(Photo: Flickr/imekinox)

“We made from water every living thing.” (Qur’an 21:30)

It’s a source of life, a means for purity, and a piece of heaven on earth.

Throughout the Qur’an, Allah refers to water on numerous occasions (the exact word for “water” is mentioned over 60 times). The Qur’anic verse above powerfully states an important feature of water that all humans have come to acknowledge: water is a necessity for life.

For Muslims, water holds additional and special meanings. Water plays an important role in purifying believers as it is used for making wudhu, or ablutions. And if you ask a Muslim to describe paradise (according to what they learned from the Qur’an and hadith), many would recall the descriptions of rivers flowing and springs gushing forth endlessly from the gardens of heaven.

Now back on earth (where things do have an end). Those of us living in First World countries won’t really ponder too much on where our water comes from or how much there is to go around. We believe that as long as the water bills are paid, our faucets will continue to provide us with this basic necessity at our demand.

Though this is one of the perks of having a First World lifestyle, our lack of understanding on current water-related issues blinds us to the reality of those living in other parts of the world. Almost a billion people on earth don’t have access to clean drinking water. While water is just a turn of a faucet away from us, some women in developing countries have to walk an average of 3.7 miles a day to attain water.

You may argue that water is a resource that is plentiful. After all, about 70% of our planet is made of water! But the earth has only about 3% of freshwater to sustain all living things that depend on it.

True, water is considered a “renewable” resource. But renewable resources can only naturally regenerate if their capacity to do so is not irreversibly impaired. Lo and behold, humans have played a large role in our own destruction through polluting water sources and overpumping water faster than it can be replenished.

Don’t be fooled into thinking that these water issues are not to be found in our country, or even in our neighborhood. Perhaps this will be news to many: California is experiencing a water crisis that will make it difficult for current water supplies to meet our growing demand. Just to sustain the large and growing population in Los Angeles, water is exported from places like the Owens Valley, which once used to be a thriving agricultural community.

Islam teaches us to not hoard waters from others, to not pollute and spread other forms of corruption on earth, and to also not indulge in wastefulness and extravagance. Let’s not fool ourselves into thinking that we have unlimited resources we can waste away. That is not how a Muslim is taught to live on this earth.

Photo of a rally against the "Ground Zero Mosque". (Flickr/asterix611)

The Question: Is Islamophobia a good thing for Muslims?

The Answer: “yes-no”

Every coin has two faces, every spectrum two ends, and every argument two sides. This lingering question is no different.

Islamophobia quite literally (and linguistically) is a fear of Islam and Muslims; albeit, an intense, irrational fear of Islam and Muslims. Some Muslims hold that Islamophobia is a good thing. Why? How could fear of Islam benefit Islam?

People tend to naturally fear what they do not know, so to overcome that fear they have to face it, explore it, learn more about it––in this case, people that fear Islam have to explore Islam, but why should they?

Because as natural as it is to have fear, it’s just as natural, if not more, to want to overcome it. No one wants to be scared of anything, and that desire can inspire a person to learn about his/her fear so that he/she can address it. This could explain why at the height of Islamophobia post 9/11, people continued to convert to Islam after learning more about this faith.

Going back to fear, some Muslims also believe that Islamophobia provides a ‘psychological venue’ or, more simply, an opportunity to speak to and inform people about our faith. Why?

Because when you’re scared of spiders, you’re just that: scared of spiders. You’re not afraid of talking about spiders or taking a zoology class that covers arachnids. In fact, you may be (for some odd reason) more inclined to jump in on conversations about spiders, when they come up.

Similarly, Islamophobes are willing to talk, argue, or learn about Islam when given the opportunity. And that willingness gives Muslims an opportunity to explain, clarify and teach our faith.

Other Muslims don’t really see it as a good thing because they believe Islamophobia as we know it today is no longer “Islamophobia”. It is no longer just a fear of Islam, it has become a loathing of it. And the masses, for the most part, have been manipulated, their fear turned to hate by a small, powerful group with an evil agenda (but let’s not delve into that).

