there you would have seen our feet coloured to our ankles with the blood of the slain. But what more shall I relate? None of them were left alive; neither women nor children were spared."^[5]

During the First Crusade and the massacre at Jerusalem, it has been reported that the Crusaders "[circled] the screaming, flame-tortured humanity singing 'Christ We Adore Thee!' with their Crusader crosses held high".^[6] Muslims were indiscriminately killed, and Jews who had taken refuge in their Synagogue were murdered when it was burnt down by the Crusaders.

Italy

Further information: History of Islam in southern Italy, Emirate of Sicily and Muslim settlement of Lucera

At first, the Muslim populations did well in Sicily in the first 100 years after the Norman conquest which ended their colonial Emirate of Sicily. Arabs remained privileged in the matters of government. Indeed, 4000 Saracen archers took part in various battles between Christian forces. When the Normans and later the House of Anjou lost control of the Island to Peter of Aragon, Islam began to decline. Norman rulers followed a policy of steadily Latinization (converting the island to Catholicism). Some Muslims chose the option of feigning conversion, but such a remedy could only provide individual protection and could not sustain a community.^[7]

Lombard pogroms against Muslims started in the 1160s. Muslim and Christian communities in Sicily became increasingly geographically separated. The island’s Muslim communities were mainly isolated beyond an internal frontier which divided the south-western half of the island from the Christian north-east. Sicilian Muslims, a subject population, were dependent on royal protection. When King William the Good died in 1189, this royal protection was lifted, and the door was opened for widespread attacks against the island’s Muslims. Islam was no longer a major presence in the Island by the 14th century. Toleration of Muslims ended with Increasing Hohenstaufen control. Many repressive measures, passed by Frederick II, were introduced in order to please the Popes who could not tolerate Islam being practiced in the heart of Christendom,^[8] which resulted in a rebellion of Sicily's Muslims.^[9] This in turn triggered organized resistance and systematic reprisals^[10] and marked the final chapter of Islam in Sicily. The rebellion abated, but direct papal pressure induced Frederick to mass transfer all his Muslim subjects deep into the Italian hinterland, to Lucera.^[9]

Mongol invasions

Genghis Khan, and the following Yuan Emperors in China forbade Islamic practices like halal butchering, forcing Mongol methods of butchering animals on Muslims, and other restrictive degrees continued. Muslims had to slaughter sheep in secret.^[11] Genghis Khan directly called Muslims "slaves", and demanded that they follow the Mongol method of eating rather than the halal method. Circumcision was also forbidden.^[12][13] Toward the end, corruption and the persecution became so severe that Muslim generals joined Han Chinese in rebelling against the Mongols. The Ming founder Zhu Yuanzhang had Muslim generals like Lan Yu who rebelled against the Mongols and defeated them in combat. Some Muslim communities had the name "kamsia," which, in Hokkien Chinese, means "thank you"; many Hui Muslims claim it is because that they played an important role in overthrowing the Mongols and it was named in thanks by the Han Chinese for assisting them.^[14] The Muslims in the Semu class also revolted against the Yuan dynasty in theIspah Rebellion but the rebellion was crushed and the Muslims were massacred by the Yuan loyalist commander Chen Youding.

Following the brutal Mongol invasion of Central Asia under Genghis Khan, and after the sack of Baghdad, the Mongol Empire's rule extended across most Muslim lands in Asia. The Abbasid caliphate was destroyed and the Islamic civilization, especially Mesopotamia, suffered much devastation and was replaced by Tengriism and Buddhism as the official religion of the empire.^[15] However, the Mongols attacked people for goods and riches and not because of their religion. Many later Mongol khans and rulers became Muslims themselves like Oljeitu and otherIlkhanid and Golden Horde rulers and inhabitants. There was no real effort to replace Islam with any other religion, but to plunder goods from anyone that didn't submit, which was characteristic to Mongol warfare. During the Yuan Dynasty that the Mongols founded, Muslim scientists were highly regarded and Muslim beliefs were respected in the Yuan Dynasty. On the Mongol attacks, the Muslim historian, ibn al-Athir lamented:

“

I shrank from giving a recital of these events on the account of their magnitude and abhorrence. Even now I come reluctant to the task, for who would deem it a light thing to sing the death song of Islam and the Muslims or find it easy to tell this tale? O that my mother had not given me birth![16]

”

Among The Detailed Atrocities Include:

• The Grand Library of Baghdad, containing countless precious historical documents and books on subjects ranging from medicine to astronomy, was destroyed. Survivors said that the waters of the Tigris ran black with ink from the enormous quantities of books flung into the river.
• Citizens attempted to flee, but were intercepted by Mongol soldiers who killed with abandon. Martin Sicker writes that close to 90,000 people may have died (Sicker 2000, p. 111). Other estimates go much higher. Wassaf claims the loss of life was several hundred thousand. Ian Frazier of The New Yorker says estimates of the death toll have ranged from 200,000 to a million.^[17]
• The Mongols looted and then destroyed mosques, palaces, libraries, and hospitals. Grand buildings that had been the work of generations were burned to the ground.
• The caliph was captured and forced to watch as his citizens were murdered and his treasury plundered. According to most accounts, the caliph was killed by trampling. The Mongols rolled the caliph up in a rug, and rode their horses over him, as they believed that the earth was offended if touched by royal blood. All but one of his sons were killed, and the sole surviving son was sent to Mongolia.
• Hulagu had to move his camp upwind of the city, due to the stench of decay from the ruined city.

