Non-Muslims are also vulnerable to private Islamophobic animus and violence. Since Muslim identity is racialized as Arab or Middle Eastern, an embedded caricature of Muslims (closely examined in chapter 3) guides how private Islamophobes imagine and identify adherents of the faith. A wide swath of non-Muslim groups and communities, most notably non-Muslims from South Asia, the Arab world, Middle Eastern nations, and Latinx states, and particularly Sikhs, are often profiled as Muslims and victimized by private Islamophobes.

Khaled A. Beydoun, American Islamophobia_ Unde…, loc. 119