A top official at the Council on American Islamic Relations (Cair) National has warned of a potential rise in violence against Muslims and Palestinians in the US following the hate-crime murder of a six-year-old boy in Illinois and the conflict between Israel and Hamas.
Edward Ahmed Mitchell, Cair’s deputy director and a civil rights attorney, called the stabbing of Wadea Al-Fayoume and his mother in their home “one of the worst-case scenarios”.
Police said that the pair were attacked because they were Muslims and due to the events in the Middle East. Joseph Czuba, 71, a landlord to the family in Plainfield, Illinois, choked and stabbed the child’s mother and killed Wadea, according to text messages from the 32-year-old woman that were shared by Cair, the US’s largest Muslim civil rights organization.
As he entered their apartment, Czuba allegedly shouted: “You Muslims must die!”
Czuba has been charged with several counts including murder.
Mitchell said: “The murder of this young boy was an act of Palestinian and Muslim hatred. It was one of the worst-case scenarios that we were worried about.”
He added: “This young boy has paid the price for the bigotry and hatred that others have spread. There are no words to describe what happened to him. But there are words to describe why it happened. And why it happened is anti-Palestinian racism, anti-Muslim bigotry, and it must stop.”
Fears of Islamophobic and antisemitic violence have spread around the world as Israel’s military assault on Gaza rages on, despite condemnation of the close US ally by human rights groups. Israel has largely cut off water, electricity, and the flow of food and medicine to the Palestinian enclave.
The assault on Gaza was triggered by an attack on Israel by Hamas in which more than 1,300 Israelis died and others were taken hostage. In response Israel has killed 2,329 Palestinians, according the Palestinian health ministry. In both areas, the majority of casualties were civilians.
Since the most recent conflict broke out, Mitchell said Cair has received reports of students, protesters and employees in the US who said they were targeted for their faith or support for the Palestinian cause. On Friday, a Republican and pro-Israel city council member was arrested for bringing a handgun to a student demonstration in support of Palestinians.
Mitchell told the Guardian: “We have been through crises so many times before the past 20 years. So in many ways, we know how to handle this type of situation. But this is somewhat unprecedented because we’re dealing with two things at the same time: We are trying to stop the violence in Palestine in Israel. We are trying to secure a ceasefire to protect more innocent people from dying overseas with the support of our government.”
He said: “At the same time, we are trying to stop and stem this sudden rise in anti-Muslim and anti-Palestinian bigotry here at home, which is now leading to violence. So we are doing two things at the very same time.
“We’re dealing with this horrific violence overseas and trying to get our government to stop supporting it and at the same time, we are trying to protect protesters, students, employees and innocent people who are now facing the threat of discrimination or even violence.”
Shortly after Hamas’s attack on Israeli civilians, Joe Biden held a press conference at the White House and said the US “stands with Israel” and that it “will never fail to have their back”. Israel has “rock solid” and ‘“unwavering” US support, he said.
“Israel has a right to defend itself and its people – full stop,” the US president said.
But Mitchell said Biden should call for the Israeli government to stop its threats against the people of northern Gaza where it has demanded that more than 1 million people in Gaza flee their homes into the south of the territory ahead of what is widely expected to be a military invasion.
Biden said he was “shocked and sickened” by the death of Al-Fayoume.
“This horrific act of hate has no place in America, and stands against our fundamental values: freedom from fear for how we pray, what we believe, and who we are,” Biden said in a statement issued on Sunday.
The current political climate in the US feels reminiscent of the years immediately following September 11, when skepticism, distrust and law enforcement surveillance of Muslim Americans was rampant, Mitchell said.
“We cannot allow our country to be dragged back to a time when Islamophobia was out of control. This young boy’s murder must be a wake-up call. That this has to stop.”
