The Death Spasms of American Racism

http://www.theamericanmuslim.org/tam.php/features/articles/the_death_spasms_of_american_racism/

by Sheila Musaji

I believe that most Americans saw the election of Barack Obama as a sign that things were changing, that racism has been put aside, that racial reconciliation was possible.  Most Americans saw the election of Barack Obama as representing a huge, positive, hopeful shift in what was possible, and even normal, in American thinking.  Aside from any purely political issues, the election of a black man to the highest office in the U.S. was a sign of HOPE for a future where race was not an issue.

For those of us who were involved with the civil rights movement in the 60’s and 70’s seeing President Elect Obama on the stage at Grant Park with his family and two little girls brought back vividly pictures of other little black girls like the one in the Norman Rockwell painting The Problem We All Live With which depicts Ruby Bridges, the little girl who integrated the New Orleans school system in 1960, being escorted to her class by federal marshalls in the face of hostile crowds.  Look at that painting and then look at a photograph of the Obama family and you can’t help but believe that we have come a long way, and you can understand why so many had tears in their eyes.

Brady Carey an Instructor of Speech at Mt. Hood Community College clearly stated why HOPE for a better future is the majority response to the election of Barack Obama:

“It was past nine when I received the news. A moment rarely experienced, a moment that comes maybe once in a lifetime. I look upon the TV and suddenly feel my body go numb. I don’t deny it. It’s a feeling I have been waiting for over two years (actually for most of my life). I thought we have finally reached the ideas for what this country represents. Well, maybe the ideals have been realized and now they are within reach. This moment is so important, so huge, that I’m sure it will take years to fully realize. Yes, Barack Obama has been elected president!

Reading the screen, my eyes begin to well. And within a second, I have transcended all the meanings of this event. Barack Obama hasn’t just been elected the next president it’s much more than that. This victory doesn’t just belong to him, but all of us. It belongs to my Father who fought in World War II to destroy racism. It’s for my Mother who battled her way through corporate sexism. It’s for my brother who raises his family with a blind eye and struggles to pay bills. It’s for my best friend (a proud black-American) who can now say that “yes” anything is possible in light of obvious conflict. It’s for my students whoever had a shadow of a doubt that their voice can make a difference. It’s for all my fellow instructors who deny failure and embrace the honor to teach the next generation. It’s for all of us who has ever been discriminated against (it’s a long time coming). And last but not least, it’s for all of us who stood up against the machine and fought for what is right.

As I watched my fellow Chicagoans gaze upon President-elect Obama giving his speech in Grant Park, I realized hope is something tangible, something that can be shared, and most importantly, necessary for the chance to make change. I think about the struggles that this country has endured and how far we need to go to heal. Now with our new captain at the helm, I believe the journey will be the next great American experience. We will stand united as a country living up, everyday, to the ideals for which it stands. Yes, we can! Thanks Barack for this moment and the ones to come!”

We saw and heard the racial, ethnic, and religious slurs before the election, and these still continue, but the response is different today than it was in the past.  Jon Stewart in a segment of The Daily Show called Obama and Hitler commenting on Congressman Paul Broun’s comparison of Obama to Hitler gave such racist ramblings exactly what they deserve - scorn and ridicule.

Racists, anti-Semites, Islamophobes, xenophobes, homophobes - still exist, and the death of racism and the other forms of prejudice is still not (and may never be) a “done deal”.  It is now however a reasonable hope that all of these forms of prejudice can be so marginalized that they lose their ability to have any meaningful influence on America.  If we unite as AMERICANS in a concerted effort to consign any sort of prejudice to the dust bin of history, we can eradicate it from our society just as we eradicated smallpox.  Prejudice is a disease of the mind.  If we see the last pockets of prejudice and racism in America as a disease that requires us to act in order to eradicate them, we can succeed.  YES, WE CAN!  If we take a stand when we hear ethnic jokes, or innuendos, or outright demeaning words or slander directed towards any particular group (because of their race, ethnicity, religion, gender, sexual-orientation, etc.) WE CAN move forward. 

