Australian news anchor perfectly sums up how Islamophobia plays into ISIS’s hands

One of the big problems with the hysterical reaction to the Paris attacks— the anti-refugee sentiment, the Islamophobia — is it’s exactly what ISIS wants.

Australian news anchor Waleed Aly explained on the TV show The Project:

They want countries like ours to reject their Muslims and vilify them. … ISIL’s leaders would be ecstatic to hear that since the atrocity in Paris, Muslims have reportedly been threatened and attacked in England, America, and here in Australia, because this evil organization has it in their heads that if they can make Muslims the enemy of the West, then Muslims in France and England and America and here in Australia will have nowhere to turn but ISIL.”

This, Aly argues, is part of ISIS’s dead-serious obsession with the apocalypse. As Vox’s Zack Beauchamp explained, the organization genuinely believes that by reestablishing an Islamic caliphate in the Middle East, it can bring on the end of days — which involves an epochal battle with the forces of unbelief in the heart of the Muslim world.

“After the victory of the Muslims over the infidel, they believe the world is eventually overrun by Gog and Magog, who will be familiar to folks who know biblical literature — basically wild men who will destroy the world,” Will McCants, ISIS expert and author of The ISIS Apocalypse, told Beauchamp. “And then we finally get down to the fire-and-brimstone stuff. The universe explodes, and all of the remaining sinners are gathered before God to face judgment at the final hour.”

So how do you counteract this fanatical vision? Aly argued for unity:

We’re all feeling a million raging emotions right now. I am angry at these terrorists, I’m sickened by the violence, and I’m crushed for the families that have been left behind. But you know what? I won’t be manipulated.

We all need to come together. I know how that sounds, I know it’s a cliché. But it’s also true. Because it’s exactly what ISIL doesn’t want.

So if you’re a member of Parliament or a has-been member of Parliament preaching hate at a time when what we actually needs is more love, you’re helping ISIL. They have told us that.

If you’re a Muslim leader telling your community they have no place here, or a non-Muslim saying basically the same thing, you’re helping ISIL. They have told us that.

Or if you’re just someone with a Twitter or Facebook account firing off misguided missives of hate, you’re helping ISIL. They’ve told us that.

And I’m pretty sure that right now none of us wants to help these bastards.