THE latest crime near London bridge on Nov 29 in which two people were killed and several injured is the latest in hate crimes in the United Kingdom.

I am reminded of Murphy’s Law inscription: “nothing is as simple as it looks at first sight.”

It is time terror-weary citizens talked eyeball-to-eyeball to the pro-terror lobbies on TV channels and social media.

Meanwhile the hate-mongering world leaders, like Viktor Orbán of Hungary, Narendra Modi of India and Rodrigo Duterte in the Philippines, should clip their long tongues a bit. These leaders fan the sentiments of their xenophobic followers.

Also the heavens would not have fallen if Boris Johnson had apologised for his racist ‘burka’ comments.

This is the time the world woke up and put a stop to these hate-mongerers. A good start would be standing up for the Kashmiri groaning under Indian jackboots for more than 72 years.

Following a terrorist attack in London in June, US Republican Clay Higgins (R-LA) posted a photo of the attack to his Facebook page along with a comment advocating the murder of Muslims and demanding a ban on federal assistance to any country where Muslims reside, and Facebook refused to remove the post.

Monika Bickert, who is the head of product policy and counter-terrorism at Facebook, justified the decision by saying, “We want to give people room to share their political views, even when they are distasteful.” Therefore now hate mongering is a political expression.

Hate crime is a hydra-headed monster which requires a multi-pronged corrective strategy to deal with it. Or do the hate-mongers think the world’s 1.3 billion Muslims will sit meekly while this nonsense goes on?

Amjed Jaaved
Rawalpindi

Published in Dawn, December 4th, 2019