European leaders are failing Muslims, EU Islamophobia chief tells Hyphen
Marion Lalisse, the European Commission’s coordinator for combating anti-Muslim hatred, describes a ‘witch hunt’ against people speaking up for Muslim rights
–
European leaders lack the political will to stem rising anti-Muslim hate, the EU’s senior civil servant responsible for combating Islamophobia has warned.
In an exclusive interview with Hyphen, Marion Lalisse said EU institutions must agree on a definition of Islamophobia and set clear goals if they are to tackle surging anti-Muslim violence, with nearly one in two European Muslims reporting discrimination in their daily lives.
“What I want is a recognition of the specific nature of anti-Muslim hatred and of its intersectionality, how it affects women, its normalisation. It’s important to name anti-Muslim hatred,” she said, adding that the lack of a clear definition is an ongoing failure on the part of the European Commission (EC), the executive branch of the EU. “There have been many attempts to reach a consensus around terminology and to agree on a definition of the phenomenon. These attempts have so far failed.”
Lalisse was appointed by the EC as coordinator for combating anti-Muslim hatred in February 2023. The French former diplomat is a fluent Arabic speaker who previously served the EU as deputy ambassador to Yemen. Since her appointment, she has held several awareness-raising events, provided training for European officials to improve their understanding of anti-Muslim racism and advocated for their support in the fight against it. It’s a job she describes as “draining”.
“[My role involves] holding member states accountable, so it’s not always a friendly relationship,” she said. “Where I have difficulties with some is in explaining to them the under-reporting, the trust issue, the structural nature of racism. There is a different level of understanding of racism and discrimination sometimes. It’s all a question of political will.”
Muslims are the second largest religious group in the EU after Christians. European Muslim leaders, academics, and civil society organisations have told Hyphen that despite years of promises of better and safer inclusion, the EU’s efforts to tackle anti-Muslim hate have been largely superficial and failed to address its own major structural bias. In 2024, just 5% of MEPs in the European Parliament were ‘racialised minorities’.
Among the biggest challenges for Lalisse is that, while the EU has several high-profile strategies in place to combat racism generally, it has no dedicated action plan to fight anti-Muslim racism, which she says has resulted in a lack of “clear targets”.
Nor does she believe enough has been done to embed anti-racist attitudes within the EU apparatus itself. “Obviously we need to work on diversity and inclusion in institutions,” she said. “My colleagues are receiving training on racism and discrimination, but much more should be done. We have been late to respond, but it’s a very difficult task.”
An “epidemic” of anti-Muslim hate
The EC created the role of anti-Muslim hate coordinator in 2015 to provide “a robust and holistic response” to rising Islamophobia. That year, as hundreds of thousands of people fled wars in the Middle East for the safety of Europe, and amid increasing reports of terror threats by extremists from Muslim backgrounds (described as “Islamists” by European politicians and media), anti-Muslim violence rocketed — particularly in Germany and France.
By 2021, UN special rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief, Ahmed Shaheed, warned the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva that anti-Muslim hate had reached “epidemic proportions”, citing European surveys showing that nearly four in 10 people held unfavourable views about Muslims.
The EC launched its first anti-racism action plan in 2020, lauded by EC president Ursula von der Leyen as the broadest set of anti-racism actions in the EU’s history. “It is a message to Europeans of all colours, faiths and backgrounds. You belong in Europe. This is your flag. This is your home,” she said. However, anti-racism campaigners across Europe told Hyphen that these promises have not been followed up with robust or meaningful action.
“We felt that we were really listened to [when the plan was created]. But it has failed in terms of tangible action being made, like police action, arrests,” said Julie Pascoët, policy and advocacy coordinator at the European Network Against Racism (ENAR).
This criticism comes amid a profound shift to the right in European politics, with far-right parties growing in popularity across Europe, particularly in France, Italy and Germany. Lalisse points to a corresponding increase in anti-immigrant and anti-terror legislation, questionable in its legality, that disproportionately targets Muslims.
“I think in all institutions, be it national or EU and possibly also in the UN, we have to recognise that even people with good will can contribute to racism,” she said. “You have these policies preventing terrorism or looking at migration — there should be watchdogs and people dealing with human rights present in the room, making sure that there are no side effects.”
Lalisse admits she was shocked by the abuse she has received as coordinator, particularly from far-right groups on social media. “The amount of lies around Muslims, activists and officials like me is amazing. Any actor who works on anti-racism or combatting anti-Muslim hatred will be blamed for being a radical person or a terrorist or close to the Muslim Brothers or political Islam.”
Lalisse believes that persecution of Muslim advocates, at all levels of the EU, is obstructing meaningful progress in securing rights for European Muslims.
“There is clearly a network, linked to the far right, who don’t always acknowledge they are far right. They can be from the European Parliament, they can be politicians, they can be so-called researchers. Some of them spend their life chasing people perceived to be Muslim or anti-racist, and it’s a witch hunt,” she said.
“[This] can lead to shrinking of civic space, to silencing, to defunding, to sidelining. In a way, it’s a badge of honour to be targeted by such people, but it also prevents us from being quicker in our actions.”
The EU is not doing enough
In November 2023, Lalisse joined ambassadors and envoys in signing a statement raising alarm at rising levels of Islamophobia in the union and calling on authorities “to spare no effort to ensure the safety of Muslim communities”. Hyphen contacted more than 20 of Europe’s leading equality officials — many of whom were co-signatories of this letter — to comment on the EU’s progress. Only two responded.
