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Executive Editor: Abdus Sattar Ghazali
Chronology of Islam in America (2017)
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali
April 2017
Trump wants visitors to hand over social media passwords
April 4: The U.S. government is mulling whether to force foreign visitors to hand over their cellular phones so that officials can conduct social media screenings, check financial records, and ask “probing questions” about ideology, according to Trump administration officials who spoke with the Wall Street Journal. Prompted by President Donald Trump’s campaign call for “extreme vetting” to prevent foreign terrorists from entering the United States, the government is considering strict guidelines that would require embassies to spend more time interviewing visa applicants, the Journal reported. The vetting procedure could affect people around the world, including visitors from 38 countries that participate in the Visa Waiver Program, including France, Germany, and Australia. That program allows citizens from specific countries to travel to the United States for up to 90 days without having to get a visa. “If there is any doubt about a person’s intentions coming to the United States, they should have to overcome — really and truly prove to our satisfaction — that they are coming for legitimate reasons,” Gene Hamilton, senior counselor to Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly, told the publication. [Think Progress]
Armed with guns and racial insults, Jacksonville man assaults Muslim neighbor
April 4: Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office said Robert Anthony Ruetting was arrested on Saturday (April 1) for pointing a handgun on his Muslim neighbor and his family.Robert Anthony Ruetting, 52, was charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, then released on $50,000 bond Monday, according to Duval County jail records. Aied Alzaidy, 47, and his wife were sitting outside their home just before 9:30 p.m. Saturday when Ruetting came out of his nearby home looking upset and holding a handgun and a flashlight, according to the arrest report. His wife went inside, but Alzaidy remained as he was told “If you move — — [expletive], I will shoot you,” according to the report. He said Ruetting put the handgun to his head, then hit him with the metal flashlight as his wife came outside screaming. Ruetting walked back into his home, then reappeared with an AK-47-style rifle and pointed it at the victim, his wife and their children, ages 9, 7 and 5, the report said. He yelled at them, saying “I’m going to kill all you Muslim — —[expletive], get out of my country. Don’t talk to my wife,” the arrest report said. He then went back in his home. Officers spoke with Ruetting and his wife Urfalino, who consented to a search of their home, police said. They found the rifle in an open bag next to Ruetting’s bed and it was seized as evidence. Both Ruetting and Urfalino have domestic violence arrests against each other in 2016, court records show. [The Florida Times]
The Senate Resolution condemns hate crimes
April 5: The US Senate today passed a resolution Condemning hate crime and any other form of racism, religious or ethnic bias, discrimination, incitement to violence, or animus targeting a minor-ity in the United States. The resolution was introduced by Democratic Senator Kamla Harris from California. It was approved by Unanimous Consent. The resolution:
- Condemns hate crime and any other form of racism, religious or ethnic bias, discrimination, incitement to violence, or animus targeting a minority in the United States. Affirms that the United States stands united in condemning hate and evil in all forms. Rejects hate-motivated crime as an attack on the fabric of society and the ideals of pluralism and respect.
- Calls on federal law enforcement officials, working with state and local officials, to: (1) expeditiously investigate all credible reports of hate crimes and incidents and threats against minorities in the United States, and (2) bring the perpetrators to justice..
- Encourages: (1) the Department of Justice (DOJ) and other federal agencies to work to improve the reporting of hate crimes, and to emphasize the importance of the agencies' collection and reporting of data pursuant to federal law; and (2) the development of an interagency task force led by the Attorney General to collaborate on the development of effective strategies and efforts to detect and deter hate crime in order to protect minority communities.
