# data[].attributes.body
Muslims stay at home mother was murder, in a apparent hate crime.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
EL CAJON, Calif (Reuters) - The murder of an Iraqi-American mother in a close-knit refugee community on the outskirts of San Diego has brought attention to a rise in bias crimes against Muslims, even as police caution against definitively labeling her death a hate crime.

Shaima Alawadi, a 32-year-old stay-at-home mother of five, was found brutally beaten in the dining room of her rented home last week by her 17-year-old daughter, police said. She died of her wounds on Saturday.

Local police are investigating the killing as a possible hate crime because of a note found next to Alawadi's unconscious body that threatened the family and was reported to have labeled her a terrorist. An FBI bias crimes squad is assisting.

Alawadi's death comes at a time of renewed anti-Muslim sentiment nationwide. The number of anti-Muslim hate groups tripled to 30 in 2011, according to a recent report by the Southern Poverty Law Center, which advocates for civil rights.

There was a big jump in hate crimes against Muslims after the September 11, 2001 attacks carried out by Al-Qaeda, but the number subsided during the middle of the decade of the 2000s.

Bias crimes are on the rise again, reaching 186 separate offenses in 2010, the highest in five years, the FBI data show.

"We are considering the hate crime aspect, but we are not labeling it as such," El Cajon Police Lieutenant Mark Coit said. But he could not reveal any details on the status of the case.

In a sign of how closely the case was being watched, the U.S. State Department expressed condolences for Alawadi's death, and Iraqi government representatives attended the funeral.

Both law enforcement and Arab and Muslim lobby groups, have stopped short of ruling out other scenarios, and even Alawadi's family was uncertain of what happened.

"The majority of the family believes that it could be anything," said Nazanin Wahid, a friend who is serving as a spokeswoman for the family. "But the fact that they found a note and that the police said initially that it resonates like a hate crime led them to believe that it could be that."

Community activists point to a history of violence and intimidation toward the local Muslim community, even as they say they cannot recall ever such a severe crime.

"Maybe this wasn't a hate crime. But I have cases that are hate crimes," said Besma Coda, Culture Adviser for Chaldean-Middle Eastern Social Services in El Cajon.

Some of Coda's clients have suffered broken bones and beatings in recent years, she said. One client had to get 10 stitches in his head because of a hate-motivated beating.

GROWING IMMIGRANT COMMUNITY

Since Alawadi's death, at least two members of El Cajon's Muslim community have reported receiving threatening phone calls, said Sadaf Hane, civil rights director of the San Diego chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations.

The Arab community in particular is prone to under-reporting such discrimination because of a distrust of the abuses of authorities, Hane added.

El Cajon is in the heart of East San Diego County, which is home to the second largest Iraqi community in the United States, behind Detroit. More than half of El Cajon's 100,000 residents are of Middle Eastern descent.

Like Alawadi's family, some of the city's Arab residents are largely Shi'ite refugees from Iraq who arrived in the United States in the 1980s and 1990s after fleeing their homeland in the aftermath of Saddam Hussein's 1980 invasion of Shi'ite neighbor Iran and the long war that followed.

But the town has seen an even larger surge of Iraqi newcomers since 2008 through a U.S.-funded refugee resettlement program, often joining relatives in the area, said Michael McKay, Deputy Director of Refugee Services at the Catholic Charities Diocese of San Diego.

A friend of Alawadi's family, Sura Alzaidy, told the San Diego Union Tribune newspaper the note found near Alawadi read: "Go back to your own country. You're a terrorist."

Alawadi and her husband arrived in the United States in 1993 after spending years in a refugee tent camp next to Majed al Hasan, who later became their neighbor in El Cajon.

The Iraq they fled was terrifying, with secret police torturing and killing perceived enemies of the state, Hasan said. Alawadi, Hasan, and thousands of other Iraqis were eventually granted asylum in the United States, where they mostly settled in the San Diego and Detroit communities.

"They come from a war-torn country," McKay said. "To think that you're not safe, still, after coming this far is scary."

HOODIES AND HIJABS

On one recent night, hundreds of mourners stood in front of Alawadi's house in a quiet cul-de-sac nestled in the hills as the sun set, lighting candles for a vigil in her honor.

The crowd quietly murmured about the case until Alawadi's mother arrived and her cries of sorrow pierced the air, silencing those gathered before wails erupted around her as she walked through the crowd, sobbing and beating her chest.

Some mourners wore the traditional black cloak and scarf worn by many devout Muslim women. Others wore T-shirts that said "Justice for Shaima Alawadi" above a silhouette of a woman wearing a Muslim headscarf.

Alawadi wore such a headscarf, and advocates for the Arab and Muslim community have suggested that her scarf may have been a factor in drawing attention to her as a perceived outsider, if indeed her killing was a hate crime.

"We're not going to cry, if that's what you wanted. We're not going to take off our scarf, if that's what you wanted," Alawadi's eldest daughter, Fatima, said at the vigil, addressing her mother's killer.

Alawadi was buried in the holy Shi'ite city of Najaf, roughly 100 miles south of Iraq's capital Baghdad, on Saturday.

For many in El Cajon, the case has drawn parallels to that of Trayvon Martin, the unarmed black teenager shot in Florida last month by a Neighborhood Watch volunteer in a killing that has also drawn outrage because of its racial undertones.

