Continued From page 8
Some critics on social media
portrayed Obama Feb. 3 as a
hypocrite.
Muslim American leaders
have been pushing for years for
Obama to visit a mosque
because they feel their commu-
nity has been defined, and stig-
matized, since the Sept. 11,
2001, attacks by images of
Muslims related to terrorism,
including those from the attacks
in Paris and San Bernardino and
Islamic State militants. The
expression experts often use is
that Muslims are stuck in front
of a “security lens.”
That’s why the visit Feb. 3 at
the large Islamic Society of
Baltimore was being watched
closely by Muslims eager for a
rebranding.
A new poll outWednesday by
the Pew Research Center shows
that the overwhelming majority
of Americans - 68 percent - see
the problem of religious vio-
lence as really being about “vio-
lent people using religion to jus-
tify their actions,” compared
with 22 percent who say some
religious teachings promote vio-
lence. However, for those who
said some religions promote
violence, Islam was by far the
most common religion named,
with 14 percent of respondents.
Aside from the fact that presi-
dents don’t often visit houses of
worship outside their own
church time, the optics of a
mosque visit by this president
have been been particularly dif-
ficult to navigate for a president
who is believed to be Muslim by
about one-third of Americans,
according to some polls. (He’s
Christian.) TheWhite House has
been talking about this trip
since last fall, said spokes-
woman Jen Psaki. That was
about the time Republican can-
didates began ramping up com-
ments about Muslims that set
off Islamophobic rhetoric.
“We discussed this as an
option of something powerful
the president could do to speak
directly to Muslim Americans,”
she told TheWashington Post on
Tuesday. The rhetoric, she said,
“has really impacted him on a
personal level in terms of how
damaging he feels it is to this
entire community.”
Among those outside the
mosque Feb. 3 was Hasiynah
Mohammed, who had driven
with her husband and four chil-
dren from Philadelphia in hopes
of getting in. Without a ticket,
that didn’t happen. “We’re disap-
pointed, but we’re still excited.”
Mohammed noted that
Obama had chosen an immi-
grant-founded mosque and said
it would have been better to
pick one with a stronger African
American presence, to highlight
a segment of the Muslim com-
munity that has been here for
many generations. She also
wished the visit had come earli-
er in his presidency. “It’s a little,
no, it’s a LOT late.”
Obama’s visit is likely to be
compared with a landmark
speech to the Islamic world
early in his presidency. At Cairo
University, Obama in 2009
called for a “new beginning”
between the Islamic world and
the United States, noting shared
interests on issues such as
extremism but also acknowledg-
ing mistakes made over cen-
turies by all societies in the
name of culture and faith.
Asked why it took seven years
to organize a U.S. mosque
event, Psaki said that “was a
hard question to answer” and
was more about logistics than
politics. Many political
observers of both parties, how-
ever, believe Obama was unable
to make the visit before because
of the intense anger and fear
around Islamist extremism.
Some pointed out that the
visit could be politically benefi-
cial to Democrats (from Obama
to 2016 candidates) who can
contrast Obama’s comments
with the GOP on the issue of
Islam. GOP candidates in recent
months have talked about
excluding Muslimmigrants
from other countries and creat-
ing an official preference for
Christians.
Among those who attended
the pre-speech roundtable were
Ibtihaj Muhammad, a member
of the U.S. fencing team who
will be the first Olympian to
compete in a hijab if she makes
it into the 2016 games in Rio;
Rami Nashashibi, an artist who
directs the Inner-City Muslim
Action Network and runs a
holistic health center; Imam
Khalid Latif, chaplain of the
Islamic Center at NewYork
University; Khadija Gurnah,
who founded a project for
young Muslims; and Suzanne
Barakat, a San Francisco doctor
whose brother and sister-in-law
were killed in the 2015 Chapel
Hill killings.
Asked Feb. 2 whether the
president was intending to
encourage Muslims to be more
active in helping police catch
radicals, White House
spokesman Josh Earnest
emphasized to reporters that
the point of the visit is to bring
up other topics. And to show
support for Muslim Americans.
“Look, I also don’t want to
leave you with the impression
that the president’s remarks at
the mosque are going to be
focused on national security,”
Earnest said. “I think the presi-
dent is quite interested in mak-
ing sure that we’re affirming the
important role that Muslims
play in our diverse American
society, and certainly affirming
their right to worship God in a
way that’s consistent with their
heritage.”
Obama did speak Feb. 3
about Islamist violence, saying
Muslims need to play a key role
in how their faith is presented.
“It is undeniable that a small
fraction of Muslims are pro-
pogating a perverted version of
Islam. This is the truth,” he said.
Federal prosecutors have
charged 77 men and women
around the country in connec-
tion with the Islamic State. So
far, 22 have been convicted. The
FBI says that, in a handful of
cases, it has disrupted plots tar-
geting U.S. military or law
enforcement personnel.
Since the visit was
announced Saturday, Muslim
Americans have been discussing
the purpose of the visit, the
location and the different per-
spectives that the small,
extremely diverse Muslim com-
munity has on everything from
politics to theology.
The event brought to the fore
day-to-day conversations
among today’s Muslim
Americans.
Those include the estrange-
ment many young Muslims feel
from the institution of the
mosque, and the issue of
women’s roles in mosque lead-
ership and worship.
The Islamic Society is pro-
gressive in its pursuit but typi-
cally conservative in that men
and women sit separately, with
men in the primary sanctuary
space. Photos of women who
participated in the event with
the president showed only
women whose heads were cov-
ered. According to Pew, about 36
percent of Muslim American
women wear hijabs when they
are in public.
According to The Baltimore
Sun, the Islamic Society’s cam-
pus on Johnnycake Road in
Catonsville houses a mosque, a
school and a seminary, as well
as a Girl Scout troop and an ath-
letic club. It was founded in
1969 by three doctors and now
has about 3,000 congregants,
the Sun reported Tuesday. This
week, its leaders were rushing to
get their facilities ready for the
presidential visit.
The community at the
Islamic Society of Baltimore is
diverse but consists predomi-
nantly of immigrants from
Pakistan, India and Bangladesh
and their families.
The society has its roots in
the small group that began
meeting on the Johns Hopkins
campus to pray, discuss scrip-
ture and study Arabic.
The Sun also noted that since
Saturday there has been a low
buzz about a former longtime
imam, Mohamed Adam El
Sheikh. In 2004, after he left the
Islamic Society, he was quoted
as saying that suicide bombings
might be acceptable in extreme
circumstances.
He told the Sun Feb. 2 that he
had spoken out “repeatedly”
since that time against religious
extremism and terrorism - a
view he expressed to the Sun in
1985, when he was an imam
there.
– TheWashington Post
Obama delivers
remarks at the Islamic
Society of Baltimore
mosque in Catonsville,
Maryland Feb. 3.
Cover Story
– that’s all you need to know
At Baltimore Mosque, Obama Encourages U.S. Muslims
Barack Obama, center, holds a
roundtable with Muslim American
community leaders at the Islamic
Society of Baltimore mosque in
Catonsville, Maryland Feb. 3.
9
News India Times February 12, 2016
