Report a hate crime or incident

In 2020, we carried out a survey carried that explored public familiarity with anti-Muslim hatred or prejudices, experiences, witnessing and actions taken as a result of these in Leeds. We appointed the Centre for Trust, Peace and Social relations, based at Coventry University to independently analyse the findings of this online survey. A final report sets out the key findings and recommendations.         

Anti-Muslim prejudice definition

The survey also assisted us in identifying the preferred terminology for a local definition of anti-Muslim prejudice. Since the findings of the survey were revealed, we worked with key stakeholders in the Muslim community as well as other strategic partners who all stated their preference for a local definition suitable for Muslims.        

The term Anti-Muslim prejudice was favoured rather than Islamophobia as the latter translates into a fear of Islam whereas we are, in the main, seeing discrimination against individuals due to them possessing the perceived characteristics of a Muslim.        

In October 2022, members of our executive board formally approved the following definition:       

Leeds City Council and partners across the city have shown a willingness to work together to protect people in Leeds from experiencing Islamophobia. We all have a responsibility to challenge attitudes and behaviours that foster hatred to ensure communities feel safe.       

In response to the findings of the survey, a council-led strategic stakeholder group focused on anti-Muslim hatred was established to take forward the recommendations of the report and to develop an action plan.

Anti-Muslim prejudice action plan

The main actions from the Anti-Muslim prejudice action plan are to:       

• raise awareness and understanding around the seriousness and scale of anti-Muslim prejudice in Leeds
• train and educate front line (and other) staff, in an inter-agency way
• investigate under-reporting and improve reporting
• prevent hate crime through collective work to tackle prejudice in all communities, enhance understanding between people, in a way that brings residents together and builds shared ideas, aspirations and hope around Leeds as the uniting factor
  
• strengthen understanding, depth and nuance around the issues and the data
  

We have adopted the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of anti-Semitism which is 'a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews.  Rhetorical and physical manifestations of anti-Semitism are directed toward Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and/or their property, toward Jewish community institutions and religious facilities.'        

The IHRA definition specifies eleven 'contemporary examples of anti-Semitism' in public life, the media, schools, the workplace, and in the religious sphere which could, taking into account the overall context, include but are not limited to:       

• calling for, aiding, or justifying the killing or harming of Jews in the name of a radical ideology or an extremist view of religion
  
• making mendacious, dehumanising, demonising, or stereotypical allegations about Jews as such or the power of Jews as a collective — such as, especially but not exclusively, the myth about a world Jewish conspiracy or of Jews controlling the media, economy, government or other societal institutions
  
• accusing Jews as a people of being responsible for real or imagined wrongdoing committed by a single Jewish person or group, or even for acts committed by non-Jews
  
• denying the fact, scope, mechanisms (e.g. gas chambers) or intentionality of the genocide of the Jewish people at the hands of National Socialist Germany and its supporters and accomplices during World War II (the Holocaust)
  
• accusing the Jews as a people, or Israel as a state, of inventing or exaggerating the Holocaust
  
• accusing Jewish citizens of being more loyal to Israel, or to the alleged priorities of Jews worldwide, than to the interests of their own nations
  
• denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, for example, by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavour
  
• applying double standards by requiring of it a behaviour not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation
  
• using the symbols and images associated with classic anti-Semitism (such as claims of Jews killing Jesus or blood libel) to characterise Israel or Israelis
  
• drawing comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis
  
• holding Jews collectively responsible for actions of the state of Israel