"My condolences go out to the family of Trayvon," Alawadi's 15-year-old son Muhammed said at the vigil, as tears welled up in his eyes. "My candle goes out to you as well."

Some activists have begun linking the two cases on social media, spurring a popular #hoodiesandhijabs hashtag on Twitter. Martin was wearing a hoodie when he was killed.

Students at several college campuses from the University of North Carolina-Asheville to the University of Southern California held "Hoodies and Hijabs" rallies on Thursday.

The two cases, despite their differences, highlight broader questions of discrimination against black and Muslim communities in America, said Abdulrahman El-Sayed, a fellow at think tank Demos and an epidemiologist at Columbia University.

As darkness fell in El Cajon at the recent vigil, mourners raised their candles in the air and chanted "We want justice."

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Iraqi-American murder highlights anti-Muslim hate crimes

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The murder of an Iraqi-American mother in a close-knit refugee community on the outskirts of San Diego has brought attention to a rise in bias crimes against Muslims, even as police caution against definitively labeling her death a hate crime.

# data[].attributes.body
A 56 minute documentary about the united states new upsurge of hate against the muslim community.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
BBC Three - United States of Hate: Muslims under Attack

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Examining Islamophobia in America and the reasons behind it.

# data[].attributes.body
Muslims in St. Louis are immigrants from Bosnia, because they are white they blend in fairly easily. And they feel that there is a lot of anti islamic prejudices that they hear from people who dot know their muslim.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Two decades ago, Muslim refugees fleeing Bosnia arrived in St Louis and became a crucial part of the city. Now anti-immigrant fervour might lead the Bosnians of St Louis to become more politically active.

Imam Eldin Susa recounts how a family of recent immigrants from the Middle East was threatened at gunpoint while looking for housing in Affton, a leafy suburb of St Louis, Missouri.

"From their faces, it was obvious from where they came," he says - and the firearm-wielding resident wasn't happy about the prospect of such new neighbours.

Dzemal Bijedic, a Muslim chaplain with the St Louis police, says a Muslim woman waiting for a bus recently was set upon by five men who shouted anti-Islamic slurs and tried to tear off her hijab.

Eventually onlookers intervened.

"Some of the people fear when they see a Middle Eastern family," Bijedic says. "They tell them to go back to their country; that they're terrorists."

Ajlina Karamehic-Muratovic, a professor at St Louis University, says she's been involved in conversations where she was shocked to hear casual anti-Islamic views by people who didn't know they were talking about her own faith.

For Susa, Bijedic and Karamehic-Muratovic, Islamophobia is real.

All three are in a peculiar position, however. They're part of St Louis's community of Bosnian immigrants - one of the true modern success stories of refugee integration into US society. They can both identify with victims of Islamophobia and yet not bear the brunt of its pain.

Despite their background as refugees and Muslims - two characteristics that have become hot-buttons in 2016 US politics - they are, in the words of Karamehic-Muratovic, "invisible".

Bosnian immigrants are European. They dress in Western clothes. They don't stand out in a crowd.

"I think it helps that we are white," says the petite blonde professor. "We look like we fit in until you notice the accent."

A new hope for St Louis

There are currently an estimated 70,000 Bosnian immigrants living in the St Louis area. The vast majority arrived in the 1990s, fleeing their home country's bloody civil war.

Some settled directly in St Louis, thanks to the efforts of city leaders eager to revitalise decaying neighbourhoods and stem a steady population decline that was eroding the city's tax base.

"Immigration and refugee-welcoming has, in a big way, been able to turn around hollowed-out urban cores, including in St Louis" says Blake Hamilton of the International Institute of St Louis, one of a handful of officially recognised refugee resettlement organisations in the US.

The Bosnians rented apartments and bought homes in southern St Louis, an area that had fallen on hard times. They took jobs as in construction and opened shops and restaurants.

"The Bosnians had skills that met the gaps that we had in the '90s," Hamilton says. "There was cheap housing available, jobs that paid the bills and a budding community."

Glendale Armenians in the shadow of the past

The immigrants still 'California dreamin'

That budding community flourished once the first wave of refugees established a foothold in St Louis. Bosnians who had originally settled elsewhere in the US soon followed, as word spread of the opportunities in this American heartland metropolis on the banks of the Mississippi River.

The International Institute and the City of St Louis are continuing efforts to bring in and integrate refugees - now from places like Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and Somalia. The political climate is much different than it was in the 1990s, however. The Bosnians in St Louis see this, and they're doing what they can to help.

"The Bosnian community has been great in terms of community outreach - and the volunteer organisations that have grown from them, kind of organically," Hamilton says.

"We can point to the success of the Bosnian community, and how they've integrated into the fabric here. We have very high hopes that the new refugees can follow that same path."

A 'human point of view'

Eldin Susa sits behind a desk in an office cluttered with half-unpacked boxes.

The rooms in his mosque still smell of fresh paint, and a long ladder leans against the side of the building, in the shadow of a tall minaret topped by a crescent moon and star.

Although the St Louis Islamic Center Nur in the suburb of Affton only recently opened for services, Susa and his family have been in the St Louis area for nearly a year and a half, and he's been laying the groundwork for his religious community ever since.

To foster understanding, he visits Christian churches in the area - which has seen an influx of Bosnians moving to the neighbourhood for larger homes and better schools (the local public school system, which Susa's children attend, is roughly 20% Bosnian).

