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OCTOBER 2013
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Obamacare to Help Close Coverage Gap for Youth New America Media, Commentary, Ghassan Michel Rubeiz Over 4 million uninsured adolescents will be eligible for health care coverage on January 1, due in part to increased Medicaid eligibility, according to a new report released by the Department of Health and Human Services. While last year’s Supreme Court ruling on the Affordable Care Act allows states to opt out of Medicaid expansion, all states are required to increase Medicaid eligibility for children up to the age of 19. The department says that including the newly eligible, some 10 percent of children nationwide between the ages of 10 and 19 will qualify for coverage when the ACA goes
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Vol.17 Issue No.206
How I learned to Stop Feeling Safe in My Own Country
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Learning to Cheat, Forgetting to Read By Yuri Guan Technology in the classroom is supposed to revolutionize education. But when learning is measured in grades and test scores, it can also make students believe that getting the right answer is more important than understanding why. That’s what happened recently at Lowell High School, ranked eighth in California and among the top performing public high schools in the country. In August, Lowell was Continued on page
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Earlier last month, “On the Media” producer Sarah Abdurrahman, her family, and her friends were detained for hours by US Customs and Border Protection on their way home from Canada. Everyone being held was a US citizen, and no one received an explanation. Sarah tells the story of their detainment, and her difficulty getting any answers from one of the least transparent agencies in the country. Other members of the party were grilled about their religious background. All of them were told to surrender their cell phones, unlocked, and not expect them to be necessarily returned. Munia Jabbar, an attorney at the Council on American-Islamic Relations, told NPR that CAIR has noticed a pattern of CBP agents imposing “really invasive and personal questions about their protected religious activity” when questioning Muslim travelers. “You’re singling out people based on their religion and then subjecting them to longer detentions and to humiliating questioning about stuff that they’re allowed to do legally, in fact, stuff that is part of the bedrock of our Bill of Rights,” Jabbar said. The Bill of Rights also protects people against unlawful search and seizure, but the MuslimAmericans who attempted to come home on Labor Day weren’t allowed that right either. “It went from, we won’t search your phones to, we’re gonna search your phone, confiscate it and not give it back to you,” Abdurrahman’s friend Khaled Ahmed told NPR “I got into an argument with the officer. I said, ‘Listen, all my work is on my phone. I really need it.’ He got aggressive with me, he said, ‘Listen, you’re not leaving with your phone today.’”
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Terms used in this paper Alhamdulilah: Praise God Allah: Arabic word for God Fatwa: Islamic decision based on Shari’a Hadith: Sayings of the Prophet Mohammad Hajj: Pilgrimage to Mecca Halal: Allowed in Islam Halaqa: Group study Haram: Prohibited in Islam Hijab: Head cover for women Hijra: Migration of the Prophet from Mecca to Madina Imam: Islamic scholar Iman: Faith Inshallah: God willing Madina: City near Mecca in Saudia Arabia Masjid: Place were Muslims gather for prayer and studies Mecca: City in Saudi Arabia where Prophet Mohammad was born Pbuh: Peace be upon him Quran: Islam’s Holy book Shahadah: Is saying “I accept Allah as the one God and Mohammad as his messenger” when someone accepts Islam. Sharia’: Islamic law Shura: A council of Muslim scholars (SWT) Subhanahu Watala: Praise be to Allah Taqwa: God consciousness
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Millions Face Cuts In Food Assistance DEARBORN, Mich. -- In Michigan, 1.8 million people will see a cut in their food assistance benefits this fall, when a temporary boost to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program — or SNAP, formerly known as food stamps — is set to expire, according to a new report from the Washington, D.C.-based Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. All of the more than 47 million Americans, including 22 million children, who receive SNAP will see their food assistance reduced, when a modest boost in benefits to SNAP recipients, which policymakers included in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act to strengthen the economy and ease hardship, expires on Oct. 31. For a family of three, that cut will mean a reduction of $29 a month—$319 for the remaining 11 months of the fiscal year. This is a serious loss for families whose benefits, after this cut, will average less than $1.40 per person, per meal. “So many struggling families in Michigan have been helped by this small increase in food assistance benefits at a time when we faced the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression,” stated Gilda Z. Jacobs, president and CEO of the Michigan League for Public Policy.
“This modest assistance is a lifeline to many families with breadwinners, who are struggling to find work, or are working at jobs that do not pay them enough
to put food on the table.” In addition to helping feed hungry families, SNAP is one of the fastest, most effective, ways to stimulate a struggling economy. Every $1 increase in SNAP benefits generates about $1.70 in economic activity. The across-the-board cuts, scheduled for November, will reduce the program by $5 billion in fiscal year 2014 alone. In Michigan, it will mean an estimated loss of $183 million in benefits. Cuts of that magnitude will have a significant impact on low-income families. It will be the first time SNAP reductions impact all participants, including 22 million children nationwide. Kareemah El-Amin, executive director of the Food Bank Council
of Michigan, said nearly 24 percent of Michigan children are food insecure. On top of these across-theboard cuts to the program, the U.S. House of Representatives recently defeated legislation that would have cut $20 billion from SNAP, eliminating food assistance for nearly 2 million people. That legislation would have provided strong financial incentives to states to reduce their caseloads. This could leave many families and their children without assistance to put food on the table when they need it most. The House is considering, and could vote on, even deeper cuts to the program in the coming weeks. “Most of the people on the Food Assistance Program are either unable to work, or are already working,” said Terri Stangl, executive director of the Center for Civil Justice, which operates a Food and Nutrition Program helpline. “The program is doing what it was designed to do: Meet a temporary need when families are struggling, because someone is laid off, or offered fewer hours of work. Now is not the time to reduce this modest source of help with something as basic as food.”
