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Chronology of Islam in America (2007)
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali
October 2007 Page III
Oklahoma lawmakers return Qurans
Oct 24: Two dozen Oklahoma lawmakers decided to return copies of the Quran to a state panel on diversity after a lawmaker claimed the Muslim holy book condones the killing of innocent people. The Qurans were given to Oklahoma's 149 senators and representatives by the Governor's Ethnic American Advisory Council. "Most Oklahomans do not endorse the idea of killing innocent women and children in the name of ideology," Rep. Rex Duncan said. He said he has researched the Quran on the Internet and believes it supports such killing. Ibrahim Hooper of the Council on American-Islamic Relations said Duncan's statement is "disturbing" and "offensive" to Muslims. "It just points to the amount of education about Islam and the American Muslim community that is needed in all levels in our society, including elected officials," Hooper said. (Associated Press)
Islamophobia: Myth or Facts
Oct 27: In a lecture sponsored by the University of Rhode Island's Muslim Student Association, a panel of speakers said that poor relations between Americans and Muslims are due to faults from both sides. Bill Bartels, a philosophy professor at the University of Rhode Island, Omer Bajwa, a Muslim Chaplain at Cornell University, and Dr. Mohamed Nimer, a member of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), spoke for nearly three hourstonight at the lecture "Islamophobia: Myth or Facts." The lecture was MSA's response to the College Republican's Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week. Bartels described "Islamophobia" as a fear of religious difference. He attributed it to four chief factors: evolutionary history, religious beliefs, political affiliations and a violated sense of security. Bartels said that personal religious beliefs might lead to "religious exclusivism." Bartels described "religious exclusivism" as a narrow-minded attitude towards religion. Political beliefs can also lead to isolated feelings, he said. Bajwa attributed "Islamophobia" to two chief factors. First, Bajwa said that jihad and hijab are the two most misunderstood terms in all of Islam. Bajwa said that jihad should be viewed as a struggle and strive for personal purification, not violence. Hijab, or religious coverings women wear, should be seen as a religious right and obligation, saying it adds to womens' sense of spirituality. Bajwa identified the second chief factor as a cultural phenomena he calls Orientalism. Nimer was the final speaker, and attributed "Islamophobia" to misconceptions and grievances. Nimer said that anti-Muslim feelings arose in the U.S. after the Sept. 11 attacks. Nimer labeled those feelings as "the most remarkable wave of anti-Muslim feelings in the history of the U.S." Nimer said that terrorist attacks are used to justify anti-Muslim sentiment, which generates anti-American feelings in the Middle East, and results in "a new round" of attacks, which in turn generates more anti-Muslim sentiment in the U.S. "So the pattern is clear," Nimer said. (The Good 5 Cent Cigar)
Arab Americans launch Yalla Vote campaign
Oct 28: The Arab American Institute held a National Leadership Conference (Oct. 26-28) in Dearborn, Michigan, that attracted over 600 Arab Americans from across the country. Participants heard directly from many of the presidential candidates: Democratic candidates Mike Gravel, Dennis Kucinich and Bill Richardson spoke at the conference. None of the top three Democratic candidates for the White House attended in person. Democratic candidates Hillary Clinton, John Edwards, Barack Obama addressed the conference via video messages. Republican candidate Ron Paul was the only Republican hopeful who addressed the conference. “On the Republican side it says that their debate is moving in such a negative direction that they simply are not, most of them, in a position to come before this audience,” said James Zogby, founder and president of the American Arab Institute. Zogby said the voices of Arab Americans are needed now more than ever. “We’re like the canary in the coal mine,” he said. “You want to know how we’re doing in the Middle East? Ask Arab Americans.” If the U.S. government had listened to Iraqi Americans, the situation there might be better today, Zogby said. The conference launched the "Our Voice. Our Future. Yalla Vote 08" campaign. At the opening of the conference Arab-Americans were urged to leverage their political strength by concentrating on issues that are important to them, yet transcend ethnic groups—and to begin working on major issues by participating in local politics. ”The burden of reaffirming American values falls on us,” said James Zogby of the Arab American Institute. (AMP Report)
More young Muslim women choose to wear scarves in Florida
Oct 29: There is a broader shift in the past decade in South Florida, where religious scholars and clerics say more teenage Muslims at schools ranging from Nova Southeastern University in Davie to Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton are opting for head scarves, sometimes before their mothers. About 24 young Muslim women interviewed say covering their hair is as much about exercising their faith as it is carving out an identity in what is sometimes the adopted country of their parents. "In general, you see more girls between 18 and 30 with head scarves in South Florida than a decade or so ago," said Aisha Musa, an Islamic Studies assistant professor at Florida International University. "I think it is a desire to assert their identity as Muslims." A national survey of 1,050 Muslim Americans by the Pew Research Center earlier this year found 43 percent of the women wore head scarves all or most of the time. More than half of those younger than 30 said they wore hijab all or most of the time. Compared with their parents and peers, young American Muslims today tend to be more religiously observant, said John Green, a senior fellow at the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life. (South Florida Sun-Sentinel)
Muslim mechanic sues employer for discrimination