Of course, the disease metaphor also implies the danger we face. Polio, which has been eradicated in the United States, does still exist in the world. Without constant vigil and continuing attempts to educate and assist in the total destruction of the disease, it can easily reemerge and spread.

Similarly, we need to do everything in our power to eradicate the reservoirs of fear and hate.  Those who believe that they are superior to others based on their skin color, sexual orientation, religion, race, or nationality must learn that we are sick and tired of their outdated, uneducated, destructive prejudices. We simply aren’t going to tolerate their expressions of hatred any more.

If the prejudice is acted out in such a way that it is a hate crime or civil rights violation, then the offenders need to be prosecuted.  If the assault on others is verbal, then the offenders may have a first ammendment right to freedom of speech, but we also have a right to use our free speech to let them know that their comments are barbaric and that we don’t want to hear them.  We need to openly protest when we hear anything that offends our sensibilities.  Racists may have a right to speak their mind, but so do we. 

I think that the following list of shameful racist incidents during and after the election process are important to look at and analyze.  My personal take on this is that what we are seeing is the “darkness before the dawn”, the dying gasp of racism among a minority of Americans who simply haven’t realized, or had it made clear to them that their world view is no longer relevant.  The racists, fewer and further between, are lashing out in desperation, exhibiting the death spasms of their culture.  The racists are the past, and those who celebrate our wonderful variety as Americans are the future.  We can’t ignore these racist incidents because they show that racism is still an issue and will remain an issue until WE, each and every one of us stands up and defies the racists.  They have no power unless we give it to them.  We don’t need to fear the guys in the white robes and pointy hats, or any other racists, we need to shine a light on them.

The Anti-Defamation League (ADL), which monitors and exposes extremist activity and rhetoric, said anger among white supremacists and other right-wing extremists in response to Obama’s victory resulted in an avalanche of vitriolic postings on racist Web sites.  This is one example of the “lashing out” of racists in their cultural death spasm.

The terrible examples of racism make the news, and remind us that we still have a ways to go, but the death of American racism will be among the many exponentially increasing changes of our times.

What is most hopeful is that the reaction to these racist incidents on the part of the majority has been strong.  Racist incidents provoked Solidarity events at Colgate University, and an anti-racism rally at Yale, Bryn Mawr will have a series of anti-racism workshops, the faculty at St. Joseph’s University is offering suggestions for improving race relations, hundreds of students participated in a Unity March at Baylor University, North Carolina State students lobby for hate crime act in response to campus incidents.  All over the country, a small number of individuals were involved in hateful, racist incidents, but the response they received was a resounding - NO YOU CAN’T!  You can’t take us back down that road. 

The death spasms of American racism:

At the University of Alabama, an Obama poster on a faculty member’s office door was defaced with a message said “He’ll be shot…” followed by the “N” word.

In Fullerton, California “Two gang members pleaded not guilty Thursday to hate crime and attempted robbery charges in connection with the beating of a black man who was trying to buy cigarettes at a Fullerton liquor store.” The two men shouted racial and anti-Obama epithets in the attack.

In Temecula, California, authorities found spray-painted graffiti on a city sidewalk containing a swastika and anti-Obama slogan

In San Bernadino, California, Diane Fedele of the ‘Chaffey Community Republican Women’ sent out “Obama bucks” fake food stamps which included racist stereotypes.

In San Marcos, California commuters and people walking their children to school saw a series of racist signs threatening presidential candidate Barack Obama, African-Americans and Muslims.  One sign spray-painted on an electric utility box read “Death to ni–ers, Muslim and Obama.” At least two other similar signs were spray-painted in the area, one of them near San Elijo Middle School.

In Torrance, California vandals spray-painted swatiskas and racial slurs on the home and cars of several Torrance residents who had displayed campaign signs or bumper stickers supporting President-elect Barack Obama

At Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Connecticut police are investigating several complaints of racism including slurs and harassing phone calls directed at black players on the school’s basketball team, and slurs written on poster and cork boards outside the dorm rooms of three black players.

