February this year seems to be the month of revelations – not just heartfelt wows of love on Valentine’s Day, but something much more sinister and worrying. Four news reports with sometimes conflicting messages have been released this month from various sources, all discussing the perceived threat (or the lack thereof) of homegrown terrorism by Muslim Americans.
What’s interesting about all four publications this month is that twelve years after 9/11 the stereotype of the Muslim terrorist is no weaker than it was right after the horrific attacks that rocked our nation. We may have become more politically correct than before, or even more educated and aware about “the other”, but underneath it all we still nurse the wounds of 9/11 and identify with a collective enemy: the Muslim American.
Very early in February came “Muslim American Terrorism: Declining Further”, a publication by the Triangle Center on Terrorism and Homeland Security. Experts at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill have been tracking terrorist plots within the country for the last several years, and some noteworthy facts emerge this year in their fourth annual report. According to the report, 2012 saw the lowest number of terrorist plots by Muslim Americans, with only 14 Muslims indicted in plots last year, as opposed to 21 the year before and more than 200 since 9/11. Perhaps most thought-provoking is the fact that all the incidents in 2012 came to the attention of law enforcement at an early stage, rather than at the last possible moment of an actual attack as in previous years. Which begs the question, are the police and FBI doing a better job than ever before?
The answer to that question is a study in contradictions, as two news stories this month highlight. A video on Huffington Post showed exactly how the FBI is tracking would-be terrorists. More than 15,000 documents in 34 states across the nation show racial profiling of several suspect communities based on stereotypes and perceptions. I may be stating the obvious, but assuming that everyone who holds a certain religious belief or emigrates from certain countries is “bad” is never a good idea. Another news article by AP similarly shows civil rights lawyers filing a protest with the U.S. District Court in Manhattan against NYPD’s routine surveillance of Muslims in “restaurants, bookstores and mosques”. According to most experts, this is hardly constitutional and in fact leads the way to discrimination and bias in all walks of life.
Perhaps secret surveillance may be the reason that 2012 showed the lowest number of terrorist threats by Muslim Americans. Or perhaps credit goes to the highest ever number of FBI informants who infiltrate Muslim American communities under the guise of friendship. A paper by Sahar Aziz of the Texas Wesleyan School of Law, entitled “Policing Terrorists in the Community” was published last week with some startling information. Aziz says that there are now more than 15,000 FBI-paid informants in the country, whose tasks are largely driven by religious profiling. She highlights that “community policing developed in the 1990s to combat violent crime in inner city communities is being adopted as a means of collaborating with Muslim communities and local police to combat Islamist homegrown terrorism.”
FBI informants may be helpful in some instances, but their job description often requires entrapment rather than prevention of crime. According to the Triangle Center report, a conflicted young man, after being told by his Imam that jihad did not mean violence, sought the advice of a friend who just happened to be an undercover FBI agent. While a true friend would have confirmed the Imam’s teachings and told him not to move forward with any terrorist activity, the FBI agent instead urged him to follow his heart and continue. The result was entrapment at its finest.
In light of these reports, I fail to see the big picture benefit. With every such publication or news story, Muslim Americans are feeling more insecure. We no longer know who is watching us at school, work, or even at our place of worship. We don’t know if our friend is really a friend or an undercover agent. Life is bound to become full of fear, suspicion and stress. Add to that the current wave of vandalism and outcry against the building of mosques in our communities, and we find ourselves raising an entire generation of people who fear their own government, as well as each other. How is that conducive to a peaceful, prosperous nation?
Saadia Faruqi is an interfaith liaison for the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community, and editor of the Interfaith Houston blog. She is actively involved in interfaith coalition building in the Greater Houston community. Most recently she has led a cultural sensitivity training for the Houston Police Department and continues to offer Islam in America presentations at local academic and religious institutions. In addition to her own blog, she writes for the Houston Community Newspapers, Altmuslimah and Religious Freedom USA.
