Stop Islamophobia!

Don’t let the racists and fascists divide us

Version of the declaration by UCFR of 20 January 2015, updated and adapted to collect signatures in Catalunya and across Europe. [En català] · [En castellano]

Form to sign the call· Supporting organisations

The attacks on the offices of Charlie Hebdo and on a kosher supermarket in Paris are terrible and totally unjustifiable; we condemn them unconditionally. We specifically condemn the antisemitic nature of the attack on Jewish people in the kosher supermarket. The attacks were designed to spread terror and division. There is a danger that the far-right and fascism will benefit from this climate as they provoke hatred and exploit tensions against Muslim and Jewish people across Europe.

Sadly, these attacks form part of a series of tragic events —in the West, in the Middle East and around the world— which in recent years have claimed hundreds of thousands of lives. It will be difficult to solve this cycle of hatred and killings: we have to try to change things where we can.

For that reason we highlight the grave risk to our peaceful coexistence in our towns and neighbourhoods represented by the increase in Islamophobia following the tragedy in Paris. There are unjustified attempts to blame the entire Muslim population for the actions of a few murderers who do not represent them, just like the fascist murderer Breivik does not represent all Christians or Norwegians.

The extreme right in Europe —from the suited fascists of the Front National in France, to the openly Nazi Golden Dawn in Greece— is trying to capitalise on the tragedy, promoting Islamophobia. They try to argue that our Muslim neighbours represent a “threat to Western civilisation”. Some unscrupulous politicians in mainstream parties also promote such ideas. As we saw in the 30s, the real threat to civilisation are the fascists. Then their main scapegoat were Jewish people; now they promote Islamophobia —there have already been attacks on mosques— without abandoning antisemitism, Romaphobia, the rejection of different sexual orientations and all the rest. As in the past, they threaten anyone who does not think like them.

That means that social movements and the left can not be neutral in the face of Islamophobia, still less encourage it. We have to fight it like we do any other form of racism.

Don’t let the fascists and racists divide us. Let’s unite regardless of differences of religion, origin, gender, skin colour, language, sexual orientation… Defend peaceful coexistence in our neighbourhoods. No to the revival of antisemitism! Stop Islamophobia!

For all these reasons, we call for the maximum support for broad movements against fascism, racism and islamophobia across Europe, and for these to be created where they do not yet exist. We express our support for the demonstrations being organised around the International Day Against Fascism and Racism, on Saturday 21 March, 2015.

We sign the declaration and commit ourselves to working to eradicate Islamophobia, making public our position and promoting the activities of the unitary campaign of #StopIslamofobia.

Note:

Promoting the declaration: Unitat Contra el Feixisme i el Racisme (Catalunya) – https://unitatcontraelfeixisme.org

In collaboration with: Unite Against Fascism (GB) – http://uaf.org.uk

More information about the International Day Against Fascism and Racism, 21-M: KEERFA (Greece) – http://bit.ly/1BPSuYd · http://www.antiracismfascism.org