Oct 29: Sayadi, a Kurdish-American in his 50s, has filed a 40 million dollar discrimination suit against New United Motor Manufacturing, Inc. (NUMMI), Fremont, CA as well as Toyota and GM, the two companies behind the company. An officer in the Iraqi air force, Saydai fought the Iraqi Baathist regime from the inside, providing intelligence for the Kurdish revolution — and by extension for the CIA, which was supporting the struggle as part of its broader operations in the region. In 1977 Sayadi became one of many Kurds given amnesty in the States. San Francisco employment attorney Kelly Armstrong who representing Sayadi in the lawsuit said: "It's a $40 million message to NUMMI that they cannot mistreat, humiliate, degrade, harass, discriminate and retaliate against and fail to protect the very people that make NUMMI what it is today," Armstrong says. "It's a message that Mr. Sayadi deserves justice." Joan Ehrlich, San Francisco's District Director for the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission says that there were over 1000 complaints from Arabs, South Asians and Muslims in general since 9/11. Ehrlich says Sayadi's accusations sound familiar — the cases she sees regular involve similar name-calling and other insults, and just as often defy logic. "It doesn't make any sense," she says upon hearing about Sayadi's case in particular. "The guy's been there over a decade and suddenly he's a security problem?" (San Francisco Chronicle)
Candidate Targeted For Being a Muslim
Oct 30: Republican delegate nominee Faisal Gill said a voter recently asked him about his Muslim faith, saying, “At the end of the day, you are going to vote for your people?” “Which people?” Gill responded, saying that many Northern Virginia Muslims are Democrats and that he is often on the other side of issues. During a bruising campaign for an open seat in Prince William County’s competitive 51st District, Gill said he has embraced the responsibility of explaining his faith on the campaign trail. “It has been difficult for the community to understand and accept a Muslim was running for office,” Gill told the largely Muslim audience at the Daar al-Noor mosque. “Let me tell you, I am happy to explain to them what we are about. I would rather have the question asked than to have it go unanswered.” (The Examiner, Denver, Colorado)
Mukasey refuses to offer waterboarding opinion
Oct 30: Attorney general nominee Michael B. Mukasey told Senate Democrats today that a kind of simulated drowning known as waterboarding is "repugnant," but he does not know whether the interrogation technique violates U.S. laws against torture. Mukasey, whose nomination to replace Alberto R. Gonzales has become less certain because of his refusal to offer an opinion on waterboarding, also wrote in a letter to Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee that he did not know if U.S. interrogators had used waterboarding because he is not cleared to receive classified information. By continuing to resist invitations to declare waterboarding illegal, Mukasey seems certain to heighten tensions between the administration and congressional Democrats, many of whom have said their votes hinge on whether the former federal judge agrees that waterboarding constitutes torture. The committee's 10 Democrats responded on Oct. 23 with a letter to Mukasey demanding that he answer the question directly and noting that the practice is well enough known that the State Department routinely condemns its use in other countries. (Washington Post)
Charges dropped in 20-year old deportation case against Palestinian activists (LA8)
Oct 31: The 20-year effort to deport two men over their alleged political support of Palestinian self-determination officially came to an end today when the nation’s highest administrative body overseeing immigration cases dismissed all charges against Khader Hamide and Michel Shehadeh, members of a group of Palestinian student activists arrested in January 1987, who became known as the LA8. The action by the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) closes one of the nation’s longest-running and most controversial deportation cases, one that tested whether immigrants have the same First Amendment rights as citizens. The case against the pair began in January, 1987, when the government arrested them and six others, who collectively came to be known as the LA 8, placed them in maximum security prison, and accused them of having ties to a faction of the Palestine Liberation Organization. The government alleged that Hamide and Shehadeh distributed newspapers, held demonstrations and organized humanitarian aid fundraisers for Palestinians, and that because these actions supported the PLO faction, they should be deported. The men were initially charged with being associated with a Communist organization, but when a court declared those charges unconstitutional, the government filed new charges of material support for a terrorist group. The case went before the US Court of Appeals four times, the Supreme Court once, and the Board of Immigration Appeals multiple times. (National Lawyers’ Guild)
'The 99' Muslim comic superheroes land in US
Oct 31: Move over, Spider-Man. There's a new team of superheroes in town. Meet Jabbar the Powerful, a Hulk-like strong man, and Noora the Light, who can create holograms. Darr the Afflicter wields powerful pain waves. One hero, The Hidden, wears a burqa. All are part of "The 99," Muslim superheroes created by Kuwait-based Teshkeel Comics. Each has a power based on one of the 99 characteristics of God described by Islam. The comic, already sold throughout the Middle East, made its U.S. debut in late October, and the new issue, "Welcome to America," finds Jabbar, Noora and Darr -- like other immigrants -- arriving at New York's JFK Airport. While the comic has its roots in Muslim and Arab culture, creator Naif Al-Mutawa said the series is geared toward a wider audience. An American reader wouldn't need to know anything about the Muslim world to understand the story line, he said. Al-Mutawa said it was important to create modern cultural heroes for kids in the Middle East. His superhero concept merges the American/Judeo-Christian model of go-it-alone action heroes with the Japanese model of heroes who work as a team. (The Star Tribune)
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