Sri Lanka’s ethnic civil war between the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), also known as the Tamil Tigers, and the government of Sri Lanka comprising the majority of the Sinhalese Buddhist community came to a bloody end in May 2009. Muslims, whose political and civil society elite had largely supported the Sri Lankan state and security forces, welcomed the end of the war and the defeat of the Tamil Tigers given the history of the community with the LTTE. The expectations by the Muslims (and other communities) that peace would return to the country, were quickly dashed as it appeared that a new extremist Sinhala-Buddhist nationalist movement targeting religious minorities especially the Muslims would emerge as the country grappled with post-war reconciliation. The rise of anti-Muslim rhetoric, hate speech, and incitement to violence against the community has pushed some Muslims to think that they have become the new focus for Sinhala-Buddhist extremists in the wake of the defeat of the Tamil Tigers. With suspicions of the complicity of the state apparatus in the anti-Muslim campaign, there are serious concerns around the role and place of minorities (non-Sinhala and non-Buddhist) in the future makeup of the country. While there is no concrete evidence on the state’s support for such an action, it is clear that the reluctance of the state to bring to justice those responsible for hate speech and incitement to violence since 2009 raises some serious questions about impartiality. In addition, with the increase of detentions and scrutiny of the Muslim community’s post-Easter Sunday attacks and the recent treatment of the Muslim community in the response to the ongoing global COVID-19 pandemic, including shutting down of key Muslim towns and the enforcement of forced cremations (which goes against Islamic teachings of dignified burials), there is much to ponder of an anti-Muslim strategy being mainstreamed and institutionalized by the state. This paper will seek to situate the present response to the COVID-19 pandemic by the state and its particular actions affecting the Muslim community amid a wider backdrop of a rise in anti-Muslim hatred and action. In order to understand this, the paper will seek to understand the reasoning behind why Muslims who supported the war against the Tamil Tigers, have now become the enemy for Sinhala-Buddhist extremists. It does this through primary and secondary data gathering including interviews conducted between July 2020 and February 2021. In so doing this paper will explore the development of Muslim political and religious identity by looking at a historical perspective. This paper makes the argument that a holistic approach needs to be developed to avoid a new conflict taking place in Sri Lanka and to avoid violent Islamist extremism taking hold.

斯里兰卡的泰米尔伊拉姆猛虎解放组织 (LTTE)（也称为泰米尔猛虎组织）与占僧伽罗佛教社区大多数的斯里兰卡政府之间的种族内战于 2009 年 5 月结束。穆斯林，其政治考虑到猛虎组织社区的历史，民间社会精英在很大程度上支持斯里兰卡国家和安全部队，欢迎战争结束和泰米尔猛虎组织的失败。穆斯林（和其他社区）希望该国恢复和平的期望很快就破灭了，因为随着该国努力应对战后和解，新的极端主义僧伽罗佛教民族主义运动似乎将出现，针对宗教少数群体，尤其是穆斯林。 . 反穆斯林言论、仇恨言论的兴起，煽动针对社区的暴力行为使一些穆斯林认为，在泰米尔猛虎队被击败后，他们已成为僧伽罗-佛教极端分子的新焦点。由于怀疑国家机器在反穆斯林运动中串通一气，人们对少数民族（非僧伽罗和非佛教徒）在国家未来构成中的作用和地位表示严重关切。虽然没有具体证据表明国家支持这种行动，但很明显，自 2009 年以来，国家不愿将仇恨言论和煽动暴力的责任人绳之以法，这引发了一些关于公正性的严重问题。此外，随着对穆斯林社区复活节后袭击事件的拘留和审查的增加，以及最近穆斯林社区在应对持续的全球 COVID-19 大流行中的待遇，包括关闭主要穆斯林城镇和强制火葬（这违背了伊斯兰教关于尊严葬礼的教义），有很多值得思考的反穆斯林战略被国家主流化和制度化。本文将寻求在反穆斯林仇恨和行动上升的更广泛背景下，定位当前国家对 COVID-19 大流行的反应及其影响穆斯林社区的特殊行动。为了理解这一点，本文将寻求理解为什么支持对泰米尔猛虎组织的战争的穆斯林，现在已经成为僧伽罗佛教极端分子的敌人。它通过收集主要和次要数据（包括 2020 年 7 月至 2021 年 2 月期间进行的访谈）来实现这一点。在此过程中，本文将从历史角度探讨穆斯林政治和宗教身份的发展。本文认为，需要制定一种整体方法，以避免在斯里兰卡发生新的冲突，并避免暴力的伊斯兰极端主义占据上风。