In Washington, D.C. at the Value Voter Summit sponsored by the Family Research Council, a booth sold Obama Waffles - a box of waffle mix emblazoned with a cartoon image of a bug-eyed, toothy, dark-lipped Barack Obama eyeing a plate of waffles.  A pat of butter on the waffles is stamped “2008”.  On the top flap, the Obama carton appears in a turban, next to an arrow printed with the text: “Point box toward Mecca for tastier waffles.”

In Marietta, Georgia a local bar made and sold a racist Obama t-shirt.

In Idaho, a bus load of elementary school children chanted “assassinate Obama”.

In Idaho, the Secret Service is investigating a “public hanging” sign erected by a man upset with the election outcome, the Bonner County Daily Bee (Sandpoint) reported Thursday. A handmade sign posted on a tree reads “FREE PUBLIC HANGING” written in large letters beneath a noose fashioned from nylon rope. The sign then names former Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry, current U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and civil rights activist Al Sharpton. The most prominent name on the sign is “OBAMA,” according to the Bee.

In Chicago, Illinois, a lawsuit has been filed alleging that while a huge Chicago crowd celebrated the election of the first black U.S. president, some white city police officers committed hate crimes against a black family cheering Barack Obama’s victory from home.  The federal lawsuit claims several officers discharged pepper spray near members of a family celebrating Obama’s win outside their home on the city’s West Side last week.

At Purdue University in Indiana there was an incident involving incident expletive graffiti about President-elect Barack Obama painted on a campus tree.

At the University of Kentucky in Lexington an effigy of Obama was hung by a noose in a tree on campus.

In Bar Harbor, Maine Police are investigating two incidents in which black figures were left hanging by nooses from trees on Mount Desert Island the day after Barack Obama won the presidential election.

In Portland, Maine at Gray-New Gloucester High School officials are investigating two incidents of racism

In Springfield, Massachussetts, a predominantly black church was destroyed by arson a few hours after the Obama election.

In Midland, Michigan, a man dressed in full Ku Klux Klan regalia walked around toting a handgun and waving an American flag. Initially denying it, the man eventually admitted to police that the display was a reaction to the Obama victory.

In Traverse City, Michigan, Employees at Hampel’s Key and Lockshop flew an American flag upside down last Wednesday protesting the election of Obama.

In Annandale, Minnesota someone sprayed KKK across both sides of an Obama for president sign and left the carcass of a dead raccoon at the base of the sign.

In Pearl, Mississippi, employees of local schools — a bus driver and a coach — banned children — black and white — from the bus or class simply for mentioning the President-elect’s name.

On the University of Mississippi campus there were reports of disruptions on many dorm floors with white students yelling at black students celebrating Obama’s victory.  In one episode, white students called a black student the n-word, and saying we have a (expletive deleted) N-word for a president. 

In West Plains, Missouri a racist billboard was put up on the highway showing a caricature of Obama wearing a turban. 

In Warren County, New Jersey a cross was burned along with an Obama flag on the lawn of an Indian families home.

In Mastic, New York more than a dozen cars were spray painted with graffiti.  The graffiti included racist slurs and sexually graphic references. At least one resident in the quiet Mastic neighborhood told Newsday her son’s car was scribbled with a message threatening to kill Obama.

In Staten Island, New York Ali Kamara, an African American Muslim teen, was viciously assaulted by four men with baseball bats in what police believe was a bias attack sparked by Obama’s presidential victory.

At North Carolina State University, four students face expulsion for spay painting the phrases, “Let’s shoot that (N-word) in the head” and “Hang Obama by a noose.”

In Durham, North Carolina, several police officers are under investigation for allegedly posting racial remarks on their personal websites.

At Western Carolina University in North Carolina a dead bear cub was draped with a pair of Barack Obama campaign signs.

At Appalachian State University in North Carolina, there has been a series of incidents including reports of threatening conversations or “racially charged, horrible statements” in the residence halls after celebrating Obama’s victory.  The conversations also included a statement suggesting Obama may not be alive in 2009, and one student wore a t-shirt with the phrase, “Obama ’08, Biden ’09” displayed on it.

In Cleveland Ohio a Medina County High School racist graffiti was spray painted on the exterior walls of the school.

An Ohio man hung an effigy of Obama in his front yard.