At the intervention of the Mongol Hulagu's Nestorian Christian wife, Dokuz Khatun, the Christian inhabitants were spared.^[18][19] Hulagu offered the royal palace to the NestorianCatholicos Mar Makikha, and ordered a cathedral to be built for him.^[20] Ultimately, the seventh ruler of the Ilkhanate dynasty, Mahmud Ghazan, converted to Islam from Tengrism, and thus began the gradual trend of the decline of Tengrism and Buddhism in the region and renaissance of Islam. Later, three of the four principal Mongol khanates embracedIslam.^[21]

Iberian Peninsula

Main articles: Expulsion of the Moriscos and Islam in Spain

Muslims invaded the Iberian Peninsula from 711, and ruled it according to Sharia law.^[22] The Peninsula was fully reconquered by 1492.

Depending on the local capitulations, local Muslims were allowed to remain (Mudéjars) with some restrictions and some assimilated into the Christian population. After the conquest of Granada, all the Spanish Muslims were under Christian rule. The new acquired population spoke Arabic and the campaigns to convert them were unsuccessful. Legislation was gradually introduced to remove Islam, culminating with the Muslims being forced to convert to Catholicism by the Spanish Inquisition. They were known as Moriscos and consideredNew Christians. Further laws were introduced, as on 25 May 1566, stipulating that they 'had to abandon the use of Arabic, change their costumes, that their doors must remain open every Friday, and other feast days, and that their baths, public and private, to be torn down.'.^[23] The reason doors were to be left open so as to determine whether they secretly observed any Islamic festivals.^[24] King Philip II of Spain ordered the destruction of all public baths on the grounds of them being relics of infidelity, notorious for their use by Muslims performing their purification rites.^[25][26] The possession of books or papers in Arabic was near concrete proof of disobedience with severe repercussions.^[27] On 1 January 1568, Christian priests were ordered to take all Morisco children, between the ages of three and fifteen, and place them in schools, where they should learn Castillian and Christian doctrine.^[28] All these laws and measures required forced to be implemented, and from much earlier.

Between 1609 and 1614 the Moriscos were expelled from Spain.^[29] They were to depart 'under the pain of death and confiscation, without trial or sentence... to take with them no money, bullion, jewels or bills of exchange... just what they could carry.'^[30]

Sikh Empire[

Maharaja Ranjit Singh of the Sikh Empire defeated Syad Ahmed Shah, and then proceeded to Peshawar to teach its governor a lesson for having supported the plot by Syad Ahmed. Ranjit Singh thus pillaged the city, cut down trees for which the city was famous, burnt the palace of Bala Hissar and its mosque was defiled.^{[citation needed]} The next grand victory of Diwan Chand was at Kashmir.^[31] Birbal Dhar pleaded with Maharaja Ranjit Singh to save the Kashmiri Pandits from the Pashtuns. When Kashmir's governor Muhammad Azim heard of this he ordered his men to abduct Dhar's women who were then sent to Kabul. Hearing this Dhar committed suicide and in an act of retribution, Ranjit Singh ordered his most able general Diwan Chand to mount the expedition of Kashmir, where he was assisted by Raja Gulab Singh Jamwal, a Hindu Dogra Rajput of Jammu. Hearing of Diwan Chand's march towards Kashmir, Muhammad Azim fled from Kashmir with his wives leaving behind his brother Jabbar Khan. Diwan Chand assisted by the Sikh general Hari Singh Nalwa met Jabbar Khan at Sophiyan, where he routed Durrani Empire governor Jabbar Khan in 1819 and ended 500 years of Muslim Rule in Kashmir.

He became the first Hindu Governor of Kashmir after 1354AD and enacted dozens of anti-Muslim laws. He raised the tax on Muslims, demolished the Jama Masjid of Srinagar and prohibited cow slaughter. The punishment for cow slaughter was the death penalty without any exception. He abducted all the Pashtun and Uzbek women and infamously sold them at Hira Mandi, a very popular market in Lahore (the Sikh Empire Capital).^[32][33][34] Maharaja

Ranjit Singh in lieu of helping Shah Shuja the grandson of Ahmad Shah Durrani asked for the ban of cow slaughter in Afghanistan and with Ranjit Singh's help, Shuja regained the Kabul Throne and imposed a Ban on cow slaughter in Kabul.^[35]

Sayyid Ahmed Barelvi declared war against Maharaja Ranjit Singh and recruited many Muslims from madrassas, however the Yousufzai and Muhammadzai Khawaneen didn't like egalitarian ideals and betrayed Sayyid Ahmed Shahid and his army at the battle of Balakot and supported the Sikh Army in the Battle of Balakote in 1831, and Barelvi's head was severed by Sikh General Hari Singh Nalwa.^[36][37]

Muslims still revered Sayyid Ahmad, however he was defeated and killed in the battle by Sikh Forces commanded by Hari Singh Nalwa and Gulab Singh.^[38] Raja Aggar Khan of Rajaouri was defeated, humiliated by the Ranjit Singh commander Gulab Singh and was brought to Lahore where he was beheaded by Gulab Singh of Jammu.