Human nature does allow for fear, but it’s human weakness that allows fear to morph into hate. Islamophobia as a fear of Islam may very well be a good thing, but Islamophobia as a hatred of Islam, not so much.

As for those people that are still true Islamphobes (only fearful but not hateful), they may still be inclined to learn about Islam. Under normal circumstances that’s not a bad thing at all, but once you throw Google into the mix, it certainly can be. Virtually everyone that may want to learn about Islam at some point consults Sheikh Google, and this “Sheikh,” for someone that doesn’t know any better, really does suck.

There are numerous anti-Muslim sites on the web and that’s a definite no-no for someone who doesn’t know much about our deen. And of the few legitimate sites on the web, only a few are completely reliable and accurate.

Islamophobia is a good thing. It has the potential to encourage people to explore Islam for themselves and it has the potential to encourage Muslims to do a better job in demonstrating the true essence of their faith.

Islamophobia is a bad thing. It has the potential to cultivate aggressive hate, and it has the potential to lead people to despicable, fallacious, crooked websites that misrepresent the religion to a degree unheard of.

As a Muslim, I like to think of the glass as half-full, not half-empty. So, Islamophobia to me is favorable but that doesn’t mean I refuse to acknowledge it’s capacity to be unfavorable.

If anything, it should be a wake-up call for us, to address the concerns people have about Islam before they become haters and before they start hitting up the wrong sources that may continue to mislead them.

(Flickr/ Arndt Nallau)

I was having a hard time tearing my attention away from his words, spoken in a soothing  tone, in order to take notes on his answers. But how else would I capture his wise thoughts?

I was volunteering at L.A.’s Green Festival when I spotted this older man dressed in traditional Native American clothes.  I noticed him lingering after the conclusion of a lecture so I decided to approach him to discuss his culture’s relationship with the environment.

He introduced himself to me as Daniel, but also offered his other name, Eagle. I noticed him holding a wooden staff with a carved eagle, reassuring me of his commitment to his identity.

“We are one with all, we do not stand apart,” he started as he explained his people’s strong connection with the environment. They saw themselves as caretakers of all the elements –the wind, air, water, fire.

Gesturing to the large number of attendees at the festival, I asked him what he would advise to those who wish to tackle our current environmental issues. Where should they begin?

“Go within. The balance of life lies within,” Eagle stated simply. His words encouraged me to contemplate the state God created us in. God informs us in the Qur’an of the balance He established and asked us to maintain (Surah ar-Rahman, verses 7-9).

“Don’t discover who you are, remember who you are,” Eagle emphasized as I continued to reflect on God’s creation of mankind’s spirit.

For if we are able to look beyond the distractions and pressures our society imposes on us from all sides, we may find ourselves ready to embrace a more  moderate and balanced life. A life not governed by consumerism and wastefulness. A life not filled with dissatisfaction and discontent.  A life that breathes with the earth, not against it.

To my pleasant surprise, Eagle turned out to be a UCLA alumnus. So before we parted, he gave me a final message to share with my fellow bruins:

“The bear spirit walks with you. Know that though it seems slow,  it is quick. It is strong.
The bear knows how to live at one with this world.”

XVI | XVII | XVIII

Salmon Hossein on his first visit to Afghanistan earlier this year.

Al-Talib interviews Salmon Hossein on his experience growing up as an Afghan American post 9/11. Hossein is a recent UCLA graduate who is now pursuing a Masters of Public Policy at Harvard University.

A-T: Describe that day in 2001. What was it like, what do you remember?

Hossein: I remember, just that summer we had moved from Northern California where I was born and raised my entire life to Southern California.