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Mentally Ill and Refugees Will Benefit from Health Care Law SAN DIEGO, Calif. – A DREAMer, single, low-income and 22, is waiting to enroll in Medi-Cal when it expands Jan. 1, 2014 under Obamacare, so people like him will finally have access to health care. A psychiatrist is eager for Obamacare to roll out because his patients will no longer be discriminated against by insurance companies. And a public health care worker who helps refugees from African and Middle-Eastern countries says once Obamacare is launched she will no longer have to witness her clients getting bumped off health care benefits eight months after they arrive in the United States, even as they are still trying to navigate the new culture. The three -- New (Jirayut) Latthivongskorn, Dr. Rodrigo A. Muñoz and Amina Sheik Mohamed -- were speaking at an ethnic media briefing organized by New America Media (NAM) here at the Jacob’s Center Sept. 25, just days before Open Enrollment begins for two key provisions in the health care reform law, popularly known as Obamacare: Medi-Cal expansion and Covered California, the online health insurance marketplace.
A recent poll shows that 24 percent of Californians still don’t know about Obamacare even though it’s been three years since it became law, and the information gap is biggest for immigrants and communities of
color, as The Field Poll Director Mark DiCamillo noted in a video aired at the briefing. Thailand-born Latthivongskorn talked about all the sacrifices his parents have made since they came to the US 13 years ago to provide him the best education, but through it all neither he nor they have had any health insurance. They relied for health care on the “well-stocked pharmacy” of medicines they have from Thailand.
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“When you have no health insurance,” the newly-minted UC Berkeley graduate said, “you have to spend all your time living to not get sick.” Now that he is a DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals) recipient – given to youngsters who have been brought to the country when they were 16 or under and who have lived in the United States continuously for five years -Latthivongskorn will be able to get statesponsored MediCal within a couple of months, but his parents, who work in low-paying jobs, will likely continue to remain without health insurance until their immigration status changes, the young man said. “As great as (Obamacare) is, undocumented immigrants will not be eligible for any of it,” Latthivongskorn lamented, noting that his determination to become a doctor was largely influenced by seeing immigrants like his parents struggle for lack of health insurance. But its shortcomings,
notwithstanding, the ACA will help reduce the discrimination by insurance companies against mental health patients, noted Muñoz, a professor of psychiatry at UCSD and the former president of the American Psychiatric Association. Insurers limit the amount of care mental health patients can access, he said. The ACA will require insurers to treat psychiatric illness like any other. It will also remove many of the obstacles to fair treatment, Muñoz said. Mohamed, program director at UCSD’s Department of Family and Preventive Medicine, and active in the African and MiddleEastern refugee communities, said that if refugees can now enroll in Medi-Cal because of its expansion, they need no longer face the short-term health care their refugee status now limits them to. That aside, Obamacare will allow refugees to access the mental health services they so acutely need, she said. “Refugees come to the United States with a lot of anxiety and stress,” she pointed out. “They need mental health care.”
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Opinion
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The Front Burner: Deadly Devices Are Futile Way to Battle Terrorism It has been more than a decade since the first US drone strike in Pakistan, and can we say that we are safer for it? In recent years, the drone campaign has expanded from Yemen to Pakistan, Somalia, eastern Turkey and the southern Philippines. Has the violence in these regions lessened and hatred of America abated?
people are killed in drone strikes — confirmed by no less an authority than President Obama himself in his recent speech at the National Defense University — but the drone is an ineffective weapon in the fight against terrorism. It creates more enemies than it eliminates and worsens the violence in the targeted regions.
