Following several attacks on the Muslim community, Canada has designated its first special representative to tackle Islamophobia.
Elghawaby is a prominent advocate for human rights and serves as the communications director for the Canadian Race Relations Foundation as well as a columnist for the Toronto Star. She was previously employed with public broadcaster CB for more than ten years.
Amira has previously worked in communications and human rights for the Canadian labour movement. Additionally, from fall 2012 to fall 2017, she worked for the National Council of Canadian Muslims (NCCM) for five years to promote the civil liberties of Canadian Muslims.
Elghawaby, who was born to Egyptian parents, moved to Canada with her mother when she was just two months old and spent four of her formative years in Bandung, Indonesia. Elghawaby graduated from Carleton University with a law and journalism degree.
Amira has a long history of supporting programmes to combat hatred and advance inclusion, including serving as a founding board member of the Canadian Anti-Hate Network and a prior board member of the Silk Road Institute, according to her official website. She was a commissioner for the Canadian Commission on Democratic Expression of the Public Policy Forum for two terms. She now serves on the National Security Transparency Advisory Group, an impartial advisory body that provides guidance to Canada’s Deputy Minister of Public Safety.
Amira also participated in the 2019 Literary Arts Residency at the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity as a writer-in-residence. The topic of her talk at TEDXOttawa 2019 is “Multiculturalism: Worth Defending.”
Hate against Muslims in Canada
According to a story in Al Jazeera, researchers in 2020 discovered that the number of hate groups operating in the nation has risen in recent years, with anti-Muslim rhetoric one of the “most prevalent” issues among right-wing extremists online. Following this, a year later, the Trudeau administration organised national conferences on anti-Semitism and Islamophobia in an effort to address the issues. In an effort to reduce attacks on Muslims, this was done. Alarm was raised and cries for action were sparked by a string of deadly assaults and intimidation directed at Muslim communities across Canada.
Elghawaby recounted the names of those slain in the recent attacks in a series of tweets he sent out on Thursday, concluding, “We must never forget.”