A Pakistani-Canadian family out on a stroll on Sunday evening was murdered in a horrific act of Islamophobic violence in London, Ontario. A...
A Pakistani-Canadian family out on a stroll on Sunday evening was murdered in a horrific act of Islamophobic violence in London, Ontario. A nine-year-old boy, hospitalised with serious injuries, is the only survivor of a terror attack that killed his sister, father, mother and grandmother.
How will he make sense of this unthinkable tragedy? This was not an accident. Police have said his family – his father, Salman Afzaal, his mother Madiha Salman, his 15-year-old sister Yumna Afzaal and his grandmother, Talat Afzaal – was “targeted because of their Muslim faith” and hit by a speeding truck. How do you process this targeted hate and violence at such a young age?
While Canadians may be shocked and blindsided by this mass murder, the ingredients for this tragedy have long been in the making. The warning signs of white nationalist violence have been glaring.
Hate crimes against Muslims in Canada grew 253% between 2012 and 2015. The 2017 terror attack in a mosque in Québec left six men dead after offering their evening prayers. Last year, a caretaker in a Toronto mosque was stabbed and killed and the person charged with his murder is alleged to have been influenced by neo-Nazi social media posts.
Not just far-right groups
But it’s not only far-right fringe groups that hold...