governments that were quick to ascribe the actions of the periphery to the evil machinations of al-Qaida and other Islamic terrorists. The US quickly came swooping in with its drones, exacerbating the conflict between center and periphery, and arousing the anger of the nation at large. For every “militant” killed, there is
The answer is a resounding no. The near daily attacks in Pakistan, Yemen and other areas where the war on terror is being played out, and countless lives lost — feeding into high-levels of antiAmericanism — are the clearest signals that the drone has failed. Not only is it a fact that innocent
US drones do not operate in a vacuum. They are being introduced into tribal societies, which are already in turmoil. Many of these societies have been locked in conflict with their central governments for decades. It was only after 9-11 that the US, in its newly minted war on terror, allied itself with central
a long line of other misguided young men ready to take his place, seeking revenge for the trauma caused to their society. For every drone strike, the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan has vowed to take revenge with a suicide bombing. A tribesman from Waziristan told me that there are not enough bombs in the region to fill the demand from willing suicide bombers. Beyond the Tribal Areas, the drone campaign has stoked bitter resentment from the Pakistani nation as a whole, souring relations with a key ally in the region needed more than ever during the impending US withdrawal from Afghanistan. Several major candidates in the recent Pakistani elections, including the new Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif , made opposition to US drone strikes a central part of their campaigns. Regardless of any of the perceived merits of the drones — with many supporters lauding the precision of the weapon or the ability to keep
American boots off the ground — the use of the drone is a clear sign that the US is not understanding the source of the violence in these regions and therefore unable to target the underlying cause. As a former administrator of tribal societies in both the Tribal Areas and Baluchistan in Pakistan, I found it necessary to rely upon political measures working within existing tribal structures to check violent elements within society rather than relying on force alone. Stability in these regions has traditionally been maintained through the councils of elders and traditional religious leaders acting as mediators working with the representative of the central government. U n f o r t u n a t e l y, these pillars of authority have been damaged or demolished in recent years amid the broader turmoil in the region. Groups like the TTP have filled that vacuum. The traditional pillars need to be reconstructed and supported in order to effectively check the men of violence. The only means to bring peace to the region is through long-term political solutions. For anyone who understands tribal society, the use of military force, including the drone, only escalates the problem rather than solving it and represents a failure of the political administration. Simply put, the drone is an ineffective method of fighting terrorism. Akbar Ahmed is the Ibn Khaldun Chair of Islamic Studies at American University in Washington, DC and author of “The Thistle and the Drone: How America’s War on Terror Became a Global War on Tribal Islam.”
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COMMENTARY
OCTOBER 2013
The Essence of Science in the Muslim Community By Heba Haleem The Ancient Greeks were the first ones in history to ask questions about science. Then came the Muslim Arabs, who made scientific and mathematical discoveries during their golden age in the Abbasid Empire. Later, using both Muslim and Greek knowledge, the western Europeans initiated the Scientific Revolution. World history shows how important science is and has been. I always wondered how studying science as an American makes me different. As a new generation American Muslim here in the United States, I have a newfound perspective on science. Whereas my parents saw it as something rigid, with calculations, numbers, and facts, I see it as flexible matter, able to be morphed into any new discovery or innovation. Whereas they consider science and medicine as profitable fields that will feed my family well, I see them as an opportunity to thrive in an
intellectual environment. As an American, I see things in a new way. But being Muslim has also indubitably influenced my perception of science. Perhaps the largest philosophical ideal that has been debated since the time of the Enlightenment in Europe is religion versus science. Some believe they are irreconcilable: how can the miracle of God be explained through the scientific method? Or to even go further, how can the existence of God be proved? It cannot. As Muslims, we believe in the divine revelation, and the truthfulness of the Allah and the Prophet Muhammad (S.A.W). This is our proof. In this way, we have shaped our view of science around our religion of Islam. At school, I study biology, chemistry, and physics. I learn about plant cells and projectile motion. But although we may learn the components of a plant cell, we may not be able to use science to prove the components of Islam.
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Military Service, Not Buddhist Meditation Clue to Navy Yard Shooting
BANGKOK, Thailand – As media pundits scrounge through Aaron Alexis’s background for clues to the uncontrolled fit of rage that led him to gun down 12 civilians at the Washington Navy Yard, a most egregious accusation has been raised against his devotion to “the dark side of meditation.” Critics have charged that Thai Buddhist meditation classes promoted his psychological detachment from reality, implying such practices amplified the voices in his head and thus impelled him to mass murder. In a further attempt to shift the blame onto the tiny Thai community in America, the New York Post in tabloidstyle claims that his break-up with a Thai girlfriend and a frustrating trip to Bangkok to find another soulmate led to the pentup rage that was later unleashed in gunfire. This sort of speculation is demeaning and completely irrelevant, since couples break up every day of the year without venting their grief in a suicidal shooting spree. His target was not his ex-girlfriend and her circle of friends in either Texas or Thailand, but unrelated victims at his workplace in Washington, D.C. These sorts of conclusions put the cart before the horse. From medical records and accounts of his acquaintances, Alexis was well aware of his emotional difficulties and had sought help from his VA hospital and wherever he could find it, and one source of comfort was the Wat Busayadhammavanara temple on the outskirts of Fort Worth, Texas. For a brief period in the suburb of White Settlement, Alexis was employed as a waiter at a Thai restaurant owned by a couple who encouraged his meditation lessons as a path toward resolving his anger issues. Apparently in Vipassana meditation, he found some relief and peace of mind from the constant anxiety that caused him to carry a .45 caliber handgun in fear for his life. Whatever prompted his feelings
of insecurity and terror arose from a source unrelated to that temple and the Thai community. His defensive reactions, which led to two earlier incidents of non-injurious gun violence, were likelier linked to traumatic experiences during his military service as a full-time Navy reservist with a secret-level security clearance. The nature of his missions remains undisclosed by the Pentagon and
– a nearly superhuman feat. As a sniper, he was sent on secret missions into Iraq, the nature of which the Pentagon has never disclosed. Those blank pages in his record undoubtedly are key to understanding his personal rebellion against the government that he had served, and are key to unraveling the alleged double homicide and other fatal shootings Dorner is accused of perpetrating in the Los Angeles area.
