SETA organized together with MEP Afzal Khan and MEP Josef Weidenhölzer, a launchingg presentation of the recently published “European Islamophobia Report 2015” (EIR) at European Parliament’s Altiero Spinelli building, Brussels/ Belgium. 

In their opening remarks, MEP Khan and MEP Weidenhölzer drew attention that Islamophobia in Europe should not just be a problem for Muslims and talked about the importance of tackling Islamophobia. Following the remarks, moderator Dr Enes Bayraklı from SETA introduced the report to the audience.

Bayraklı gave the information that 27 experts and scholars worked on 25 different European countries. The EIR project, which started in 2015, will continue next year with an extension of states to be observed, including Turkey.

First speaker was Dr Farid Hafez, who explained the report’s core intention and shared general findings of the research. He also told that there is still an absence of sufficient data on Islamophobia. Hafez also remarked that still many European states do not recognize that there is Islamophobia in their countries. He mentioned that especially hostile language used in the media is serving policies of far-right parties in European countries. 

Dr Anna-Esther Younes presented her findings on the report’s part on Germany in giving details from Germany. She especially referred to the refugee crisis and the rising fear of the German society of increasing extremism related to it. Here, she also gave an example of how media coverage is influencing the society’s attitude towards Islam and Muslims.

The last speaker, Dr Amina Easat-Daas, talked about her observations from Belgium and added that there is a big need and importance in a cooperation between academia, politics and civil society. Dr Easat-Daas shared her opinion that only this kind of cooperation could bring more awareness to the spectrum of Islamophobia, and this cooperation's effectiveness would lead to more options to tackle this problem.

Finally, in his closing remarks, MEP Afzal Khan stated that he believes that Islamophobia is still increasing, but in turn the interest and awareness of European policy makers is increasing, too. He added that events like this are contributing to the tackling of Islamophobia and expressed his wish to further cooperation.