That morning I happened to wake up a little earlier, and I’m sitting down in front of the TV and there’s smoke billowing from one of the Twin Towers so I’m like “Mom! Mom! Come look at this!” So while we’re watching the broadcast and while I’m eating my breakfast, the second plane hits and that’s when we knew like ok, something serious is happening here. I just remember that morning so vividly.

A-T: How do you think it impacted you growing up?

Hossein: In terms of national history, it’s probably one of, if not the most important thing that happened to me, more than the war in Afghanistan, because I was ridiculed a lot when I went to school.

It was my second day at school and the kids barely knew me to begin with. And on top of that, I happened to be an Afghan-American. So they kept calling me “Afghanistan” to a point where I didn’t think they even knew my name.

It affected me on multiple fronts because I was Muslim, and Islam was being attacked. I was Afghan, and Afghanistan was the first country that was invaded. And lastly, my last name is Hossein. So as if being Muslim and Afghan wasn’t enough, I happen to have the same last name as Iraq’s dictator. I was like the living, walking, talking Axis of Evil in one.

And it really hurt me because I didn’t know how to respond to it, I was only in 8^th grade. I went through an identity crisis. I would actually try reasoning with them “I was born and raised in California, I don’t know any of them” or “that’s not what I believe. If I believed any of it I wouldn’t be living here.”

Soon enough I realized these people weren’t listening and they were just making more fun of me. And that’s when I started to develop a sense of humor and try to mentally take what they say lightly. It almost changed my personality. Before that I was this geeky nerd and after that I realized I could use humor and personal relationships with people.

A-T: How about today, do you think 9/11 influenced your interaction with non-Muslims?

Hossein: Today I think I’m very aware of my interactions with non-Muslims, especially if they know my faith. If I’m one of the only Muslims they know, I have to put on a good show and represent Islam to them. Not put on a show as in be fake, but if I’m this temperamental, angry guy, I fit into the media stereotypes that are hammered into them every day.

But if I’m this guy that’s working for social justice, devoting my life to public service, or I’m friendly with them, then I hope that they’ll take away that not all Muslims are like this, in fact, most are like Salmon.

A-T: What about your identity? How was that impacted?

Hossein: At first, I was so typecast as “the other,” “the minority,” “the Muslim,” that I fell prey to it, that when people asked me what I am I would say that I’m Afghan. But that changed over time because I realized that no, I’m American. I was born in California, raised in California, went to school in California, lived 23 years of my life in California and only this year did I spend five months in Afghanistan. So I’m as Californian and as American as the person next to me. That’s something I hadn’t come to terms with until recently.

A-T: You want to dedicate your life to fighting poverty and other social issues. Given the conflicts going on in Afghanistan even before 9/11, what led you to this path?

Hossein: Before 9/11 I cared a lot about Afghanistan because I had learned so much about what my parents had gone through for me to be in America today and how one small change in their escape story could have either meant death for them or them not ending up in America. And if they didn’t end up in America they wouldn’t have met each other and my sister and I wouldn’t be here today.

So because I understood how privileged we were I cared a lot about Afghanistan and the issue of poverty around the world.

But 9/11 made me look into the political and societal ramifications of being a Muslim. Before that, it was a very private faith for me. It was something we did in our family, behind closed doors amongst relatives and friends. It wasn’t something that I needed to talk about. But after 9/11 I realized I have to justify my faith and justify my beliefs. I had to defend it against people who were ignorant.

So it did influence me. Because of that bigotry, because my patriotism was questioned, my faith was demonized, the very freedoms, honor and respect that my family sought in the United States was no longer being afforded to them, I wanted to enter law, policy and government and put an end to that. Because I believe that what America stands for, its truest ideals are in conjunction with the Islamic faith because both preach and promote freedom, justice, and liberty for all, and the pursuit of happiness and equality for everybody.

A-T: Tell me a little bit about your reaction right after September 11th.

