While watching the news and the press conference of Ruslan
Tsarni, the uncle of the Boston Marathon bombers, I am reminded of a
conversation I had with a lady at the local laundromat yesterday. As many of you might already know, I live in
an area where we are an interesting mix of people – Greek, Korean, Russian,
Polish, Ukrainian, Spanish, African American, along with just about every
Middle Eastern country is represented here as well as Americans. This lady and I find ourselves meeting up at
this laundromat fairly regularly and have become warm acquaintances. She is clearly American with no accent
hinting at any other birthplace. She was
wearing a traditional hijab so is also clearly Muslim. Her blonde, curly mop haired, hazel-eyed
freckled daughter laughed, played and ran around while we did our chores and
chatted amiably.
As we watched the latest news on the Marathon bombing, she
mused out loud how she took small comfort in that no terrorist ties to Islam
seemed to be being made. She feared that
if a connection was made then ALL Muslims would be blamed and made suspect yet
again. She looked at me a bit fearfully
to see my reaction. I assured her that
as someone who survived and witnessed two terrorist attacks in NYC I wasn’t ‘one
of those’ that thought all Muslims were radical jihadists. Her relieved smile underscored to me how
terribly many Americans must treat her and others in her community.
She opened up a bit and said that although she wasn’t born
here, her family came to America from Syria when she was two and all her
brothers and sisters were born here. Her
father worked hard as did her mother and embraced America as their new
home. They are as fearful, ashamed and
angry at those in her community who embrace radicalism as any of us.
As I watch the news this morning and hear the conjecture
that these young men who perpetrated this horrific crime were Muslims from Chechnya,
I wonder if this fear anger and persecution of Muslims will spread and include
the Russian community. Ruslan Tsarni’s
anger at his nephews was clear. His fear
that he, his family and friends would be subjected to such persecution and
suspicion was also clear. He defended
his estranged brother (the suspects’ father) by saying that if the boys were
radicalized, they were radicalized here and not something that was observed
before 2005 when the uncle last saw them.
Now the conjecture has begun that there are Islamic terrorist
ties to this horrific event. Conjecture
that somewhere along the line these boys were ‘radicalized’ in recent
years. This may be true and might even
be likely, but it doesn’t mean that every Muslim is out to blow up
Americans. I can tell you in no uncertain
terms, that is not my experience. After
the 1993 Bombing, 9/11 and the Boston Marathon I have watched the members of
the Muslim community here look around them in fear. I have watched its leaders speak until they
were blue in the face about how Islam reviles such actions and that it is not
what the Islamic Community stands for.
I understand that our communities may always stand apart
because of cultural and religious differences; it does not mean that we stand
against one another. I beg you… do not
stand against the Islamic community because of this. If anything you’ll miss out on the most beatific
smiles I have ever encountered when showing kindness and acceptance.
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