Good morning. Assalam alaikum. Greetings of peace.

I come to you from the Haldimand tract, land that was granted to the Haudenosaunee of the Six Nations of the Grand River and within the territory of the neutral Anishinabe and Haudenosaunee peoples.

I'm here on behalf of the Coalition of Muslim Women of KW—CMW—which provides opportunities for personal and professional growth for Muslim women and youth while addressing issues of gender-based violence, racism, discrimination, Islamophobia and gendered Islamophobia through innovative programming and services, partnerships and collaboration, bridge-building and public education, and advocacy and outreach.

In April 2021 CMW launched its hate reporting, documentation and support services with seed funding from the Department of Canadian Heritage. This service, the first of its kind, was built upon a decade of CMW's work against hate, racism and Islamophobia in the Waterloo region. Now known as anti-hate services, or AHS, it provides various avenues to report and document hate and discrimination. It also provides an area of support services to the victims of hate and discrimination.

CMW releases yearly reports based on the data collected by AHS. We just released the third annual “Snapshot of Hate in Waterloo Region” report last week. The report, covering January 1 to December 31, 2023, shows a 26% increase in reported cases, with a total of 115 cases reported. Waterloo Regional Police Service, or WRPS, reported a total of 369 hate-motivated crimes in 2023, an increase of 94% from 2022; 46% of the total cases through AHS were reported between October and December 2023. When compared to the same time frame in 2022, an 83% increase in reported hate incidents and a 212% increase in Islamophobic, anti-Arab and anti-Palestinian hate was noted. The AHS report documented 46 cases—which is 40%—that were motivated by Islamophobia, and 12 cases—which is 10%—that were motivated by anti-Palestinian hate.

WRPS reported a total of 67 hate-motivated crimes targeting religion; however, only two of the 67 cases are reported as directed towards Islamic identity. Forty-one per cent of the cases documented by AHS targeted individuals who self-identified as Arab, and another 26% targeted those who identified as South Asian. WRPS reported 190 race-based hate-motivated crimes, most often targeting Black individuals.

Key populations reflected in the AHS report include females and youth under the age of 24. A total of 74 cases—64%—were victimized females, and a further 38 cases—41%—were victimized youth under the age of 24. Furthermore, 69% of female and 71% of youth included Islamophobia as a reason for the incident. During an analysis of the data, a trend tying religious or cultural clothing directly to the victim's experience of hate emerged. Often, this clothing was mentioned directly in verbal hate harassment cases. Of the 115 victims, 55—48%—were wearing a hijab or a niqab, and in seven cases victims were wearing a kaffiyeh.

The AHS report fills a crucial gap in police-reported hate crimes, as you may have noticed. The trends emerging from the AHS report are important to note for this committee. Women and youth in Canadian Muslim communities are bearing the brunt of Islamophobia. They're more at risk of physical assault, verbal abuse, harassment in public spaces and educational environments, and bullying, intimidation and discrimination in workplaces and educational institutions. I hope that this esteemed committee will pay due attention to the experiences of Muslim women and youth as part of this study on Islamophobia.

It will also be important to look into the experiences of Canadian Arab and Palestinian communities to understand how Islamophobia, anti-Arab racism and anti-Palestinian racism intersect.

The report cited here is available at cmw-kw.org, under the publications tab, in English.