At George Fox University in Oregon an effigy of Obama was hung by a noose from a tree. 

In Pennsylvania a teacher’s aide was suspended for going on a racist rant to a minority student saying that “Obama was going to be shot and killed, the U.S. flag would be changed to the KFC flag, and the national anthem would be changed to “Movin’ On Up.”

In Pennsylvania‘s Apolacon Township, situated in an area known for KKK activity, an interracial couple looked out their front window to find the remnants of a burned cross.

In Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania a threatening note was left on someone’s car saying “We know you (expletive) voted for Obama—now just watch out for your house!” In a separate incident someone spray-painted the word “Obama” on a vehicle and then set it on fire.

At Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania there were racial incidents reported election night, mostly racial epithets aimed at black students.  In a separate incident, the campus newspaper—The Brown And White—had a piece of paper placed inside hundreds of newspapers last Friday that read “Your president is black. How does that make you feel?”

At St. Joseph’s University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania there has been controversy over the school’s delayed response to an October 29th incident inside McShain Hall where racist and sexist language was written on a classroom board along with drawing of a stick figure in a noose.

At LaSalle University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania - A street corner just off LaSalle’s campus was the site of student violence in wee hours of Sunday morning. Witnesses and victims say that at least 20 white male students, members of the Phi Gamma Delta fraternity, allegedly attacked several black students as a party in their unofficial frat house let out.

In Texas at Baylor University students awoke the morning after Obama’s victory to find a noose hanging from a tree in front of Morrison Hall.

In Tennessee police foiled a skinhead plot to kill random African Americans, and Obama himself.

In Texas, a back-up offensive lineman on the Texas football team posted a message on his Facebook page that read, “All the hunters gather up, we have a [racial epithet] in the White House.”

Texas Christian University received word of a half-dozen instances of racial epithets being used in conversations about the president-elect and one report of an Obama poster being torn off a student’s door at a residence hall, officials said.

In Washington County, Virginia an Obama sign had “KKK” written twice in white and the word “kill” in black above Obama’s name.

In Buckley, Washington five students at White River High School in Buckley are accused of hanging a doll of Obama with a rope by its neck in what appears to be a mock lynching.

The U.S. Secret Service says there has been a dramatic spike in death threats against President Elect Obama.    

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Date Posted: Friday, September 05, 2008

http://www.masnet.org/views.asp?id=5192

By Kaleem Kawaja 

Even though seven long years have elapsed since the horrible 2001 Al Qaeda terrorist attacks in New York and Washington, the political atmosphere in America continues to be against the nation’s five million strong Muslim citizens and voters.  This year most of the candidates for the offices of President, Senators, Congressmen. , Governors throughout the fifty states in US have not allowed any of the many active and serious American Muslim political activists a significant role in their campaigns.

WASHINGTON, DC (KHABREIN.INFO) Sept. 5, 2008 – As the well attended political conventions of the Democratic and Republican parties concluded after a long Primary election process in America, and as a general election approaches in November this year, it is painful to observe that the American Muslims are not only invisible in the electoral arena, they are also not openly welcome by political parties and politicians.

In the decade before 2001 many American Muslims had shied away from the Republican Party, afraid that it is a party predominantly of the White folks.  At the same time they were also attracted to it because of the party’s emphasis on observing religious faith, the discipline of family values and a conservative lifestyle in the free-wheeling American society.

However, the number of Muslim activists in the Republican Party was small and shrunk further after the 2001 terrorist attacks.  In the 2004 election very few Muslim activists worked for the Republican Party, perhaps angered by the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan under the watch of Republican US President George Bush.  Today Muslims do not receive much visibility in the GOP party, and some anti-Muslim politicians regularly make corrosive remarks about Muslims.

In comparison to the Republicans, Muslim activists flocked in significant numbers to the Democratic Party to which many racial minorities in US have turned to in recent decades. The presence of other colored folks in the Democratic Party gave them a sense of comfort.  But since 2001 in the Democratic Party too Muslims are not receiving a warm welcome.

