When the Elitist Press Sounds Invested in Islamophobia

Tim Graham on May 22, 2026

On Monday, two teenagers killed three men at the San Diego Islamic Center, then killed themselves. What a pointless spasm of violence it was. It took a few days for The New York Times to flex their rhetorical muscles and blame conservatives.

On the top left of Thursday's front page, the headline read: "Islamophobia Spreads Fast, As Does Fear: Mosque Attack Reflects Rise in Overt Hatred."

The second paragraph from reporters Shaila Dewan and Jill Cowan was blunt: "To some, the killings seemed like an inevitable result of a swell of Islamophobia in the United States and around the globe. Anti-Muslim rhetoric on the right has become louder," spurring "a new phase of overt discrimination and fears of violence."

The words "inevitable result" do a lot of work. Conservative rhetoric will "inevitably" be blamed, but no one has to prove a causal connection. This kind of sloppy smear caused Sarah Palin to sue the Times over their suggestion that her placement of targets on congressional districts in a pamphlet somehow led to the shooting of then-Rep. Gabby Giffords (D-Ariz.) by an apolitical nihilist.

The Times reporters quickly turned to assigning blame to President Donald Trump, Rep. Randy Fine (R-Fla.) and Trump ally Laura Loomer, who used the term "invasive species" for Muslims. Most Americans believe in our history of religious liberty and tolerance. That is different from being critical of Islam in general -- Muslim countries often don't allow any religious freedom -- or Islamic extremists in particular. Criticism of Islam is not automatically "Islamophobia."

The rise of radical Muslim Democrats in office, from New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani to Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), causes the Times to worry about "increased vitriol against them." No one at the paper worried in print about "increased vitriol" against Trump leading to "fears of violence," despite the three assassination attempts.

This very same newspaper recently celebrated Islamic extremist Hasan Piker on one of its podcasts, as he spoke in warm terms of the man who was filmed assassinating a health insurance CEO on the street, because he was guilty of "social murder," so he had it coming. "Fears of violence" seem to only flow in one direction. Some violence is apparently socially acceptable.

Likewise, the Times turned to the Council for Islamic-American Relations as their source of data on Islamophobia. CAIR "received more civil rights complaints last year than it had recorded in any year since 1996." CAIR leader Nihad Awad was quoted as calling on public figures not to fuel "hatred and division that inevitably inspires acts of violence."

They did not recall what their reporter Peter Baker noted in 2023, after the Oct. 7 massacre of 1,200 Israelis by Hamas. Awad celebrated the mass murder: "The people of Gaza only decided to break the siege, the walls of the concentration camp, on Oct. 7." This group should be no journalist's idea of an "anti-hate" or "anti-discrimination" or anti-violence group.

"PBS News Hour" also turned to a CAIR official, deputy director Edward Ahmed Mitchell, who proclaimed without challenge, "Anti-Muslim bigotry in the United States is completely out of control." Anchor Geoff Bennett also acted unaware of CAIR's record of cheering mass murder, asking Mitchell, "What's it going to take to really lower the temperature?"

If these liberal journalists seriously wanted to lower the temperature, they'd stop linking violence to nonviolent speech, and they could try harder to notice when their designated leftist "hate" experts are engaged in vicious hate themselves.

Tim Graham is director of media analysis at the Media Research Center and executive editor of the blog NewsBusters.org. To find out more about Tim Graham and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.