Muslim American News Briefs, October 22, 2007

When the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) left a house, he would say: "In the name of God, I put my trust in God. O God, I seek refuge in Thee lest I stray or be led astray or cause injustice or suffer injustice or do wrong or have wrong done to me!"

‘ISLAMO-FASCISM’ WEEK SPEAKER MEETS WITH EUROPEAN 'NEO-NAZIS' - TOP
Robert Spencer is main speaker for upcoming Islamophobic campus tour

(WASHINGTON, D.C., 10/21/2007) - The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) revealed today that the main speaker for an upcoming series of "Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week" lectures at university campuses nationwide recently offered a keynote address at a European gathering that included representatives of racist or "neo-Nazi" political parties.

Author Robert Spencer, who is scheduled to appear beginning next week at universities such as Brown, DePaul and Dartmouth, is regarded by American Muslims as one of the nation's worst Islamophobes. His virulently anti-Islam website promotes the idea that life for Muslims in the West should be made so difficult that they will leave.

Spencer recently spoke at a so-called "Counterjihad Brussels 2007" conference in Belgium attended by those with links to far-right parties such as Filip Dewinter of Vlaams Belang (Belgium) and Ted Ekeroth of Sverigedemokraterna (Sweden). Both parties have been accused of either having a racist platform, a neo-Nazi past or having links to neo-Nazis and other racists.

Vlaams Belang is the successor to the Vlaams Blok party, which was banned in 2004 for being an illegal racist political faction. (Vlaams Belang's founders were Nazi collaborators in World War II.)

Of Sverigedemokraterna, the International Herald Tribune wrote: “Sverigedemokraterna, or the Sweden Democrats, have been part of this country's political landscape for almost 20 years, but they were considered too close to the Nazi-inspired far-right to contend for large numbers of votes.” (7/7/06)

Robert Spencer's Jihad Watch Board Vice President "Hugh Fitzgerald" wrote on that hate site: "Only one group, only one belief-system, distinguishes itself by appearing incapable of fitting in. And that is Muslims, and Islam ... if one really knew what Islam contained ... then how could any decent person remain a Muslim?"

He also recommended that western nations be "Islam-proofed the way a house is child-proofed," compared Muslims to Nazis and urged that they be boycotted: "[I]t should not be hard to find ways to limit the spread or practice of Islam. And if in addition to whatever local, state and federal government officials do, private parties simply conduct their own boycott of goods and services offered by Muslims, in the same way that they would have refused to buy, in 1938, a German Voigtlander camera..."

Other speakers on the "Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week" tour include Ann Coulter, who refers to Muslims as "rag heads," and Daniel Pipes, a supporter of the internment of Japanese-Americans in World War II and of the views of French racist Jean-Marie Le Pen.

“All those who value religious tolerance and diversity should be concerned about the growing links between European racists and American Islamophobes,” said CAIR Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper.

Publicity for the tour got off to a bad start when it was revealed that the poster promoting the campus events used a photograph that purportedly showed a Muslim woman being stoned to death, but which was in fact an image from a fictional movie.

CAIR, America's largest Islamic civil liberties group, has 33 offices and chapters nationwide and in Canada. Its mission is to enhance the understanding of Islam, encourage dialogue, protect civil liberties, empower American Muslims, and build coalitions that promote justice and mutual understanding.

CAIR National Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper, 202-488-8787 or 202-744-7726, E-Mail: ihooper@cair.com; CAIR Communications Coordinator Rabiah Ahmed, 202-488-8787 or 202-439-1441, E-Mail: rahmed@cair.com; CAIR Communications Coordinator Amina Rubin, 202-488-8787 or 202-341-4171, E-Mail: arubin@cair.com

A controversial week of events, billed as Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week, launches at the University of Washington and some 100 other colleges next week — drawing condemnations from Muslim groups here and across the country.

The UW College Republicans, organizer of the local events, say the week is intended to foster awareness of the terrorist threat posed by a small number of extremists within Islam.

But some local Muslims say the week fosters Islamophobia and racism and attempts to paint all Muslims as terrorists.

