It's an interesting distinction, because I think the distinction between Islam and Muslims is a factual distinction, but I think it has also become a political distinction, used at times for motives that I would characterize as hateful or discriminatory. One can set up the thing to attack an abstract entity like Islam, but the problem is the way Islam is defined when it's being set up for attack. It can be Islamophobic to critique Islam if you define Islam in such a way that it encompasses more than what you're actually critiquing.
On October 2nd, 2017. See this statement in context.