- Calls on the executive branch to continue to: (1) offer federal assistance that may be available for victims of hate crimes; and (2) carry out safety and preparedness programs for religious institutions, places of worship, and other institutions that have been targeted because of their affiliation with any particular religious, racial, or ethnic minority in the United States. [US Congress]
Investigation into possible hate crime against Muslim woman in downtown Los Angeles
April 8: A Muslim woman was attacked by a man who allegedly shouted racial slurs at her and beat her in the head in downtown Los Angeles today. Lisa Sallaj was out walking her daughter's dog when a man approached her, kicked the dog and began shouting profanities at her, she said. Sallaj told NBC4 she felt the man targeted her because she is a Muslim woman who was wearing a hijab. The man allegedly told her to go back to her country and made death threats. She said she called 911 when the man kicked the dog and shouted at her. She followed him at a distance so that the police could track him down. The man turned around and attacked her, punching her four times in the back of the head, she said. Sallaj suffered serious injuries. Staples were used to close her head wound. She says she has moved several times to escape discrimination and this incident just adds to her frustration. Sallaj is also a citizen of Jordan, having lived there with her late husband for 5 years. "It’s just really bad that you have to be scared of the people in your own country, which is America for me because I’m American by birth. But it’s also really bad when you feel like you have to go to another country to be safe and you’re not," she said. A suspected attacker was arrested for felony battery, but has not been charged with a hate crime. [NBC Bay Area]
Brother of Tariq Ramadan ‘forced to leave’ France
April 10: Swiss Imam and head of the Islamic Centre of Geneva, Hani Ramadan, has been forced to leave France. The Egyptian born cleric, the older brother of the Islamic scholar and intellectual Tariq Ramadan, was arrested on Saturday (April 8) in Colmar, eastern France, and escorted by police convoy to the French Swiss border. French authorities released a statement in which they stressed that Ramadan had been “returned to the border” rather than “expelled” from France – a lesser penalty under French law. The decision is linked to previous views and opinions that he had expressed. “He is known in the past to have adopted behavior and made remarks which pose a serious threat to public order on French soil,” the ministry statement said. In recent months, several of Ramadan’s conferences and events in France have been cancelled, but on 7 April, the interior ministry issued an administrative ban on the 57-year-old imam ordering that he be returned to Switzerland where is a naturalized citizen. Since May 2012, 116 people have been “forced to leave” France and 26 mosques have been shut down. [Middle East Eye]
Hungarian top court repeals village's ban on mosques
April 12: Hungary's Constitutional Court has repealed a ban by a village led by a far-right mayor on the construction of mosques and headscarves like burkas and chadors worn by Muslim women. The court said that the ban, also outlawing the activity of muezzins, infringed on freedoms of religion and speech. The measure had been in place since November in the village of Asotthalom, on the Serbian border, led by Mayor Laszlo Toroczkai of the far-right Jobbik party. Before Hungary built fences on its borders with Serbia and Croatia in late 2015, Asotthalom was a frequent point of entry into Hungary for migrants and refugees on their way to Western Europe. Last year, Toroczkai said the ordinance was adopted to defend the village's "community and traditions." [DNA India]
Racist, Islamophobic Letter with 'Foreign Substance' on Quran Page Sent to CAIR's DC Headquarters
April 17: The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the nation's largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, said today that its Washington, D.C., headquarters has received a racist, Islamophobic letter sent from Michigan portraying former President Obama as a monkey and containing a page from an English translation of the Quran smeared with a "foreign substance" that is assumed to be feces. The letter, which had an apparently fake return address, will be turned over to law enforcement authorities."This is just a sample of the hate targeting American Muslims and other minority groups in the wake of the presidential election," said CAIR National Executive Director Nihad Awad. "These bigoted acts will never stop us from defending the civil rights and religious freedom of all Americans." CAIR recently called for hate crime investigations of bias-motivated incidents targeting Muslims in Wisconsin and Texas, part of "almost daily" attacks on American Muslims and other minority groups nationwide in recent months. [CAIR]