Despite the American Muslim community showing much enthusiasm for Democrats and especially for the party’s Presidential nominee Senator Barrack Obama,  the senior managers in the party are not letting Muslim Democrats receive significant roles.  In the public election rallies, Muslims wearing obvious Muslim attire e.g. Hijab clad women, are not allowed to be seated in locations where the television cameras can spot them, as was reported in one of Senator Obama’s campaign rallies in Detroit in June this year.

Even two Black Muslim Congressmen who are lifelong Democratic Party loyalists, Keith Ellison (MN) and Andre Carson (IN), have been politely told by Senator Obama’s campaign to stay away from campaigning for him.  A few liberal Muslims who got an opportunity to be a part of some Democratic party election campaign committees, e.g. the very liberal Muslim stockbroker in Chicago,  have been politely asked to step down on one excuse or the other.

What is strange is that if you do not identify yourselves as a Muslim, you may receive some welcome, as the sizeable number of Indian-Americans do.  But if you identify yourself as being associated with any Muslim platform, your proclamations of loyalty to the party, your desire to be in the American mainstream, or even your being an ultra-liberal Muslim, cut no dice.  A pretext is found and you are sidelined regardless of your financial contribution or grassroots campaign work.

Quite a few American Muslims are trying to participate in fundraising efforts for the Democratic party’s political candidates this year, and a few for the Republican party, as they did four years ago, with hopes of recognition.  But neither the Republican nor the Democratic parties are encouraging any roles for Muslim donors beyond accepting their financial contributions.  A couple of very active Muslim political activists and fundraisers in the Democratic Party in the state of Maryland  have told me that the party managers’ clear message to Muslims is:  Your financial contribution and vote is welcome; but we cannot afford to make you  very visible as a campaigner and we cannot pledge any significant recognition from the Party for your help.

In fact many disgruntled Muslim political activists in US have abandoned Muslim political groups and have joined Asian-American political groups in order to continue their political activism.

This is not to say that a few Muslims have not received political appointments to some junior level management positions in county, state or federal management positions or government Commissions, as a result of their help in the campaigns.  But most such people have received that recognition by working through an Asian-American platform, and not by identifying association with any American-Muslim group.  And they are vulnerable to even false complaint against them by anyone.

That makes one wonder if the political parties in America are angry at the nation’s Muslims.  Since 2001 a large number of American Muslim organizations and Islamic Centers have categorically condemned the 2001 Al Qaeda terrorist attack on US and on US interests abroad. Yet their alienation from the American political parties is not showing any sign of diminishing.

 No matter how one looks at it, it is obvious that the five million strong American Muslim community, with sizeable vote power and sizeable fundraising power, is not getting a voice in the US political process.  A survey and analysis of the situation indicates that one factor for the alienation of Muslims from the political parties in US is their continuing complaint against the US foreign policy in Middle East since 2001, and their lack of attention to the Administration’ s domestic policies in US.  Also the race based elements of electoral politics in this year’s Presidential election appears to have aggravated the alienation of American Muslims from the majority White Americans.

In the Democratic party Presidential Primary election the flocking towards Senator Obama of a disproportionately large number of Muslim Americans compared to Senator Hillary Clinton , in spite of the fact that Senator Obama stretched absolutely no olive branch to them, and their aversion towards Republican candidates reinforces the feeling that the alienation of Muslims from White Americans has increased in this election year. Thus today American Muslims are not only alienated from the Republican Party where most people are Whites; they also appear to be alienated from a large segment of the Democratic Party that is populated by Whites.

To compound the political problems of America’s Muslims, their major national organizations like Islamic Society of North America, Islamic Circle of North America, Council on American Islamic Relations, Muslim Public Affairs Council, American Muslim Alliance etc have stopped taking initiatives in the political arena since 2001, and are now mostly involved in social, interfaith, religious and government-liaison work.  The enthusiasm towards the Presidential, Congressional and Statehouse elections that American Muslims demonstrated in 2000 has evaporated, leaving a deafening silence and eerie vacuum in the community’s political activism landscape.  The American Muslim community that was becoming politically vibrant only eight years ago is without any political agenda or goal or leadership in today’s America .

