An attempted arson of Finsbury Park mosque was part of a “growing trend of anti-Muslim hatred in London following the Paris attacks”, according to its chairman.
Video footage showed a white male wearing a hoodie and blue jeans attempting to light a canister before hurling it into the mosque compound and fleeing on a moped, on 27 November.
Police were called after workers discovered the full petrol can, attached to scorched rags, inside the mosque grounds.
“If this container had exploded on Friday it would have been a disaster,” said chairman Mohammed Kozbar.
“We were lucky because it was raining at the time and it didn’t explode. The impact on the community would have been huge.”
In response to the attempted attack, Unite Against Islamophobia will hold a vigil outside Finsbury Park Mosque at 6pm on Friday December 4.
Unite against #Islamophobia pic.twitter.com/jw2GEFAct7
— Omer El-Hamdoon (@Omer_Elhamdoon) December 1, 2015
Organisers say that the event aims to “stand in solidarity with Finsbury Park mosque and the Muslim community”.
Unite campaigner Albert Amankona, who is attending the event, said: “We must not tolerate Islamophobia. Some attitudes towards Islam in the UK are not too dissimilar to attitudes people held against gays, women and black people in the past. We must all work together to prevent tragedies of the past reoccurring today.”
Statistics from the Metropolitan Police show that the number of reported Islamophobic offences increased dramatically following the Paris attacks on 13 November.
There were 76 recorded incidents between 17 and 24 November, compared to 24 offences from 3 to 10 November.
Following the incident, the mosque was visited by Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, who, according to the Finsbury Park mosque secretary, expressed his solidarity with the mosque by “standing side by side with the people at a time when we needed him”.
The incident comes a week after a series of hoax letters were distributed to Islington residents, purporting to be from the mosque, which inappropriately suggested people “Find Islam”.
Mr Kozbar said the trend was “very worrying”.
Image Credit: Metropolitan Police