probably never will be revealed in accurate detail. A Troubled Generation Alexis attributed his mentalhealth issues to his assignment in cleaning up contaminated debris at the 911 Ground Zero site, but the Navy claims no such record of this work. A report in British paper Daily Mail notes Alexis was seen exiting a subway near the World Trade Center just as the twin towers were collapsing. The sight, it says, quoting Alexis’ father-in-law, left him “traumatized.” Indeed, the career of Alexis runs parallel to the 911 era, when thousands of servicemen were assigned to secret combat missions that do not appear on their military records. Another troubled Navy reservist, Christopher Dorner, was trained as a sniper at Fallon air station, Nevada, and with an elite commando unit that required every member to swim with full combat gear from Camp Pendleton on the California coast to militarycontrolled San Clemente island
The Washington Navy Yard incident is rife with many other inconsistencies. Alexis owned an AR-15 rifle but his blue-clad body was found only with a shotgun and two pistols, while military veterans at the shooting site heard the distinct sound of gunfire from an AR-15 and saw a second shooter dressed in green holding this very same model of automatic weapon. If any of the above factors haunted his military career, then Alexis had good reason to seek out Vipassana meditation, which was developed by Sinhalese Buddhists in ancient Sri Lanka and then transmitted to Thailand. Diversion Tactics To blame meditation by Thai Buddhist practitioners is a cheap trick aimed at diverting public attention from the homegrown causes of gun violence. Buddhism, especially of the Theravada school practiced in Thailand, stands firmly opposed to these sorts of overbearing societal pressures and, to the contrary, tries to help individuals
rediscover their genuine mental grounding, which in JudeoChristian terms could be called moral conscience. When Alexis turned to Vipassana meditation, it was to free himself from the shackles that imprisoned his mind. This is not to say that Buddhism is entirely peaceful as is commonly assumed. There are political factions in Buddhist societies that, for reasons of material interest, advocate violence. This is obviously the case in places like Sri Lanka, Myanmar and Japan in the wartime period, where fanatic monks or priests have urged brutal attacks against minority religious groups and foreigners. These gross violations of the Buddhist doctrine of nonviolence are based on secular power struggles that exploit religious differences. Some of these same problems apply to Tibetan Tantric Buddhism in the politically complex struggles inside and outside its homeland. The Southeast Asian temples in the United States are not associated with any of these deviant teachings but remain true to the original calling of helping people resolve their personal troubles and live together in harmony. Most of these religious communities – Vietnamese, Cambodia and Laotian – arrived as refugees, while Thais came as students or economic migrants. These subgroups are by no means free of violent crime against each other or against other Americans, as has been shown in several shooting incidents in Minnesota and on the West Coast. If anything, these communities have been occasional victims of discrimination and violence, as in the case of the murderous attack on schoolchildren in Stockton, Calif., in the late 1980s. In none of these past cases of violence has Buddhism or meditation ever been suspected as the cause of crime. To borrow a phrase from Jesus of Nazareth, the wider solution to the Aaron Alexis mystery is: Physician, heal yourself. The root problem resides in the violence of American political power, not in the nonviolence of Buddhism.
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My Sister’s Story:
‘Broken’ Taillight Leads to Deportation a notice in the mail telling her to come to the courthouse to resolve it. The very next day, after her class at Bakersfield College, my sister headed back to the Kern County Courthouse in Bakersfield. When she arrived she was met with an
costly to hire a lawyer to fight her case, so she agreed to a voluntary deportation. Not having my sister here with me while I finished my senior year, or during my first year at Bakersfield College, has created a dark and empty hole in my
us who arrived here as children, it was a bittersweet moment because I knew it was too late for my sister. I thought of how unfortunate she was, given that if she had not been deported, she too would have been able to apply for DACA, just like me and our other two sisters.
arrest warrant, and handcuffed. At first I’d thought it was all just a big mistake, that my sister was the victim of a glitch in the system. But then I learned that what happened to my sister has happened to others. According to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU): “S-Comm has led to the deportation of over 92,000 California residents as of January 2013 – more than any other state. Contrary to the program’s stated goal of prioritizing serious felony offenses, the vast majority of those deported, about 7 out of 10, are categorized by ICE as either ‘non-criminals’ or individuals with lesser offenses, including traffic violations.” There was a time when I admired the fairness of our government and justice system. Yet after seeing what happened to my sister, my views have changed. My sister’s taillight was not broken. Could the “broken taillight” have been an excuse made up by the officer to pull over my sister and check her immigration status? After she spent about two weeks in jail, without visits from family members, and after countless meetings with lawyers, my sister realized that it would be far too
heart. I haven’t been able to hug my sister, spend a day with her, or simply have her hold my hand when I had a problem I couldn’t face alone. There are nights when all I can do is think about her. I cry, and my sadness turns to anger. I’m angry at the fact that my sister was torn from me without letting me say good-bye or spend time with her before she left.
I miss her so much, and I’ve never understood why she was the one who had to have this horrific experience. After being deported, my sister was able to situate herself with a friend of one of my siblings in Mexico, and they have been kind enough to take her in as one of their own. But it doesn’t take away the fact that she has been without her own family -- to be there on her birthday, Christmas, or to see the birth of her nephews. The amazing thing is that she hasn’t lost her smile. I maintain hope that she will soon see her family again.