Once more a bit of paranoia here. There are quiet a few gouts monitored by the FBI, including known militias an hate groups. There are plenty of groups out there intent on bring the US down. So, yes, there are elements within the Muslim community who are attracting attention.
If anyone has concerns a boy the Muslim community, its the British. There are mosques who are known tone creating hoe grown terrorists. The Brixton Mosque comes to mind.
What I see here is a series of whine fests on your part. I already read your blog that left the impression that Feisal Abdul Rauf is a victim in a lawsuit. I know you have an gullible audience here, but some of us take what you write with a grain of salt.
let’s say you had a nice country that you were charged with protecting. One day, a group of muslim terrorists destroy a national landmark and kill over 3,000 people. The perpetrators state that more attacks like these will happen. Now, what you know about this perpetrator and their cronies is that they are MUSLIMS and they hang in MUSLIM crowds. They don’t have names like John Smith or Thomas Jefferson, they have different sounding names. You would be out of your mind not to play extra close attention to the MUSLIM communities – that is where the terrorists come from. It’s one thing to say that all MUSLIMS are bad, I don’t think that’s true. It’s another thing to say that our enemies are of MUSLIM decent and we need to pay extra close attention to them…
Calling this racial profiling or saying that this type of profiling is wrong is anti american, counter intuitive and insensitive to the victimes are radical muslim attacks.
Tom, thank you for your comments, I apreciate your spending time reading my article. The point I’m trying to make here is not that Muslims were or weren’t responsible for 9/11 (although I would beg to differ in the sense that such actions go against the teahings of Isam so grealy that those who did it are not really Muslims) but the fact that even 12 years after 9/11 law enforcement is unfairly targetting an entire community of close to 6 million people with the assumption that they may be guilty. If you read the two reports that I have linked in my article you will get further evidence of this. The ways that community policing is being misused according to Sahar Aziz’s paper borders on illegal and is certainly unethical. Also, the Triangle Report referenced above says that while the terrorist plots they studied did not result in even 1 fatality or injuries, there were 14,000 murders in the US during that same time period. Further since 9/11 Muslim terrorists have been responsible for 33 lives lost whereas the total number of people killed in the US in those 12 years was 180,000. Also during that time more than 200 people have been killed by white supremacists and other hate groups, but nobody is following or entrapping them. That’s what bothers people like me… there is no evidence that Muslim Americans need to be profiled, followed and put under surveillance, but that’s still where the bulk of FBI/police resources are being spent. This is not healthy for us as a nation, and like it or not, Muslim Amercans have been part of the fibre of American history since the first Muslim slaves arrived from Africa. Those who attacked us on 9/11 are definitely the enemy, but it’s dangerous, foolish and disresectful to lump us all together in that category.
Saadia, I am sure you understand Islam far better than I do, but even i know there are many different streams of Islam and man different interpretations of tyne Koran. There is Sufi, Shia, Sunni, Wahabi etc. Of particular interest are the Wahhabis, who indeed had supporters behind the attacks on 911. And we know there are Mullah’s out there who support violent Jihad.
As for attack in the US by Muslim extremists, the have been fewer, but there have been. And AQ would lover to recruit volunteers for more.
But with al that you have written here, this is the most perplexing:
Saadia:
“Muslim Amercans have been part of the fibre of American history since the first Muslim slaves arrived from Africa”
How wrong can you be? I mean, were African slave Muslims? No. In fact Arabs’, most of whom are Muslim, were deep into the slave trade. They sold slaves to the Europeans. This only brings into question your credibility as a blogger. I am sure your fan club wil come along and try and deny they Muslim Arasb were slave traders. The cannot be slave traders and oppressed the same time, can they?