The 33-year-old Susa describes the expressions of surprise he sees when he walks into a new church.

Youthful, lean and tall, with a close-cropped beard and often dressed in slacks and Oxford shirt, he doesn't look the way they imagine an imam to be.

He's clearly aware that Bosnians, when they want, can blend in.

"Probably for Bosnians it's easier for them to get integrated and not to be seen," he says. "I'm not proud of it. It shouldn't matter how you look. Everyone should be accepted the same way."

The local question-and-answer sessions often turn to addressing accusations that his religion is inextricably linked to violence, intolerance and terrorism.

"I tell them that there are some who are perverting Islam, who are cutting off heads and saying they do that in the name of Islam," he says.

"The first thing I say is that the name, Islam, means the religion of peace."

And when people tell him Bosnians Muslim are different, that they have proven to be hard workers and a boon to the St Louis economy, and that doesn't necessarily translate to other immigrants from strikingly different cultures and circumstances?

"I say that we shouldn't just look at immigrants from the economic point of view," he answers.

"We should look to them from the human point of view. We should look to them as those who are fleeing war, who are fleeing killing, who are fleeing oppression. As humans we are obliged to help those people; to give them protection."

Big city, Little Bosnia

If Affton is the future of the St Louis area Bosnian community - with shiny new mosques, single-family homes and quiet suburban streets - Bevo Mill, in south St Louis, is its past and, largely, its present.

Karamehic-Muratovic, the St Louis University professor, walks along Gravois Avenue, the formerly blighted thoroughfare that two decades ago became the focal point of Bosnian refugee relocation. Known as "Little Bosnia", the neighbourhood continues to be the cultural centre of the immigrant community.

She points to a market that offers all the tastes of home - Bosnian beer, snacks, smoked meat, breads and bins full of chestnuts. She still shops here, even though she lives in the north of the city.

At a local Chamber of Commerce, young girls twirl and hop as they learn Bosnian folk dances. A stern-faced woman explains that this is not a public performance - the youngsters cannot be distracted from their practices.

In 2013, the Bosnian community here built a replica of the Sebilj, an ornate wooden fountain in the Bosnian capital of Sarajevo, and gave it as a gift to the city on the 250th anniversary of its founding,

Bosnian President Zeljko Komsic came to St Louis to join Mayor Francis Slay - the grandson of Lebanese immigrants - during the monument's public ground-breaking.

"Everyone told me they are proud and happy to have Bosnians here," Komsic told the crowd that had gathered for the event. "And for that, I am proud of you."

Karamehic-Muratovic herself arrived in the US for university before the start of the Yugoslavian civil war, with its massive civilian casualties and displacement of the nation's Bosnian population.

She says she lost touch with relatives during the fighting and long siege of Sarajevo, near her childhood home. A 17-year-old cousin with whom she was close was killed toward the end of the conflict.

Now, she studies the impact the war had on her community's mental health.

"Many Bosnians that you will meet here have been in detention camps, including women," she says.

"It is very hard to establish a normal life, and go to work, and worry about normal daily routine things when you've been through such an ordeal."

Children of the refugees also have problems. Quicker to learn English than their parents, they often served as translators, which changed the power dynamic in homes.

They also often feel torn between their Bosnian culture and the American influences. Drugs and delinquency are a concern.

Karamehic-Muratovic, who is married to a Bosnian refugee and has three children under the age of five. She takes them back to her home country every year to remind them of their roots.

"I think teaching kids your culture and who you are and where they come from can serve as a protective factor," she says.

The Bosnian community has also been pulled into some of St Louis's larger racial turmoil - including the unrest that followed the 2014 police shooting of Michael Brown in nearby Ferguson.

That November, 32-year-old Bosnian refugee Zemir Begic was beaten to death near Gravois Avenue by four black and Hispanic teenagers.

"It was a big deal because it certainly didn't get the same attention as Ferguson," Karamehic-Muratovic says, a concern that was echoed in the conservative national media.
Are the media ignoring another St Louis killing?
About 50 St Louis Bosnians held a protest march in the neighbourhood calling for greater police protection, but tensions eased when the perpetrators were arrested and charged with first-degree murder.

Finding a voice in politics

Dzemal Bijedic, the Muslim St Louis Police chaplain, remembers fallout from the Begic murder well. He went from house to house, family to family in the Bosnian community, explaining what the police were doing to solve the crime and why their concerns weren't being ignored.

"There was a lot of tension," he said. "But they appreciate that you came and you tried.

Bijedic arrived in St Louis as a refugee in December 1997, just a few days before Christmas. Adapting to a new country and city wasn't easy - dealing with homesickness, the language barrier and the struggle to make ends meet.

After he earned his criminal justice degree at a local university, he became the first Muslim police chaplain in Missouri.

"We needed somebody who can help the community and teach the officers about Islamic religion and different nationalities in St Louis," he says.

The job, at times, is political and some friends have encouraged him to run for public office. He demurs.

"Politics is too much pressure," he says. "As police chaplain, I can help the community, keep peace between police officers and take care of citizens too. I don't want to sit in the office."

So far, very few Bosnian-Americans have shown an interest in getting involved in US politics.