Surely the community cannot afford to remain in this limbo and must find a way out of the suffocating impasse.  American Muslims must recognize that building bridges with all Americans, especially the majority White people, and overcoming their anger against Muslims due to the 2001 Al Qaeda terrorist attacks on US, should be a priority for them.  Taking far more interest in the domestic US issues rather than foreign policy issues is a must for the community to redeem itself.

In today’s America Muslims should pay serious attention and respect to women candidates.  In elections for important national positions the community folks should support a variety of candidates from various shades and both political parties; not just minority ethnic or religious candidates. The American Muslim minority should understand that to receive fairness from America ’s majority community they should also give fairness to the majority.

(The writer is a community activist in Washington DC .  He can be reached on:  kaleemkawaja@hotmail.com  )

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Date Posted: Thursday, November 06, 2008

In the Name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most Merciful

From the Desk of Ibrahim Abdil-Mu’id Ramey, MAS Freedom Civil and Human Rights Director

WASHINGTON, D.C. (MASNET) Nov. 6, 2008 – There is, understandably, a huge wave of euphoria sweeping across the nation, and throughout the world, after Barack Obama’s historic Nov. 4 victory in the U.S. Presidential Election.

Also notable is the that the 2008 Presidential campaign also makes the history books as one of the longest and most expensive presidential campaigns – pitting a veteran Republican maverick and "war hero" backed by powerful conservative interests against a previously unknown, first-term Senator and African American with Muslim ancestry.

But the more obvious cause for celebration stems from the fact that for the first time in U.S. history an African-American major party candidate was not only nominated, but actually won the election.

The Obama victory, celebrated by virtually all political progressives, comes after eight years of a truculent and increasingly unpopular Bush administration. The victory comes also in the context of a national financial and market crisis, rising unemployment, a ten trillion dollar national debt, and wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that are draining the national treasury.

As the world celebrates with us, we must pause to ask; what does this mean for Muslims in America and what does this new political zeitgeist compel Muslims to do?

I contend, first of all, that Muslims should exhale a collective sigh of relief as the Bush administration fades into history. 

Our joy over the election results should be tempered, however, with a critically needed strategy to consolidate and amplify both our political strength and our legitimate presence in civil society.

Not to diminish that the Muslim community has a lot to be happy about. An Obama administration means, first of all, a new Department of Justice, with (hopefully) a great deal more respect for civil rights and greater willingness to enforce the laws that guarantee equal protection.

The Guantanamo prison camp and torture abomination is likely to be dismantled, and it is likely we will see a more progressive policy in the U.S. Department of Justice regarding protection for immigrant rights, especially those of Muslim immigrants and Latinos.

President Obama will also be in a position to appoint federal judges that can counter-act the right-wing stacking of the judiciary under President Bush, and restore some modicum of objectivity and fairness to the courts.

We might also look forward to a potential shift in resources to enhance education, health, and the internal infrastructure with more emphasis on job creation and positive environmental stewardship and conservation compared with the deplorable record of George Bush and Company.

The numbers aren’t in yet, but if Virginia is at all typical of trends in our wider community, it’s quite likely to be reported that something in the range of an approximate 90% Muslim American vote went for President-Elect Obama.

The number of registered Muslim registered voters in Virginia, for example, exceeded 72,000 persons in the 2008 election. If 80% of this number voted and 90% of those votes went for Obama, then it is likely that Muslim Democratic votes provided a large component of the margin of Democratic victory in the key battleground states. 

While Muslims are a relatively small part of the overall electorate, the bloc voting tendency points to the importance of concentrated and mobilized Muslim votes in close elections.

It can also be observed that Muslims leveraged their voting power by forging new and potentially powerful strategic alliances with, for example, Latino communities, labor activists, and African-American civil rights activists. 

In the 2008 election campaign, it is clear that the convergence of shared interests within the Muslim community gave birth to larger, progressive collaborations with other political forces to help move the nation beyond the legacy of the Bush administration.

Yet more sobering realities remain.

While the Muslim community voted in large numbers, our impact on a possible shift in American foreign policy in the Middle East leaves something to be desired.

