76 pct of Islamophobic attacks target women in Belgium

By Serife Cetin and Yusuf Hatip

BRUSSELS

Around 76 percent of Islamophobic attacks in Belgium in 2017 targeted Muslim women, an anti-Islamophobia association in the country revealed on Saturday.

The Belgian Association for the Prevention of Islamophobia (CCIB) published a report on the attacks happened in 2017.

According to the report, the attacks mainly carried out by targeting places of worship, spreading hatred on social media and physical aggression towards people.

“There is an Islamophobic attack in Belgium every two days,” the report said.

As 29 percent of Islamophobic attacks occurred on the Internet, cyberspace was the most widespread area where these attacks happened. Daily life (17 percent), education institutes (16 percent), workplace (14 percent), and politics (8 percent) are other areas where Islamophobic attacks occur.

The CCIB said the report is based on the information gathered from people who were attacked.

According to the report, Muslim women were mainly attacked because of their headscarves.

The report stated that most attackers were male.

The EU has lately witnessed growing Islamophobia and hatred of migrants in recent years triggered by propaganda from far-right and populist parties, which have exploited fears over the refugee crisis and terrorism.

Meanwhile, around 200 people gathered on Sunday in front of the Justice Palace in Belgium’s capital Brussels to protest increasing Islamophobic and racist attacks in the country.

A number of politicians and activists also participated in the protest organized by the CCIB.

The protesters were carrying banners that read “Stop racism,” and “No hate speech”.