When I found out last year that President Obama had issued Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), granting temporary legal status to those of
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ARVIN, Calif. -- It is often said that family is everything in life, and in that sense I am fortunate to have grown up in a family of nine brothers and sisters. Life wasn’t always easy for us, but we lived comfortably and most importantly, we were happy. But everything changed three years ago, when my 22-year-old sister was deported to Mexico. Ever since, my family and I have lived with such emptiness in our hearts. My parents brought us from Michoacán, Mexico, to Arvin, California, in 2001. I was in the second grade and my sister, Blanca (who would later be deported), was 12-years-old. When we arrived here, my dad immediately got a job working in the fields. Our nightmare began on a Friday in December 2010. I was walking home from Arvin High School with my sister, Marylou. We were talking about going to dinner with Blanca and my other sister, Samantha, since we hadn’t seen them in a while. A few minutes into our conversation, Marylou got a call from Samantha with some frightening news: Blanca had been arrested. I felt the blood rush through my body, and for what seemed like an eternity, my whole world stopped. All I could hear was the panicking beat of my heart. The rest of our walk felt like the longest walk home I’d ever had. I remember hoping that maybe, by the time I got home, things would be all better. But that wasn’t the case. My family had always feared law enforcement because we were undocumented. Any mistake we made could have meant deportation for us. But when my sister Blanca showed up with a ticket in her hand for a broken taillight – which she hadn’t thought was broken – we didn’t worry about it much because my brother had once gotten a speeding ticket and had paid it, without any further repercussions. Little did we know then that Blanca’s ticket would profoundly change her life, and ours. The week after Blanca was pulled over for the supposedly broken taillight, she went to the courthouse to check on the status of her ticket. To her surprise, the ticket wasn’t in the system. In the following weeks, she began to wonder whether the cop had forgotten to report the ticket, until one day she received
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Learning to Cheat, Forgetting to Read Youth Voices on Classroom Technology
one of 42 Bay Area high schools that were cited for cheating on the state’s annual standardized test. Some students at the schools used their mobile devices to snap and send pictures of the tests via social media. As a punishment, it and the other schools could lose their API score for two years, which would make them ineligible for state funds and performance awards. As a recent graduate of Lowell I know the stakes are high there. I remember how after almost every test I took there would be text messages on my phone from students hoping to get a hint of what to expect. “So what was on the test?” they read. Often students would wait outside class with the same question. And the problem isn’t just at Lowell. In a 2008 survey conducted by the National Center for Education Statistics of 24,000 high school students in grades nine to 12, 95 percent of respondents admitted to cheating at least once. Teachers, meanwhile, are going
to ever-greater lengths to try to prevent cheating. Some of my teachers made multiple versions of tests, rearranged seating during tests and spent hours on-line afterward on sites like Turnitin.com to look for signs of plagiarism. Students caught cheating had their tests thrown out and faced other disciplinary measures. The English Department actually keeps a “Book of Shame,” where plagiarized work is kept for teachers to see. But why cheat? For students at Lowell grades are everything. Add to that the feeling -- one most Lowell students experience sooner or later -- that to the left and right there’s someone smarter than you, and the temptation to look for a way to get ahead becomes even stronger. And with all the new gadgets out there, those ways could be right at your fingertips. I No Longer Read by Jimmie Fails It’s a beautiful, late summer day
Arabic Yellow Pages
in San Francisco. I walk into the main public library located near city hall and what do I see? There’s an older disabled man trying his luck at using the computer to find books, while a young working-class mom struggles with three children in tow. In this big beautiful library with over 7 million books inside of it I manage to see about three people my age, only two of whom were actually there to read or find books to read. The other guy was on a computer in a corner watching porn and looking back every few seconds to make sure no one saw. So how much reading do young people do on their own time nowadays? When I was younger, I enjoyed reading and would do so for hours each day. I read the Harry Potter trilogy at 9 years old and more than a dozen Animorphs books. But at 18 I can say that I am no longer as enthusiastic about picking up a new book to read. These days the only reading I do
is via Facebook status updates, or the occasional Twitter-length message. So what happened? I blame technology. For young people, video sites like YouTube, Vimeo, and the newer phenomenon, Worldstarhiphop. com are driving the ascent of visual media. It’s like there’s no patience for reading anymore. And even if teens are reading books you will more likely see them reading from their iPads or electronic tablets than with an actual physical book. It’s gotten to the point where if I was to walk up to a high school student and ask if he’s read J.D. Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye, chances are he may have not even have heard of the book. But I can bet you he knows the latest viral video on YouTube, or the Facebook status of Kim Kardashian.
