2006: Another
Tough Year for Muslim Americans
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali
CA
***Six
Imams, on their way home from Minneapolis after
a meeting of the North American Imams Federation,
are detained in a holding cell, questioned by
police and FBI agents and released after several
hours.
***Virginia congressman, Virgil Goode, opposes
oath on the Qur’an by Keth Ellison, the
first Muslim elected to the US Congress and calls
for a ban on the immigration of Muslims to prevent
election of more Muslims to the Congress.
***Radio talk-show host Dennis Prager says that
Keith Ellison should not be allowed to take his
congressional oath on the Qur’an because
America is interested in only one book, the Bible.
These recent episodes symbolize the dilemma of
American Muslims in post-9/11 America. More than
half a decade after 9/11, seven million strong
American Muslim community remains under siege
with constant attacks on its faith. The events
of 9/11 were used as an excuse to greatly magnify
the hostility toward Muslims and cloak it in pseudo-patriotism.
Unfortunately, Muslim-bashing has become socially
acceptable in the United States. Bigots’
venom against Islam and Muslims, once shocking
has become a mainstream trend.
There was a surge in Islamophobia and bigotry
towards Muslims this year. The growing anti-Islamic
sentiment was reflected in the unfortunate use
of the offensive term "Islamic fascist"
by President George Bush who equated Islam with
fascism.
Many political and religious leaders continued
their anti-Islam and anti-Muslim rhetoric. Franklin
Graham reaffirmed his scorn for Islam again when
he told an interviewer of the ABC News "Nightline"
in March that he hadn't changed his mind about
Islam. He says that the Qur’an teaches violence
and that the God of Islam is not the God of Christians.
At the same time, radio talk-show hosts continue
to spew venom against Muslims. Talk-show host,
Michael Savage calls on lawmakers to institute
an outright ban on Muslim immigration and on the
construction of mosques. And when radio host Jerry
Klein suggests that all Muslims in the United
States should be identified with a crescent-shape
tattoo or a distinctive arm band, the phone lines
are jammed instantly.
Americans' attitudes about Islam and Muslims are
fuelled mainly by political statements and media
reports that focus almost solely on the negative
image of Islam and Muslims. Tellingly several
opinion polls conducted this year amplify this
point.
A July Gallup poll finds that thirty-nine percent
Americans say they felt at least some prejudice
against Muslims. The same percentage favored requiring
Muslims, including US citizens, to carry a special
ID "as a means of preventing terrorist attacks
in the United States."
Two polls released in March indicated that almost
half of Americans have a negative perception of
Islam and that one in four of those surveyed has
extreme anti-Muslim views. The Washington Post-ABC
News Poll indicated that the proportion of Americans
who believe that Islam helps to stoke violence
against non-Muslims has more than doubled since
the attacks, from 14 percent in January 2002 to
33 percent today.
According to a CAIR poll some one-fourth (23 to
27 percent) of Americans consistently believe
stereotypes such as: "Muslims value life
less than other people," and "The Muslim
religion teaches violence and hatred." Only
six percent of Americans have a positive first
impression of Islam and Muslims.
One impact of Islamophobia was negative public
reaction to the building of new mosques and expansion
of the existing ones. In many cases permission
to build a new mosque or expansion of the existing
mosques was resisted by communities conditioned
by the anti-Islam and anti-Muslim rhetoric.
Prejudice against Islam and Muslims allowed politicians
to whip a frenzy in rejecting the approval of
the Dubai firm to operate American ports in March
2006.
The continuing anti-Islam and anti-Muslim rhetoric
has contributed to the rise of discrimination
against Muslims. According to the 2006 annual
report by the Council on American-Islamic Relations'
(CAIR) there was an almost 30 percent increase
in the number of anti-Muslim bias incidents from
2004 to 2005 with substantial increase in California
which has one of the largest Muslim populations.
CAIR also received 153 reports of anti-Muslim
hate crime complaints, an 8.6 percent increase
from the 141 complaints received in 2004.
And the hard feelings are damaging the mental
health of US Muslims, suggest new studies released
at the American Psychological Association. Verbal
harassment and discrimination correlate with worse
mental health in studies of Muslims and Arab-Americans
since 9/11, says psychologist Mona Amer of Yale
University School of Medicine. Muslims, who made
up 70% of the study's participants, had poorer
mental health than Christians.
Discrimination and stereotyping Muslims has had
other profound effects. A national study released
in August 2006, by economics researchers at the
University of Illinois, found that the earnings
of Muslim and ethnically Arab men working in the
United States dropped about 10 percent in the
years after the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.
Hundreds - if not thousands - of men with Arabic-sounding
or Muslim names were experiencing endless delays
in what should be the pro forma final step of
the citizenship application process. Some applicants
are waiting for years for their swearing-in ceremonies.
In April 2006, the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination
Committee launched a national legal campaign to
get the government to resolve hundreds of cases.
More than 40 lawyers filed lawsuits in federal
courts, requesting that a judge step in and force
US Citizenship and Immigration Services to complete
the stalled naturalization cases. In May, ten
Chicago area Muslims filed a class-action lawsuit
against the federal government alleging their
quest to become U.S. citizens is being delayed
because of their Islamic faith and male gender.
The Syrian, Moroccan, Jordanian, Pakistani and
Egyptian natives have no criminal records, but
they have been waiting one to four years for the
government to make a decision on their applications.