Ulrika Sundberg, Sweden’s special envoy to the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation’s intercultural and interfaith dialogue, cited the EU’s efforts to combat hate speech on social media and its anti-racism action plan. Germany’s minister of state Reem Alabali-Radovan — who was appointed Germany’s first anti-racism commissioner in 2022 — acknowledged that Islamophobia remains “a serious problem in Europe” and that recording of anti-Muslim crime must be improved, both in Germany and across Europe.
While EU officials were overwhelmingly reluctant to talk to Hyphen on the bloc’s Islamophobia problem, rights organisations were more forthcoming.
“They are not doing enough. The EU does not want to acknowledge the problem,” said Enes Bayraklı, head of political science and international relations at the Turkish German University and co-author of the annual European Islamophobia Report. “The situation is deteriorating. More and more, states are introducing legalised and institutionalised Islamophobia through headscarf and hijab bans, mosque and minaret bans, and halal slaughter bans.”
The latest European Islamophobia Report, based on data gathered by grassroots organisations across the EU, found “pervasive denial and under-recognition of Islamophobia” across member states. Anti-Muslim hate remains “unacknowledged by all European governments and the overwhelming majority of political parties”, the authors added.
A spokesperson for the EC told Hyphen that it is deeply concerned by the spike in discrimination and hatred towards Muslims in Europe since the dramatic escalation of the Israel Hamas conflict on 7 October 2023. “The EU condemns all forms and manifestations of racism and xenophobia. They are incompatible with the values and principles upon which the EU is founded.”
Among its efforts to respond to this crisis it cited a meeting between EU member states, the Council of Europe, and international organisations to discuss combating anti-Muslim hatred, held in Strasbourg in March 2024. It also listed legislation dating back several decades, including the Victims’ Rights Directive (2012) and the Digital Services Act (2022), requiring digital platforms to remove hate speech.
Civil society organisations, however, argue that EU institutions are still failing to adequately consult the Muslim community when conducting research and before rolling out plans and policies.
Karim Ridwan, Collective for Countering Islamophobia in Europe research and advocacy officer, points to the EU’s Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) 2024 report, which consulted only first and second generation Muslims, who do not represent the majority. “People at the European Commission are living in a different world. We are on the front lines,” Ridwan said. “It’s like they don’t want to hear the voices of the victims.”
The FRA report’s co-author Vida Beresneviciute insisted that despite its limitations, the EU’s data remains useful for showing how Muslims experience racism and discrimination. It found that 47% of Muslims living in the EU face racism and discrimination in their daily life, up from 39% in 2016. “[It also] underscores that more needs to be done to tackle anti-Muslim racism, discrimination and hate,” Beresneviciute said.
What is the solution?
Lalisse was keen to stress her close working relationship with the EC’s antisemitism coordinator Katharina von Schnurbein, both of whom report directly to von der Leyen. She is working with Michaela Moua, the commission’s first anti-racism coordinator, to develop a new strategy against racism due to be launched in 2026. Among her recommendations will be improving the EU’s data gathering on anti-Muslim hate, both in methodology and scope. The second will be around language: “Anti-Muslim racism is my preferred terminology, and I will seek a consensus on this.” She would also like to see better and more regular international coordination on tackling anti-Muslim hate and more work around safeguarding online.
Yahya Pallavicini, imam of the Al-Wahid Mosque in Milan, believes the EU needs to make significant institutional adjustments if it’s to successfully tackle the rising hate that threatens his community, but says the creation of an anti-Muslim hate coordinator was at least a move in the right direction.
“I am happy that at least one person is appointed and paid to try to do this work. They are not magicians, they cannot solve all of the problems,” Pallavicini said, before pointing out a deeper structural problem of “religious illiteracy” among Europe’s policymakers.
“They think that they can solve the needs of any religious community as they would any other technical issue,” he said. “The solution is institutional cooperation. We need to increase knowledge and cooperation.”
Other campaigners and analysts question how effective Lalisse can be in making necessary change without more meaningful political backing and resources. Pascoet said: “She is a desk officer, but we need a political level effort. We can’t only rely on coordinators as the only ones active on this. They don’t have a lot of resources.”
Another Brussels insider familiar with the workings of the commission suggested that Lalisse was “not up to the task” and that bureaucracy was no match for the populist right: “She is a low-level diplomat who doesn’t really have the political backing. How can someone like Lalisse stand up to Viktor Orbán?”
Lalisse said that while she could not provide a figure for her annual budget, which the EC provides primarily to organise events, a lack of money is not inhibiting her success. “It’s not necessarily money that will change [the issue of anti-Muslim racism], but a decision by member states and by actors to work more efficiently on the topic,” she said.
She declined to confirm the size of her team but described feeling underresourced: “I think the shortcoming is the staff. Obviously, if I am alone, I cannot spend my life troubleshooting and firefighting against attacks from the far right and deliver at the same time. So for that, I would need a proper team to be able to do both.”
Responding to the criticism that she does not have the visibility or political heft to make the changes necessary to defend Europe’s Muslims against the multiple threats they now face, Lalisse said that tenacity rather than profile was what the job required. “It should be my role to mention that more needs to be done. Not only about anti-Muslim hatred, but about Muslims,” she said, adding: “I think there is a lack of narrative around Muslims, which shows the different sides of the story. I’m not here to be famous, I’m here to deliver.”
Topics
Get the Hyphen weekly
Subscribe to Hyphen’s weekly round-up for insightful reportage, commentary and the latest arts and lifestyle coverage, from across the UK and Europe
This form may not be visible due to adblockers, or JavaScript not being enabled.