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INTERNATIONAL
OCTOBER 2013
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Syria Needs Humanitarian, Not Military Intervention New America Media: You’re preparing to depart for Jordan. What is the purpose of your trip? Jamal Dajani: I will be visiting the largest [Syrian] refugee camp there, which is called Zaatari. It’s one of the largest refugee camps in Jordan, and one of the largest in the region. Just to give you an idea, Zaatari has 100,000 refugees in it. This is a very arid piece of land close to the Jordanian-Syrian border that used to be a Jordanian military base. The closest town [to the camp] is called Mafraq, which is the fourth largest city in Jordan. It has 52,000 people living in it, and the Zaatari refugee camp is now double the size of the town. NAM: A number of refugee camps have been set up in neighboring countries since the start of the Syrian war. Why are you going to this particular one? Dajani: This will be my third visit to the area. I did an assessment of the area a year ago and found there were roughly 25,000 Syrian refugees in the camp. A year later there are 100,000, with at least 30,000 children. So now I am going to follow up on my earlier work. NAM: What are you expecting to see? Dajani: Well I am not expecting to see anything pleasant. I have a good idea of what to expect … but I think it’s important to put this in context. While everyone is talking about military action, strike or not strike, a vote in the Congress and now chemical weapons … after these stories die out, people will
forget about the refugees. You always see a peak of interest … and then always, the refugees get left behind. And I have a long history with refugees. As a Palestinian, my family was made refugees in 1948. And 65 years later, we still have a refugee problem with the Palestinians. I once did a story (in 2004) on Iraqis who fled to Syria. Imagine the irony today with Syrians becoming refugees and going into Iraq. It is a never-ending issue. To add more context; in March of this year there were 1 million Syrian refugees, today [there are] 2 million. The number doubled in six months. NAM: What is the population of Syria? Dajani: About 21 million, so we’re talking close to 10 percent of the population. Lebanon alone has 728,000 Syrian refugees, or 20 percent of the country’s population. Proportionally, relative to population size, the United States would have to take in 50 million refugees to be equal the number Lebanon has taken in. Of internally displaced Syrians, there are currently 5 million, or one third of the Syrian population. These figures come from the United Nations. The U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees called this the “Great tragedy of the century.” For me, the saddest statistic is that more than half of all those displaced are children. NAM: Can you describe what an average day is like for a Syrian child in one of the refugee camps?
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Dajani: Inside the camp, in fact, certain age groups are better off. For example, at Zaatari, the United Nations and other donor countries set up a couple of schools. When I visited, they had kids from 7 to 13-years-old all taking the same three classes. So, some of the younger kids may get to learn to read and write. But if you are 16 and two years from college, you’ve lost those
Obama administration gave it very little attention. And I wondered why this was the case. Was it fatigue, after getting involved in Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen, and then Libya? When Syria came, we looked the other way. Three years later, the big question for me is, after more than a hundred thousand deaths, what difference does it make if we say chemical weapons or not? The other
last years. You will never get into college. This is why we see some kids becoming child soldiers, or young Syrian girls marrying early to wealthy Arabs and Jordanians. The families just can’t support their kids. It’s almost like they are selling them away. NAM: Given Syria’s ethnic diversity, are the refugee camps being formed along ethnic lines? Dajani: I have yet to see a study that looks at camp populations broken down by ethnicity. But in the camps, for example at Zaatari, there are fault lines that run not along ethnic lines but political. I heard people complain about how some of the combatants and their families were allowed to enter the camp. So you’re mixing people who are neutral with those who have either fought against or for the regime. There have been frictions in the camps because of this. NAM: There are reports that with the growing number of refugees, host countries are beginning to withdraw the welcome mat. Dajani: There are Jordanians beginning to say, “Hey, you are coming to my country, working for cheaper wages and driving up the rents.” After a while, the welcome begins to wear out, usually by year two or three. Syria had been in this position, welcoming Iraqi and Palestinian refugees. Now they are the ones in need of welcome. Jordan, too, has hosted Palestinians, Iraqis, and now Syrians. Lebanon is the same story. In essence, they have been seeing a flow of refugees for the past 60 years. And if there are any countries used to this, it is these. But when you go further abroad, say to Egypt, you don’t see a lot of refugees. Egyptians have their own problems. NAM: What have you made of the debate we see in the United States over whether or not to strike Syria? Dajani: I think the United States abandoned Syria three years ago. The
question is, if Assad surrenders his weapons, will that stop the killing? Even if he does surrender them, the conflict will continue and more people will die or be made refugees. We are putting too much emphasis on the military option. And now it has become official that we will begin arming the rebels. Where is that going to take us? NAM: Is there a humanitarian solution to the crisis in Syria? And can there be international consensus on it? Dajani: Yes. By internationalizing the humanitarian situation, and not the battle, which is already internationalized. Inside of Syria, information [on refugees] is very limited because of the security issues. What we do know is that we have 5 million displaced. But because the government there is under the threat of attack, it is unlikely to allow a corridor of humanitarian aid from the United States. And that is the first thing that has to be established, which is why Russia is very important. Moscow is the only one that has Assad’s ear. Everyone else wants to attack him … he is like a cornered cat. I am not saying he is an angel, but he is part of the puzzle. The Russians can help broker an agreement to create a safe corridor to help the people inside the country. That is the first international intervention that should take place. NAM: As a Palestinian, do you see something unique in the plight of the Syrian refugees. Dajani: Every circumstance is different, though there are similarities. When the Palestinian crisis first erupted, I doubt many Americans even knew of Palestine beyond what they’d read in the Bible. I think what’s different here is the sheer numbers involved and the short period of time that this has unfolded. In this day and age, this is the failure. With all the information available, we have gotten this far without anyone having lifted a finger. That is the shock.
