SHAFAQNA– Representatives Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib, two of the first Muslim women elected to the US Congress, both call on MSNBC host Joy-Ann Reid to apologize for ‘Islamophobic’ remarks.
In a segment on the Tuesday airing of her primetime show the ReidOut, Reid said “Leaders, let’s say in the Muslim world, talk a lot of violent talk and encourage their supporters to commit violence. … We in the U.S. media describe that as radicalizing people.”
“That’s the way we talk about how Muslims act”, she added.
The comments have come under fire from advocacy groups and legislators alike.
“Reid must apologize on air for spreading the false, dangerous myth that Muslims are inherently radical and violent. MSNBC also needs to take action to ensure anti-Muslim bigotry has no place on its network,” Muslim Advocates, a national civil rights organisation, said in a statement.
“We call on her to recognize the impact of her comments and make an on-air apology for her words, which repeated painful anti-Muslim stereotypes. SPLC would be pleased to join other civil rights and Muslim leaders in a meeting with Reid and her producers to discuss how the impact of her words perpetuates harmful stereotypes”, Margaret Huang, president and CEO of the Southern Poverty Law Center, a nonprofit legal advocacy organisation, said in a statement emailed to Al Jazeera.
“Honestly, this kinda of casual Islamophobia is hurtful and dangerous,” Omar, tweeted Tuesday. “We deserve better and an apology for the painful moment for so many Muslims around our country should be forthcoming.”
Tlaib said: “These words feed into the harmful anti-Muslim rhetoric & actions that we continue to see in this country”.
Social media users were quick to point to Rubin’s own past Islamophobic comments. For example, in 2010, she slammed then-President Barack Obama for coming out in support of Muslims’ rights to build a mosque in downtown Manhattan near the site of the 9/11 attacks, according to Middle East Eye.