MODERN

Anatolia

See also: Greco-Turkish War (1919–1922)

Many Muslims (Turkish and Kurdish) were killed by Russians and Armenians in eastern Anatolia (including Bayburt, Bitlis, Erzincan, Erzurum, Kars and Mus),^[40][41] and by Greeks in western Anatolia (including Izmir, Manisa and Usak).^[42]

On May 14, 1919 a fleet of British, American and French warships brought an entire Greek division into the harbour of Izmir (Smyrna). The landing was followed by a general slaughter of the Turkish population. Greek gangs roamed the streets looting and killing. As the Greek army pushed into Anatolia the local population was subjected to massacres, ravaging and raping.^[43]

Johannes Kolmodin was a Swedish orientalist in Izmir. He wrote in his letters that the Greek army had burned 250 Turkish villages.^[44]

Balkans[

See also: Massacres during the Greek Revolution and Massacres of Albanians in the Balkan Wars

As the Ottoman Empire entered a permanent phase of decline in the late 17th century it was engaged in a protracted state of conflict, losing territories both in Europe and the Caucasus. The victors were the Christian States, the old Habsburg and Romanov Empires and the new nation-states of Greece, Serbia, Romania and Bulgaria.^[45] Rival European powers encouraged the development of nationalist ideologies among the Ottoman subjects in which the Muslims were portrayed as an ethnic “fifth column” leftover from a previous era that could not be integrated into the planned future states. The struggle to rid themselves of Ottomans became an important element of the self-identification of the Balkan Christians.^[46]

According to Mark Levene, the Victorian public in the 1870s paid much more attention to the massacres and expulsions of Christians than to massacres and expulsions of Muslims, even if on a greater scale. He further suggests that such massacres were even favored by some circles. Mark Levene also argues that the dominant powers, by supporting "nation-statism" at the Congress of Berlin, legitimized "the primary instrument of Balkan nation-building": ethnic cleansing.^[47] Hall points out that atrocities were committed by all sides during the Balkan conflicts. Deliberate terror was designed to instigate population movements out of particular territories. The aim of targeting the civilian population was to carve ethnically homogeneous countries.^[48]

During the Russo-Turkish War of 1787–1792 the Russian Army commander Alexander Suvorov successfully the fortress of Izmail on December 22, 1790. Ottoman forces inside the fortress had the orders to stand their ground to the end, haughtily declining the Russian ultimatum. Alexander Suvorov announced the capture of Ismail in 1791 to the Tsarina Catherine in a doggerel couplet, after the assault had been pressed from house to house, room to room, and nearly every Muslim man, woman, and child in the city had been killed in three days of uncontrolled massacre, 40,000 Turks dead, a few hundred taken into captivity. For all his bluffness, Suvorov later told an English traveller that when the massacre was over he went back to his tent and wept.^[49]

Justin McCarty estimates that between 1821 and 1922 around five and a half million Muslims were driven out of Europe and five million more were killed or died of disease and starvation while fleeing.^[50] Cleansing occurred as a result of the Serbian and Greek independence in the 1820s and 1830s, the Russo-Turkish War 1877–1878, and culminating in the Balkan Wars 1912–1913. Mann describes these acts as “murderous ethnic cleansing on stupendous scale not previously seen in Europe” referring to the 1914 Carnegie Endowment report.^[51][52] It is estimated that at the turn of the 20th century there were 4,4 million Muslims living in the Balkan zone of Ottoman control.^[53] More than one million Muslims left the Balkans in the last three decades of the 19th century.^[54] Between 1912 and 1926 nearly 2.9 million Muslims were either killed or forced to emigrate to Turkey.^[53]

Between 10,000^[55] and 30,000^[56][57][58] Turks were killed in Tripolitsa by Greek rebels in the summer of 1821, including the entire Jewish population of the city. Similar events as these occurred also elsewhere during the Greek Revolution resulting in the eradication and expulsion of virtually the entire Turkish population of the Morea. These acts ensured the ethnic homogenization of the area under the rule of the future modern Greek state.^[59] In 1830 the Muslims population in Morea is put at 300,000. In 1878 the Muslim inhabitants in Thessaly are estimated to be 150,000 and in 1897 the Muslims numbered 50,000 in Crete. By 1919 there were virtually no Muslims left in Morea and Thessaly and only 20,000 in Crete.^[60]

In the Bulgarian insurgency of the April Uprising in 1876 an estimate of 1,000 Muslims were killed.^[61][62] During the Russo-Turkish War a significant number of Turks were either killed, perished or became refugees. There are different estimates about the casualties of the war. Crampton describes an exodus of 130,000-150,000 expelled of which approximately half returned for an intermediary period encouraged by the Congress of Berlin. Hupchick and McCarthy point out that 260,000 perished and 500,000 became refugees.^[63][64] The Turkish scholars Karpat and Ipek argue that up to 300,000 were killed and 1–1.5 million were forced to emigrate.^[65][66] Members of the European press who covered the war in Bulgaria reported on the Russian atrocities against Muslims. Witness accounts from Schumla and Razgrad describe children, women and elderly wounded by sabres and lances. They stated that the entire Muslim population of many villages had been massacred.^[67] Recently uncovered photographs in the archive of the German Ministry of Foreign Affairs from the Russo-Turkish War 1877–1878 show the massacre of Muslims by the Russians in the region of Stara Zagora claiming to have affected some 20,000 Muslim civilians.^[68]

Massacres against Turks and Muslims during the Balkan Wars in the hands of Bulgarians, Greeks and Armenians are described in detail in the 1912 Carnegie Endowment report.^[69] Hupchick estimates that nearly 1,5 million Muslims died and 400,000 became refugees as a result of the Balkan Wars.^[70] The Bulgarian violence during the Balkan Warincluded burning of villages, transforming mosques into churches, rape of women and mutilation of bodies. It is estimated that 220,000 Pomaks were forcefully Christianized and forbidden to bear Islamic religious clothing.^[71]