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NATIONAL
OCTOBER 2013
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Volunteers Keep Watch on Immigrant Detainees It’s looking unlikely that Congress will take up immigration reform this fall. But the push is still on to put deportations and immigrant detention centers under the microscope. And some of those leading this effort are immigrants themselves—who’ve spent time in detention centers— and are organizing to support those still inside. Luis Nolasco was nine when his parents brought him to California from Mexico. Back then, his family’s “undocumented” status meant little to him, but that changed his senior year of high school. “That’s when the whole [feeling of], ‘Oh crap, I’m undocumented,’ kicks in,” Nolasco says. “You know, ‘I don’t have papers. What does this mean? I can’t go to college. Oh my God.’” Without papers, Nolasco missed out on college funding. But he found a way to study, graduated, and joined others like him to push for immigrants’ rights. “It’s not until after I became comfortable in my undocumented identity,” Nolasco says, “that I started learning more about the way that detention centers work, and where we are pretty much right now.” Where are we now? On any given day, some 34,000 immigrants sit behind bars in US detention centers for reasons related to their status—that’s up about five-fold from 20 years ago, as enforcement has tightened. Nolasco protested this mass detention of immigrants, most of them held on civil – not criminal – charges. Then he went a step further, and turned himself over to Border Patrol. “I turned 22 inside detention, which is really fun,” Nolasco says with a laugh. “Party of one.” Nolasco saw how immigrants could feel lost in the system. In one month, he was shuttled between three detention facilities in three states. He never had a visitor. Friends and family couldn’t keep track of where he was. Eventually, Nolasco was released, and he’s trying to legalize his status. He’s also determined to support immigrants still in detention. In Southern California, he joined a coalition of undocumented youths and met an activist, Victoria Mena. “And she’s like, ‘Actually, I’ve been working on setting up a
visitation-type program up here in the detention center we have in Adelanto,” Nolasco says. “’Would you be interested?’ And [I said,] ‘Yeah, definitely.’ So I was able to get connected to the Friends of Adelanto Detainees.” Friends of Adelanto Detainees,
that, over the phone, ICE complained about Adelanto Friends Facebook posts and website comments related to visitation. Though they said the main culprit was a Huffington Post blog by CIVIC’s co-founder criticizing the treatment of detained transgender
in Southern California, is part of a nationwide network called Community Initiatives for Visiting Immigrants in Confinement—or CIVIC. It supports programs sending volunteers to visit detained immigrants—and watch the facilities holding them. Prisoner visitation programs have long existed, but for immigrant detainees, the need is especially great, advocates say. Detained immigrants usually lack lawyers, and often lack English language skills. And many are alone in the US. So Nolasco helped launch the Adelanto program in July. It started strong. Some volunteers drove hours to visit the desert facility. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, had approved the program. And then it stopped. “We got about a week in,” Nolasco says, “and then ICE emailed us saying that our visitation program is canceled until further notice, without any explanation whatsoever… why, reasoning, nope, nothing.” Other visitation programs in California were also canceled without explanation. “So we started a campaign to get the program reinstated,” Nolasco says. A congressman complained to ICE. The ACLU wrote a letter. So did volunteers. Then CIVIC–the national visitation network—reported
immigrants. ICE declined interview requests for this story but stated in an email that they had suspended the visits to protect detainees’ privacy.
Nolasco says his visitation program has strict privacy guidelines, with visitors instructed not to talk about detainees. Finally, almost a month after the suspension, ICE said it would reinstate the visitation program at Adelanto. But there was no champagne. The Friends of Adelanto Detainees told ICE, “No thanks.” “We’re choosing not to be reinstated,” Nolasco says, describing his group’s response to ICE’s offer. “We don’t need [ICE] any more. We already made some friends inside who can help us spread the word out. Because what if we do something just slightly, just publish something, and they take away our program again?” So the visitation program hasn’t stopped. It’s just happening informally now, with volunteers visiting detainees as if they were regular friends and family. And the program is growing, exceeding 100 detainees requesting visits, and 70 trained volunteers.
