Tommy Robinson can never take hope from me. The silence around the San Diego mosque attacks alongside my experiences at the Unite the Kingdom march last weekend have only made me more determined to 'plant saplings', says Remona Aly.
Last weekend, I joined a merged Palestinian and counter-rally to the far-right 'Unite the Kingdom' march spearheaded by Tommy Robinson. I watched social media reels of his plans to 'remigrate' (a euphemism for ethnic cleansing) people like me, and his pledge to 'remove Islam from the UK' while so-called patriotic flags carrying the symbol of the Palestinian-Turkish Saint George flew behind him.
Two days later, while questioning why this hate was parading around so unchecked yet again, WhatsApp messages pinged bringing ghastly news – the San Diego mosque attacks in the US where three Muslim lives were violently taken – ripped away precisely because they were Muslim. I scoured news outlets, searching for front page coverage, for outrage, for politicians and authorities to denounce these acts as terrorism, but was met with barely anything to acknowledge my pain. The silence is not incidental, it is familiar. I keep seeing the words, 'what else do we expect?' and 'our lives matter less' on my Instagram feed. Islamophobia is no longer creeping – it is flagrantly screeching that Muslims and Islam are the perpetual bogeyman, a woe on society, and a threat to British life.
I didn't know that I, one of a mere six per cent of the population, wielded such power over the other 94. I say I, as it is personal, as much as it is collective. Like the collective blame post 7/7 and 9/11, when I was called a terrorist, and suffered the chronic, exhausting question over loyalty and my right to even exist here.
But this is not a piece about my cowering. It is about resistance. It always has been.
'What does hope mean to you?' I was asked recently. It is more radical than it sounds. My faith, Islam, like the other major faiths of Judaism, Sikhism, or Christianity – which has been disgracefully co-opted by the far right – was born in a nucleus of hostility and othering. All were defiant, all resisted. An Islamic prophetic saying has been my motto throughout life: 'Plant a sapling, even if it is the Last Hour'. Doom – even when guaranteed – isn't an excuse to give up. I have interrogated hope all my life. For me, hope is a process. It's perseverance. When I see hate-fuelled rallies, any human life taken in an act of terror, or political hypocrisy – I get angry. And rage is exactly the right response. I want to keep feeling, my humanity depends on it. But I want that rage to take me to justice. To call people to account. To call out the truth. To hold up a placard saying 'Unity over division'; to donate to a 'Tommy Chooses Love' spin-off campaign raising over £200k for refugees. To see a stranger struggling and rush to their side – whoever they are, even an attendee of the Unite the Kingdom rally. I want that rage to take me to hope. To resist.
Seeing an elderly man give up his Saturday to march along with me, and others like and unlike him, deafened the hate that's pounded in my head. Yet hatred has also taught me a lot. As an 'outsider' hate has pushed me to a vantage point of differing perspectives. I see things more as they are rather than being spoonfed a false status quo. It has shown me that wherever it is directed – whatever the background or belief of its target – it threatens us all. Hate has taught me never to frame my life within it. My work has been inspired by faith, and focused on the complex spectrum of daily lives, ideas and experiences of Muslims, and not them exclusively: I am fascinated about how we all live, how we fail, how we strive, how we simply exist. There is little sign of the hate disappearing in my lifetime, it may even worsen, but I will keep planting.
