San Diego Muslims Criticize Mayor’s Response to Pleas

Leaders in San Diego’s Muslim community are perplexed by Mayor Dick Murphy’s delay in meeting with them to discuss vandalism against the Islamic Center and alleged harassment of Muslim children in school.

Mayors in other major cities, from New York to Los Angeles, were quick to call for calm after the Sept. 11 attacks, said Dr. Omaran Abdeen, spokesman for the Islamic Center of San Diego, the county’s largest mosque.

But calls and e-mails to Murphy’s office went unanswered until a few days ago. His spokeswoman, Elena Cristiano, said he has a meeting scheduled next week with local Muslim leaders.

“We felt an urgent need to meet with the mayor to relate our concerns about the safety of our children and families,” said Abdeen, an associate professor at the UC San Diego School of Medicine. “We asked his office to issue a calming statement, but he has been silent.”

Murphy declined to comment, but a statement released by his office said that he has shown his support for the “Arab American community” in the past, including his public denouncement in July of racist comments allegedly made by a local radio talk show host.

“In the aftermath of last month’s terrorist attacks, the mayor’s message has been one of unity,” Cristiano said. She said Murphy issued a statement Sept. 11 asking San Diegans “to unite as one nation.”

But Abdeen said the Muslims are disappointed that Murphy, a former Superior Court judge, did not speak out when the Islamic Center was vandalized on two occasions after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. In one incident, paint balls were fired at the building, and a couple of days later a cherry bomb was detonated outside the mosque.

Abdeen said that requests from him and other Muslim leaders for a meeting with Murphy increased after the vandalism.

At first, Cristiano said that Abdeen and other callers may not have been clear about requesting a meeting with Murphy. But later she said that “the mayor receives approximately 100 requests for meetings and events per week and simply can’t do them all.”

“Maybe he’s too busy to meet with us,” Abdeen said. “But we need the mayor’s support to stop the harassment of our women who wear the hijab, for example. There’s also the issue of our kids being harassed at school.”

Imam Sharif M. Battikhi, head of the Islamic Services Foundation in San Diego, said Muslim women and young girls who wear the hijab [the traditional head covering] have been singled out for ridicule and harassment since the attacks on the East Coast.

The covering is part of Muslim women’s religious tradition, he said, but it also makes them targets for people wanting to express feelings of outrage over the terrorist attacks.

“Three crazy guys who twisted the meaning of the Koran and crashed into the Pentagon lived in San Diego, hiding among other Muslims,” Abdeen said. “The mayor should know that we don’t support the terrible thing they did. He can help us put out this message.”

Cristiano said Murphy also considers Muslims loyal Americans. His Sept. 11 statement asked residents to “stay mindful we’re all Americans who love our country,” she said.