As the Israel-Hamas war unfolds, Muslim Americans struggle for understanding | The Excerpt

On today's episode of The Excerpt podcast: It's now been nearly seven months since Hamas attacked Israel, killing nearly 1200 Israelis and taking over 200 hostage. Since then, the Israeli Defense Forces, or IDF, have executed a devastating bombing campaign and sent in ground forces to "eradicate" Hamas. The death toll in the Palestinian enclave is staggering, with more than 34,000 killed, according to the Gaza health ministry.The majority of those killed are women and children. The health ministry says the sheer scale of the tragedy unfolding in Gaza is unprecedented. The UN estimates that more than 70% of Gaza's 2.3 million residents have been displaced. Food and medical supplies aren't nearly enough to meet the needs. Meanwhile, in the U.S., Islamophobia and anti-Muslim incidents have surged. Nihad Awad, co-founder and national executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, a Muslim civil rights and advocacy nonprofit joins The Excerpt to share his thoughts. For a different perspective, please see last Sunday's episode which features Jonathan Greenblatt, the CEO of the Anti-Defamation League or ADL, a Jewish civil rights organization.

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Hit play on the player below to hear the podcast and follow along with the transcript below. This transcript was automatically generated, and then edited for clarity in its current form. There may be some differences between the audio and the text.

Dana Taylor:

Hello and welcome to The Excerpt. I'm Dana Taylor. Today is Sunday, May 5th, 2024. In this episode, we are featuring an interview with Nihad Awad, national executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. For a different perspective, we invite you to also listen to last Sunday's episode, which featured Jonathan Greenblatt, the CEO of the Anti-Defamation League, a Jewish civil rights organization. Now on to today's show.

It's now been nearly seven months since Hamas attacked Israel killing nearly 1200 Israelis and taking over 200 hostage. Since then, the Israeli Defense Forces or IDF have executed a devastating bombing campaign and sent in ground forces to, quote, unquote, "eradicate Hamas." The death toll in the Palestinian enclave is staggering with more than 34,000 killed according to the Gaza Health Ministry. The majority of those killed are women and children, the health ministry says. The sheer scale of the tragedy unfolding in Gaza is unprecedented. The UN estimates that more than 70% of Gaza's 2.3 million residents have been displaced. Food and medical supplies aren't nearly enough to meet the needs. Meanwhile, here at home, Islamophobia and anti-Muslim incidents have surged. I'm now joined by Nihad Awad, co-founder and national executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations or CAIR, a Muslim civil rights and advocacy non-profit. Thanks for being on The Excerpt, Nihad.

Nihad Awad:

Thank you for having me, Dana.

Dana Taylor:

Let's start with the pro-Palestinian protests, which are still active and growing across the country. These demonstrations have led to some Jewish students being harassed and feeling unsafe on campus. The Anti-Defamation League or ADL has come out pretty strongly against the protests. On a recent episode of Morning Joe on MSNBC, its president Jonathan Greenblatt said about them, "Iran has their military proxies like Hezbollah, and Iran has their campus proxies like these groups like SJP and JVP." SJP stands for the Students for Justice in Palestine, and JVP, the Jewish Voice for Peace. And there are two student-led groups that are key stakeholders in organizing and encouraging these campus protests. You called for MSNBC to ban Greenblatt from the network following this statement. Why do you think he made this accusation?

Nihad Awad:

I think that question has to be asked to him, why did he accuse American legitimate voices who uphold the tradition of free speech and they are reviving the tradition of protests and objecting to our universities being part and parcel in the investment and perpetuating of genocide by doing business with states like the State of Israel. These students have to be applauded for awakening our society and reminding it to living up to our ideas of being fair and being respectful and protecting the rights of all people, whether here at home or around the globe. That's why people look up to America. And when we look at our history, we applaud those students. Even Columbia University itself on its website they applaud the students of the 1968 who stood up to the university itself and the administration who were supporting the Vietnam War. So those voices are critical to our mission as a society.

Protests or protest is as American as apple pie, so we have to revive this tradition because it led to important social change and important policy change from school segregation to child labor, to improved environmental standards, too many things, and it was uncomfortable. To accuse those people of being foreign agents and accusing even Jewish students of being Jewish agents to foreign countries, I think it's an insult to the intelligence of people. And people in responsible position, they have to watch those statements.

