"Mosques in U.S. That Have Experienced Violent or Racist Incidents," a Commentary by Sheila Musaji

January 28, 2007

Source: The American Muslim

http://theamericanmuslim.org/tam.php/features/articles/mosques_in_us_that_have_experienced_violent_or_racist_incidents1/0012120

Mosques in the U.S. are becoming dangerous places. Type MOSQUE in The American Muslim site search engine and you will turn up 234 entries. I can’t help but think that the violent rhetoric of conservative and religious commentators in America has to be counted as at least partially responsible for what is going on. When people say that Arabs are sub-human or that Muslim leaders should be killed and Muslims all converted to Christianity, it cannot help but have some effect over time. Ignorance and racism are a lot more powerful than people realize. throw in a bit of fear (talk about mosques needing surveillance, or being hotbeds of extremism), and even the most evolved of us may fall prey. Much of this violence is the result of religiously motivated reprisals against the Muslim community in general for acts committed by particular individuals or organizations.

According to the most recent CAIR Report on hate crimes there was a 29% increase in anti-Muslim hate crimes in 2005. “Overall, nine states and the District of Columbia accounted for almost 79 percent of all civil rights complaints to CAIR in 2005. These ten states are (in descending order): California (19%), Illinois (13%), New York (9%), Texas (8%), Virginia (7%), Florida (6%), District of Columbia (5%), Maryland (4%), Ohio (4%) and New Jersey (4%).”

We have been collecting information about mosque incidents for some time, and here is our (partial) list. If you know about other incidents, please contact us with the information.