O’Neill: I was really scared. I was nine years old and I remember, my dad works for a company, and they were on lockdown. And so, it was really scary to think that I might never see my dad again, or those were just the thoughts that were going through my head. I remember seeing everyone in panic, they were talking about where it might get hit next, and so it was kind of like everywhere, scary. I just remember seeing it on T.V. and not knowing what to think.

A-T: When you figured out the attackers were Muslim, how did you start reacting to Muslims?

O’Neill: Well, it was interesting, because before the attack I didn’t really know about Muslims at all. The community I grew up, I wasn’t really exposed to that. It was mostly Latinos, Whites, Asians and Blacks. That was it. So, I became more educated about them [Muslims] and I learned. I saw all the negative sentiments towards them around me, but I’m the type of person who doesn’t judge people or not like them. So I learned more about the culture, and when I came to UCLA I met a lot of different Muslim people, from different countries. It was really cool. I got to hear their stories and the things they’ve gone through.

A-T: In your own community, did you ever see negative sentiment?

O’Neill: Well, in my parents’ community there aren’t really Muslims there, and people more or less just talked about the event. They would talk about the figures pinned on it, like Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein. They would talk about those things, but they wouldn’t say, “Oh, all Muslims are blank,” or that it was their fault. It was more the leaders themselves that they disagreed with and were mad at.

A-T: How do you feel after 10 years since 9/11?

O’Neill:  I can’t believe it’s been ten years. I have such a fresh memory of it. I see it as a part of history, just like any other event. The one good thing that I think came from it was a feeling of the country coming together, and least in the first part, right after it happened. You would see on T.V. people praying together and I felt a sense of unity within the country. I see it as an obstacle that happened, and we had to go over.

A-T: Is there anything else you would like to say?

O’Neill: For people that do have negative sentiments towards Muslims because of that incident, I hope that they would become more educated and really get to know people from those cultures and not be ignorant, stereotype, and hate them for something they didn’t do. We’ll never know the full answers of everything, but people need to move on and not cause dissensions.

Al-Talib interviews Kelsey Paxton, a second year Psychobiology major at UCLA, about her experience living in post 9/11 America. Although she is not Muslim, she feels the need to defend Muslims and encourages others to be more accepting and understanding towards people of all faiths and backgrounds.

A-T: Did you feel the effects of 9/11 right away?

Paxton: At first, no. I was shocked, I didn’t believe it was happening. As I watched, and we saw the street view of the people crying, I felt the effect. I have a family of people who served in the military, served the country working as police officers and firefighters. My father was in the military so my family is very prideful for this country. We have this love for the country, even though it has things that it needs to work on. It was very disheartening because not only was this happening to your country all of a sudden, these are your fellow American citizens, even though you may not know them, you automatically feel sad for them.

A-T: Did you start seeing changes in your environment?

Paxton: I did. People are more kind where I come from compared to Los Angeles. Everyone was even more kind to each other, trying to help people. The community came together and tried to help people. We put care packages together for the firefighters. We saw more patriotism in my town, flags, people wearing American colors. It united my community.

A-T: You’re not Muslim?

Paxton: No, I’m not.

A-T: So when did you learn the attackers were Muslim and how did you react to that?

Paxton: I actually found out that same day because my dad likes to analyze everything. I asked him who did it, and he said it was a terrorist group, and they’re Muslims. You saw people throughout my community talk about Muslims like they were bad people. My parents raised me to always defend myself and others who can’t defend themselves. So I said,” just because this person is Muslim doesn’t mean you should talk about them”. I would go home to my mom and my dad, and although I was young, I wasn’t super young, and I would say to them, “People are saying that all Muslims are part of this terrorist group.” I remember my parents sitting down and they said that it’s not true, because it’s like saying that all white people are a certain kind of way.

My dad said, “These particular Muslims are radical, they’re terrorists. Not every Muslim in this country is like that. So you need not to judge people when you first look at them, because you don’t know.” My parents told me that at times when people go into airports and see Muslims, they may get frightened or scared, because they don’t know and terrorist attacks are happening through the airport system. They said it’s only natural but you can’t turn around to that person who is Muslim, or someone who looks of Middle Eastern decent and accuse them of being a terrorist. Just like you can’t accuse someone who looks like you of being a Nazi.