Dana Taylor:

Well, emotions are running hot right now on both sides and both the ADL and CAIR have said things that the other side finds incendiary. Do you think that community leaders like yourself, like Greenblatt deserve some grace for statements made in the moment right now? How do you engage with the substance of this very important conversation without adding fuel to the fire?

Nihad Awad:

Absolutely. We all have to be responsible and we all have to be genuine in not only what we say, but what we actually do. And that's leadership. Leadership is not about just saying words about taking action. And those students, let's remember why they are putting everything on the line. Their education, their safety, their prospect careers, not only them but also faculty members. And these are very diverse. They're not Palestinian or Muslim, they are Jewish, they are Christian, they are people of different backgrounds. You just look at their faces. These people put it all on the line to protest the genocide, the onslaught that's taking place in Gaza at the hands of the Israeli government supported by our government and some of our universities.

So these people are the beacon of hope that we should come around and listen to them. And all, if we are genuine in our advocacy and our personal and professional work, we have to make our society better. We have to make the world a better place. And today the world is watching what's taking place in Gaza and while the global community is up in arms supporting the Palestinians, demanding action, demanding the end of the genocide. Unfortunately, university officials like at the University of Columbia and other universities, our elected representatives including the White House, are turning not only a blind eye, they are aiding, abetting the oppressor with our tax dollar dollars and also with our war machines. I mean, this is incredibly disheartening for all of us, but especially for me.

This is personal for me. I'm an American Palestinian. I was born and raised in a refugee camp as a result of my parents being ethnically cleansed from their own town in historic Palestine just because they were not Jewish. As a result, we have been dispersed around the world, and some of our family members still live in refugee camps in Palestine. To me, it's not only personal, I feel that I have the obligation to clear not only the misunderstanding, the historic misinformation about our people who have been dehumanized, who have been blamed for their own suffering. So we all have to work together to uphold the values of justice for all.

Dana Taylor:

We had a recent report released by CAIR citing a surge in complaint, citing anti-Muslim speech, Islamophobia, and other threatening incidents in 2023 with a clear surge following October 7th. Tell me what American Muslims have been saying about their experiences since October 7th, and please share what CAIR's reporting and vetting processes in these incidences.

Nihad Awad:

Our organization has been fighting for social justice and for the civil rights and human rights of American Muslims ever since we started in 1994. And we started documenting and issuing an annual report, the first and only of its kind that highlights the status of Muslim civil rights in the country. And since then we have been meticulous in receiving reports and not only receiving reports, vetting them, investigating each and every single report and complaint that we receive. And this vetting process, they have been handled by professional attorneys with paralegals and case intake officers nationwide. We have 30 some offices in major cities and states, and ever since 1996 in particular, CAIR started to issue a regular report. The feeling of anti-Muslim incidents hits home to many members of our community. In fact, we've conducted numerous surveys consistently. The majority of American Muslims more than 53% believe that in their lifetime they have suffered one form of Islamophobia with either physical harm, discrimination, or any form of anti-Muslim sentiments in their professional or private lives.

In the past, last year 2023, our current report, which is the 2024 report, we cited a massive wave of increase of Islamophobia. We reported 8,061 cases, the majority of which happened between October and end of December. And that is a 56% jump over the previous year surpassed even the period following the Trump era when he imposed the Muslim ban. That increase and the 8,061 cases is the highest recorded by our organization ever since we started this process. And obviously, the categories include immigration cases, asylum cases, workplace discrimination, hate crimes, and violence. And I'm sure our media highlighted some of these very tragic cases, including the stabbing to death of a Palestinian child, six-year-old Wadea Al Fayoume in the suburb of Chicago, who was stabbed about 26 times to death, and his mother was choked and stabbed by the landlord where they live.

Dana Taylor:

There has also been a surge in anti-Semitism here in the U.S. since the Hamas attacks with dozens of physical assaults and hundreds of acts of vandalism. In addition, American Jews have experienced an alarming increase in hate speech that have left them feeling genuinely frightened and unsure of their place in America. Something that was brought up at the recent House committee hearing at which Columbia University President Minouche Shafik testified that is also frequently chanted at pro-Palestinian protests is the phrase, "From the river to the sea. Palestine will be free." Many Jews experience this language as an existential threat in that from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea includes land that is currently part of the State of Israel. Do you support this use of language, and if so, why?