Immigrant arrests up 33 percent since Trump inauguration
April 18: Arrests of immigrants have jumped by nearly one-third since President Donald Trump took office, compared to the same period a year ago. The Immigration and Customs Enforcement unit of the Department of Homeland Security arrested 21,362 allegedly undocumented immigrants from January 20 through mid-March, according to statistics released to the Washington Post, compared to 16,104 in the same period of 2016. Despite Trump’s claim that he is targeting “criminals” among the undocumented immigrant population, the largest increase in arrests is among immigrants with no criminal record of any kind, more than doubling to 5,441. Arrests of immigrants with some type of criminal record—which could include a drunk driving charge from 20 years ago—rose from 13,404 to 15,921, an increase of 18.7 percent. The Post wrote of “newly empowered federal agents intensifying their pursuit of not just undocumented immigrants with criminal records, but also thousands of illegal immigrants who have been otherwise law-abiding.” Some regional ICE offices reported much greater increases in arrests for immigrants with no criminal record: Philadelphia was up 500 percent to a total of 356, Atlanta was up 300 percent to nearly 700. There was also a 75 percent increase in immigration detainers, requests from ICE to local police agencies and prisons asking that they hold prisoners beyond their scheduled release date for transfer to federal custody and deportation. The total since Trump’s inauguration through mid-March was 22,161, greater than the number of ICE arrests. Despite the increase in arrests and detainers, actual deportations fell by 1.2 percent, to 54,741 in January, February and March, compared to the same months in 2016. That is because the greater number of recent arrests is putting more prisoners into already clogged immigration courts, where caseloads have soared and the time required to process cases has lengthened. There is also resistance from many countries to taking back citizens targeted by the US authorities for removal, particularly China, which has no reason to do any favors for a government that has accused it of “raping” the United States through its trade practices, and which is beating the drums for war against North Korea. [WSWS]
First protected DREAMer is deported under Trump
April 18: Federal agents ignored President Trump's pledge to protect from deportation undocumented immigrants brought to the United States as children by sending a young man back to his native Mexico, the first such documented case, a USA TODAY examination of the new administration's immigration policies shows. After spending an evening with his girlfriend in Calexico, Calif., on Feb. 17, Juan Manuel Montes, 23, who has lived in the U.S. since age 9, grabbed a bite and was waiting for a ride when a U.S. Customs and Border Protection officer approached and started asking questions. Montes was twice granted deportation protections under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program created by President Barack Obama and left intact by President Trump. Montes had left his wallet in a friend's car, so he couldn't produce his ID or proof of his DACA status and was told by agents he couldn't retrieve them. Within three hours, he was back in Mexico, becoming the first undocumented immigrant with active DACA status deported by the Trump administration's stepped-up deportation policy. Since taking office, Trump has followed through on his campaign pledge to crack down on illegal immigration by signing executive orders to step up enforcement against the estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants living in the U.S. The new policy calls for expanding the criteria for detaining and deporting undocumented immigrants and hiring thousands of new agents. Yet Trump declined to revoke the DACA protections Obama had granted to more than 750,000 undocumented immigrants, repeatedly saying he had a soft spot for these young people who are leading productive lives and have few, if any, ties to the countries of their birth. "They shouldn't be very worried," he told ABC News in January. "I do have a big heart." [USA Today]
Muslim girl’s hijab ripped off, called “terrorist” in Georgia
April 19: A 14-year-old Muslim girl’s headscarf was ripped off by an unidentified man yelling “terrorist” in the US state of Georgia. The victim was walking with a group in the parking lot of Perimeter Mall near Maggiano’s Little Italy in Atlanta at 9:40 PM yesterday when the man approached and fled after snatching the hijab, police said. Dunwoody police said they were searching for the man accused of ripping the headscarf off the Muslim girl while yelling “terrorist”, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported. “Dunwoody is a very diverse community, welcoming people of all faiths. Therefore, an incident such as this one is unusual,” Police Chief Billy Grogan said. The Georgia chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) is offering a USD 1,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the man. [Press Trust of India]