Bosnian Muslims

The Bosnian Genocide refers to either genocide at Srebrenica and Žepa^[72] committed by Bosnian Serb forces in 1995 or the ethnic cleansing campaign throughout areas controlled by the Army of the Republika Srpska^[73] that took place during the 1992–1995 Bosnian War.^[74]

The events in Srebrenica in 1995 included the killing of more than 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys, as well as the mass expulsion of another 25,000–30,000 Bosniak civilians, in and around the town of Srebrenica in Bosnia and Herzegovina, committed by units of the Army of the Republika Srpska (VRS) under the command of General Ratko Mladić.^[75][76]

The ethnic cleansing campaign that took place throughout areas controlled by the VRS targeted Bosnian Muslims. The ethnic cleansing campaign included unlawful confinement, murder, rape, sexual assault, torture, beating, robbery and inhumane treatment of civilians; the targeting of political leaders, intellectuals and professionals; the unlawful deportation and transfer of civilians; the unlawful shelling of civilians; the unlawful appropriation and plunder of real and personal property; the destruction of homes and businesses; and the destruction of places of worship.^[77]

The Srebrenica massacre, also known as the Srebrenica genocide^{[78][79][80][81][82][83]} (Bosnian: Genocid u Srebrenici), was the July 1995 killing of more than 8,000^{[84][85][86][87][88]} Bosniaks (Bosnian Muslims), mainly men and boys, in and around the town of Srebrenica during the Bosnian War. The killing was perpetrated by units of theArmy of Republika Srpska (VRS) under the command of General Ratko Mladić. The Secretary-General of the United Nations described the mass murder as the worst crime on European soil since the Second World War.^[89][72] A paramilitary unit from Serbia known as the Scorpions, officially part of the Serbian Interior Ministry until 1991, participated in the massacre,^[90][91] along with several hundred Russian and Greek volunteers.^[92][93]

Bulgaria

There were 1.5 million Muslims living on the territory of modern-day Bulgaria at the start of the Russo-Turkish War (1877–1878). After the Ottoman defeat, the Russian army along with irregular troops including Cossacks entered the land and carried out massacres and deportations against Muslims with the aid of the Bulgarians. Half a million Muslims succeeded in reaching Ottoman controlled lands and 672,215 were reported to have remained after the war. Approximately a quarter of a million perished from massacres, cold, disease and other harsh conditions.^[94] "I can come to no other conclusion but that the Russians are carrying out a fixed policy exterminating the Moslem race".^[95] According to Aubaret, the French Consul in Ruse in 1876 in the Danube Vilayet alone there were 1,120,000 Muslims and 1,233,500 non-Muslims of whom 1,150,000 were Bulgarian. Between 1876 and 1878, through massacres, epidemics, hunger and war a large portion of the Turkish population vanished. Turkish flow to Anatolia continued in a steady pattern depending on the policies of the ruling regimes until 1925 after which immigration was regulated. During the 20th century Bulgaria also practiced forced deportations and expulsions, which also targeted the Muslim Pomak population.^[96]

Central African Republic

During the internal armed conflict in the Central African Republic in 2013, anti-balaka militiamen were targeting Bangui's Muslim neighborhoods^[97] and Muslim ethnic groups such as the Fulas.^[98]

Middle East and Palestine

The Sabra and Shatila massacre was the slaughter of between 762 and 3,500 civilians, mostly Palestinians and Lebanese Shiites, by a Lebanese Christian militia in the Sabra neighborhood and the adjacent Shatila refugee camp in Beirut, Lebanon from approximately 6:00 pm 16 September to 8:00 am 18 September 1982.^[99]

Israeli settler violence refers to acts of violence committed by Israeli settlers against Palestinians and Israeli security forces, predominantly in the West Bank. Most West Bank settlers are "law abiding" (according to a senior Israeli army officer)^[100] and the vast majority are non-violent,^[101] but there has been a rise in violent acts by fringe extremists against Palestinians and Israel Police and IDF troops.^[102] In 2007 Israeli prosecutors determined that of 515 criminal suits relating to violent activity committed by Israeli settlers against Palestinians and Israeli security forces, 502 related to right wing Jewish settlers in the Occupied Territories.^[103][104] In 2008, the senior Israeli commander in the West Bank said that a hard core of a few hundred activists were involved in violence against the Palestinians and Israeli soldiers.^[105] Some prominent Jewish religious figures living in the occupied territories, as well as Israeli government officials, have condemned and expressed outrage over such behaviour.^[106] In the years 2008-2009, the defense establishment began taking a harder line against unruly settlers.^[102] An EU heads of mission report found that settler violence had more than tripled in the three years up to 2011.^[107]OCHA figures state that the annual rate of settler attacks (2,100 attacks in 8 years) has almost quadrupled between 2006 and 2014.^[108] Palestinian police are forbidden from reacting to acts of violence by Israeli settlers, a fact which diminishes their credibility among Palestinians.^[109]

The Cave of the Patriarchs massacre, also known as the Hebron massacre^[110] was a shooting attack carried out by American-born Israeli Baruch Goldstein, a member of the far-right Israeli Kach movement, who opened fire on unarmed Palestinian Muslims praying inside the Ibrahim Mosque (or Mosque of Abraham) at the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron,West Bank. It took place on February 25, 1994, during the overlapping religious holidays of Purim and Ramadan.^[111][112] The attack left 29 male worshippers dead and 125 wounded.^[113] The attack only ended after Goldstein had expended his ammunition, when he was overcome and beaten to death by survivors.

