WASHINGTON— Accusations of religious bigotry and politically correct “hysteria” framed an emotional congressional hearing Thursday over the threat posed by American Muslims plotting terror attacks against their homeland.
Rep. Keith Ellison, the first Muslim-American elected to Congress, wept during testimony in which he accused Republicans of demonizing the entire Muslim community in the U.S. over the actions of an extremist few.
“When you assign their violent actions to the entire community, you assign collective blame to a whole group,” Ellison told the House Committee on Homeland Security. “This is the very heart of stereotyping and scapegoating.”
Ellison’s tearful appeal for tolerance stood in stark contrast to testimony from several witnesses who warned Congress the Muslim community within the U.S. is being radicalized by extremist imams and the Internet teachings of distant clerics like Anwar al-Awlaki.
“We are losing American babies. Our children are in danger. This country must stand up and do something about the problem,” said Melvin Bledsoe, whose son Carlos — a Muslim convert known now as Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad — is accused of killing a U.S. soldier at an Arkansas military recruitment centre in 2009. “Tomorrow it could be your son, your daughter . . . We must stop these extremist invaders from raping the minds of American citizens.”
The sharply divergent viewpoints underscored the tension and division within U.S. society that remains almost a decade after the 9/11 terror attacks.
Moreover, the hearing highlighted the extreme sensitivity over how to combat homegrown terrorism, a threat the Obama administration says ranks higher than the danger of another major attack from overseas.
Rep. Peter King, the committee’s Republican chairman, opened the hearings into the “extent of radicalization in the American Muslim community” over the objection of Muslim groups and civil libertarians.
Since announcing plans for the hearings last December, King has been likened to Senator Joe McCarthy, the Cold War communist hunter, and faced threats from overseas that have required extra personal security.
In his opening statement at the hearing, King accused his critics of flying into“paroxysms of rage and hysteria” and said they were “living in denial” about radical activity within the U.S. Muslim population, estimated at between two and five million.
“Despite what passes for conventional wisdom in certain circles, there is nothing radical or un-American in holding these hearings,” King said.
The New York congressman cited the 2009 Fort Hood shootings and last year’s failed Times Square bombing as clear evidence of the heightened risk posed by American Muslims driven to violence by radical teachings.
Nidal Hasan, the army psychiatrist accused of killing 13 in the Fort Hood attacks, was born in Virginia.
Faisal Shahzad, who has been convicted of the Manhattan car bomb plot, was a naturalized American citizen born in Pakistan.
King called several witnesses who support his view that America’s Muslim organizations have not done enough to battle extremism in the community.
One witness, Virginia Republican congressman Frank Wolf, cited an instance in California where a branch of the Council on American-Islamic Relations put up posters advising Muslims to:“Build a wall of resistance. Don’t talk to the FBI.”
Bledsoe told the panel how his son, once a“happy-go-lucky kid,” converted to Islam and became radicalized after leaving for college in Nashville in 2003. Falling under the influence of a Nashville imam, Carlos Bledsoe then travelled to Yemen before he returned to the U.S. and allegedly carried out his attack in Little Rock.
“Let me also state clearly that it is a problem that we can only solve. Christians, Jews, non-Muslims cannot solve Muslim radicalization,” said Zuhdi Jasser, a Muslim who founded a group called the American Islamic Forum for Democracy. “We can close our eyes and pretend it doesn’t exist. Wecan call everybody a bigot or Islamophobic to even talk about it. But you’re not going to solve the problem, and the problem is increasing exponentially.”
Other witnesses, though, said any congressional examination of homegrown terrorism in the U.S. must also investigate white supremacists and other extremist groups.
Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca cited Congressional Research Service statistics showing there had been 77 terror plots by“domestic non-Muslim perpetrators since 9/11.” By comparison, he said there had been 41 plots by domestic and international Muslim conspirators.
“Evidence clearly indicates a general rise of violent extremism across ideologies,” Baca said.
He also disputed claims the Muslim community is turning a blind eye to radical activities, citing news reports that tips from Muslim Americans helped disrupt seven of last 10 plots in the U.S.
But it was Ellison, a Minnesota Democrat, who provided the hearing’s drama.
At the end of his testimony, Ellison recounted the story of 23-year-old Mohammed Salman Hamdani, a New York paramedic who died after rushing to aid victims at World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001.
Though he is now recognized as a hero, there were initially unfounded rumours about whether Hamdani was somehow part of the al-Qaida plot.
“Mohammed Salman Hamdani was a fellow American who gave his life for other Americans,” Ellison said, his voice quavering. “His life should not be identified as just a member of an ethnic group or just a member of a religion, but as an American who gave everything for his fellow Americans.”
Postmedia News
Комментариев нет:
Отправить комментарий