Rakhine families settle on displaced Rohingya land in Burma

 NAYPYIDAW, Burma (MNTV) — Rakhine families are being settled on land where Rohingya communities lived before their mass displacement, according to local residents, raising fears that the redistribution of villages and farmland could make the eventual return of displaced Rohingya increasingly difficult.

According to the Rohingya Khobor,  construction has recently begun in Bagone Nar in southern Maungdaw Township, where a Rohingya village was burned during the Burmese military’s brutal 2017 crackdown that drove hundreds of thousands of Rohingya into neighboring Bangladesh.

Residents said the former village market had been bulldozed and houses were being constructed on surrounding land under the administration of the United League of Arakan and its armed wing, the Arakan Army, or AA, which now controls most of Rakhine State.

Some of the Rakhine families reportedly being brought into the area are from Rathedaung Township and southern parts of the state. Residents said families were being allocated residential plots and, in some cases, about two acres of farmland previously owned or cultivated by Rohingya.

The allegations come amid wider reports of Rohingya land being seized or repurposed in areas under AA control.

The Burma Human Rights Network reported in June that Rakhine settlements were being established on confiscated Rohingya land in northern Maungdaw, with some Rohingya allegedly forced to help construct them. 

A recent United Nations human rights report has also documented allegations of Rohingya land seizures and restrictions preventing displaced residents from returning home.

Similar concerns have emerged in neighboring Buthidaung Township, where Rohingya residents said some families displaced by fighting have been prevented from returning to their original villages and instead relocated to designated settlements.

Residents said families were given small plots but largely left to construct their own shelters despite widespread poverty and restrictions on obtaining bamboo and timber. Some said they feared arrest if they refused to relocate.

Local residents also identified Maung Gyi Taung, Tat Min Chaung and Kyein Chaung, locally known as Thami Khali, as areas where Rakhine settlement or redistribution of Rohingya land was reportedly taking place. The specific claims could not be independently verified.

The dispute carries potentially far-reaching consequences for Rohingya refugees and internally displaced people.

More than a million Rohingya currently live in neighboring Bangladesh, including hundreds of thousands driven from Burma during the military crackdown in 2017. Renewed warfare since 2024 has displaced many more Rohingya inside Rakhine State and across the border.

Rohingya groups have long demanded restoration of their homes and property as a central condition for any future return.

If their former villages are occupied and agricultural land permanently redistributed while they remain displaced, returning to their places of origin could become increasingly difficult even if security conditions eventually allow repatriation.

“We lost our homes first. Now we are losing our farmland as well,” one Rohingya farmer said. “If this continues, our children may have nowhere to return to.”

Anti-Muslim Hate Targeting Abdul El-Sayed Surged 20-Fold After Primary Win

 Anti-Muslim bigotry in the US has continued to rise through 2026, following the pattern set the year before, and the environment it has produced is harsher now than at any point in the recent past. Much of that climate has been built deliberately rather than arising from events on its own. In April 2026, the Center for the Study of Organized Hate (CSOH) documented how 89 elected officials assembled a coordinated anti-Muslim campaign over thirteen months, publishing 1,111 social media posts, introducing eight bills, and forming a Sharia-Free America Caucus that grew to 65 members.

These campaigns draw on conspiracy theories about Muslim religious practices, mosques, and the supposed imposition of “Sharia law,” all reinforcing a broader narrative of an impending Muslim takeover. This narrative echoes the Great Replacement theory and intensifies around major events, including conflicts in the Middle East and the growing visibility of Muslims running for public office.

Online, that bigotry and the conspiratorial narratives carrying it have escalated in successive waves. Abdul El-Sayed’s victory in Michigan’s Democratic Senate primary on August 4 produced the most concentrated wave of the summer. In the seven days that followed, posts targeting El-Sayed with anti-Muslim bigotry rose to 20 times their pre-primary rate, while overall anti-Muslim posts on X reached their highest single-day total since June 1. This data brief examines the scale of both surges and the rhetoric driving them.

Findings

• Anti-Muslim hate targeting El-Sayed jumped twentyfold after the primary. Posts naming him averaged 155 a day between June 1 and August 3. Between August 4 and 10 they averaged 3,099 a day, an increase of 1,895%. 
• Seven days produced more abuse than the preceding seven months. The 21,690 posts recorded between August 4 and 10 account for 56.7% of all 38,280 Islamophobic posts targeting El-Sayed since January 1.
• Overall anti-Muslim bigotry on X (formerly Twitter) hit its highest single day of the summer on August 5, the day when El-Syed was declared winner of the primary: 11,883 posts, 115% above the previous 30-day average and the highest daily figure recorded since June 1.
• The surge has not subsided. Six days after the result, general anti-Muslim volume remains 59% above its pre-primary baseline, and daily abuse aimed at El-Sayed remains an order of magnitude above its June-July level.