It is no secret that the policy statements from both President-Elect Obama concerning Israel and Palestine – especially Obama’s recognition of Jerusalem as the de facto capital of Israel – reinforces the status quo of American regional foreign policy at the expense of a more even-handed and democratic discourse that recognizes not only Israeli security rights, but Palestinian national and human rights as well.

In the course of his marvelous campaign President-Elect Obama made a concerted effort to directly reassure Jewish voters of his sensitivity to their concerns; in comparison, however, Muslims received no such consideration.

There is also the question of challenges to the legitimacy of the American Muslim identity itself. 

We remember that Obama campaign staff members removed Muslim women in hijab from a photograph with the candidate – an action that subsequently resulted in a public apology. However, the incident signaled to the Muslim community a "don’t-get-too-close-to-Muslims" policy that may carry over into the Obama administration as positions of power are assigned.

Added to these concerns is the ambivalence shown by the Obama campaign on the issue of war in Iraq and Afghanistan. 

President-Elect Obama’s endorsement of American military strikes inside Pakistan raises enormous anxiety and concern for Muslim advocates who seek to demilitarize our foreign policy and create non-violent approaches to building new and better relationships with Iran, Pakistan, Iraq, Somalia, and other majority-Muslim states on the current American military target list.

However, none of these concerns should dampen our hope and enthusiasm at this moment of monumental political change in America. But the realpolitik of our position requires clear vision, sound policy analysis, and above all, continuous Muslim political mobilization and coalition-building work to assure that a progressive Muslim-American agenda is not subsumed, or even lost, in the mix of regime change in Washington.

So let’s congratulate President-Elect Obama for his extraordinary victory, and let’s share in the happiness that most of the world is feeling.

But as Muslims, let us also continue to strategize and organize, not only for our own community, but for an even more progressive vision of real peace and a better future for all of America - and all of humanity.   

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MAS Freedom (MASF) is a civic and human rights advocacy entity and sister organization of the Muslim American Society (MAS), the largest Muslim, grassroots, charitable, religious, social, cultural, civic and educational organization in America – with 55 chapters in 35 states. Learn more here. To donate click here.

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 Saddam’s Weapons Bluff Aimed at Iran - FBI Reports

http://www.aawsat.com/english/news.asp?section=1&id=17268

02/07/2009

WASHINGTON,(Reuters) - Saddam Hussein believed Iran was a significant threat to Iraq and left open the possibility that he had weapons of mass destruction rather than appear vulnerable, according to declassified FBI documents on interrogations of the former Iraqi leader.

"Hussein believed that Iraq could not appear weak to its enemies, especially Iran," FBI special agent George Piro wrote on notes of a conversation with Saddam in June 2004 about weapons of mass destruction.

He believed Iraq was being threatened by others in the region and must appear able to defend itself, the report said.

The FBI reports, released on Wednesday, said Saddam asserted that he was more concerned about Iran discovering Iraq’s weaknesses and vulnerabilities than the repercussions of the United States for blocking the return of UN weapons inspectors who were searching for WMD.

"In his opinion, the UN inspectors would have directly identified to the Iranians where to inflict maximum damage to Iraq," according to the documents obtained and released by the National Security Archive, a nongovernmental research institute.

Saddam began a bloody border war with Iran in 1980 that lasted until 1988, during which Iraq used chemical weapons.

Former U.S. President George W. Bush launched the Iraq war in 2003, citing a threat of weapons of mass destruction from Saddam’s government, but no such weapons were ever found.

FBI special agents carried out 20 formal interviews and at least five "casual conversations" with the former Iraqi leader after his capture by U.S. troops in December 2003, according to the documents.

Saddam, identified as "High Value Detainee #1," shared Bush’s hostility towards the "fanatic" Iranian mullahs, according to the FBI records of conversations from February through June 2004 between Saddam and Arabic-speaking agents in his detention cell at Baghdad International Airport.

Saddam also denied any connections to al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, who he called a "zealot," and cited North Korea as his most likely ally in a crunch, according to the documents.

He also takes personal responsibility for ordering the launching of SCUD missiles against Israeli targets during the 1991 Persian Gulf War, because he blamed Israel and its influence in the United States for "all the problems of the Arabs," the reports said.

