Fellow Americans urged by Muslims to learn facts

While the world searches for someone to blame in the aftermath of Tuesday’s attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, Muslims in the United States urge people to wait until the facts emerge before pinning the attacks on Islamic groups.

“Let’s not be hasty to point fingers,” said Imam Adib Shaheed of Little Rock, director of education at Little Rock’s Muhammed School. In the Muslim religion an imam is similar to a preacher.

Even if a Muslim group bears responsibility for the terrorist attacks, that group’s actions don’t reflect the teachings of peace central to the Islamic faith, said Shaheed, a taxi driver who spent much of Tuesday

morning driving stranded airline passengers to area hotels.

“If it turns out to be an Islamic group, it would not be something based in what we believe. We’re appalled by it,” he said.

His sentiments were mirrored by Muslims across the nation.

The United Muslim Americans Association issued a statement Tuesday condemning the attacks and urging people to weigh the facts before condemning Muslims, Arabs or Palestinians.

“In any circumstance, Muslim and Arab communities as a whole should not be collectively punished, discriminated against or stereotyped for any crazy and terrorist acts,” the association said in a press release.

Scholars are bracing for a wave of anti-Arab sentiment similar to the one after the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995 before Americans were found to be the culprits.

“We don’t know yet who’s responsible, but assumptions are already being made,” Arkansas State University Professor Charles Hartwig said.

Those assumptions are being made quickly because many Americans want to find those responsible and retaliate, he said.

“We’re all angry, and we want to strike back,” Hartwig said.

Because people in the United States link the oil supply to the Middle East, Hartwig worries that Tuesday’s skyrocketing prices and long lines at gas stations could spark anti-Arab sentiments.

“This paranoia is fueled by what’s going on at the gas stations. It lends credibility,” he said.

In Little Rock, Muslims kept to their normal routines Tuesday.

rayers were said on schedule at the Islamic Center for Human Excellence, 1717 Wright Ave., where Muslims expressed outrage at the crashes in New York, Pennsylvania and Virginia, site of the Pentagon.

“We had the same reaction as other American people had. We’re part of America,” Omar Zakee Abdulah said.

J. B. Muhammed, assistant imam at the center, hopes no one links him or his fellow Muslim Americans to terrorist groups who say they’re defending the Islamic religion.

“You must understand this,” he said. “We’re Americans, and we don’t advocate violence.”

Muhammed said true Muslims could not be responsible for such terrorism.

“We’re a peaceful living people,” he said.

State set to demolish bridge near Augusta

State Highway and Transportation Department workers will demolish a historic bridge on Arkansas 64 over the White River near Augusta on Wednesday morning, according to the department’s spokesman.

The demolition is scheduled for 8 a.m. and will last only a few seconds.

“This is a controlled demolition,” said Randy Ort, a spokesman for the highway department. “In light of [Tuesday’s] events, we don’t want residents to be alarmed.”