Anesa Kajtazovic was elected in 2010 to the Iowa House of Representatives, becoming the first Bosnian-American to hold public office and, at 23, the youngest-ever member of the Iowa legislature. In 2014 she ran an unsuccessful Democratic primary campaign for a US congressional seat.

Bosnian-Americans offer a variety of explanations for the lack of interest. Susa says that the community is simply too new to fully flex its muscles in elections.

For Karamehic-Muratovic, it could have something to do with the Bosnian political experience in their home country.

"What politics means over there, it's not a very promising picture," she says. "Our politics are very corrupt and unfair and continue to be so."

Ajla Delkic, executive director of the Washington, DC, based Advisory Council for Bosnia and Herzegovina, says that her organisation - which advocates for Bosnian-American issues before the US Congress and encourages voter awareness - says some political reluctance could be related to the Bosnian war experience

"We would go around and ask for their name and addresses, and they'd say, 'well, do we really want the government to know that?'" she says.

"In Bosnia the government targeted them for extermination. They didn't think the US government would do that, but especially when you're fresh of the boat, as they say, there was a little bit of fear." She adds that the first priority of the newly arrived refugees was to take care of their basic human needs.

Thanks to the rise of Donald Trump and his anti-refugee, anti-Muslim speeches, Bosnian-Americans may be finding their political voice.

"In this election, given some of the rhetoric coming from one of the candidates, they really are concerned about the future and what that would mean for them personally," Delkic says.

If the first generation of Bosnian refugees are sometimes reluctant to join the political fray, Delkic says, their children, who are attending universities and entering the white-collar workforce, are more eager to participate.

It is only a matter of time - 10 or 15 years, she says - before they make their mark.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Two decades ago, Muslim refugees fleeing Bosnia arrived in St Louis and became a crucial part of the city. Now anti-immigrant fervour might lead the Bosnians of St Louis to become more politically active. Imam Eldin Susa recounts how a family of recent immigrants from the Middle East was threatened at gunpoint while looking for housing in Affton, a leafy suburb of St Louis, Missouri.

# data[].attributes.headline
Women worried if her family will survive Trumps hate.

# data[].attributes.subject
Women worried if her family will survive Trumps hate.

# data[].attributes.body
The writer of the article talks about how her children worry about the hate they will get now Trump is elected.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
The day after the presidential election, my 14-year-old son left a message in the shower. With his little brother's foam alphabet letters, he spelled out, "Haters gonna hate us."

It was the "us" that transformed the popular catchphrase into something troubling. I knew that the rhetoric of this election cycle had affected my children, but here it was spelled out so clearly. My son felt the vitriol towards Muslims directed at him.

Over the course of the week, my daughter would ask if we were going to be banned from the country, pleading after my every reassurance, "But how do you know?" My five-year-old son asked if Trump would break our family. When I answered that as president, Trump would learn to be nice, he ran to share this news with his older siblings, his little feet light with relief.

I thought I faced discrimination when I was growing up as the daughter of Iraqi immigrants in a California seaside town. I still remember the first Gulf War and the novelty shops filled with distorted Arab faces on mugs and T-shirts, the camel jockey jokes, and the boy at the mall who told me to go back to Kuwait where I came from. Now I look back on the stereotypes and prejudice of the day, and it seems so innocent, so benign in comparison.

Nostalgia for antiquated ideas on immigration

When I was in the eighth grade, my teacher was an all-American, white male who played baseball and never failed to remind us that the United States was the greatest country in the world, the one place where anyone can become anything. "It doesn't matter where you came from," he'd say, "America is a melting pot."

Although the melting pot analogy is dated and contentious, as a first-generation American and the only Muslim in a Catholic grade school, it meant something to have the person of authority in my classroom repeat that I not only belonged in this country, but that my story was somehow an intrinsic part of our nation's identity. "We're all immigrants," he'd say and look over at me. "Everyone here came from somewhere and that's exactly what makes America special."
OPINION: The working class Trump will suppress
At the time, his words hardly impressed me. I didn't need my teacher to tell me what I lived every day. My family home was overcrowded with immigrating relatives who had waited close to 10 years for green cards to come to the US, and I knew the lived experience of immigration was far more complicated than this story of America's unbridled acceptance.

Melting pot or not, people were suspicious of my family's accents and our religion. My grandparents struggled to learn English and lived a life of relative isolation.

My classmates' curiosity, although mostly gentle and respectful, often made me feel like a foreign coin in their wallet, a token representation of all that was different. But I never doubted my right to be an American. Somewhere my teacher's message of equality had taken root within me.

Exactly a year after 9/11, my oldest son was born. It pained me to think he'd never know a time in this country when Muslims were not the enemy.

I can't help but wonder if my children will grow up with a similar sense of security regarding their place in their country.

Last summer, our current president-elect claimed that Muslims don't assimilate. In response to Sean Hannity's question about how to vet the hearts of Muslims coming to the US, Donald Trump replied, "Assimilation has been very hard. It's almost, I won't say nonexistent, but it gets to be pretty close. And I'm talking about second and third generation - for some reason there's no real assimilation."

I never thought I'd long for the most simplistic and contested views of immigration. I want they myth of our soupy integrated society to be an option once again, a goal. I want recognition for all the painful and inadvertent ways my family and I surrendered our heritage to our English-loving tongues and our western educations.