Sammy, please know that my knowledge about Islam and American Muslims is quite extensive. I don’t appreciate being told flat out that I’m wrong, because as an author, researcher and spokesperson for my organization I make sure I have all my facts straight before I put them on the internet. Islam had spread to Africa very early in its history because of its proximity to Arabia. A large number of Africans were Muslims who prayed, fasted, spoke Arabic, etc. which is why when they were brought here in the 18th and 19th centuries they stood out among their peers and there are actually a lot of historical records available about them. Muslim slaves were brought over to North America by colonial powers (not Arabs), the same Christian people who kidnapped and brought over all the African people to enslave them and make them work like dogs on plantations. Historians agree that approximately 15-30% of all African slaves brought to the colonial Americas were in fact Muslim and that 50% of all slaves brought to the Americas came from areas in Africa where at least a minority of the population was Muslim. There is a lot of hisorical documentation out there about this topic, and if you are truly interested in increasing your understanding or information, you are welcome to look it up.
I noticed that your statements parallel the propaganda of CAIR, the Muslim terrorist group (all of the leaders are unindited conspirators) Are you on their payroll? And you and several others parrot the propaganda of another terrorist hate group calling itself “The Southern Poverty Legal Center” Although it’s Jewish, rather than Muslim. A religion that obeys the ten commandments NOT, Kill anyone not Muslim, And presently there isn’t any Jihad in Judeo-Christian religions.
Thank you Mr. Robert Gill for your rational comments….yes every community has its hot-heads…
Thank you sister Saadia for your efforts to explain Islam for those who don’t know. I ask who deny that there were no slave Muslims is to visit the Islamic Museum in Jackson, MS where they can learn so much about the Muslims and how many in fact burried in the 1800s with Muslims names…..Thanks again
Can we also learn about the Muslim slave trade?
I truly hope you are out denying Arabs, most of whom were Muslims, participated in the slave trade. Slavery is not just a white phenomenon. Claiming as much paints you as a Arab centric bigot. And I don’t appreciate seeing that in a a member of the academic world. We know that the Arab world not only seized and sold Black slaves, they also sold white slaves from Europe. Hay, we are all human, Arabs included.
Care to refute this? yes I know it was puled form Wikipedia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arab_slave_trade
“Historians estimate that between 10 and 18 million Africans were enslaved by Arab slave traders and taken across the Red Sea, Indian Ocean, and Sahara desert between 650 and 1900”
Sammy, my sincere request to you is that before posting comments on my blog post in the future please read my articles, all the links referenced thereof, and all comments completely before giving your opinion. Nowhere have I even mentioned slave trade by Arabs (which by the way has got nothing to do with the topic of my post). In my last comment I had discussed the history of African slaves brought to North America in the 1800s. That too, was not the topic of my blog post, but I discussed it at length when you challenged my statement that Muslims have been a fibre of American history since the time of slavery in the US. Kindly stick to the topic and do not call myself or anyone else any names such as Arab centric bigot, especially since I am not Arab. I use Tikkun Daily to offer genuinely interested readers the opportunity to learn about different faiths and perspectives, so please take it as such.
Accepting that there are issues within the Muslin world that has ignited terrorists acts is a step forward. As Jews, we know tat there are issues within our world and confront them. Playing the victim card here in front of a gullible audience is a form of denial. This is your 3rd victim blog
In my first response, I addressed your current blog directly. I really think that you have a feeling of being oppressed and targeted here. I pointed to that the FBI is looking at groups that are not Muslim.
Unfortunately, Americans are not good at complexity, nuance or specifics. They are much more comfortable dealing with stereotypes and broad generalizations, especially about those they find “different.” Hence, it is much easier to label all Muslims in America as potential terrorists who must be watched, based on the actions of a few Muslims (not Americans, mostly Saudis) on 9/11. Native Americans, African Americans, Hispanics and gays have all felt the sting of being “different” and somehow dangerous. Every community has its hot-heads and those who find understanding others too hard to deal with. Yes, there are Christians who have committed acts of hatred in America, but they are somehow not held up to scrutiny because they are part of the majority. All religions have those among the membership who have a twisted understanding of what their religion requires of them. None of the major religions, Christian, Jewish or Muslim, condone wonton hatred or killing of others. In fact, they all require that we treat the stranger hospitably. Too bad some have not yet learned that lesson. I applaud your attempts to educate on the issues facing the American Muslim community.
Only Americans?