The bloody protests that started in June as an anti-quota movement have been plaguing Bangladesh for almost two months. On 5th August things took a significant turn as Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina Wazed resigned and departed the nation. She has since landed at the Hindon air base in India, where National Security Advisor (NSA) Ajit Doval met her. The army is now in charge of the neighbouring country and has installed an “interim government” composed of judges, doctors and former military personnel as announced by Army Chief Waker-uz-Zaman.
Meanwhile, the extremists backed by Begum Khaleda Zia’s Bangladesh Nationalist Party and the outlawed Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami have taken over the streets. The agitation, which began under the garb of democratic student rallies, has since degenerated into a violent display of unrest, hatred for minorities, especially Hindus, death and devastation. There is nothing democratic about the current state of affairs in Bangladesh, rather, it is shockingly brutal and provides the fundamentalists carte blanche.
Islamists don’t need a reason to target minorities in any country and likewise, they are “saving democracy” in Bangladesh by going after the Hindus there with impunity. Their counterparts in the Indian media are also dutifully covering up the former’s violent deeds, precisely as they always have. Mohammed Zubair, co-founder of Alt News who has always been at the forefront to assist his ideological and religious brethren, has once again stepped in to defend their murderous actions.
Interestingly, despite his unwavering commitment, he is clearly running out of creative ways to advocate for the Islamic zealots. On 6th August, he posted a long thread about Muslims in Bangladesh allegedly ‘protecting Hindus’ including the customary “forming a human chain to safeguard temples.” Anyone will undoubtedly have a deja vu moment because Islamists and their cheerleaders do this routinely to attempt to manipulate public opinion in their favour by portraying Muslims as peaceful and secular people who guard temples and protect Hindus during critical times while ignoring the violent acts of Islamists. However, they never address the reasons or the individuals from whom the Hindus or their temples needed protection as it would expose their bogus narrative.
More images of Local Muslims safeguarding Temples. #BangladeshBleeding #BangladeshViolence pic.twitter.com/ZyrXknKqfb
— Mohammed Zubair (@zoo_bear) August 5, 2024
More images of Local Muslims safeguarding Temples. #BangladeshBleeding #BangladeshViolence pic.twitter.com/ZyrXknKqfb
— Mohammed Zubair (@zoo_bear) August 5, 2024
Mohammed Zubair shared multiple posts showing Muslims standing outside temples, including the prominent Dhakeshwari Temple, to guard them in an effort to downplay the ongoing killings and rapes of Hindus as well as the vandalism of their religious places by Islamists . He also mentioned about an alleged appeal from a group called ‘Students Against Discrimination’ from a mosque to “maintain communal harmony” and “protect Hindu minorities and their wealth from miscreants and evil forces.”
More images of students and Local Muslims safeguarding the temples in Bangladesh. #BangladeshBleeding #BangladeshViolence pic.twitter.com/w0WZoNcbqx
— Mohammed Zubair (@zoo_bear) August 5, 2024
A Special Announcement on a loudspeaker from inside the Mosque in Bangladesh.
— Mohammed Zubair (@zoo_bear) August 5, 2024
"Dear Citizens,
We 'Students Against Discrimination' are requesting you, during this period of unrest in the country, We all must maintain communal harmony. We should protect Hindu minorities.… pic.twitter.com/AszMMk2gyN
These uploads are reminiscent of similar incidents including the infamous episode when 100 Muslim youths reportedly formed a ‘human chain’ outside a Hanuman temple located near Shampura main road to protect it from arsonists after Islamists wreaked havoc and specifically assaulted Hindus in Bengaluru in 2020.
Strangely, Mohammad Zubair and his fellow apologists never mention who or what the Hindu temples and homes are being protected from.
The perpetrators were projected as good guys as their crimes were conveniently excused and whitewashed in the name of a “human chain” by Mohammad Zubair, who in his desperation to shield the extremists cited a Bangladeshi Islamist account that referred to Hindu females as bitches after a Hindu woman was attacked by a police official in Dhaka and has been spreading hatred against the community for years.
