@layman,
There have been two groups hoping and praying for this backlash: Terrorist organizations and the Western Left.
Now, of course their motivation is dissimilar as is the extent of their exultation. ISIS et all welcome it because it it helps them in recruiting new jihadists who will go out and commit new murders and feed the backlash. They couldn't care less about either the innocents victimized by the backlash or the innocents victimized by the acts that gave rise to the backlash. For that matter, they couldn't care less about the lives of the jihadists...as long as they get the job done.
The Western Left does care about the innocents victimized by jihadists and the Backlash, but it will remain to be seen if their concern and outrage will be equal as respects the two groups. While I, of course, am not arguing that the Left, in general, is happy about specific innocent Muslims being victimized, I am certain that it is pleased that there is now evidence of what of what they have feared and predicted after every Islamist terrorist attack: Violent backlash. Just look at the tone of the posted article.
It's a peculiar place to be if that which you assert you fear and don't want to see, in some way pleases you when it shows up because it confirms your analysis of a situation and your predictions. There must be a word for being happy about something for a reason that overrides your unhappiness about it's particulars, and if so, it must be German.
Walter?
I can't recall exactly which Islamist attack on US soil was involved (there have been enough that their particulars have begun to run together) but I absolutely recall Attorney General Loretta Lynch announcing that "our" biggest concern (in the wake of the attack) was for any sort of backlash against innocent Muslims. Not the fate of those wounded or the possibility of copycat attacks, but of a backlash.
Can you provide a link to this article layman?
The excerpt specifically (without much specifics) cites Britain and Germany as nations where there has been an increase in "violence and harassment directed against Muslims" but then it resorts to overly broad terms like
"around the world," and
"across Europe" with the intention, no doubt, of leading the reader to the conclusion that the feared Backlash is occurring
everywhere!. I suppose this could be considered cynical of me, but I feel quite certain that the author of this piece as well as the publication source would have used language to connote that incidents were restricted to several nations rather than
erupting all over the world if the subject was Islamist attacks and not a backlash to those attacks.
The US is conspicuous in its absence in this excerpt. It seems very unlikely that if there was evidence of a backlash against Muslims in America that might even come close to qualifying as
"a rising wave of violence," the US would not be featured in the article and simply included in "around the world" bucket. This is why I would like to read the full, original article.
I'm obviously not as familiar with the public reactions of foreign government officials, pundits, and entertainers having millions of pennies with which they fund their incessant insertion of two cents into every topic in the news, as I am with those here in the US, but if they are similar, then the evidence of a backlash was welcome news to a great many.
A rising wave of violence and harassment directed at any group of innocents is a terrible thing, and should be combated, but it's no worse than any other because its origin can be defined as a backlash, and a credible argument can be made that if the attacks that have given rise to the backlash were stopped those of the backlash would stop as well.
One thing is for certain, if authorities all around the world are somehow able to put a halt to any and all Backlash attacks, we won't see a stop or even a slowdown in Islamist attacks.