Beginning Monday, the group plans to hand out information sheets describing what the week's activities are all about.

And it's hosting two events open to the public: a showing of "Suicide Killers," a documentary about suicide bombers, at 7 p.m. Wednesday in Smith Hall, and a talk by conservative author and talk-show host Michael Medved at 7 p.m. Thursday in Kane Hall.

Amin Odeh, a board member with the local Arab American Community Coalition, said he agrees that "radical anything is dangerous — radical Muslims, radical Christians, radical Jews. Education is needed."

But Odeh says Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week makes too general a link between extremism and Islam, and that the term "Islamo-fascism" links fascism with an entire religion.

"Unfortunately, when people hear the term they don't think of only a small group of extremists, but of Islam in general," he said.

Hala Dillsi, a member of the UW Muslim Student Association, believes Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week promotes fear and intolerance. She is distributing green armbands and encouraging people to wear T-shirts that are green — traditionally the color associated with Islam — on Wednesday in solidarity with local Arabs and Muslims.

The student group also is organizing a forum Oct. 29 in which professors and local Muslims discuss and answer questions about Islam.

Members of the Muslim Student Association, along with other organizations, also plan to hold protests outside Wednesday and Thursday evening's Awareness Week events.

Assistant Chief Ray Wittmier with the UW Police Department said his department is meeting with student organizers on all sides "to make sure everybody stays safe." (MORE)

A young local Muslim lauded by Bakersfield and Pasadena city leaders for her continuous community activism has become the highest-ranking woman in America's largest Islamic civil liberties group.

Tahra Goraya, 34, was hired in September as the Washington, D.C.-based deputy director and chief operating officer for the Council on American-Islamic Relations. That makes her the organization's second-in-command.

"She has excellent character, she's a hard worker and wherever she goes, she's gonna do a great job," said Bakersfield City Councilwoman Irma Carson.

Carson is also the executive director of Ebony Counseling Center, where Goraya worked with minorities and youths from 1997 to 2001 as an HIV and drug prevention educator, then as a program director.

"My passion is really about community," said Goraya, who lives according to her favorite verse from the Quran, which says that God has divided people into nations and tribes not to segregate them, but "so that you might come to know one another."

After her work for Carson, Goraya went on to became the executive director of Day One in Pasadena, also a nonprofit that works with at-risk youths and families.

A 1992 graduate of West High School who majored in biology and minored in psychology at UC Irvine and later earned her master's in organizational management from the University of Phoenix, Goraya stayed at Day One for more than six years until being hired by CAIR.

While in Day One, she worked closely with Pasadena City Mayor Bill Bogaard on summer programs for at-risk youths.

"Tahra has a maturity in her work that far exceeds her youthful age," he said. "She is dedicated and brings the highest integrity to her responsibilities. She's quiet but is focused and disciplined in pursuing the best interest of the young people with whom she works."

Goraya was born in Sacramento in July 1973. In October of that year, her parents, Pakistani immigrants who have lived in America since around 1971, moved with her to Bakersfield.

She was raised here together with her younger sister and three younger brothers and attended mosque at the Islamic Center of San Joaquin Valley on Ming Avenue.

Her father, Mohammad Goraya, a local real estate broker who is active in Bakersfield's Islamic community, said he and his wife have always had high expectations for all their children, but "some children excel better than the other ones." He called his firstborn a perfectionist who works "very, very hard," sometimes doing as much work as two or three people. Goraya herself said mediocrity was never an option for her.

"We are proud that our daughter is, Islamically and culturally, a good person," he said.

Goraya, who is single, said she started wearing a head covering in college and has sometimes suffered others' prejudice for being a Muslim, especially after 9/11. She said that, as a woman, she does not feel hindered or limited in any way by her religion.

"I think people need to differentiate between the culture and Islam," she said. "Islam is about women's rights and celebrating their intellectual capacity. The various cultures people come from make the negative spins and perpetuate the myths and stereotypes.

