To judge from CAIR press releases, one would think that Muslims were being hounded, harassed, and hung all over the US and in Europe. Not so. As I earlier pointed out, in the US it is much, much more dangerous to be a Jew.

But, is CAIR overstating the number of anti-Muslim hate-crimes in the US? Perhaps to aquire the coveted status of victim? That charge has been made in the blogosphere. Perhaps it is best to check an objective source. Here is a quote from the official FBI report on hate crimes in 2001. "A breakdown of the 2118 victims of hate crimes motivated by religious bias showed that the majority of victims were Jewish, 56.5 percent. Anti-Islamic bias accounted for 26.2 percent of victims of hate crimes motivated by religious bias, . . ." Report here . The statistics table shows 554 Muslim victims, compared with 1196 Jewish victims. For 2000 the FBI report indicates 36 Muslim victims, and 1269 Jewish. Report here. For 2002 the figures are 174 Muslim victims, and 1084 Jewish. Report here.

The same is true in Great Britain. This article from the Telegraph on persecution of Jews. A major culprit seems to be Muslims.

Jewish people are four times more likely to be attacked because of their religion than Muslims, according to figures compiled by the police. One in 400 Jews compared to one in 1,700 Muslims are likely to be victims of "faith hate" attacks every year. The figure is based on data collected over three months in police areas accounting for half the Muslim and Jewish populations of England and Wales. The crimes range from assault and verbal abuse to criminal damage at places of worship.

. . .

Rabbi Alex Chapper, 33, was the victim of a "faith-hate" crime in July last year. He was returning from a synagogue in Ilford, Essex, with three Jewish friends after conducting a service. All were wearing skull caps. Seven Asian teenagers followed them down the road shouting "Yehudi", which means Jew in Arabic. One of them shouted, "We are Pakistani, you are Jewish. We are going to kill you", before punching Rabbi Chapper in the face and hitting one of his friends over the head with a bottle.

"It was very frightening, we were all very shaken," said the rabbi. "I thought we were going to get seriously hurt but someone threatened to call the police and they ran off.

"We identified the youths and told the police but they were never prosecuted. They just did not seem interested. I feel very let down."