MCB Welcomes Government’s Working Group on Anti-Muslim Hatred Definition

On 28 Feb­ru­ary 2025, the Mus­lim Coun­cil of Britain (MCB) pub­lished a state­ment say­ing that it wel­comed the UK government’s new work­ing group to devel­op a def­i­n­i­tion of Anti-Mus­lim Hatred/Islamophobia, address­ing the rise in hate crimes against Mus­lim com­mu­ni­ties. The arti­cle begins:

The Mus­lim Coun­cil of Britain (MCB) today wel­comes the government’s announce­ment of a new work­ing group to devel­op a def­i­n­i­tion of Anti-Mus­lim Hatred/Islamophobia, a long-await­ed step towards address­ing the alarm­ing rise in hate crimes against Mus­lim com­mu­ni­ties across the Unit­ed King­dom. The MCB is par­tic­u­lar­ly encour­aged by the appoint­ment of Dominic Grieve KC as chair of the work­ing group. Mr Grieve has con­sis­tent­ly demon­strat­ed a prin­ci­pled approach to engag­ing with Mus­lim com­mu­ni­ties and has been a respect­ed voice in dis­cus­sions about tack­ling Islam­o­pho­bia. His pre­vi­ous involve­ment with the All-Par­ty Par­lia­men­tary Group on British Mus­lims and his con­tri­bu­tions to dia­logue between Mus­lim and non-Mus­lim com­mu­ni­ties posi­tion him well to lead this impor­tant ini­tia­tive. The MCB notes that a com­pre­hen­sive def­i­n­i­tion of Islam­o­pho­bia has already been devel­oped by the All-Par­ty Par­lia­men­tary Group (APPG) on British Mus­lims, which has been wide­ly accept­ed by numer­ous polit­i­cal par­ties and organ­i­sa­tions. The pri­ma­ry oppo­si­tion to this def­i­n­i­tion has come from those advanc­ing straw­man argu­ments and mis­char­ac­ter­i­sa­tions, often from groups with a doc­u­ment­ed his­to­ry of hos­til­i­ty towards British Muslims.

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Key Points:

• The Mus­lim Coun­cil of Britain wel­comed the government’s new work­ing group to devel­op a def­i­n­i­tion of Anti-Mus­lim Hatred/Islamophobia, address­ing the rise in hate crimes against Mus­lim communities.
• Dominic Grieve KC, who the group said was known for his prin­ci­pled engage­ment with Mus­lim com­mu­ni­ties, has been appoint­ed as chair of the work­ing group.
• The MCB not­ed that a com­pre­hen­sive def­i­n­i­tion of Islam­o­pho­bia had already been devel­oped by the All-Par­ty Par­lia­men­tary Group (APPG) on British Muslims.
• Dr Nao­mi Green, Assis­tant Sec­re­tary Gen­er­al of the MCB, empha­sized the need for a def­i­n­i­tion that effec­tive­ly pro­tects British Mus­lims from hatred and discrimination.

Activ­i­ty cen­tered on Islam­o­pho­bia has been an impor­tant aspect of world­wide Mus­lim Broth­er­hood strategy.

The Mus­lim Coun­cil of Britain (MCB), estab­lished in 1997, is an influ­en­tial U.K. umbrel­la orga­ni­za­tion that has faced scruti­ny over its ide­o­log­i­cal align­ments. The orga­ni­za­tion has his­tor­i­cal­ly had strong ties to Jamaat-e-Isla­mi, a South Asian Islamist move­ment, and has often coor­di­nat­ed its posi­tions and activ­i­ties with groups asso­ci­at­ed with the Glob­al Mus­lim Broth­er­hood (GMB) net­work, though the MCB itself main­tains its inde­pen­dence. The MCB’s lead­er­ship has includ­ed indi­vid­u­als con­nect­ed to both Jamaat-e-Isla­mi and Mus­lim Broth­er­hood-linked orga­ni­za­tions in Europe, and the orga­ni­za­tion has reg­u­lar­ly par­tic­i­pat­ed in joint ini­tia­tives with oth­er Broth­er­hood-linked groups in the UK and Europe. Despite peri­od­ic ten­sions with UK gov­ern­ment offi­cials over these rela­tion­ships, the MCB has main­tained its posi­tion as one of Britain’s most promi­nent Islam­ic orga­ni­za­tions, claim­ing to rep­re­sent over 500 affil­i­at­ed Mus­lim insti­tu­tions across the country.

In Jan­u­ary 2021, Zara Mohammed was elect­ed as the new MCB Sec­re­tary-Gen­er­al, the first female SG in its his­to­ry. From 2014 to 2017, Mohammed held sev­er­al lead­ing posi­tions in the Fed­er­a­tion of Stu­dent Islam­ic Soci­eties (FOSIS), a nation­al umbrel­la orga­ni­za­tion rep­re­sent­ing Islam­ic soci­eties at uni­ver­si­ties through­out the UK that has numer­ous ties to the GMB net­work in the UK.

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