The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, today urged over 2000 university leaders across the country to take immediate and proactive steps to protect Muslim students following a pattern of apparently coordinated incidents of harassment, intimidation, and disruption targeting events hosted by Muslim Student Associations (MSAs).
Over the past several weeks, CAIR and MSAs around the country, especially in Texas and Florida, have documented a sharp increase in incidents in which non-university actors, many aligned with organized anti-Muslim networks, have appeared unannounced at MSA campus events to harass, provoke, film, and intimidate Muslim students. These individuals monitor public social media posts to identify MSA events with the goal of assaulting, harassing, and intimidating Muslim students, such as filming, mocking and aggressively approaching students while praying. In some cases, these incidents have escalated to physical aggression and the burning of a Quran at an MSA University of Houston event whose location was publicly posted.
“What we saw at the University of South Florida is a clear example of how hate and discrimination lead to a hostile environment on campus as institutions fail to educate their communities about Islamophobia and anti-Muslim harassment,” said Dr. Maryam Hasan, CAIR’s Research and Advocacy Specialist. “When Muslim students are targeted for exercising their constitutionally protected right to pray, it reveals serious gaps in campus training, policy, and leadership. Universities must correct these failures immediately by directing campus security to protect MSA events from outside agitators, condemning anti-Muslim harassment and affirming the rights of Muslim students to gather, fellowship and pray without interference.”
SEE: CAIR Letter to University Leaders Demanding Urgent Responses to Coordinated Attacks on MSAs
Nimrah Riaz, Chair of The Muslim Students Association of the U.S. and Canada (MSA National) said in a quote, “Across the country, Muslim students have been met with intimidation tactics — both physical and verbal — meant to silence and dehumanize them. Our community refuses to accept the normalization of any form of Islamophobia. We call on campus administrators and all members of the American community to demand real accountability of perpetrators of Islamophobia and safeguarding every student’s right to live as a Muslim without fear.”
MSA National also issued a parallel statement calling for university administrators to protect MSAs that are being targeted on their respective campuses. MSA National also issued guidance to MSA leaders and members advising them on how to protect themselves and report security incidents.
SEE: LINK TO MSA NATIONAL ADVISORY
CAIR is demanding universities to urgently:
- Explicitly name Islamophobia and anti-Muslim bias, harassment, and intimidation in their non-discrimination policies, and issue an immediate campus-wide statement clarifying protections for Muslim students;
- Strengthen communication and coordination with MSAs and other Muslim student groups;
- Provide visible and preventative safety measures at events, where appropriate;
- Establish rapid-response protocols when threats or incidents occur; and
CAIR also urged Muslim students facing harassment to immediately report incidents to both their university and their local CAIR office. Students may also report incidents through CAIR’s national portal at cair.com/report.
In fall 2024, CAIR launched its Unhostile Campus Campaign, a project aimed at fostering a campus environment where Palestinian, Muslim, Arab, Jewish, and other students, faculty, and staff opposing the genocide of the Palestinian people in Gaza enjoy free speech and academic freedom and are not subjected to state force or university discipline due to their viewpoints. Since then, CAIR has designated over 25 universities as ‘Hostile Campuses’ due to their creation of a thoroughly hostile and dangerous environment for anti-genocide students, faculty, and staff, especially Muslim and Palestinian community members. Report a university as hostile at islamophobia.org/reportcampus.
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CONTACT: CAIR National Deputy Director Edward Ahmed Mitchell, 404-285-9530, e-Mitchell@cair.com; CAIR Government Affairs Director Robert McCaw, 202-742-6448, rmccaw@cair.com; CAIR National Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper, 202-744-7726, ihooper@cair.com; CAIR National Communications Manager Ismail Allison, 202-770-6280, iallison@cair.com