Hate Directed at Abdul El-Sayed

The Center for the Study of Organized Hate (CSOH) analyzed 38,280 Islamophobic posts naming Abdul El-Sayed, published between January 1 and August 10, 2026 across X, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Reddit and Bluesky. 

Measured against the June 1- August 3 baseline of 155 posts per day, the post-primary week represents a 20-fold increase. Measured against the January-May daily rate of 44 posts, it is 70 times higher. Volume peaked on August 5 at 6,923 posts in a single day, the day Stevens conceded and the result was widely reported.

Themes

The content is organized around a small number of recurring anti-Muslim tropes and conspiracy theories, applied to him because of his religious identity:

• Terrorism and Muslim Brotherhood allegations: Posts allege that El-Sayed has connections to Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Muslim Brotherhood, and accuse him of antisemitism. Widely shared posts describe him as “an Islamic jihadist.” This is the single largest theme in post-primary peak.
• Sharia-takeover trope: A substantial share of posts claim El-Sayed intends to impose Islamic law.
• Communism and red scare: It’s a recurring strand and pairs anti-Muslim conspiracy with Cold War language and claims El-Sayed as part of an alliance of “Islamists and communists” said to be taking over the Democratic Party and the country.
• Guilt by association with Muslim civil society: Many posts frame campaign contributions from Muslim groups and individuals as terrorist financing.
• Dual loyalty and anti-American framing. El-Sayed is characterized as fundamentally foreign and hostile to the US, with 9/11 and other terror attacks invoked as rhetorical devices.
• Remigration: Posts advocated “remigration,” the mass removal of Muslims from Western countries, as the only solution to a claimed “Islamic takeover,” “invasion,” and “conquest”.

These themes are not new. CSOH observed a closely similar pattern during New York City’s Democratic mayoral elections last year, when Zohran Mamdani’s candidacy drew the same combination of terrorism allegations, Sharia-takeover claims, dual-loyalty framing and accusations of communism. The repetition across two contests a year apart, in different cities and at different levels of office, points to a stable repertoire that activates whenever a Muslim candidate becomes competitive or wins office.

Overall Anti-Muslim Hate Across X

Separately, CSOH tracked 409,640 posts promoting anti-Muslim bigotry and harmful conspiracy theories on X in the US between June 1 and August 10.

On August 5, following El-Sayed’s primary victory, volume reached its highest single-day level of the summer and exceeded 10,000 posts for the first time.

The content of this wider dataset follows the same conspiratorial architecture as the anti-Muslim hate targeting El-Sayed. Its central claim is that the US is being “invaded” and progressively Islamized, with “Sharia law” portrayed as an instrument of this alleged takeover. Within this narrative, users call for Muslims to be deported, Muslims and Islam to be banned, and for “remigration” to be adopted as the only remedy to the purported invasion.

Based on the evidence from this primary, last year’s New York mayoral election, and the persistently elevated level of anti-Muslim hate, these patterns of bigotry and conspiracy are likely to intensify as the 2026 midterm election campaign progresses.

UN Aid for Rohingyas Misappropriated

 The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (WFP) is distributing food items including rice and pulses to the Rohingya camp in Cox’s Bazar. However, there have been complaints about the distribution of that rice.

WFP rice was found in illegal mills in Sadar, Ukhia and Chakaria. Investigations revealed how the rice was being smuggled out of the camps and who was buying it.

The reporter was caught hoarding rice at the camp’s rice mill, and mill owner Fazal Karim tried to manage it. When he went to the WFP center, the staff there also stopped him.

An outlet worker said, “I work for an organization. I need permission to speak.”

Fazal Karim, owner of Sonali Agro Enterprise in Chakaria, said, “I was doing some odd jobs during the flood. I am working by keeping the signboard instead of stealing it for business.”

Rohingyas say that many people sell the distributed rice because they don’t like it.

A Rohingya said, “We are given 13 kg of rice per month. But we have to sell this rice. We cannot eat this rice.”

Another said, “We only get rice, but we don’t get other essentials, including oil. So we give a sack of rice back to the WFP office. The office buys this rice back.”

Despite sending written questions, WFP’s statement on the allegations was not available.

Mizanur Rahman, Commissioner for Refugee Relief and Repatriation, said action will be taken if complaints are received. The Food Department also has no monitoring in this regard.

Mizanur Rahman said, ‘WFP also has donor commitments. Donors are giving money to taxpayers of their countries, it is not for misuse. We do not have any such information. If there is, we can definitely take immediate action.’

Cox’s Bazar District Food Controller Abu Kausar said, “We have no control over the program in the Rohingya camp. They tender as they wish, sign contracts with mills and take supplies from there.”

WFP provides food assistance to about 1.2 million Rohingya in Cox’s Bazar and Bhasan Char.