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Chronology of Islam in America (2012)
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali
June 2012 - Page Two
U.S. mosques active in interfaith and outreach activities
June 20; The second installment in a series of reports based on the US Mosques Survey 2011 released in Washington today indicates that Islamic houses of worship are "healthy and growing" and are engaged in a high level of educational, interfaith and outreach activities. A coalition of major American Muslim and academic organizations sponsored the comprehensive study of mosques and the attitudes of mosque leaders in the United States from which the latest report, titled was compiled. To conduct the survey, researchers counted all mosques in America and then conducted telephone interviews with a sample of mosque leaders.
* Full-time Islamic schools have experienced significant growth in the past decade.
* Almost two-thirds (63 percent) of mosques indicated that they have hosted an open house for their neighbors of other faiths in the past 12 months.
* The majority of mosques (70 percent) use only English for the main message of the khutbah (sermon).
* The vast majority (88 percent) of American mosque leaders say domestic abuse should be addressed.
* In terms of social services, mosques compare very well with other religious congregations. For example, surveys show that only 26 percent of congregations of other faith traditions are involved in providing some type of health program as compared to 45 percent of mosques. Only 29 percent of other religious congregations are involved in community organizing activities, while 47 percent of mosques are involved in these types of activities.
* A majority of mosque leaders (71 percent) agreed that their mosque is working for social justice. African American mosques are the most likely (87 percent) to be active in social justice.
* The role of the religious leader (Imam) is becoming more professionalized.
* The percentage of mosques unaffiliated with any national organization has increased significantly over the past few decades.
The , released earlier this year, showed that the number of American mosques increased 74 percent since 2000 and that Islamic houses of worship are ethnically-diverse institutions led by officials who advocate positive civic engagement. A third report on women in American mosques is forthcoming. The Hartford Institute for Religion Research (Hartford Seminary), the Association of Statisticians of American Religious Bodies (ASARB), the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the Islamic Society of North American (ISNA), the Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA), and the International Institute of Islamic Thought (IIIT). The U.S. Mosque Survey 2011 is part of a larger study of American congregations called , which is a project of Cooperative Congregational Studies Partnership, a multi-faith coalition of denominations and faith groups. [CAIR]
Apple Store Employees Refuse iPad Sale To Farsi Speakers
June 20: Apple Inc. (Nasdaq: AAPL) stirred controversy following reports that employees of Apple stores have refused to sell products to customers overheard speaking Farsi, the language of Iran, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) said in a statement today. "One woman, a U.S. citizen and University of Georgia student, said an Apple employee refused to sell her an iPad Thursday after hearing her and a relative talking," the CAIR statement said. "An Apple Store manager reportedly cited a policy prohibiting sales to Iran." "When we said 'Farsi, I'm from Iran,' he said, 'I just can't sell this to you. Our countries have bad relations'," the woman, Sahar Sabet, said according to the Atlanta Journal Constitution. The store's manager later showed a local TV channel a copy of Apple's policy, which prohibits the export, sale or supply of Apple products to Iran without explicit government approval. An Apple representative reportedly later apologized to Sabet and told her she could buy the iPad through the company's online store. Apple maintains 363 retail stores in 13 countries.
"Apple must revise its policies to ensure that customers do not face discriminatory treatment based on their religion, ethnicity or national origin. If the actions of these Apple employees reflected company policy, that policy must be changed and all employees retrained," CAIR national executive director Nihad Awad said. Awad noted that not selling embargoed items like iPads or laptops to Farsi speakers "would be like not selling the same items to Spanish speakers because they might be from Cuba."CAIR says it knows of at least one other case where customers have been refused service in Apple Stores because they spoke Farsi. [CAIR]
Enterprise Institute Embraces Islamophobia
June 21: The American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research (AEI) is one of the nation’s oldest and most influential conservative think tanks. It is a bastion of Republican values and has, since its founding in 1943, had its finger on the pulse of mainstream issues that have united the GOP. A number of U.S. presidents and presidential candidates have relied on the work of its scholars, and its board reads like a Who’s Who of red-state leaders. But recently the AEI took a broad step to the right and firmly planted its feet on the other side of the line that divides the sensible Republican Party from fringe extremists. It announced that its resident scholar Michael Rubin would join blogger Robert Spencer, who is a vitriolic critic of Islam, and writer Claire Berlinski to lead a 10-day tour of Turkey. The excursion (whose participants must cough up more than $4,500 each) is being organized by the David Horowitz Freedom Center, a right-wing activist group named for its founder, who in addition to being Spencer’s sugar daddy (Horowitz funds Spencer’s blog Jihad Watch and publishes his articles on FrontPage Magazine) has led campaigns against the Muslim Student Association and said such things as Islam is a religion of hate and Palestinians are “morally sick.” [Nathan Lean -Truth Dig]
Anti-Muslim activist barred from speaking at Jewish Federation headquarters
