War on Iran fuelling Islamophobic social media surge in US: Report 

The United States and Israel’s war on Iran has “accelerated” the spread of harmful content targeting American Muslims on social media platforms, a study by the US Center for the Study of Organized Hate (CSOH) finds.

The centre found that on X alone from February 28, the first day of the war, to Thursday, users posted more than 25,300 Islamophobic remarks.

The report, which was released on Monday, also found that Islamaphobia was present on social media before the war. The dataset examined original posts, quotes and replies containing Islamophobic content from January 1 through Thursday, noting that the reach of such posts expanded “significantly once reposts are included” to more than 279,000 mentions of Islamophobic content.

The analysis showed that such posts surged from February 28.

Users turned to using “dehumanizing language”, referring to Muslims as “pests”, “rats”, “vermin”, “parasites” and an “infestation”, the CSOH said.

“Such language has historically preceded and enabled the most extreme forms of violence against targeted communities,” the report said.

Among 30 such posts that were flagged, 11 were removed while 19 were still available on the platform as of Monday.

According to the centre, the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF), a US watchdog group, has reportedly received complaints since February 28 that US military commanders have told service members the war with Iran was “all part of God’s divine plan”.

Reports said the MRFF has received more than 200 complaints from service members across multiple military installations about commanders framing the war in religious terms.

Some of those comments were also fuelled by comments by officials from President Donald Trump’s administration.

In a speech on March 2, US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth made remarks criticised as Islamophobic as he emphasised Trump’s long-held stance on Iran.

“Crazy regimes like Iran, hell-bent on prophetic Islamist delusions, cannot have nuclear weapons. It’s common sense. Many have said it, but it takes guts to actually enforce it, and our president has guts,” Hegseth said.

Aside from dehumanising content, the CSOH also found posts that “cross the line from hatred into explicit incitement to violence” and which directly call for “extermination of Muslims”.

“Some posts frame the elimination of Muslims as an act of self-defense or civilizational survival,” the CSOH said, adding that the comments lend “a veneer of patriotic duty to the genocidal rhetoric”.

“In the current climate, this content functions as a call to action directed at a community that is already experiencing rising rates of bias, harassment, discrimination, and hate-fueled violence,” the centre added.