I tell my son about the melting pot myth I grew up with and ask him if he feels the US can still call itself that. "Maybe for some people," he says, "but right now, it's like there's one ingredient that's giving everyone a rash and everybody just wants to pluck it out."

A grey zone

I'm glad my young son does not yet see the bitter irony of his statement. Terrorist activity caused America's allergy to Muslims, but it is exactly this physical rejection that terrorist groups have looked to exploit.

The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) group has expressed its desire to eliminate the grey zone - the spaces inhabited by Muslims and non-Muslims alike, and our president-elect is fully cooperating with their vision by suggesting Muslims in the US are a fifth column.

This is the scenario I feared most after 9/11. My mind went straight to the hate. I saw it rippling through generations, the way it had with so many minority groups that had been forced to carry the blame for world events. Exactly a year after 9/11, my oldest son was born. It pained me to think he'd never know a time in this country when Muslims were not the enemy.

It is this generation of Muslim-Americans that weighs heavily on my mind. How will these smart, talented, vibrant young people maintain a sense of pride in their faith when their soon-to-be president rose to power on the promise of registering them in a database?

Political rhetoric matters. It filters down through our televisions, computers, and smartphones and straight into our bodies, shaping our self-concept and our attitudes towards others.

It is just as dangerous and lethal as any weapon in a government's arsenal. I hope, over the next four years, that Trump will choose his words more carefully.
Huda Al-Marashi is an Iraqi-American writer specialising in Muslim women's issues and the Muslim experience in the US. The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera's editorial policy.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Can the Muslim American family survive Trump?

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The day after the presidential election, my 14-year-old son left a message in the shower. With his little brother's foam alphabet letters, he spelled out, "Haters gonna hate us." It was the "us" that transformed the popular catchphrase into something troubling.

# data[].attributes.headline
Discrimination on building  muslim cemetery.

# data[].attributes.subject
Discrimination on building  muslim cemetery.

# data[].attributes.body
Muslim man started a firestorm by wanting to build a funeral home cemetery and perhaps later a mosque.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Atlanta, United States - With the US presidential election only days away, many in the US - particularly the Muslim-American community - are bracing for the worst over fears that a win, or a loss, by Republican candidate Donald Trump could bring violence.

Stirred by Trump's inflammatory rhetoric, members of local militias from across the US have said they plan to carry firearms at polling stations to prevent alleged election "rigging" in favour of Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton.

In Newton County, 85km south of Atlanta, Georgia, those concerns are justified.

When a local Muslim-American community in the Atlanta area decided last August to buy land to be used primarily as a community cemetery, they did not expect that their innocuous plans would set off a firestorm of opposition that included local officials and armed white nationalist militia groups.

Al Maad al-Islami Mosque sought approval from Newton County to construct a cemetery, a funeral home and, perhaps many years down the road, a mosque and a recreational area on the half-a-square kilometre of land purchased for the project.

But when word spread of the plans, local residents and several county commissioners protested on the grounds that the property would be used as "training ground for ISIL terrorists", referring to the armed group known as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, or ISIS.

The plans also drew the attention of a group known as the Georgia Security Force III% , one of many white nationalist militias around the country that have been galvanised by the Trump campaign and his anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim rhetoric.

In August, Members of Georgia Force III% - headed by Chris Hill, 42, a former US marine who goes by the name "General Blood Agent" - held an armed protest against the Muslim community at the property in Newton County, accusing them of being ISIL supporters and "terrorists".

The Georgia militia group is also connected to a Kansas militia which had plotted to blow up a Somali Muslim mosque and community centre, according to Ryan Lenz, a researcher for the Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks and researches hate groups in the US.
READ MORE: White Lives Matter - A new US hate group shows its face
The FBI announced last month that it had foiled a plot by a local militia in Garden City, Kansas, to detonate car bombs at the Somali Muslim community centre and around the apartment buildings where many of the community members live.

Lenz told Al Jazeera that historically, white nationalist groups have tended to embrace a conspiratorial view of the US federal government, accusing it of conspiring with the UN to establish a new world order and thereby undermining the US.

"In the aftermath of September 11, white nationalist groups teamed up with organised anti-Muslim hate groups, creating a dangerous and threatening alliance against members of American Muslim community," he said.

Lenz added that the convergence of these two groups has created a terrifying mix in US local and national politics, the effects of which are not going away any time soon.

"The election of President Barack Obama, whom white nationalists and anti-Muslim hate groups accuse of being a crypto-Muslim, is also energising the anti-Muslim hate campaign in this country."

The Georgia Security Force III% did not respond to Al Jazeera's requests for an interview.

Imam Mohamad Islam, the leader of the al Maad Mosque, is unfazed by the threats and hateful statements made by militia members and others who opposed the cemetery plans.

He said he only wants to establish legitimate institutions to care for the community's social and religious needs, but knows a change in local attitudes will only come through patience and dialogue with the area's non-Muslim community.

"As a Muslim, I have to exercise patience when facing hardship and animosity," Islam told Al Jazeera.

Islam also expressed frustration that as an American and a Muslim he is somehow required by the public and the American media to answer for actions of other Muslims across the globe.

"It seems like certain segments of the American society insist on holding us responsible for the violent actions of some Muslims overseas. We don't condone any kind of violence, much less defend those who commit it. We are Americans first and foremost."
READ MORE: Arab Americans gear up to vote, defying Trump
Edward Ahmed Mitchell, the executive director of the Council of Islamic American Relations (CAIR) and a former Atlanta prosecutor, agreed with Islam that Muslim Americans are just as American as any other citizen of the US and therefore should be treated equally.

