Muslim American Discrimination on the Rise Two Decades After 9/11

In the aftermath of the September 11 attacks against the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, discrimination against Muslim Americans surged. Two decades later, bias remains a troubling problem.

In a 2017 Pew survey, more Muslim American adults surveyed said they experienced some form of discrimination than they did in previous years. Six percent reported being physically threatened or attacked. In a 2021 report, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) said it saw a 9% increase in complaints from two years prior.

Incidents tend to rise on the anniversary of the attacks. CAIR reports receiving more complaints from students and families of bullying and Islamophobic rhetoric every year around the date. (Islambophobia can also be aimed at people who aren’t Muslim or Arab. Sikh men, for example, can be targeted because they wear turbans or sport full beards.)

This year, as the 20th anniversary of 9/11 approaches mere weeks after the Taliban’s shocking takeover of Afghanistan, concerns about bias against Muslims in the U.S. are especially heightened. Amid the abrupt withdrawal of U.S. military, an Islamic State suicide bomber at Kabul’s airport killed 13 American service members and at least 90 Afghans. In the aftermath of the chaos, more than 100,000 Afghan refugees are being resettled; around half are expected to land in the U.S.

There is no simple answer to moving beyond hate. But one place to start is in schools. Last month, CAIR released a classroom guide to teach about 9/11 without stoking anti-Muslim sentiment.

Tips include refraining from singling out Muslim students to comment on the attacks; avoiding role playing perpetrators and targets; and using information from vetted sources such as museums and mainstream media outlets. The guide also lists other educational resources and documentaries.

Advocacy group Sikh Coalition also contributed to an educational curriculum called Teaching Beyond September 11th from University of Pennsylvania.

Educators should focus not just on 9/11 itself, “but how it affected so many different people in the United States and around the world for years after the fact,” says Dr. Ameena Ghaffar-Kucher, Director of the International Educational Development Program at University of Pennsylvania.