Leicester woman attacked over hijab

Leicester, NU Online
In a new series of anti-Muslim attacks, a veiled Muslim woman was attacked by a group of youth in the central British town of Leicester, apparently for her hijab.<>

“The victim felt upset and frightened following the incident and feels that she was targeted because she was wearing a hijab,” Pc Dave Adams told This Is Leicester on Friday, February 15.

“The road was quite busy at the time of the incident so there is a possibility that passers-by and passing traffic may be able to help.”

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Earlier in February, the woman, who was not identified by the Police, was walking near to the St Matthews service station in Humberstone Road, near Leicester city centre.

Donning her hijab, the 20-year-old woman noticed three young men approaching her.

Later, one of them spat on her as they passed by and the three began laughing as they walked away.

Islam sees hijab as an obligatory code of dress, not a religious symbol displaying one's affiliations.

Officers have released a CCTV image of the three people, appealing for help to trace them.

The attack came as Liam Ferrar (24) admitted last January religiously-aggravated harassment aimed at the Muslim community at the city's magistrates' court.

Shocking the Muslim minority, the head of the pig was discovered by worshippers from the As Salaam group at the Thurnby Lodge centre at 7.30am last December 25.

Islam considers pigs unclean because they are omnivorous, not discerning between meat or vegetation in their natural dietary habits unlike cows and sheep for instance, which eat only plants.

It also comes as tensions intensified over As Salaam Trust's plans to open an Islamic centre in a disused Scout hut neighboring the community centre.

The center was planned to provide food-sharing services, and drug and alcohol advice and education.

There have been months of protests, including involvement by the English Defence League and the British National party, whose leader Nick Griffin visited the area in August.

Police have launched an investigation in Leicester that has seen heightened far-right activity in recent months.

Unacceptable

Police officers confirmed that they will never tolerate anti-Muslim incitement.

“We will not tolerate people feeling intimidated and frightened on our streets and I would urge anyone with information to call us as soon as they can.

British Muslims, estimated at nearly 2.5 million, have been in the eye of storm since the 7/7 2005 attacks.

A Financial Times opinion poll showed that Britain is the most suspicious nation about Muslims.

A poll of the Evening Standard found that a sizable section of London residents harbor negative opinions about Muslims.

The anti-Muslim tide has also been on the rise across Europe, with several countries are restricting the freedom of Muslims to wearing face-veil and building mosques.

Earlier this year, a British research cited by Baroness Sayeeda Warsi found that a majority of the country now believes that Islam is a threat to Western civilization.

The research by academics shows that just 23 per cent of a representative sample questioned said that Islam was not a threat to Western civilization.

Just 24 per cent thought Muslims were compatible with the British way of life - with nearly half of people disagreeing that Muslims were compatible.

This compares with research among Muslims that showed 83 per were proud to be British, compared to 79 per cent of Britons overall.

Editor : Sudarto Murtaufiq