"There's nowhere in Islam that says you cannot be both career-driven and a good wife and mother. The role of women in Islam is to be engaged in all levels of society," she said. "Women have a lot to give back to society. We're intellectually just as capable as our male counterparts." (MORE)

CAIR-NV OPENS OFFICE WITH RIBBON-CUTTING - TOP
Las Vegas Review-Journal, 10/19/07

The Council on American Islamic Relations will hold a ribbon-cutting today in Las Vegas to mark the official opening of its first chapter in Nevada.

Mayor Oscar Goodman is scheduled to assist in the ribbon-cutting at the new office, located at 501 S. Sixth St., and to deliver brief remarks during the 2:30 p.m. ceremony.

Yasser Moten, executive director of the Nevada chapter, said it will serve the estimated 18,000 Muslim-Americans who live in the Las Vegas Valley through civil rights advocacy, education, media outreach and governmental relations.

He said the outreach effort provides a way to curb civil rights violations against Muslims, which have increased nationwide in recent years. "We just wanted to take a proactive approach," Moten said.

He said the Nevada chapter will not only serve Muslims; it also will help educate non-Muslims about Islam. He said studies show that non-Muslims who know a Muslim person have better perceptions of Islam and Muslims than non-Muslims who do not.

(NEW YORK, N.Y., 10/18/07) On Sunday, October 21, the New York chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-NY) will host a panel discussion entitled “Islamophobia: Institutionalized Racism?” The event is part of a series of discussions scheduled around the nation, addressing the issue of "Islamophobia," or fear and hatred of Islam and Muslims.

The New York event will seek to explain the historical context of Islamophobia and provide resources for gaining a better understanding of the negative impact anti-Muslim bigotry has on individuals and organizations throughout the United States.

WHAT: Panel Discussion - "Islamophobia: Institutionalized Racism?"
WHEN: Sunday, October 21, 2007, 2 5 p.m.
WHERE: Islamic Center at NYU, at New York University, 238 Thompson Street, New York, NY

"Given the lamentable state of our nation's international image, it is imperative that American Muslims analyze the situation and advocate solutions that will help remove the perception that we, as a nation, are at war with the faith of Islam," said CAIR Board Chairman Parvez Ahmed, who is one of the panelists.

CAIR, America's largest Muslim civil liberties group, has 33 offices, chapters and affiliates nationwide and in Canada. Its mission is to enhance the understanding of Islam, encourage dialogue, protect civil liberties, empower American Muslims, and build coalitions that promote justice and mutual understanding.

CONTACT: Faiza N. Ali CAIR-NY Community Affairs Director, 212.870.2002 E-Mail: fali@cair.com; CAIR-NY Civil Rights Director Aliya Latif, 732-429-4268, E-Mail: alatif@cair.com

MA: MUSLIM CHAPLAIN SEEKS 'TRUTH OVER FEAR' - TOP
Matt Gunderson, Boston Globe, 10/21/07

Anti-Islamic sentiment in the country swelled in the aftermath of the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. But for Mary Lahaj, Muslim chaplain at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, those energies had been taking root on US soil for decades prior.

She remembers the telephone calls that came flooding into mosques around Boston after airplane hijackings first began in 1985. Some callers politely asked for speakers to come for talks, hoping to deepen their knowledge about Islam. Others called to make negative remarks about the religion.

Lahaj will talk about the religion in an effort to combat what she calls Islamophobia at a symposium on Islam scheduled for this month and next at the Groton Public Library. Borrowing a phrase used as a slogan by the Muslim Public Affairs Council, an educational and activist group with offices in Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles, Lahaj is calling her effort a "truth over fear campaign."

In her lecture, scheduled for 7 p.m. Nov. 6, Lahaj plans to discuss a variety of topics about Islam but hopes to focus mainly on Muslims' role and connection to American history and contemporary society.

Many people don't know, for instance, that Thomas Jefferson owned a Koran, said Lahaj, who is Muslim student adviser at the Groton School. Most people may also not know that early Muslims instituted a form of democracy in its early goings to elect its leaders, linking Islam indelibly to the democratic values of this country, she said. (MORE)

FL: AFTER SEVEN MONTHS, MUSLIM MAN HAS FREEDOM BUT NOT ANSWERS - TOP
Immigration authorities will not comment on his case.
Rebecca Catalanello and Abbie Vansickle, St. Petersburg Times, 10/20/07

Iyad Abuhajjaj walked out of jail last week with as many questions as he had when he went in 7-1/2 months earlier.