Germany

Violent xenophobic riots took place in the Lichtenhagen district of Rostock, Germany, targeting mainly Muslim Turkish Germans; the Rostock-Lichtenhagen riots were the worst mob attacks against Turks in postwar Germany. The Solingen arson attack of 1993 on a Turkish family was one of the most severe instances of anti-Muslim violence in modernGermany. Muslims were also targeted in the Bosphorus serial murders and the Murder of Marwa El-Sherbini.

China

Main articles: Dungan revolt (1862–1877), Dungan revolt (1895–96) and Panthay rebellion

The Dungan revolt erupted due to infighting between different Muslim Sufi sects, the Khafiya and the Jahariyya, and the Gedimu. When the rebellion failed, mass-immigration of the Dungan people into Imperial Russia, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan ensued. Before the war, the population of Shaanxi province totalled approximately 13 million inhabitants, at least 1,750,000 of whom were Dungan (Hui). After the war, the population dropped to 7 million; at least 150,000 fled. Xi'an, the capital of Shaanxi province, was the Holy city of Dungan (Hui) in China before the revolt. But once-flourishing Chinese Muslim communities fell 93% in the revolt in Shaanxi province. Between 1648 and 1878, around twelve million Hui and Han Chinese were killed in ten unsuccessful uprisings.^[114][115]

The revolts were harshly suppressed by the Manchu government in a manner that amounts to genocide.^{[116][117][118][119]} Approximately a million people in the Panthay rebellionwere killed,^[120][121] and several million in the Dungan revolt^[121] as a "washing off the Muslims"(洗回 (xi Hui)) policy had been long advocated by officials in the Manchugovernment.^[122] Many Chinese Muslim generals like Ma Zhanao, Ma Anliang, Ma Qianling, Dong Fuxiang, Ma Haiyan, and Ma Julung helped the Qing dynasty defeat the rebel Muslims, and were rewarded, and their followers were spared from the genocide. The Han Chinese Qing general Zuo Zongtang even relocated the Han from the suburbs Hezhouwhen the Muslims there surrendered as a reward. The Muslims were granted amnesty and allowed to live as long as they stayed outside the city.^[123] Some of the Muslims who fought, like General Dong, did not do it because they were Muslim, rather, like many other generals, they gathered bands of followers and fought at will.^[124][125]

However, Muslims in other parts of China proper like in the east and southern provinces who did not revolt, were not affected at all by the rebellion, and experienced no genocide, nor did they seek to revolt. It was reported that Muslim villages in Henan province, which was next to Shaanxi, were totally unaffected by the Dungan revolt and relations between Han and Hui continued normally. Muslims from eastern China like Ma Xinyi continued to serve in the Chinese government during the revolt, and ignored the Muslims of the northwest China.

Elisabeth Allès wrote that the relationship between Hui Muslim and Han peoples continued normally in the Henan area, with no ramifications or consequences from th Muslim rebellions of other areas. Allès wrote in the document "Notes on some joking relationships between Hui and Han villages in Henan" published by French Centre for Research on Contemporary China that "The major Muslim revolts in the middle of the nineteenth century which involved the Hui in Shaanxi, Gansu and Yunnan, as well as the Uyghurs in Xinjiang, do not seem to have had any direct effect on this region of the central plain."^[126] The Hui Muslim population of Beijing was unaffected by the Muslim rebels during the Dungan revolt.^[127]

Gedimu Hanafi Sunni Muslims tried to distance themselves from the Jahriyya Sufi rebels. Some of them even helped the Qing dynasty crush the Sufi rebels.^[128]

During the revolt, Uzbek Muslim forces under Yaqub Beg performed massacres on Dungan Muslims, in one instance, they massacred Dungans in Ili, in the Battle of Ürümqi (1870), the Uzbeks even enlisted non-Muslim Han Chinese militia to help kill Dungans and conquer Xinjiang.^[129]

The Qing dynasty did not persecute Muslims systematically, it only massacred rebels regardless of their religion, when the Muslim General Ma Rulong defected to the Qing Dynasty, he became the most powerful military official in Yunnan province.^[130]

It was noted that the Qing armies only massacred the Muslims who had rebelled, and spared Muslims who took no part in the uprising.^[131]

Hui Muslims and Uyghur Muslims massacred each other in the Battle of Kashgar (1933), Kizil massacre, Battle of Kashgar (1934), Battle of Yarkand, Battle of Yangi Hissar,Charkhlik Revolt, during the Kumul Rebellion. More massacres occurred during the Ili Rebellion.