A-T: What do you look like Kelsey?

Paxton: Blond hair, blue eyed, white person. And so, I really took that to heart. My parents raised my to be open minded and understanding towards others of different religions and cultures. They always taught me, you don’t judge other people. That’s not your place, that’s God’s place.

I wasn’t afraid of Muslim people, I always felt bad for them. Even if people wouldn’t outright call them terrorists, they would still make derogatory jokes about them. Some people would say they didn’t really care if they made those jokes, but you could see that others really took it to heart.

I actually have a close friend who’s from the Middle East. She would be upset a lot of the time because she would say, “Just because you’re from there doesn’t mean that you’re automatically a terrorist.”

Many are kept to this one-minded track and I always try to talk to people about it. I say, “Look. what if I came up to you and said, ‘Because you’re Mexican you must mow my lawn.’ You would not like that, would you? So why are you saying that about people who are Muslim?” I always try to play Devil’s advocate and make people look at things in different ways.

Photo: Flickr/ buddawiggi

XVI | XVII | XVIII

Al-Talib interviews Kutibh Chihabi, a fourth year Neuroscience major at UCLA, on his experience growing up as a Muslim and Arab American.

A-T : After 9/11, did you start seeing changes in either the Muslim community or the Non-Muslim community? Did you notice that people are friendlier or more to themselves?

Chihabi : I remember that my 6^th grade teacher was very political person, always talking about the Middle East and always like talking about the US search for oil. He was probably one of those people who didn’t really like Arabs, sometimes saying really derogatory things. He would encourage us to watch the news every night and educate ourselves about current events. I still remember my best friend’s mom was actually supporting my mom, making sure to make clear to others that there was nothing wrong with our being Muslim.

With regards to the Muslim community, I remember going to the Mission Viejo Masjid [Mosque] Sunday program, but a lot of people dropped out, including myself. The Muslims were disassociating with it. With regards to the Non-Muslim community, I remember there was a lot of pride, so everyone was buying flags here and there. I think the country came together very quickly and the people bonded much more.

A-T: Do you think that has affected your own life?

Chihabi: It definitely has because for a while we had stopped seeing our friends that we would normally see because we would always go to the same events with the Muslim community. At the same time, I felt more sheltered from the Muslim community but I wasn’t necessarily unaware of things. When I started to learn more about Islam during my freshmen year of college, I remembered a lot of things that I had learned a long time ago, but I felt like there was a disconnect, something changed.

A-T: Did you feel the negative ramifications on Muslims?

Chihabi: Definitely, there was a lot of stereotyping going on. People didn’t necessarily go out of their way to say things to me, but they would make it a habit to let me know that they don’t like me. I remember this random kid in 7^th grade who suddenly started cursing at Muslims for no apparent reason. I know that Muslims were harassed more in different areas and places, but I definitely experienced a detachment from the community on campus as well.

A-T: Did it ever make you not want to be Muslim or Arab? Did it make you ashamed at all?

Chihabi: No, not really. I’ve always been that stubborn guy, in fact if anything it has made me more proud.

A-T: How do you think 9/11 changed things for our generation?

Chihabi: In terms of the general society, I think there are a lot of people wondering just out of curiosity why any religion would preach such things, which is very interesting because if you look at the statistics, we had a sharp rise in the number of converts to Islam after 9/11. This doesn’t make sense only if you assume that the extremists acted truly under their faith, which they did not. So people started researching the religion themselves and the rest is statistics. In terms of the Muslim community, it had a lot of negative impact at first, but now we are starting to re-assimilate into society and keeping less to ourselves. There had been a time where people were just afraid to associate with MSA (Muslim Student Association) on campus, but we now see that people are coming back.

