Source: The New York Times
Ahmad Alsalkhadi, an immigrant from Jordan, has never had a run-in with the police, but he works in a section of Astoria, Queens, that has come under police surveillance in the years after the Sept. 11 attacks because of the concentration of Muslim-owned businesses.
Mr. Alsalkhadi, 39, a butcher at Al-Noor Halal Meat & Groceries on Steinway Street, and others who work in or frequent a bustling area known as Little Egypt or Little Morocco — depending on whom one asks — chafe at what they see as unequal treatment at the hands of the police because of their religion and ethnicity.
“We do not want to feel we are being marginalized because we want to be part of the bigger community and assimilate,” said Mr. Alsalkhadi, who spoke in Arabic through a translator. “We live in this country, and we are part of this country, and we are citizens.”
Mr. Alsalkhadi said that there was so much mistrust of the police and government authority among some Muslims that when he went to apply for a state driver’s license two months ago, he was advised not to say he was Muslim or he might not get a license. (He received the license and was not asked about his religion, he said.)
At Little Morocco, a restaurant on Steinway Street known for its couscous, Mustapha Ennaji, 27, a counter worker, said that he respected other people regardless of their religion, ethnicity, race or nationality and that he wanted to be respected in return.
“For me personally, I care about peace and mutual respect, so obviously I was not happy about what was going on before,” Mr. Ennaji said in Arabic of the police surveillance.
Youssef Immas, 27, a college student and part-time store driver who ate a meatball sandwich at the counter, said that while he had never been harassed by the police, he had seen stories of harassment shared on Facebook and other social media.
Categories: America, Islamophobia, Terrorism, The Muslim Times, USA