On October 8, 2012, a mob of about 200 Tibetan monks beat a dozen Dungans in Luqu County, Gansu province, in retaliation for the Chinese Muslim community's application to build a mosque in the county.^[132]

Uyghurs face discrimination and religious persecution at the hands of the government authorities. In a 2013 news article, The New York Times reported, "Many Uighurs are also convinced that Beijing is seeking to wipe out their language and culture through assimilation and education policies that favor Mandarin over Uighur in schools and government jobs. ... Civil servants can be fired for joining Friday afternoon prayer services, and Uighur college students say they are often required to eat lunch in school cafeterias during the holy month of Ramadan, when observant Muslims fast."^[133]

Vietnam

Main articles: Cham–Vietnamese War (1471) and History of the Cham–Vietnamese wars

The Vietnamese Emperor Minh Mạng unleashed persecution of Cham Muslims after he conquered the final remnants of Champa in 1832.^[134][135]

The Cham Muslims in Vietnam are only recognized as a minority, and not as an indigenous people by the Vietnamese government despite being indigenous to the region. Muslim Chams have experienced violent religious and ethnic persecution and restrictions on practicing their faith under the current Vietnamese government, with the Vietnamese state confisticating Cham property and forbidding Cham from observing their religious beliefs. In 2010 and 2013 several incidents occurred in Thành Tín and Phươc Nhơn villages where Cham were murdered by Vietnamese. In 2012, Vietnamese police in Chau Giang village stormed into a Cham Mosque, stole the electric generator, and also raped Cham girls.^[136] Cham Muslims in the Mekong Delta have also been economically marginalized and pushed into poverty by Vietnamese policies, with ethnic Vietnamese Kinh settling on majority Cham land with state support, and religious practices of minorities have been targeted for elimination by the Vietnamese government. ^[137]

Indonesia

Main articles: Sambas conflict and Sampit conflict

Under the reign of President Suharto during the New Order (Indonesia), Islamists were suppressed, and religious Muslims were actively persecuted by the Indonesian government. Several Christian Generals who served under Suharto like Leonardus Benjamin Moerdani actively persecuted religious Muslims in the Indonesian military, which was described as being "anti-Islamic", denying religious Muslims promotions, and preventing them from praying in the barracks and banning them from even using the Islamic greeting "Salaam Aleikum", and these anti-Islamic polices were entirely supported by Suharto, despite Suharto being a Muslim himself, since he considered political Islam a threat to his power.^{[138][139][140][141]} The Christian General Theo Syafei, who also served under Suharto, spoke out against political Islam coming to power in Indonesia, and insulted the Qur'an and Islam in remarks which were described as Islamophobic.^{[142][143][144][145][146][147]}

In 1999, Muslim Malays and Animist Dayaks joined together in Kalimantan in Indonesia to persecute and massacre Muslim Madurese during the Sambas conflict. Madurese were mutilated, raped, and killed by the Malays and Dayaks and 3,000 of them died in the massacres, with the Indonesian government doing little to stop the violence.^[148] In 2001, Dayaks launched another massacre of several hundred Madurese in the Sampit conflict.

Imperial Japan In World War 2

Main articles: Rakhine State massacre in 1942 and Japanese occupation of the Philippines

Imperial Japanese forces slaughtered, raped, and tortured Rohingya Muslims in a massacre in 1942 and expelled tens of thousands of Rohingya into Bengal in British India. The Japanese committed countless acts of rape, murder and torture against thousands of Rohingyas.^[149] During this period, some 22,000 Rohingyas are believed to have crossed the border into Bengal, then part of British India, to escape the violence.^[150][151] Defeated, 40,000 Rohingyas eventually fled to Chittagong after repeated massacres by the Burmese and Japanese forces.^[152]

Japanese forces also carried out massacres, torture and atrocities on Muslim Moro people in Mindanao and Sulu. A former Japanese Imperial Navy medic, Akira Makino admitted to carrying out dissections on Moro civilians while they were still alive.^{[153][154][155][156]}

India

Main article: Anti-Muslim violence in India

Hindu Dogra Rule

In 1837, Raja Gulab Singh of Jammu was entrusted by Maharaja Ranjit Singh to suppress the revolt of the Yousafzai tribe which formed the biggest proportion of Pashtun tribes. He offered one rupee for the head of every Yousafzai man brought to his feet. He made Katuha his headquarters and hunted for Muslim Pashtun tribes. He had some of the women spared, but others were kept for Raja Gulab Singh's harem and the rest were sold as slaves in Lahore and Jammu. It was reported that this expedition resulted in the loss of tens of thousands of Pashtun rebels and thousands of women were sold into slavery.^[157] After acquiring Jammu and Kashmir through the Treaty of Kashmir, Dogra rulers continued the anti-Muslim policies of their Sikh allies. The worst atrocities perpetrated against Muslims in the state came in 1863 when the Dogra ruler Maharaja Ranbir Singh ordered a major invasion of the frontier areas of Yasin and Hunza to punish Muslim rebels. 3,000 troops were commanded by General Hooshiara Singh who invaded the frontier. The Dogras took all men as prisoners and many Dogra soldiers entered the back portion of the Mandoori Hill which was full of Yasini and Hunza women and their children. Those women who were injured but not dead were burnt alive and approximately 2000 Yasin villagers were killed overall. About 5,000 Yasinis were taken back to Srinagar for forced labor and all their women were included into the harems of Dogra Soldiers.^[158]

Partition Violence

There were widespread riots during the Partition of British India in 1947. In order to facilitate the creation of new states along religious lines population exchanges between India and Pakistan were implemented, at the expense of significant human suffering in the process. A large number of people (Hindus and Muslims in particular) on both sides (more than a million by some estimates) died in the accompanying violence. After the annexation of the Muslim-ruled state of Hyderabad by India in 1948, about 7,000 Muslims were due to emigrate to Pakistan at their own will from India.^[159] Most Muslims, however chose to stay in India, as the Indian Government did whatever was possible for their safety. There was widespread violence against the Muslims in Hyderabad city, as an aftermath of the 'Police Action' (officially Operation Polo) and Jawaharlal Nehru had a committee investigate the pogrom against Muslims, but the resulting Sundarlal Report was never made public (an estimated 50–200,000 Muslims are believed to have been killed).^[160]