One of the first victims of the post-9/11 climate
of fear in the Muslim community is charitable
giving. Support for both Palestinians and victims
of the US occupation of Iraq is now considered
precarious. Donating to charities is especially
hazardous because so many of these institutions
have been targeted by law enforcement as terrorist-related.
In February 2006, the Treasury Department froze
the assets of KindHearts USA, padlocking the doors
of the Toledo-based charity "pending an investigation."
In September US authorities, raided another major
Muslim charity, the Michigan-based Life for Relief
and Development (LIFE). Federal agents also raided
the home of the charity's President and Chief
Executive officer, Khalil Jassemm, and the Dearborn
office of a former official of the charity, Muthanna
Alhanooti.
A New York Times report has confirmed what Muslims
have believed since the Sept. 11 attacks that
the FBI has been working to infiltrate their community.
A young Muslim police detective testifies at the
Herald Square bombing plot trial that he was recruited
from the Police Academy 13 months after 9/11 to
work deep undercover in the Muslim community.
He took an apartment in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, where
his assignment was to be a "walking camera"
among Muslims there.
In another headline-grabbing terror trial of two
Pakistani Americans - Hamid Hayat and his father
Umer Hayat - a Muslim informer was paid $ 250,000
to infiltrate the large Muslim community in Lodi,
California. The trial ended in August after a
US Federal Judge in Sacramento sentenced Umer
Hayat, to time he served in detention since his
arrest in June last year. In April -- the same
day Umer Hayat's trial ended in a hung jury --
a federal jury in Sacramento convicted his son,
Hamid, 23, of providing material support to terrorists
and lying to the FBI about it. However, Arcelia
Lopez, one of the jurors in the case, later filed
an affidavit alleging that she was bullied into
a guilty verdict by fellow jurors who exhibited
a pattern of misconduct and racism. Hamid’s
attorney has asked for his retrial.
An operative of the FBI was a part-time employee
for three years at KindHearts, the Toledo-based
Muslim charity shut down by the government in
February 2006. His work led to the arrests of
three men on terrorism charges. KindHearts' attorney
and a board member Jihad Smaili believes investigators
planted the operative inside KindHearts in an
effort to link the charity with terrorists.
The trial of Dr. Sami Al Arian, who was a tenured
professor of computer engineering at the University
of South Florida until being fired, says legions
about the place of Muslims in the United States
following the attacks of 9/11. It is part of a
ruthless campaign to strip Americans of fundamental
rights because of their religious beliefs. Al-Arian
was found not guilty on eight of 17 counts, including
conspiracy to maim or murder. Jurors were deadlocked
on the rest of the charges, including ones that
he aided terrorists. To avoid re-trial, Dr. Sami
Al-Arian, signed a plea agreement in April in
which he admitted providing support to members
of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a State Department-designated
terrorist group. In May a federal judge in Florida
sentenced him to another year and a half in prison
before he will be deported. But his time now seems
likely to be extended since, despite plea bargaining
that should have exempted him from further testimony,
he has been called to testify before a secret
grand jury in Virginia investigating Islamic organizations
in the state. And so, although Al-Arian is scheduled
to be deported in April 2007, he could now be
imprisoned for an additional 18 months. The federal
government has placed him in contempt of court
because he is refusing to answer questions before
the Virginia grand jury.
Muslim Response
The American Muslims have responded to the state
of siege with political and social activism, media
campaigns, outreach and interfaith dialogue. They
are now more proactive as they believe that the
best way to protect their eroding civil rights
is to become more active politically. From coast
to coast, Muslim and Arab-American groups organized
as never before to make known their concerns about
civil liberties. They have gone beyond sign-waving
demonstrations to hold voter registration drives,
meet with politicians and form alliances with
other civil rights and religious organizations.
Muslims are becoming more organized and vocal
in their demands, petitioning school boards to
establish prayer rooms in public schools for their
children and turning to the courts when they believe
their constitutional rights to practice their
faith have been violated.
In the 2006 mid-term elections, Muslims and Arabs
voted overwhelmingly for the Democratic Party.
A pre-election CAIR poll revealed that 42 percent
consider themselves members of the Democratic
Party while only 17 per cent are Republican. The
exit polls confirmed the findings of the pre-election
polls.
The Muslim community demonstrated its importance
in this election particularly in the states where
it has large concentration of population. In states
like Virginia, which has substantial concentration
of Muslim population, the Muslim vote became the
critical vote in tipping the balance on control
of the US Senate. In Virginia incumbent senator
George Allen was defeated by his Democratic opponent,
Jim Webb, giving Democrats control of the Senate
with 51-members.
The seven-million-strong American Muslim community
got a big political push when the Minnesota Democrat
Keith Ellison was elected as the nation's first
Muslim member to the US Congress in the November
elections. His campaign was based on making alliances
with all groups. Tellingly, he was able to defeat
his Republican rival, Alan Fine, who was of Jewish
faith as Ellison was able to garner the support
of Jewish groups too. However, a systematic campaign
was launched against Muslims when he indicated
that he will take oath on the Qur’an. Opposing
oath on the Qur’an, Virginia Congressman,
Virgil Goode, insists that immigration of Muslims
should be curbed “to preserve the values
and beliefs traditional to the United States of
America."
In the final analysis, the Democrats may have
taken control of the House and Senate in the midterm
elections, but American Muslims still suffer from
configuration of laws and government policies
that have usurped the civil rights of all Americans
but particularly target Muslims in America.
(Abdus Sattar Ghazali is the Executive Editor
of the online Magazine American Muslim Perspective:
www.amperspective.com)
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