Two Teens Charged with Hate Crime for Vandalizing Trump Sign
April 20: Law enforcement officials in Princess Anne, Maryland, have charged two teen girls—D'Asia R. Perry and Joy M. Shuford, both 19—with a hate crime for setting fire to a Trump “Make America Great Again” sign. According to the Baltimore Sun, an officer wrote in the arrest report that “intentional burning of these political signs, along with the beliefs, religious views and race of this political affiliation, directly coincides with the victim." The paperwork states the pair burned the sign, which was posted in the parking lot of a sporting goods store, “because of said victim's race and religious beliefs based on the victim's political values." As the Sun notes, “The only way to make any sense of this charge is to assume that anyone who is a minority (as both Ms. Shuford and Ms. Perry are) who dislikes President Trump must then automatically hate white people and Christians. Put another way, the Princess Anne police evidently think that to be a Trump supporter is synonymous with being white and Christian.” The charges suggest the police in this case are going out of their way to punish the two girls for making a nonviolent gesture of disrespect toward those who are “white and Christian.” That tells you precisely how the police view these two groups and whose stature they think needs protecting. [AlterNet News]
Hundreds of Muslims gather at Capitol to advocate for inclusive California
April 24: Seven hundred Muslims from across California gathered today for the 6th Annual Muslim Day at the State Capitol in Sacramento. This year's theme -- Action Trumps Fear. "We have an opportunity for citizens to come out, and really speak with our legislators and have our voices heard," civil rights attorney Saad Sweilem said. In the first 100 days of Donald Trump's presidency, California Muslims say they've felt a great amount of injustice. They're fighting for four bills. The first one, SB 31, known as the anti-Muslim ban. "We saw multiple attempts at a Muslim ban that, thankfully, have been stopped by the courts," Sweilem said. Then, there's SB 54 -- better known as the Sanctuary State bill. This would prohibit local agencies from assisting ICE with deportations. "The reality set in of the Trump presidency for California Muslims. Because of the impact we felt immediately, we wanted to take part in advocate to other immigrants through SB 5," CAIR Legislative and Government Affairs Coordinator Yannina Casillas said. Next, there's AB 158, a bill that would ensure that hate crimes are properly recorded by peace officers. "Our ideas also matter as well, not just adults," Mehreen Chauhan said. [Fox40]
1,035% Spike in Islamophobic Incidents at U.S. borders during President Trump's first 100 days
April 25: The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) today reported preliminary data revealing that cases of U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) profiling of Muslims accounted for 23 percent of CAIR case intakes in the first three months of 2017. This represents a 1,035 percent increase in CBP bias cases reported so far this year over the same period in 2016. The CAIR also found that: (i) Of the 193 CBP cases recorded from January-March 2017, 181 were reported after the January 27 signing of the Protecting the Nation from Foreign Terrorist Entry into the United States Executive Order, also known as the Trump administration "Muslim Ban." (ii) The 181 cases that occurred after the Muslim Ban was signed exceeded the combined total of 136 CBP profiling cases CAIR documented in the previous three years. In early May, the CAIR will release a report detailing anti-Muslim bias incidents documented by the civil rights organization during the 2014-2016 period. Shortly after the release of that report, CAIR will release its preliminary first quarter 2017 case data. The CAIR said the first 100 days of Donald Trump's presidency witnessed initial efforts to translate his anti-Islam campaign rhetoric into official U.S. policy. These efforts included populating his administration with a number of officials who have a history of problematic and misleading statements about Islam and Muslims. It also included an evolving effort to fulfill his campaign promise of a ban on Muslim entry into the U.S. There were also reports of substantive movement toward an executive order directing the Secretary of State to determine whether to designate the Muslim Brotherhood a foreign terrorist organization, which experts say is just a "witch hunt" rooted in conspiracy theories peddled by the U.S. Islamophobia network and intended to eviscerate American Muslim civil society. [CAIR]
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