Gujarat Violence

The 2002 Gujarat violence was a series of incidents starting with the Godhra train burning and the subsequent communal violence between Hindus and Muslims in the Indian state of Gujarat. On 27 February 2002, the Sabarmati Express train caught fire and the blame was put on Muslims. Ref.http://www.frontline.in/static/html/fl1915/19150110.htm 58 Hindus including 25 women and 15 children were burnt to death.^{[161][162][163]} Attacks against Muslims and general communal riots arose on a large scale across the state, in which 790 Muslims and 254 Hindus were ultimately killed; 223 more people were reported missing.^[164][165] 536 places of worship were damaged: 273 dargahs, 241 mosques and 19 temples.^[166] Muslim-owned businesses suffered the bulk of the damage. 61,000 Muslims and 10,000 Hindus fled their homes. Preventive arrests of 17,947 Hindus and 3,616 Muslims were made. In total, 27,901 Hindus and 7,651 Muslims were arrested.^{[167][168][169]}

Assam Violence

The 2012 Assam violence arose in the state of Assam between indigenous Bodos and Bengali-Muslims due to the high influx of Muslims illegally from Bangladesh.^[170] Muslim illegal immigrants in Assam are regularly attacked by indigenous people.^[171] As of 8 August 2012, 77 people had died and over 400,000 people were taking shelter in 270 relief camps, after being displaced from almost 400 villages. Eleven people have been reported missing. In retaliation, Muslims mounted attacks on students and workers from the north-east India across various places including Mumbai, Pune, Andhra Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh. Muslim mobs resorted to large scale violence against media persons, bystanders, shops, vehicles and tourists in several cities including Lucknow, Kanpur and Allahabad.^[172] 30,000 people from North East India fled Bangalore after attacks on them by Muslims.^[173]

Myanmar

Main articles: Persecution of Muslims in Myanmar and Rohingya people

Myanmar has a Buddhist majority. The Muslim minority in Myanmar mostly consists of the Rohingya people and the descendants of Muslim immigrants from India (including what is now Bangladesh) and China (the ancestors of Chinese Muslims in Myanmar came from the Yunnan province), as well as descendants of earlier Arab and Persian settlers. Indian Muslims were brought to Burma by the British to aid them in clerical work and business. After independence, many Muslims retained their previous positions and achieved prominence in business and politics.

Buddhist persecution of Muslims arose from religious reasons, and occurred during the reign of King Bayinnaung, 1550–1589 AD. After conquering Bago in 1559, the Buddhist King prohibited the practice of halal, specifically, killing food animals in the name of Allah. He was religiously intolerant, forcing some of his subjects to listen to Buddhist sermons possibly converting by force. He also disallowed the Eid al-Adha, religious sacrifice of cattle. Halal food was also forbidden by King Alaungpaya in the 18th century.

When General Ne Win swept to power on a wave of nationalism in 1962, the status of Muslims changed for the worse. Muslims were expelled from the army and were rapidly marginalized.^[174] Many Rohingya Muslims fled Burma and many refugees inundated neighbouring Bangladesh including 200,000 in 1978 as a result of the King Dragon operation in Arakan^[175] and 250,000 in 1991.^[176]

A widely publicised Burmese conflict was the 2012 Rakhine State riots, a series of conflicts that primarily involved the ethnic Rakhine Buddhist people and the Rohingya Muslim people in the northern Rakhine State—an estimated 90,000 people were displaced as a result of the riots.^[177][178] The Burmese government previously identified the Rohingya as a group of illegal migrants; however, the ethnic group has lived in Burma for numerous centuries.^[179]

Sri Lanka

See also: Expulsion of Muslims from the Northern province by LTTE

Sri Lanka has a Buddhist majority and significant Hindu Tamil minority. The rebels Tamil LTTE attacked Muslims during the Sri Lankan Civil War.

The militant Buddhist Bodu Bala Sena campaigned against Halal meat and attacked Mosques and Muslims.^[180][181] The BBC reported that "Sri Lanka’s Muslim minority is being targeted by hardline Buddhists. ... There have also been assaults on churches and Christian pastors but it is the Muslims who are the most concerned."^[182]

Philippines

Further information: Moro people

The Philippines is predominantly a Christian society with a complicated history of relations between Islam and Christianity. Despite historic evidence of Islamization spreading throughout the islands in the 13th-16th centuries, the archipelago came under Spanish rule in the 16th century. The Spanish proselytized many natives, and labelled those who remained Muslims as Moro, a derogatory term recalling the Moors, an Islamic people of North Africa who occupied Spain for 800 years. Today, this term Moro is used to refer to the indigenous Muslim tribes and ethnic groups of the country. When the Spanish came to the Philippine islands, most of the natives in Luzon and Visayas were pagans with Muslim minorities, and while Spanish proselytized many natives, many Muslims in Luzon and Visayas were not exempted by Spaniards because of Spanish Inquisition, wherein Muslims must be converted to Catholicism or to be executed. Those who remained Muslims are only natives of Mindanao which Spaniards did not invade.

