WHITE WOMAN PEPPER SPRAYS MUSLIM UBER DRIVER FOR PRAYING

In this viral video, we see Uber passenger Jennifer Guilbeault, 23, lunging forward and attacking driver Shohel Mahmud, 45, using pepper spray. The driver said he had been praying in Arabic whilst stopped at a red light in New York.

In the footage, Mahmud was seen unbuckling his seat belt and jumping out of the car to escape the attack, but immediately returned as the vehicle moved. The father of three then put the car in park while the second passenger pulled Guilbeault back. When the second passenger asked the attacker why she attacked the driver, Guilbeault allegedly responded, 'He's brown.'

Mahmud experienced burning, redness and pain, calling 911 a few minutes following the attack.

The Manhattan District Attorney's Office indicted Guilbeault in the New York State Supreme Court on one count each of second-degree assault as a hate crime, third-degree assault as a hate crime, and second-degree aggravated harassment. The 23-year-old former employee at D. Pagan Communications, a public-relations firm, is expected to return to court in January, having been 'released with non-monetary conditions.'

Mahmud said he has been working fewer hours out of fear for his safety.

The Council on American Islamic Relations, the largest civil-rights advocacy group for Muslims in the US, has documented 4,951 bias complaints in the US between January and June this year, a 69-per cent increase over the same period in 2023. Earlier this year, the organisation received the 'highest number of complaints it has ever received in its 30-year history' with 8,061 complaints documented in 2023. Nearly half of those complaints were reported in the year's final three months, following the 7 October escalation in the 76-year Israeli occupation of Palestine.