(Update: Portions of the interview relating to the interviewee’s family were removed after the interviewee expressed concern over his family’s privacy.)

XVI | XVII | XVIII

Al-Talib interviews Bayan Abusneineh, a third year Political Science major at UCLA, about how she and her family dealt with their Muslim and Arab identity in the US after 9/11.

A-T: Tell me where you were when the attacks first happened.

Abusneineh: It was about 6 o’clock and I was getting ready for school. I went over to the family room so I could go to the kitchen and eat, and I saw my mom standing there with the remote and this look that, “Oh crap, something happened.” She called, “Bayan, come see this, come see this!” She called my brother, my dad was at work so he wasn’t there, and we were all just looking. It was really interesting because we were looking at the first plane crash when the second plane actually hit. I was really upset. We all went to school, and we were watching the news the entire day at school. We were only in fifth grade but we understood that something really bad happened to our country and it affected a lot of people. Many people were even crying in class.

A-T: When did you figure out the attackers were Muslim?

Abusneineh: I remember my mom stating something in the beginning, like, “Oh shoot, we’re going to get blamed for this.” I didn’t understand what that meant. I had trouble with this one boy from the year before, and he used to come up to me and make fun of me for being Arab all the time. He came up to me when I was crying that day and asked me, “Why are you crying? It was probably your uncle who did this…” After 9/11 his insults became a lot worse, and he used to really bother me. I actually got into my first fight with that individual that year because of this.

A-T: Did you start to feel the effects on the Muslim and Arab community right away?

Abusneineh: I did because of my family members. My immediate family, we don’t look Muslim but people know we’re Arab. Some of our neighbors stopped talking to us at first. My cousins did wear the headscarf. One of them was walking home from school at one point and some guy swerved to almost hit her, and she had to run up to the concrete. He almost hit her, and he started yelling at her, “You terrorist, go back to your country.” My cousins were new to the country. It was at the time they were moving here that all this happened.

A-T: Do you feel like the attacks changed your family?

Abusneineh: I did. I noticed my own mother or my father become a lot more paranoid. I remember they wouldn’t be openly praying outside anymore. We tried to keep it quiet  that we had Arab roots in Palestine, we would just say that we’re from the Middle East. Our word choices changed and things like that.

A-T: Did you notice that it changed peoples’ religiosity levels?

Abusneineh: Definitely, especially within my own family. I think we started becoming more secular. We started shying away from people that were Muslim, we stopped hanging out with hijabis (women who wear the headscarf) as much, we wouldn’t go to the mosque as often, things like that. We were just really paranoid. I think it escalated after we took a trip to Jordan in 2002. Arabs and Muslims had problems in the airport and we especially noticed it. We don’t wear the headscarf or anything, but our last name says it all. We were “randomly” searched, we were put to the side, we had to open our arms and they patted us down forever.  We were scared we were going to miss our flight because they searched us for a really long time. That’s when I noticed there was a problem with me being Muslim or Arab in this country.

A-T: Is there anything else you’d like to say?

Abusneineh: Muslims and Arabs are still targets till today, not as bad as before, but I’ve seen a lot of Muslims become secular because of fear of the United States. It’s even had an effect on me and my family. It would be very difficult for me, even if I wanted to, to put the headscarf on because that’s part of it. My own mother says, “I’m from the Middle East,” instead of saying, “I’m Palestinian,” “I’m Jordanian,” or “I’m Muslim.” It’s taking a toll on our identity and I think that’s something we should never, ever have to compromise and be afraid of, ever.

Photo: Flickr/ Usman Ahmed

10th Anniversary of 9/11 Series: I | II | III | IV | V | VI | VII | VIII | IX | X | XI | XII | XIII | XIV | XV |

XVI | XVII | XVIII

I sat in the hard cushions of the school bus trying to keep awake as our bus drove to school. “Quiet down…there’s been attack!” exclaimed the bus driver as she turned up the volume on the radio.  At nine years old, I didn’t think too much of it at that moment – what were the twin towers anyway?

