This articles was published in 2001.

Prejudice rages throughout the world against Muslims especially in the nation of Israel’s biggest ally, the U.S.A. Even with the atrocities of mass killings, destruction of property and the violations and denials of basic human rights by the Israeli Occupation Authority, continued targeting of Muslims occur daily.

The Omar Mosque in Nablus was purposely and willfully destroyed even as it was also being used as a makeshift hospital for the many wounded during the siege of Nablus. Jenin, as it has been leveled to the ground by Israeli Occupation tanks, has of course lost all of its holy places, mosques and churches alike.  Bethlehem is under siege with the main concentration on the Church of the Nativity under fire but also tens of other churches and several mosques under fire of tanks, rifles, and bombing.

Fear from the despair and rage suffered by the Arab world, Muslims and Christians alike, is promoting extreme levels of prejudice amongst the U.S. population. Arab Americans and more obviously Muslim Americans are being racially profiled and unjustly accused of assumed guilt, before any action has taken place. The raids upon Islamic institutions and charity organizations in the U.S., the racial profiling at airports and refusal to let Muslims travel, and the accusations thrown at Muslim ladies wearing the headscarf, ‘hijab’, have got to be controlled. Just last week, May Department Stores settled by monetary compensation and an apology to 2 Muslim women that they had accused of shoplifting and hiding stolen goods under their hijabs. This settlement comes 7 months after the incident occurred, too little, too late.

There are 7 million Muslims residing in the U.S., the policy of prejudice had better to be altered as discrimination is unconstitutional and a violation of one’s human rights. What more can the vile Israeli prejudice against the Palestinian people teach us?

* Saira W. Soufan is a Pakistani-American studied in Biology and free lance social worker.