Shaykh Abdal Hakim Murad (Timothy Winter) argues that although parts of the European far right are clearly marked by xenophobia and anti-immigrant sentiment, it’s too simplistic to see them as driven by hatred alone.

Beneath that surface, he suggests, there is a deeper unease. An existential anxiety about what has been lost in modern life.

In his view, many people feel that the foundations that once gave their lives meaning and identity have eroded. Things like monarchy, religious practice, pilgrimage, national symbols, and shared cultural rituals used to anchor individuals within a larger story. As those structures weaken or disappear, people are left searching for something to hold onto.

Within this context, muslims can become convenient scapegoats. Not necessarily because they are the true cause of the problem, but because they are visible, different, and easy to blame. The real issue, Murad suggests, is not immigration itself, but a deeper cultural dislocation that globalisation has brought.

What has taken the place of those older forms of meaning, he argues, is a kind of hollow consumer culture. One that offers endless distraction and surface level satisfaction, but little in the way of depth, purpose, or identity.