Nihad Awad:

Well, look, to me and to all of us, anti-Semitism is no different than Islamophobia. It's a form of unacceptable hate, prejudice against Jews because of who they are. Any form of prejudice, Jews, or action against any people because of their background, because of their faith, should completely be rejected and condemned by all people, period. No question there. And we have a long, long tradition of condemning anti-Semitism and being at the forefront of condemning this phenomenon and calling for the protection of our Jewish sisters and brothers in the communities. We have a long history as Jews and Christian and Muslim of coexistence in America and around the world.

If people chant from the river to the sea, it depends on what they mean. If I hear this, I would like to see Palestine, free of discrimination, free of apartheid, free of double standards for both population. I would like to see in the same thing that happened to the South African society. When people worked and fought against apartheid, they were not calling for the destruction of the white people, they were seeking equal justice under the law. That's what I see when we would like to see the historic Palestine free of prejudice, free of oppression where Jews, Muslims, and Christians can live with equal rights, with dignity and respect for all.

Dana Taylor:

Turning to Gaza, circumstances for innocent women and children there are now dire and there is a very real risk of famine, especially in the north. Meanwhile, there's also been a surge in settler violence, including some involving the IDF against Palestinians in the West Bank. Many Palestinian Americans, including yourself, have family in these places. What's your experience and what have you been hearing from others since October 7th about what is happening abroad?

Nihad Awad:

It's hard to take your mind off the daily news looking at your phone to see are you going to receive messages from your family members that someone was killed, someone's house was bombed, or injured. Children have been orphaned. I am in constant contact with my family. I have family members and extended family members who live in Gaza who have been also killed, and their houses have been bombed. I have family members who live as refugees in their home like in Ramallah, West Bank, and I know many, many friends. All the friends I know from Gaza, American Palestinians, they have numerous family members who have been killed and their houses have been leveled to the ground in a massive carpet bombing that even President Biden himself accused the prime minister of Israel of indiscriminately bombing civilians. Although our administration has been supplying arms and politically defending the State of Israel, they recognize and admit that Israel has been committing war crimes and violating international humanitarian and also U.S. laws like the Leahy Law, for example.

And Israeli units have been accused of gross violation of Palestinian human rights even according to the State Department. Yet, our government continues to send arms to be used to kill people, to kill relatives of American Palestinians. And even they don't have to be relatives of us they are human beings. And I wonder why on earth our country, our government continues to fund a genocide in broad daylight when the international community is condemning this and saying, you stop it. The only person, the only government that can stop the genocide, not only Israel itself, but I believe our administration, especially President Biden. If he wants to end this genocide, he can end it as soon as he decides to, and unfortunately, he decided not to do so until now.

Dana Taylor:

Nihad, as you know, some organizations here in the U.S. have called into question the number of civilian casualties being reported in Gaza. They've said among other things that if Hamas can't even determine how many Israeli hostages are still alive, how can the Hamas-run health ministry possibly keep track of tens of thousands of casualties? They've also pointed out that apart from children, because Hamas fighters don't wear uniforms, it's impossible to tell who is a civilian and who is a fighter. What's CAIR's perspective here?

Nihad Awad:

Well, I would like people to Google credible international humanitarian organizations to get to the facts, and even American officials privately and publicly stated that the numbers that come from Gaza are accurate and historically have been proven to be accurate. It doesn't take a rocket scientist when you see hundreds of casualties and everybody has been saying that the majority of those who are injured and killed are women and children. These people have nothing to do with Hamas. The other number can be disputed, but we are talking about tens of thousands of people. I mean, imagine 10,000 people are not known, which means they are under the rubble. I mean, we're talking about human man-made catastrophe by the State of Israel supplied with our tax dollars and weapons manufactured mainly in the U.S. and continue to go to the State of Israel.

I would like people to have some humanity to recognize that if you're not a Palestinian, you don't have to be a Palestinian to recognize this genocide, you have to be a human and you have to have the heart and compassion. This is not about politics, it's about our conscience, what we are doing and saying when our children are watching. They are watching this generation because this is the most documented genocide in human history. People see it live, they see it on social media. And they don't see it only through the mainstream media who has over generations framed the issue and formed the opinion instead of informing the public.

Dana Taylor:

I want to give you an opportunity to respond to some of the criticism against CAIR that's out there. I understand that CAIR has unequivocally condemned the Hamas attacks of October 7th. Both the U.S. and the European Union have designated Hamas as a terrorist organization and both have condemned Hamas for its use of hospitals and civilians as, quote, unquote, "human shields." Does CAIR agree that Hamas is in fact a terrorist group?