Zubair is quoting Basherkalla to whitewash the communal atrocities against Bangladesh Hindus.
— Sensei Kraken Zero (@YearOfTheKraken) August 6, 2024
Basherkalla is the same Bangladeshi Islamist group that had called Hindu women 'bitch'. pic.twitter.com/LTDsPtOLQY
Liberal-Islamist ecosystem and its deceiving methods of depicting Muslim rioters as good samaritans
Taking a cue from the Nazi handbook and Adolf Hitler who once stated, “All propaganda must be confined to a few bare necessities and then must be expressed in a few stereotyped formulas. Only constant repetition will finally succeed in imprinting an idea upon the memory of a crowd,” the Liberal-Islamist ecosystem and their affiliate media have aced the art of crafting a straightforward narrative that is laced with deception and falsehoods. It then circulates the same lies repeatedly to discredit the persecution of Hindus or insinuate that their suffering is ‘collateral damage’ and not a product of Islamic oppression while simultaneously depicting the jihadis as kindhearted people.
Mohammad Zubair who unleashed a ruthless Islamists after former Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) spokesperson Nupur Sharma for merely quoting a religious text in response to a jibe on Kashi Vishwanath Temple has a similar habit of whitewashing crimes of bigotry perpetrated by Islamists by selectively amplifying the photo-op good samaritanism.
Violence broke out in the state of Maharashtra in 2021 when protests and rallies were held across the state by some Muslim organizations in the aftermath of claims of attack on mosques in Tripura. Two journalists disseminated false information and alleged that a copy of the Quran had been burned and a mosque had been vandalized in Tripura, which set off a chain of violent incidents. The Muslim community even threw stones and indulged in violence when the BJP organized a nonviolent demonstration. However, the media protected the former and blamed the saffron party as well as the Hindus during the entire ordeal.
Similarly, in 2020 Muslims claimed that the Prophet Muhammad was disrespected and they marched to the streets, igniting chaos in Bengaluru. Hundreds of Muslims armed with sharp metal objects, sticks, iron rods, and other weapons congregated in the vicinity of Dalit Congress MLA Akhanda Srinivasamurthy’s home and stormed inside in reaction to an alleged insulting tweet posted by his relative. They pelted stones and set fire to nearby cars, ATMs (Automated teller machines) and stores as well as burned down a police station amidst chants of “Allahu Akbar” and “Naara e Takbeer.” Some media posts indicated that the riots were not spontaneous but prearranged. Meanwhile, the media was busy defending the rioters by amplifying a video of Muslim men ‘forming a human chain’ to protect a temple in the area.
Delhi’s anti-Hindu riots were also followed by the same events when news articles surfaced detailing how Muslims in the national capital established human chains in an attempt to “save temples.” Such “human chains” also appeared during demonstrations against the National Register of Citizens (NRC) and the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA).
Similar impressions were created and spread during the communal unrest in Delhi Hauz Qazi after the destruction of a Hindu temple nearby. A manufactured narrative that promoted “secularism” and the “bond of brotherhood” was published in the media, alleging that Muslims were assisting Hindus in “installing the idols” and providing meals. As it happened, the reports were refuted by the Hindu activists in the area, who maintained that Muslims were merely providing food for “photo-ops.”
Conclusion
The Liberal-Islamist ecosystem repeats the same trope every single time to condition the masses to elicit a particular kind of social reaction. The first and foremost is to never blame the Muslims or hold them accountable for the mayhem they cause as they are merely a victim of their circumstances. They never initiate any violence and only respond to the events that are thrust upon them. Even when it occurs at the hands of Muslims, the bloodshed simply unfolds as a result of the situation and they are not responsible for it. Hence, anyone could be blamed including the administration, the state, and even the Hindus who are usually victims during such times, but never the Muslims. Lastly, fabricate tales to demonstrate that the Muslim community was not only innocent but was defending Hindus and their holy places to bend the propaganda to the advantage of the former. Notably, in the scenario, the rioters don’t have any religion but the ‘human chain’ always does.
