This is so for two reasons. First, advocates and opponents of Muslim inclusion often share underlying assumptions about Islam, citizenship, and national belonging, and a positive or negative spin on those assumptions does little to modify their political effects. Second, popular views of Muslims, and state policies related to Islam, are shaped by historical traumas that have been woven into narratives of national identity. Whether they are interlaced with fear or affection, the narratives of trauma that are commonly applied to Muslims living in the West are peculiar in the extent to which they focus on people and events located outside the time/ space of nationhood.

Carl W. Ernst, Islamophobia in America_ Th…, loc. 661