Nihad Awad:

We have stated numerous times that we as Muslims and CAIR, we condemn any attack on any civilian anywhere any time. And this statement doesn't set the rule and give a clear answer where we stand on the issues then I think people have to look at their own bias. Dana, I would like you as a journalist to have asked questions to the other side or even any supporter of the State of Israel or American Jewish organization to condemn the atrocities that Israel has been committing against the Palestinians and have been condemned by the international community. When even all international and national human rights organizations, including Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and even the biggest Israeli human rights organization, B'Tselem declared Israel as a system that is using apartheid to oppress the Palestinians.

The statements that came from the prime minister of Israel, the president of Israel, the ministers of Israel, key leaders of Israel, dehumanizing the Palestinians and calling for genocide of the Palestinians. Has any of these people or their representatives or their supporters in the United States, have they ever been asked to condemn the State of Israel? If yes, I haven't seen it. If not, why the double standard? Why do we ask Palestinians to condemn their people? Are there two sets of rules, one for the Palestinian and one for the Israelis?

Dana Taylor:

I have one more question on this topic. CAIR has been accused over the years by federal agencies, by various branches of government, by states of having direct links to Hamas. In a 2007 case involving the Holy Land Foundation, CAIR was in fact named an unindicted co-conspirator alongside several other Muslim American organizations in what was then the biggest American terrorism money laundering case to date. Speaking plainly and directly for our audience, does CAIR currently have any ties, political, financial, or otherwise to Hamas?

Nihad Awad:

CAIR is an independent American organization for the past 30 years. We since our founding, we never had any interaction with any foreign groups that are listed by the United States government as terrorist organization and the government never has and will never be able to document otherwise. What the U.S. government has done is what they have been doing to the American Muslim community, silencing their voices, smearing them in a major campaign after 9/11, and they have not been proven to be right and including they have listed about 1.9 million Muslims on the terror watchlist unjustly without any due process. So we as American Muslims, we have been at the receiving end of the illegal and unconstitutional government practices over the years, I think is just one of the biggest forms of Islamophobia that the U.S. government has been dealing with the Muslim community. And we have not seen the U.S. government cracking down on Jewish American organizations who support settler activities, who have been financing and fighting and killing innocent Palestinians using American weapons. This double standard must end.

Again to the media, the media, including USA Today, has a major, major responsibility to reframe the issue and refrain from casting the American Muslim community and American Muslim organizations in a false light. This does not help the mission of journalism and it does not help informing the public. The USA Today in this question is really forming the public, not informing the public because these questions were not asked to the ADL about its history of spying on anti-apartheid protests where the ADL offices were even raided by the FBI and hold them accountable. That history somehow has been forgotten. CAIR was never raided, CAIR was never taken to court. And if we go to court, we are looking for our day in court to clear our name. None of this happened. Pro-Israel organizations' offices have been raided by the FBI for violating people's rights. We never violated anyone's rights. We never violated any law. So I think why American Muslims and American Muslim organizations are held to another standard, but not everyone else.

Dana Taylor:

Thank you for addressing that here. Final question, Nihad, if there was one thing you wanted people listening to this interview to walk away with something about the Muslim American experience at this very difficult time, what would that be?

Nihad Awad:

Islam has been part of this country even before its founding. The slaves who were brought against their own will, big percentage of them were Muslim and they kept the faith, the tradition of Islam. And American Muslims have fought in all the wars that led to where America is today, and also they as a minority, they have been suffering discrimination, stereotypes because of their faith. And American Muslims is now a growing and vibrant community, and American Muslims are an important part of the American fabric today. American Muslims serve in the military, they serve in Congress, they serve in schools, they serve in IT. They're cab drivers, they are your neighbors. Take advantage of getting to know an American Muslim and make America and American freedom and democracy work for all.

Dana Taylor:

Thank you so much for joining me, Nihad.

Nihad Awad:

Thank you.

Dana Taylor:

Thanks to our senior producers, Shannon Rae Green and Bradley Glanzrock for their production assistance. Our executive producer is Laura Beatty. Let us know what you think of this episode by sending a note to podcasts@usatoday.com. Thanks for listening. I'm Dana Taylor. Taylor Wilson will be back tomorrow morning with another episode of The Excerpt.