During the interviews, Saddam rejects some examples of what he viewed as myths, like his purported use of body doubles. According to the notes, Saddam said he could recall using the telephone only twice since March 1990 and that he communicated primarily through couriers.

Saddam was executed in December 2006 after being convicted of crimes against humanity by an Iraqi court for the killing of 148 Shi’ite men and boys following a 1982 assassination attempt.

Date Posted: Tuesday, November 04, 2008

Once Bush backers, Muslims today are staunch Democrats. But both Obama and McCain shun them.

PENNSYLVANIA (The Guardian) Nov. 3, 2008 – Marc Maron finds American Muslims unhappy with the abuse their religion is receiving in this presidential campaign link to this video.

American Muslims have been called the "outcasts" of this presidential election. Muslims themselves have told the media that Islam is being treated as "political leprosy", a "scarlet letter", or the "kiss of death". In Pittsburgh, a city with a large Muslim population, the Guardian team heard sentiments like these when we attended a lecture by the writer and political analyst Raeed Tayeh titled Are Americans Obsessed with Islam?, followed by a panel discussion involving local community leaders and advocates.

One of the few comprehensive surveys (pdf) of Muslim voters in the United States was produced two years ago by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR). While they are a diverse community, American Muslims overall tend to be young, well educated, professional, middle-class, and family-oriented, and differ in their degree of religious observance. Muslims are also somewhat more likely than Americans in general to vote regularly, fly the US flag and do volunteer work.

Most importantly for this election, CAIR’s demographic research found that American Muslims were concentrated in 12 states, including the battleground states of Pennsylvania, Ohio, Florida, Virginia, and Michigan, where they ran from about 3 to 7% of the population. In the survey, 42% of respondents said they were Democrats and just 17% identified themselves as Republicans, while 28% said they did not belong to a political party. This reflects a dramatic turnaround in the past decade: in 2000, George Bush won an astonishing 72% of the Muslim vote, based on some combination of his social and fiscal conservatism, perceived openness on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and deliberate outreach to the Muslim community. By 2004, with the "war on terror" and the war in Iraq under way and civil liberties in a shambles, the numbers were more than reversed, with some 90% of Muslim voters choosing Kerry.

This year, it appears that Barack Obama can count on a substantial majority of Muslim votes. To begin with, many Muslims in the United States are African American. Those who trace their roots to the Middle East, Asia, and elsewhere like Obama’s record of opposition to the Iraq war and believe he can be better trusted on civil liberties and immigration issues. While some will vote for him enthusiastically, others will do so despite feeling alienated and betrayed by what they see as Obama’s eagerness to escape being "branded" a Muslim (which 12% of Americans apparently still believe he is).

The accusations have been both vicious and absurd: emails and robocalls have declared that Obama attended a fundamentalist madrassah, that he will take the oath of office on the Qur’an, that he is a Manchurian candidate for a worldwide terrorist jihad. In his responses, Obama has often failed to denounce the underlying racism inherent in these attacks, and has done little to dispel the overarching sense that Islam itself is a stigma from which he must distance himself. "I’m not and never have been of the Muslim faith," he said in one interview, as if he were answering to some sort of un-Christian activities committee.

Imam Mahdi Bray expressed this feeling of betrayal at the Pittsburgh forum. "No Muslim wants to be sacrificed at the altar of political expediency. I think Barack Obama has practiced that. I think that for his own candidacy that Obama has kind of thrown us under the bus."

On the other side, however, is John McCain, whose campaign, as one Muslim writer put it, has from the start "conflated the terms ‘Islamic’ with ‘terrorism’ and ‘radical extremism’." He points to the DVD distributed to tens of thousands of voters in swing states, called "Obsession: Radical Islam’s War on the West," with scenes of Muslims "flying planes into buildings, bombing people, burning American flags and screaming with homicidal rage. Although the video dutifully offered a disclaimer that most Muslims are not fanatics, its horrific images and sinister music conveyed an emotional message about Muslims that was unmistakable."

http://www.masnet.org/views.asp?id=5228

THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN BUSH AND OBAMA ON ISLAM

GAFFNEY: America’s first Muslim president? - Washington Times