Over those weeks, he had been questioned by police detectives, FBI agents, newspaper reporters and attorneys. Every part of his life from birth to now was spilled and discussed in detail with strangers. And yet, he says, he never got the answer he craved: Why was he held by immigration authorities 3,000 miles from home?

He lost 20 pounds, his job in California, his car. He prayed every day for God to release him in time to celebrate the last day of Ramadan with his wife, Karen.

He got that wish, reunited with her the day before the end of the Muslim holy month, but not much more.

"Seven and a half months of my life are wasted," he said this week during a stop in Tampa. "Taking me away from my family, my work, my clients, my friends, my soccer team, my singing choir."

Justice Department and immigration officials won't talk about his case. One of his attorneys said he thought the government was trying to recruit Abuhajjaj to be an informant. Another attorney thinks bureaucracy played a role.

On Tuesday, 37-year-old Abuhajjaj boarded a Southwest Airlines plane, bound for San Jose, Calif., where he lives. A thousand times he wondered whether he shouldn't just drive cross country instead. It was, after all, a Southwest flight that led to his incarceration in the first place.

The details of that first Southwest flight on Feb. 28 come from Abuhajjaj, a physical therapist who works with the developmentally disabled.

On the flight from San Jose to Phoenix to Tampa, he went to the restroom and stretched his legs and was told to be seated. On his laptop, he watched scenes from a movie he acted in: The Strange Case of Salman abd al Haaq, a film by two Stanford University students about terrorist torture.

When he landed, police questioned him about the flight and the movie. They found a warrant for his arrest out of Okaloosa County. A Florida woman he met online accused him of accessing her AOL account without her permission, according to documents. Abuhajjaj said he thought the charges had been dropped.

He was jailed in Tampa but was moved to Okaloosa County. On March 14, he pleaded not guilty, posted $20,000 bail and expected to be released. Instead, the Department of Homeland Security took him into custody and shipped him to the Wakulla County Jail in Crawfordville.

Abuhajjaj tried to see into the minds of his questioners for answers. Two men who introduced themselves as FBI agents grilled him for four to five hours. (MORE)

SEVERAL U.S. CONGRESSMEN APOLOGIZE TO ARAR - TOP
Democrats decry practice of sending terrorism suspects to countries where they face strong possibility of torture
Paul Koring, Globe and Mail, 10/19/07

A clutch of U.S. congressmen apologized publicly yesterday to Maher Arar, the man Canada's Mounties once fingered as a terrorist and who was later shipped by the Bush administration to Syria where he was tortured.

"Let me personally give you what our government has not - an apology," said Bill Delahunt, a Massachusetts Democrat, who chaired the extraordinary hearing yesterday.

The image of Mr. Arar, 37, was beamed in from Ottawa by video link and appeared on a huge monitor on the wall of the wood-panelled chamber on Capitol Hill. Despite an apology from Prime Minister Stephen Harper and a $10-million compensation payment from Canadians for being wrongly accused of al-Qaeda links, the Syrian-born software engineer remains barred from the United States as a terrorist suspect.

"I am not a terrorist; I am not a member of al-Qaeda or any terror group," Mr. Arar told the joint hearing of the justice and foreign affairs committees of the House of Representatives, where the Democrats hold a majority.

Democrats echoed Mr. Delahunt, keen to portray the Bush administration as wrong, arrogant, unwilling to admit its mistakes and too keen to ship people off to places where they face a strong possibility of being tortured.

"We should be ashamed" of what happened to you, Dana Rohrabacher, the committee's senior Republican, told the Canadian. (MORE)

CAIR
Council on American-Islamic Relations
453 New Jersey Avenue, S.E.
Washington, D.C. 20003
Tel: 202-488-8787, 202-744-7726
Fax: 202-488-0833
E-mail: info@cair.com
URL: http://www.cair.com

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