The build-up to the 2016 presidential election, Mitchell stressed, has caused anti-Muslim rhetoric to increase, with candidates such as Trump and Ben Carson frequently making bigoted statements against Islam and Muslims.

"The anti-Muslim rhetoric of certain politicians encouraged bigots who otherwise lurked in the dark recesses of the internet who now have a national platform," he said.

Imam Islam's approach of reaching out to county officials, dignitaries in the area and the local community by holding several joint meetings and having lunches and dinners with them has worked in easing the tension and eliminating misunderstanding between the two communities.

A Newton County spokeswoman told Al Jazeera the county was now ready to receive the mosque's application for permits to start the construction of its cemetery ground.

"At the end, the people of Newton County stood up in defence of religious freedom that ultimately makes this a success story," Mitchell said.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
American Muslims brace for the worst after US election

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Atlanta, United States - With the US presidential election only days away, many in the US - particularly the Muslim-American community - are bracing for the worst over fears that a win, or a loss, by Republican candidate Donald Trump could bring violence.

# data[].attributes.headline
Trump makes people feel safe to voice their prejudice

# data[].attributes.subject
Trump makes people feel safe to voice their prejudice

# data[].attributes.body
This article talks about Trumps ban on muslim immigration to America. ANd why muslims are suffering from that.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - About three months ago, Sarah Ibrahim's son came home from his fourth-grade class at a Maryland school with a disturbing question.

"Will I have time to say goodbye to you before you're deported?" he said, according to Ibrahim, a Muslim Arab American who works at a federal government agency in Maryland.

"The kids in his classroom were saying: 'Who's going to leave when Trump becomes president?'" said the 35-year-old mother.

The incident happened a few months after Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump - now the presumptive nominee - first called for a ban on Muslim immigrants and for more scrutiny at mosques after 14 people were killed in San Bernardino by a Muslim couple whom the FBI said had been radicalized.

Trump intensified his anti-Muslim rhetoric after last week's mass shooting in Orlando, in which a U.S.-born Muslim man killed 49 people at a gay nightclub, calling for a suspension of immigration from countries with "a proven history of terrorism".

He reiterated his call for more surveillance of mosques and warned that radical Muslims were "trying to take over our children."

While Democratic and several Republican leaders have distanced themselves from Trump's comments, many American Muslims say his stance has fueled an atmosphere in which some may feel they can voice prejudices or attack Muslims without fear of retribution.

"What Trump did was make these hidden thoughts public. He gave people permission to speak out loud, he removed the shame associated with being prejudiced. People know that they won't be punished," Ibrahim told Reuters at a community iftar, the sundown meal during the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan.

Trump's campaign did not respond to Reuters' request for comment. Trump has rejected the criticism that his rhetoric is racist, and has said he is often misunderstood by the media and his opponents.

A report by the Council on American-Islamic Relations and University of California, Berkeley released on Monday said the number of recorded incidents in which mosques were targeted jumped to 78 in 2015, the most since the body began tracking them in 2009. There were 20 and 22 such incidents in the previous two years, respectively. The incidents include verbal threats and physical attacks.

Corey Saylor, CAIR's director of the department to monitor and combat Islamophobia, said there had been a spike in Islamophobic incidents in the wake of Orlando, including those targeting mosques.

"Trump's rhetoric is a direct threat to American principles. He has mainstreamed anti-Constitutional ideas like banning or surveilling people based on faith," Saylor told Reuters.

"Such divisive rhetoric contributes to a toxic environment in which some people take the law into their own hands and attack people of institutions they perceive as Muslim."

"DIVIDING THE COUNTRY"

CAIR says the last big spike in incidents targeting mosques was seen in 2010 following the controversy over locating an Islamic center near the site of the Sept. 11 attacks in New York.

It said that lent "additional weight to the argument that levels of anti-Muslim sentiment follow trends in domestic U.S. politics, not international terrorism".

American rabbis and preachers have also denounced Trump's rhetoric. Anti-Semitic incidents in the United States still outstrip those against Muslims. The Anti-Defamation League said last year there were 912 anti-Semitic incidents across the United States during the 2014 calendar year, up 21 percent from 2013.

"If Muslims are not free and safe in America, then Christians and Jews are not free and safe in America," said Rabbi Eric Yoffie, president emeritus of the Union for Reform Judaism.

Trump has also drawn criticism for his rhetoric against Latino immigrants, saying early in his campaign that Mexican "rapists" and other criminals were coming across the border and calling for all undocumented immigrants to be deported.

Manal Omar, a Muslim-American author based in Washington, said she has stopped taking the metro and walking alone late at night.

"I can't dismiss the tweets and angry messages I've received from right wing militants," said Omar, who says she has grown especially vigilant after last week's murder of British lawmaker Jo Cox, whom she knew.

A few days after the San Bernardino attack, Ilhaam Hassan's family restaurant was burned down in an arson attack in Grand Forks, North Dakota.

Matthew Gust pleaded guilty in May to federal hate-crime and arson charges. He admitted to setting the fire because of the national origin of the employees and customers at the restaurant - a focal point of the local Somali-American community.

