O humankind!
Indeed, We have created all of you
from a single male and female.
Moreover, We have made you peoples and tribes,
so that you may come to know one another.
And, indeed, the noblest of you, in the sight of God,
is the most God-fearing of you.
Indeed, God is all-knowing, all-aware.
—The Quran, 49:13
(Washington, D.C.; 3/19/2021) – The US Council of Muslim Organizations (USCMO), on behalf of our member institutions and American Muslims, mourns the senseless, tragic murders in cold blood of the six Asian Americans and two others in the massage businesses shooting spree in and around Atlanta on 16 March.
We unequivocally condemn this fatal yet sadly predictable hate massacre of our Asian fellows. We urgently call for immediate, measurable public actions to stem the alarming, lethal public rise of deliberately nurtured hostility against and widespread harassment of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (AAPI) in American society.
Moreover, we denounce those party and societal leaders – and call out their many more servile accomplices and enablers in government and communal institutions – who have openly conjured this dark-hearted hate against our Asian fellows as part of an appallingly horrific, cynical calculus meant to exalt majoritarian racism and vault its demagogues and opportunists into power.
USCMO leadership and American Muslims also condemn this senseless killing spree as an expression of a part of a proliferating sentiment of deadly misogyny among Americans: their young, white, male executioner unquestionably chose his victims based on gender as well as race. Six of the eight people mercilessly gunned down were Asian women, a seventh was also a woman, along with a loving husband and father, while critically injuring a Hispanic American man, as well.
Our hearts and prayers go out to all the victims’ families and loved ones of these dearly treasured and vital human beings. As Muslim Americans, we have long shared the intimate psychological horror and dire consequences of what it means to become the dehumanized object of widespread communal hate propagated for the craven purposes of nihilistic ambitions. We stand in seamless solidarity with our Asian American and Pacific Islander brothers and sisters in their moment of horror and vulnerability.
USCMO leadership and American Muslims state the following:
- We fully support President Joseph Biden’s urgent call to Congress to “swiftly pass” the Covid-19 Hate Crimes Act presciently proposed earlier this month by Asian American and Pacific Islander congressional leaders introduced by Rep. Grace Meng, D-N.Y., and Sen. Mazie K. Hirono, D-Hawai.
- We adjudge FBI Director Christopher Wray’s statement that the murderous spree “at the moment does not appear that the motive was racially motivated” as blinkered and benighted. This act of inhuman slaughter is inherently racist, an expression of a sustained year and more of highly targeted blame and hate from the highest offices in the land against Asian Americans relating them directly to the COVID-19 pandemic and stoking violent public action against our Asian American and Pacific Islander brothers and sisters.
- We endorse and highlight the Stop AAPI study released Tuesday that documents 3,795 hate incidents against our Asian American and Pacific Islander fellow Americans between March 19, 2020, and Feb. 28, 2021, an absolutely dramatic leap from about a hundred incidents recorded in the prior year. This stands as an indisputable indictment of the hate target the hands of lawmakers and party and societal leaders have helped, or allowed to be, placed on the backs of this besieged community. This egregious number of hate reports represents only a fraction of the actual hate incidents against Asian Americans that took place all across America since their deliberate political vilification a year ago.
- We condemn the hate-driven stereotyping of all minorities and the dire need for a stronger national stand against emboldened white supremacists and decisive steps from our elected officials and their appointees to eliminate and hold individuals strictly accountable for the rampant and dangerous practice of selective enforcement of the law by law officers and our judiciary.
- We call for vigilance from government, law enforcement, and the public in the face of the mushrooming danger and “elevated threat” in 2021 of domestic violent extremism in America – particularly from white supremacist organizations and their sympathizers – as reported on 17 March by the Director of National Intelligence, the nation’s top intelligence office. Citing conspiracy theory propagation of our recent past and the Capitol riot, the report says this “will almost certainly spur some DVEs [Domestic Violent Extremists] to try to engage in violence this year.”
Our hearts are filled with prayer for the victims of this massacre, their loved ones, the Asian American and Pacific Islander communities, and our nation. The US Council of Muslim Organizations, on behalf of our member institutions and American Muslims, remains vigilant in vindicating the rights and safety of our brothers and sisters of these culturally vital, vibrant, and integral American communities. We ask God to bless them with relief, protection, and flourishing prosperity.