Prior to 9/11, my family lived a pretty non-political life. My parents were Reagan-lovers in a fitting environment: perhaps all of the 600 homes in our equestrian-styled community were staunch supporters of the establishment, self-proclaimed flag-waving patriots.

Before I got onto the bus, labels such as “Afghan” or even “Muslim” did not prompt many responses except for confused faces or fake gestures from people who pretended they knew what “Afghan” meant. When my sister was a young girl, she was playing outside when suddenly one of neighbors ran up to her and asked “IS THIS YOU?!” pointing to the recently-published National Geographic which featured the famous portrait of the Afghan girl with piercing eyes. To their credit, my sister does have blue eyes.

To summarize, no one really knew much about Afghans or even Muslims.

But when I got off the bus, I entered a post-9/11 world where the words Muslim and Afghan became labels which prompted curiosity or even fear.  I entered class that day – a substitute.

“There was an attack on our country today. They flew planes into our buildings. We aren’t sure who did it yet.”

“I heard they were Muslims” said one student.

“Do we have any Muslims in the class?” the teacher asked. I raised my hand and was asked to explain my beliefs.

I became a spokesman for 1.4 billion people in my class, in my school. The way I would act, dress, behave all reflected the Muslims.

“Are you Afghanistan?” asked one of my classmates a few days later.

“Your name means terrorist” remarked one girl on the school bus.

The ensuing years didn’t come by easy although I had a few breaks here and there. One of my 5^th grade teachers expressed sympathy when I told her when she asked where my parents were from.

“They’re from Kandahar in Afghanistan”

“I’m so sorry, yesterday on the news I heard they started bombing Kandahar. It must be very hard.”

In sixth grade, I moved to a new school where the racist comments came regularly.

The most challenging experience was having to listen to all of the fear-mongering rhetoric from the media that permeated the education system. I felt that it was my responsibility to counter these claims. When I was 11, I argued with my class (including my teacher) that it would be wrong to invade Iraq claiming that there were no weapons of mass destruction.

Although obvious today, at the time this was tantamount to arguing that the world was flat. “Even if Saddam does have weapons of mass destruction, it’s only because we sold it to him” I remember citing the unfortunate historical fact that the U.S. sold chemical weapons to Saddam which would later be used to gas the Kurds and Iranians during the Iraq-Iran War.

“Where is the proof that we sold to him the WMDs?” asked the teacher

“The proof is that we have the receipts!”

My 8^th grade history teacher became my next opponent. I kept my copy of Lies My Teacher Told Me on my desk for easy reference.

After her, followed my 9^th grade biology teacher. After him, followed my 10^th grade history teacher who had great sympathy for Afghans, even making The Kite Runner a required reading in her class. But even she promoted fear-mongering and propaganda to which I frequently objected to in class.

Then came my first class as an official college student in which a student claimed in my women’s study class that the reason why there are few female CEOs in the U.S. is because “corporations have to deal with Muslim countries and Muslims don’t do business with women and do not respect them.”

By the time I transferred to UCLA, I had enough experience to retort confidently to the never ending stream of anti-Muslim and Islamophobic rhetoric which was often used to justify an egregious foreign policy.

Many great Muslim figures were mocked, belittled, and trivialized. Do we not find time and time again in the Qur’an that many Prophets were ridiculed and ostracized? They were accused of being under the influence of magic or simply crazy. Despite this, the Prophets when responding to these people were calm, rational, and patient.

It would be arrogant to claim that I experienced even half of such great figures. But there is something unique about undergoing a small taste of the tests that were given to some of our greatest role models.

Despite these difficult 10 years, I will not let this Islamophobia define the legacy of the tragedy of 9/11. I will wear black on this day and will remember the brave men and women who heroically sacrificed their lives to rescue their fellow Americans regardless of their backgrounds.