{"id":471161,"date":"2026-03-12T09:02:07","date_gmt":"2026-03-12T09:02:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/471161\/"},"modified":"2026-03-12T09:02:07","modified_gmt":"2026-03-12T09:02:07","slug":"i-have-never-seen-anything-like-it-mp-warns-of-rise-in-extreme-views-on-race-and-identity-islamophobia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/471161\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018I have never seen anything like it\u2019: MP warns of rise in extreme views on race and identity | Islamophobia"},"content":{"rendered":"

Zubir Ahmed, a health minister, tries not to read the comments under his social media feeds, but sometimes curiosity gets the better of him.<\/p>\n

After performing a transplant on Christmas Day, the vascular surgeon scanned a post about the operation.<\/p>\n

He recalled: \u201cIt went viral on the internet, but I have also never seen anything like the abuse. There was one comment that stuck out for me that just said: \u2018Thanks for the transplant, now go home.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

For the MP, who, as parliamentary undersecretary of state for health innovation and safety, is one of two Muslims in government, such comments reflect the Islamophobic abuse that he says has got worse in recent decades.<\/p>\n

He warned that there had been a further shift over the past nine months in the Overton window \u2013 the range of ideas deemed acceptable in the mainstream population \u2013 in terms of the \u201cextraordinary conversations\u201d being had about identity and race.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe now find ourselves in a space where, to be honest, I\u2019ve got young children and I can\u2019t confidently say their lives, in terms of living in society on an equal footing, [are] better than what I was growing up. That\u2019s a really sad thing to see,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

However, he told the Guardian that the government\u2019s announcement this week<\/a> of a definition of anti-Muslim hostility was a turning point that could mean a better future for his children and others.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s telling them that there is an issue and validating their existence in this country,\u201d said Ahmed.<\/p>\n

The new three-paragraph definition <\/a>says anti-Muslim hostility includes engaging in criminal acts directed at Muslims because of their religion, or at those perceived to be Muslim. Prejudicial stereotyping and unlawful discrimination were also cited in the definition, which was launched alongside a new action plan to strengthen social cohesion.<\/p>\n

But it has been criticised by opponents including the Conservatives, who described the definition as too broad and said it risked creating a back-door blasphemy law.<\/p>\n

Ahmed insisted that the language is \u201cthe right diagnosis for the illness\u201d \u2013 Islamophobia<\/a>. He recalled how he and friends experienced racism based on the colour of their skin growing up in the Govan area of Glasgow before it felt like British society was on what he described as \u201can irreversible pathway to progress\u201d in the 2000s. This changed after 9\/11, the war on Iraq and terror attacks, he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey were not the only things \u2013 vested interests were attempting to dehumanise Muslims,\u201d he said, but he noted that those events reverberated through wider society \u2013 \u201cand then you found yourself in the midst of a storm.\u201d<\/p>\n

The definition, he insisted, captured the sort of Islamophobia increasingly encountered by him and other British Muslims since the Iraq war and other events. Recorded anti-Muslim hate cases have also surged in recent years. Of religious hate crime offences recorded by police in England and Wales in the year ending March 2025, 4,478 (45%) targeted Muslims \u2013 compared with 3,866 in 2023-24.<\/p>\n

Responding to the Tory criticism, Ahmed said: \u201cIt\u2019s not about blasphemy laws or anything like that. This is about anti-Muslim hatred, which has a racial element to it. This is about appearing visibly Muslim or if you have, for example, a \u2018Muslim-sounding name\u2019 then you\u2019re less likely to get picked for a job.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ahmed said he sometimes gauges the mood in the street by wearing \u201cvisibly Muslim garb\u201d and monitoring reactions.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt still manages to turn heads in a way that it would not [have done] so 10 years ago. If I\u2019m out on the streets with relatives who wear headscarves, you can see the change from people. The looks just linger a bit longer than they used to.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t blame people, because they are being inundated and attacked every minute of the day with algorithmic content driving them towards questioning the role of Muslims in society. That\u2019s why this [social cohesion strategy] is a multi-pronged approach and the definition of the diagnosis is one part.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Zubir Ahmed, a health minister, tries not to read the comments under his social media feeds, but sometimes…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":471162,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[59,57,58,50,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-471161","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-kingdom","tag-gb","tag-great-britain","tag-greatbritain","tag-news","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/471161","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=471161"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/471161\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/471162"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=471161"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=471161"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=471161"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}