June 25: The Jewish Federation of Greater Los Angeles barred anti-Muslim activist Pamela Geller from delivering a previously scheduled speech at its Wilshire Boulevard headquarters on Sunday, June 24. Geller, who is Jewish, had been set to address the Western Region of the Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) with a speech titled “Islamic Jew Hatred: The Root Cause of the Failure to Achieve Peace.” The Sunday morning event, announced in early June, was abruptly canceled just hours before it was to take place. The event was later moved to another location, the Mark in Pico-Robertson. According to ZOA National Vice Chairman Steven Goldberg, who said he spoke with Los Angeles’ Federation President Jay Sanderson early Sunday morning, the reason for the cancelation was fear that local Muslim groups might protest outside the building. A statement from a coalition of Muslim, Christian and Jewish groups condemning Federation for hosting the event was circulated via email on Saturday afternoon. A second statement, commending Federation for the cancellation of the event, was circulated by the same group on Sunday morning. Geller, who blogs at AltasShrugs.com, is known for her strident criticism of all things Muslim. She first gained national prominence in 2010 when she led opposition to a proposed Islamic cultural center in Lower Manhattan, and she has since supported efforts in other cities to oppose mosque construction. She told the New York Times in 2010 that she does not believe in the existence of a “moderate” Islam, and that “a moderate Muslim is a secular Muslim.” Stop the Islamization of America (SOIA), a group co-founded by Geller in 2010, has been branded a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center. Oren Segal, the director of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) Center on Extremism, said in an interview on Friday that while his group and others have concerns about radical Muslim individuals and groups, Geller goes further, to the point of xenophobia. “The difference between [Geller and] legitimate criticism about the very serious threat of radical Islam,” Segal said, “is that she vilifies the entire Islamic faith by making assertions that there are conspiracies against American values inherent in Islam.” [Jewish Journal]
Apple stores refuse Ipad sale to Farsi speakers
June 28: An American born woman with Iranian parents was barred from buying an Apple iPad in a US store after one of the Apple salespeople heard her speaking in Farsi, the Iranian language.The salesperson cited the US ban on exports of high technology goods to Iran. According to media reports, Sahar Sabet, 19, an American citizen was discussing in Farsi language with his uncle the purchase in the Apple store in Atlanta, Georgia when she was overheard by a salesperson, who asked what language she was speaking. Upon being told it was the Iranian language, the salesman then said that he could not sell her the iPad due to the US embargo on Iran. The store management backed the salesman's decision. Apple's head office suggested that she make the purchase online to avoid dealing with sales staff. She called Atlanta's television news station to complain about her treatment, and has sparked a debate about whether a technology company can sell goods to a US citizen who just happens to have an Iranian relative. Apple is not banned from selling items to American-Iranian citizens, but could be held liable if it is found to have sold prohibited items knowing that they were to be exported to a sanctioned country. Apple itself says that it does not discriminate against customers, while activists have protested outside several branches against presumed racial profiling by staff. In a statement, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) said that it agreed with those who noted that not selling embargoed merchandise to Farsi speakers would be like not selling the same items to Spanish speakers because they might be from Cuba or Korean speakers because they might be from North Korea. An Apple representative reportedly later apologized to Sabet and told her she could buy the iPad through the company's online store. Apple maintains 363 retail stores in 13 countries. "Apple must revise its policies to ensure that customers do not face discriminatory treatment based on their religion, ethnicity or national origin. If the actions of these Apple employees reflected company policy, that policy must be changed and all employees retrained," CAIR national executive director Nihad Awad said. CAIR says it knows of at least one other case where customers have been refused service in Apple Stores because they spoke Farsi. In that case, the individual in question was an Iranian student in the U.S. on a student visa, according to a note on Export Law Blog. However, "you can't sell anything to an Iranian in the United States if you have any reason to believe that the item might be exported back to Iran by the purchaser." Moreover, deemed export laws may prohibit the transfer of technology to Iranian citizens regardless of their visa status. But, Export Law Blog noted, because of an oddity of deemed export law, iPads, iPhones and MacBooks are not among those items. A coalition of civil advocacy orgainzations, which includes the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Georgia, Iranian American Bar Association, Council on American-Islamic Relations and National Iranian American Council, sent an open letter to Apple CEO Tim Cook requesting that the company make public its nondiscrimination policy, retrain its employees on export control regulations and investigate the alleged incidents. [AMP Report]
SEAL training range won't show Muslim woman, Quran as target
June 30: The Navy will not use a target depicting a Muslim woman holding a gun at a new training range for SEALs in Virginia Beach.The announcement came hours after the Council on American-Islamic Relations asked the Pentagon to remove the target. A picture of the cardboard target,which shows a woman in a headscarf holding a pistol, was published in The Virginian-Pilot on Tuesday. The image shows verses of the Quran hanging on the wall behind the woman, which also generated criticism from the group. Nihad Awad, executive director of the Washington-based council, said in the letter to Defense Secretary Leon Panetta dated Friday that the target "is offensive and sends a negative and counterproductive message to trainees and to the Muslim-majority nations to which they may be deployed." Last night, Lt. David Lloyd, a spokesman for Naval Special Warfare Group 2, said the materials in question would not be used on the close quarters combat training range, which was dedicated Monday at Joint Expeditionary Base Fort Story. "We have removed this particular target and Arabic writing in question from the range in the near term, and will explore other options for future training," Lloyd said.Ibrahim Hooper, a spokesman for the CAIR, said it's important that military units not be trained to see Muslims as enemies, even if they are fighting in Afghanistan or other Muslim-majority nations. "There are all kinds of people all over the world trying to do us harm. Why would you use this particular image in training people how to kill?" Hooper asked. "It creates the impression, we believe, in subtle and not-so-subtle ways, that you should view Muslim women in headscarves with hostility and suspicion." The council also spoke out in recent months against an instructor at the Joint Forces Staff College in Norfolk who taught a course on Islamic radicalism that referred to the war on terror as a war against Islam. The course was halted after a military officer who was a student complained. The instructor, an Army officer, was relieved of his teaching duties. A broader review of training across the military related to Islam found no other problems. [The Virginian-Pilot ]
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