"I don't know what to expect if he (Trump) becomes the president," Hassan said. "He is against minorities. He is against Islam. It's not a message of unity, it's a message of dividing the country and that is not what America is based on."

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.keywords[]
judicial process / court cases / court decisions

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
American Muslims see Trump rhetoric fueling prejudice, hate incidents

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - About three months ago, Sarah Ibrahim's son came home from his fourth-grade class at a Maryland school with a disturbing question. "Will I have time to say goodbye to you before you're deported?" he said, according to Ibrahim, a Muslim Arab American who works at a federal government agency in Maryland.

# data[].attributes.headline
Trump wants a religious discrimination database.

# data[].attributes.subject
Trump wants a religious discrimination database.

# data[].attributes.body
Donald J. Trump wants a data base for Muslims only that tracks where radicalization would take place. That means targeting them just because of their faith.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
WASHINGTON - The latest on what presidential candidates are saying about ways to counter the terrorism threat in the United States. All times are local:

-

9:10 a.m.

Ben Carson says he backs broad intelligence-monitoring any place where there's "a lot of radicalization going on."

Just where? Churches, mosques, schools, shopping centers are some of the examples the Republican presidential candidate is citing.

He tells ABC's "This Week" on Sunday that the country needs "to get very serious about our intelligence" to ensure Americans' safety.

-

8:52 a.m.

Donald Trump says he wants a database, watch lists and unspecified other "checks and balances" to track Muslims in the U.S.

On ABC's "This Week," Trump was asked whether he rules out a database on all Muslims in the U.S.

Trump says: "No, not at all. I definitely want a database and other checks and balances. We want to go with watch lists. We want to go with databases."

His comments were something of a change from what the GOP front-runner has said in recent days.

On Thursday, an NBC News reporter pressed Trump in Iowa on whether there should be a database for tracking Muslims in the U.S. Trump replied: "There should be a lot of systems, beyond databases."

Would he put such a database in place as president?

"I would certainly implement that. Absolutely."

He tried in another interview to clarify that position, suggesting a watch list for the Syrian refugees admitted to the U.S.

-

8:50 a.m.

Donald Trump says "trouble's coming out of the mosques" in the United States and "we're being foolish, we're kidding ourselves" if law enforcement doesn't keep close surveillance on those houses of worship.

The Republican presidential candidate says such monitoring is needed as part of a terrorism-fighting strategy - even if there's strong push-back to that idea. He says "we've taken political correctness to a point where we can't do anything as a country anymore."

He tells "Fox and Friends" why he thinks it's imperative to conduct such surveillance in the country: "The problem's not coming out of the middle of Sweden. It's not coming out of Norway. It's not coming out of Denmark."

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Trump and Carson repeat calls to spy on U.S. Muslims

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
WASHINGTON - The latest on what presidential candidates are saying about ways to counter the terrorism threat in the United States. All times are local: - 9:10 a.m. Ben Carson says he backs broad intelligence-monitoring any place where there's "a lot of radicalization going on." Just where?

# data[].attributes.body
Trump said he would most likely be treated unfairly by a muslim judge.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Donald Trump says "it's possible" he wouldn't be treated fairly if the federal judge hearing a lawsuit against Trump University was Muslim.

The presumptive Republican presidential nominee has called for banning Muslims from entering the United States.

Trump responds "it's possible, yes," when asked on CBS' "Face the Nation" whether he'd feel a Muslim judge would treat him unfairly because of his policies.

Trump has also proposed building a wall along the border between the United States and Mexico. He's been arguing that U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel, who is overseeing the case, is biased against Trump because of the border proposal and the judge's heritage.

Curiel is an Indiana native whose parents are Mexican.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Trump says 'it's possible' a Muslim judge would treat him unfairly

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Donald Trump says "it's possible" he wouldn't be treated fairly if the federal judge hearing a lawsuit against Trump University was Muslim. The presumptive Republican presidential nominee has called for banning Muslims from entering the United States. Trump responds "it's possible, yes," when asked on CBS' "Face the Nation" whether he'd feel a Muslim judge would treat him unfairly because of his policies.

# data[].attributes.body
A man attempted to light a muslim woman on fire and is being look at by the police to capture him.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
NEW YORK (Reuters) - New York City investigators on Tuesday searched for a man suspected of setting fire to a traditionally dressed Muslim woman in a Midtown shopping area, police said.

Police said they were investigating the incident, which occurred the day before the 15th anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, as a hate crime.

The 35-year-old woman was standing outside a luxury clothing boutique on Park Avenue on Saturday evening when she felt her left arm suddenly heat up and noticed her blouse was on fire, city police said in a statement.

"She patted out the fire and observed a male standing next to her with a lighter in his hand," police said.

The victim, who local media reported was a tourist from Scotland, was not injured and declined medical attention, police said. Authorities did not name her.

The suspect fled before officers arrived.

On Tuesday, police released video surveillance footage of the suspect, a slim young-looking man wearing a backwards baseball cap walking down a sidewalk. No arrests have been made.

The Council on Islamic American Relations has condemned the incident, which it said followed an increasing number of attacks targeting Muslims in the United States.

"We are clearly seeing a spike in attacks on individual Muslims and Islamic institutions in New York and around the country," the Muslim advocacy group said in a statement on Monday. "It is time for the mayor and the NYPD to put forward the necessary resources to investigate and prevent these attacks on the Muslim community."

