By Herb Jackson
The Passaic County Herald News
North Jersey Muslims who helped law enforcement get to know and understand their community after 9/11 resent their patriotism being challenged as the House Homeland Security Committee opens a series of controversial hearings on Islamist radicalism today.
“It’s painting a very broad brush on an entire community,” said Sherine El-Abd of Clifton. “Every Muslim has to prove they are innocent.”
The committee chairman, Rep. Peter King, assured television interviewers Wednesday that the hearings opening about “The Extent of Radicalization in the American Muslim Community and that Community’s Response” will be fair.
King, R-N.Y., dismissed critics for suggesting the committee ignore what he sees as a serious threat to national security.
“Too many of the leaders of the Muslim community ... are not cooperative and are not willing to speak out and condemn this radicalization that’s going on,” King said on CNN.
That’s not so in North Jersey, say Muslim leaders, law enforcement officials and members of Congress from North Jersey.
El-Abd, president of the New Jersey Federation of Republican Women, said she reported some troubling encounters she had when working as a defense contractor recruiting U.S. citizens in the Northeast who were fluent in Arabic to work in Iraq and Afghanistan.
“People might say they would not consider [taking such a job] because they’re against the war, and that’s someone’s opinion. You might disagree, but it’s not disturbing.
“But if people in the community are saying [American troops] are there because they want to wipe out Islam, and we have to have a plan to get even with them, it’s a different story,” she said. Those incidents were reported to authorities.
She called King’s approach a distraction from the war on terror, since the first step in winning a war is correctly identifying the enemy.
“If he wants to fight radical Islam in the United States, he should be reaching out to leaders who are on the same page. In the Muslim community, the No. 1 enemy is the radicalization of Islam,” she said.
Instead, King has put people on the defensive with his public statements and the witnesses he’s chosen to invite to the first hearing, said Prospect Park Mayor Mohamed Khairullah, a teacher at Passaic County Tech.
“People are disgusted by the hearings and they feel singled out. It’s being compared to what happened with the Japanese and the camps” during World War II, he said.
Waheed Khalid of Palisades Park, a board member of the American Muslim Union and past president of Darul Islah Mosque in Teaneck, said the hearings should have looked at all types of domestic terrorism, “rather than targeting a specific community.”
“I’m not as much concerned with the reaction within the United States because people know for years we’ve been working with law enforcement and the community,” Khalid said. “But overseas, people will not see it as clearly. This is another excuse to provide the radicals, who are a tiny minority, to go out and get recruits.”
Journalist and community activist Ayat Oraby of Nutley said she expects protest rallies in New York and New Jersey after the hearing if King’s comments continue in the same direction.
“His statements were 100 percent against us,” said Oraby. “We are American before anything else. He has no idea of who we are.”
Rep. Bill Pascrell Jr., D-Paterson, stopped short of saying the hearings should not be held, but he worried it could provide fodder for al-Qaida recruiters and has sent a private letter of concerns to King, with whom Pascrell has worked on security issues.
“If I was chairman, I would not be holding the hearing. You cannot single out one segment. The majority of Muslims I know are law-abiding, patriotic Americans,” he said.
He also downplayed fears about a lack of cooperation in the community.
“Every meeting I’ve had with the FBI since 9/11, this is what I’ve been told: There is no evidence in the 8th Congressional District of any noticeable attempt in the Muslim community or mosques to overthrow the government or do damage to the United States of America,” Pascrell said.
U.S. Attorney Paul J. Fishman refused to comment about King’s hearings specifically. But he said his office, the FBI and state and local police all have reached out since the 2001 terrorist attacks to build two-way cooperation with Muslim leaders and residents.
“Our goal is not just to get people to identify those in their communities who may pose a risk,” he said. “We want to make sure that they feel they can trust us with other concerns.”
Copyright 2011 North Jersey Media Group Inc. (Staff Writer Carol Lawrence contributed to this story.)