The clashes between Spanish colonial authorities and the indigenous Sultanates of the Moro peoples, (the Sultanate of Sulu, Maranao and Maguindanao) further escalated tensions between the Christian and Muslim groups of the country.

Russian Empire

The period from the conquest of Kazan in 1552 to the ascension of Catherine the Great in 1762, was marked by systematic repression of Muslims through policies of exclusion and discrimination as well as the destruction of Muslim culture by elimination of outward manifestations of Islam such as mosques. The Russians initially demonstrated a willingness in allowing Islam to flourish as Muslim clerics were invited into the various region to preach to the Muslims, particularly the Kazakhs whom the Russians viewed as "savages" and "ignorant" of morals and ethics.^[183][184] However, Russian policy shifted toward weakening Islam by introducing pre-Islamic elements of collective consciousness.^[185]Such attempts included methods of eulogizing pre-Islamic historical figures and imposing a sense of inferiority by sending Kazakhs to highly elite Russian military institutions.^[185] In response, Kazakh religious leaders attempted to bring religious fervor by espousing pan-Turkism, though many were persecuted as a result.^[186]

While total expulsion as in other Christian nations such as Spain, Portugal and Sicily was not feasible to achieve a homogenous Russian Orthodox population, other policies such as land grants and the promotion of migration by other Russian and non-Muslim populations into Muslim lands displaced many Muslims making them minorities in places such as some parts of the South Ural region to other parts such as theOttoman Turkey, and almost annihilating the Circassians, Crimean Tatars, and various Muslims of the Caucasus. The Russian army rounded up people, driving Muslims from their villages to ports on the Black Sea, where they awaited ships provided by the neighboring Ottoman Empire. The explicit Russian goal was to expel the groups in question from their lands.^[187] They were given a choice as to where to be resettled: in the Ottoman Empire or in Russia far from their old lands. Only a small percentage (the numbers are unknown) accepted resettlement within the Russian Empire. The trend of Russification has continued at different paces during the remaining Tsarist period and under the Soviet Union, so that today there are more Tatars living outside the Republic of Tatarstan than inside it.^[188]

Alexander Suvorov announced the capture of Ismail in 1791 to the Tsarina Catherine in a doggerel couplet, after the assault had been pressed from house to house, room to room, and nearly every Muslim man, woman, and child in the city had been killed in three days of uncontrolled massacre, 40,000 Turks dead, a few hundred taken into captivity. For all his bluffness, Suvorov later told an English traveller that when the massacre was over he went back to his tent and wept.^[49]

Tatarstan[

The famine deaths of 2 million Muslim Tatars in Tatar ASSR and in Volga-Ural region in 1921-1922 was catastrophic as half of Volga Tatar population in USSR died. This famine is also known as "terror-famine" and "famine-genocide" in Tatarstan.^[189] The Soviets settled ethnic Russians after the famine in Tatar ASSR and in Volga-Ural region causing theTatar share of the population to decline to less than 50%. All-Russian Tatar Social Center (VTOTs) has asked the United Nations to condemn the 1921 Tatarstan famine asGenocide of Muslim Tatars.^[190] The 1921–1922 famine in Tatarstan has been compared to Holodomor in Ukraine.^[191]

Syria

See also: Sectarianism and minorities in the Syrian Civil War

In World War I, in Ottoman-ruled Syria the total number of civilian casualties was as many as 500,000. The civilian casualties of Greater Syria, including Akkar, were covered in a detailed article by Linda Schatkowski Schilcher.^[192] Scholars acknowledge one particular reason for civilian deaths attributed to Germany (Ottoman ally in World War I), the callousness of German military officials in Syria, and systematic hoarding by the population at large.^[192]

USSR

See also: Islam in the Soviet Union, Population transfer in the Soviet Union, Deportation of Crimean Tatars and Operation Lentil (Caucasus)

The Soviet Union was hostile to all forms of religion, which was "the opium of the masses" according to Karl Marx. Relative religious freedom existed for Muslims in the years following the revolution, but in the late 1920s the Soviet government took a strong anti-religious turn. Many mosques and churches were closed.^[193] During the period of Stalin's leadership, Crimean Tatar, Chechen, Ingush, Balkar, Karachay, and Meskhetian Turk Muslims were victims of mass deportation. However, the deportation was not religious persecution, it was officially based on the facts of Collaborationism^[194] during the Nazi occupation of Crimea.^[195] The deportation began on 17 May 1944 in all Crimean inhabited localities. More than 32,000 NKVD troops participated in this action. 193,865 Crimean Tatars were deported, 151,136 of them to Uzbek SSR, 8,597 to Mari ASSR, 4,286 to Kazakh SSR, the rest 29,846 to the various oblasts of the Russian SFSR.

From May to November 10,105 Crimean Tatars died of starvation in Uzbekistan (7% of deported to Uzbek SSR). Nearly 30,000 (20%) died in exile during the year and a half by the NKVD data and nearly 46% by the data of the Crimean Tatar activists. According to Soviet dissident information, many Crimean Tatars were made to work in the large-scale projects conducted by the Soviet Gulag system.^[196]

Cambodia

The Cham Muslims suffered serious purges with as much as half of their population exterminated by communists in Cambodia during the 1970s.^[197] About half a million Muslims were killed. According to Cham sources, 132 mosques were destroyed during the Khmer Rouge. Only 20 of the previous 113 most prominent Cham clergy in Cambodia survived the Khmer Rouge period.^[198]

Courtesy Of: Wikipedia