Last month, a man killed a Muslim cleric and his associate on the street as they left a mosque in borough of Queens.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
New York police seek man who set fire to Muslim woman

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
NEW YORK (Reuters) - New York City investigators on Tuesday searched for a man suspected of setting fire to a traditionally dressed Muslim woman in a Midtown shopping area, police said. Police said they were investigating the incident, which occurred the day before the 15th anniversary of the Sept.

# data[].attributes.headline
 Muslim-Americans 'grieving' after Trump win

# data[].attributes.subject
 Muslim-Americans 'grieving' after Trump win

# data[].attributes.body
Muslims talk about their reaction to election of Trump.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Muslim Americans tell us what they think a Trump presidency means for them.

# data[].attributes.body
67% more hate crimes since last year are up against the muslim people.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Reported hate crimes against Muslims rose in 2015 to their highest number since the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, according to FBI statistics released Monday.

Overall, the total number of hate crimes against all groups reported by law enforcement agencies to the FBI increased from 5,479 in 2014 to 5,850 last year. That remains far lower than the numbers seen in the early 2000s, but the FBI release comes amid numerous reports of attacks nationwide based on race and religion following last week's presidential election.

The most recent reporting covers calendar year 2015, which included the terror attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, California, as well as Republican Donald Trump's call for a ban on all Muslims entering the U.S. All of those, however, did not occur until the final two months of the year.

It's not yet known whether Trump plans to implement such a ban now that he has won the presidency. Critics say his pledge has contributed to anti-Muslim sentiment.

"We've seen how words from public figures like Donald Trump translate into violence," said Mark Potok with the Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks hate groups in the U.S.

Last year, there were 257 reported incidents of anti-Muslim bias compared to 154 the year before, a 67 percent increase. The number of reported hate crimes against Muslims peaked at 481 in 2001.

Ibrahim Hooper, spokesman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations, said he was not surprised to see the large increase in 2015 and said he expects the trend to continue.

"We saw a spike in anti-Muslim incidents nationwide beginning toward the end of 2015. That spike has continued until today and even accelerated after the election of President-elect Trump," Hooper said.

There have been reports of racist and anti-religious incidents around the country since the Nov. 8 election.

Two students at a vocational school in York County, Pennsylvania, held a Donald Trump sign in a hallway as someone shouted "white power," an incident captured on video and widely shared on Facebook.

In Silver Spring, Maryland, a banner advertising a Spanish-language service at an Episcopal church was slashed and the words "Trump nation. Whites only" were written on the back.

Authorities on two California State University campuses, in San Diego and San Jose, were investigating reports that two women wearing headscarves were attacked. At San Diego State University, authorities said a Muslim woman had her car keys and vehicle stolen by two men who targeted her while she wore a hijab and made comments about Donald Trump's election.

At the same time, a videotaped assault in Chicago showed black men beating a white man as onlookers screamed, "You voted Trump!"

On Sunday, Trump said he had not heard reports that some of his supporters might be harassing minorities.

"I am so saddened to hear that," Trump said during an interview with CBS's "60 Minutes." ''And I say, stop it. If it, if it helps, I will say this and I will say right to the cameras: Stop it."

According to the FBI report, the majority of hate crimes were motivated by bias against race or ethnicity. Of the 4,216 victims of a hate crime motivated by race or ethnicity, 52 percent were black, 18.7 percent were white and 9.3 percent were Hispanic or Latino. Crimes against Jews increased about 9 percent, while bias incidents involving sexual orientation were up 3.5 percent.

Civil rights groups have expressed concern that a Trump administration could radically reshape the U.S. Department of Justice, particularly when it comes to policing but also in terms of the priority placed on hate crimes. Those concerns were compounded over the weekend after Trump named as his chief White House strategist Steve Bannon, who came to his campaign from Breitbart News. Under his leadership, the Breitbart website became one of the leading outlets of the so-called alt-right, a movement often associated with far-right efforts to preserve "white identity" and oppose multiculturalism.

Michael Lieberman with the Anti-Defamation League said there have been "unprecedented efforts" to address hate crimes in recent years, from outreach to law enforcement, community meetings and an emphasis on cooperation among federal agencies.

Any increases, including the ones seen in anti-Muslim crimes, could be due in part to more reporting by victims as well as better reporting and tracking by law enforcement agencies. The number of law enforcement agencies sending data on hate crimes to the FBI decreased by about 3 percent in 2015.

An AP investigation earlier this year found 17 percent of local law enforcement agencies had not submitted a single hate crime report during the past six years as part of the FBI's tracking program, prompting concerns that an undercount was masking the true scope of hate and bias crimes in the U.S.

"Gaps in participation and incomplete reporting demonstrate materially that this work must continue, and we will be pressing the Trump Justice Department and U.S. attorneys so this important work will be ongoing," Lieberman said.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
FBI: Hate crimes against Muslims up by 67 percent in 2015

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Reported hate crimes against Muslims rose in 2015 to their highest number since the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, according to FBI statistics released Monday. Overall, the total number of hate crimes against all groups reported by law enforcement agencies to the FBI increased from 5,479 in 2014 to 5,850 last year.

# data[].attributes.body
People discrimination of muslims. Involve them feeling singled out in wake of terror attacks.