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Islam
OCTOBER 2013
FAMILY RELATIONSHIPS By Lolita V Jefferson Ed.D Verily, Allah commands justice, the doing of good and giving to kith and kin .(Qur’an, 16:90) A sensible and well-balanced family system is the very foundation of a happy life. Indeed, it is the root of an advancing civilization. Religion comes to take human beings closer to Allah. Therefore, it must create an atmosphere conducive to that ideal; otherwise, it cannot achieve its goal. No religion can be regarded as complete unless it has a welldefined code of family life which expressly shows the exact role and responsibility of each member of the family. The family is a closelyknit unit of human society; and this closeness creates danger of friction and conflict unless every member is told in unambiguous terms what his duties and rights are. Within a family, role of its head is very important as the entire responsibility of family management rests on him, particularly at the stage when children are in their tender age. He has to protect himself as well as his family members from all kinds of troubles and difficulties. He has to arrange for their basic needs health, care, and educational requirements. The head of the family has to be very carefully while taking decisions in these matters. A wrong decision taken by the head of the family can become the cause of great damage to the entire family. He shall, therefore, prevent himself and his family from the disastrous consequences of choosing a wrong path (66:6). He has to see that his family is engaged in productive activity as well as constructive work. This is possible through correct and farsighted planning and its effective implementation. The true Muslim understands his/ her great responsibility towards the children he/she has brought into this world, as the Qur’an tells him: {O you who believe Save yourselves and your family from a Fire whose fuel is Men and Stones . . .} (Qur’an 66:6) He also appreciates the responsibility that the Prophet (s) has placed upon him: ´Each of you is a shepherd and each of you is responsible for his flock. The leader is a shepherd and is responsible for his flock; a man is the shepherd of his family and is responsible for his flock; a woman is the shepherd in the house of her husband and is responsible for her flock; the servant is the shepherd of his master’s wealth and is responsible for it. Each of you is a shepherd and is responsible for his flock.’ (Bukhari and Muslim) Islam has placed a burden of responsibility on the shoulders of all people, from which none may be excused. Above all, parents are responsible for providing their children with a sound Islamic education and upbringing, based on the noble characteristics which the Prophet (s) mentioned that he had
been sent to complete and spread among people: The Qur’an says: “And the Lord commanded that you shall not serve (any) but Him, and goodness to your parents. If either or both of them reach old age with you, say not to them (so much as) “Ugh” nor chide them, and speak to them a generous word. And, out of kindness, lower to them the wing of humility, and say: “My Lord! Bestow on them Thy Mercy even as they cherished me in childhood.” Qur’an 17:23-24 ´I have only been sent to make righteous behaviour complete.’1 Amongst the clearest examples of THE FAMILY in Islam is the great status of the mother in Islam. Islam commands kindness, respect and obedience to parents and specifically emphasizes and gives preference to the mother as shall be shown in this article. Islam raises parents to a status greater than that found in any other religion or ideology. The command to be good to one’s parents begins right from the Qur’an. Allah says: “Worship Allah and join not any partners with Him; and be kind to your parents...” [Noble Quran 4:36] The mention of servitude to parents follows immediately after servitude to God. This is repeated throughout the Qur’an. “Your Lord has decreed that you worship none but Him and that you be kind to parents. Whether one or both of them attain old age in your life, say not to them a word of contempt, nor repel them, but address them in terms of honor. And out of kindness, lower to them the wing of humility and say, “My Lord! Bestow on them Your Mercy even as they cherished me in childhood.”[Noble Quran 17:23-24] The great scholar, Abu al-Faraj Ibn Al-Jawzî (d. 1201CE) explained: To be kind to one’s parents is: to obey them when they order you to do something, unless it is something which Allah has forbidden; to give priority to their orders over voluntary acts of worship; to abstain from that which they forbid you to do; to provide for them; to serve them; to approach them with gentle humility and mercy; not to raise your voice in front of them; nor to fix your glance on them; nor to call them by their names; and to be patient with them. (Ibn alJawzî, Birr al-Wâlidayn) We must also remember the Prophet’s Compassion for Children. The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) is the model for the whole of humankind. His attitude towards children was always compassionate and merciful. Being fond of children, Prophet Muhammad showed great interest in playing with them. His involvement in children’s games shows us the great importance in playing with our children. He
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would have fun with the children who had come back from Abyssinia and tried to speak in Abyssinian with them. It was his practice to give lifts on his camel to children when he returned from journeys. Prophet Muhammad never held back his love for the children and always expressed his fondness to them. In one hadith Abu Hurairah (may Allah be pleased with him) narrated: I went along with Allah’s Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) at a time during the day but he did not talk to me and I did not talk to him until he reached the market of Banu Qainuqa`. He came back to the tent of Fatimah and said, “Is the little chap (meaning Al-Hasan) there?” We were under the impression that his mother had detained him in order to bathe him and dress him and garland him with sweet garland. Not much time had passed that he (Al-Hasan) came running until both of them embraced each other, thereupon Allah’s Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him) said, “O Allah, I love him; love him and love one who loves him.” (Muslim) Anas ibn Malik (may Allah be pleased with him), the servant of the Prophet, had another recollection: I never saw anyone who was more compassionate towards children than Allah’s Messenger (peace and blessings be upon him). His son Ibrahim was in the care of a wet nurse in the hills around Madinah. He would go there, and we would
go with him, and he would enter the house, pick up his son and kiss him, then come back. (Muslim) The Prophet’s love for children was not restricted to his children and grandchildren. The scope of his mercy and affection embraced all children, and he showed the same interest and gentleness to his Companion’s children. The following hadith narrated by Usamah ibn Zaid (may Allah be pleased with him) shows this humane aspect of the Prophet’s personality: Allah’s Messenger used to put me on (one of) his thighs and put AlHasan ibn `Ali on his other thigh, and then embrace us and say, “O Allah! Please be merciful to them, as I am merciful to them.” (Bukhari) Simply put families are the building blocks of society. Home plays a very important role in the civilised life of man. It is a small world in itself. An individual is born, brought up, and trained in family atmosphere and this naturally leaves an everlasting impression on him. His character and habits are developed at home, and in the family, and these factors are responsible for his future career. This is the reason why the Quran has laid so much emphasis on family life, and has touched (for guidance) even the minute aspects of it in most elaborate form. A good family order serves as a model for the society, and its people determines future of a nation.
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Continued from p. 1
Report: Obamacare to Help Close Coverage Gap for Youth
into effect in January – many of them Latino and African American. “When you look at the statistics, and you see the number of adolescents who are uninsured and eligible for benefits, 35 percent of them are Latino and 16 percent are African American,” says Wilma M. Robinson, the Deputy Director of the Office of Adolescent Health. “[The Affordable Care Act] is especially important for communities of color.” The report, released by the Office of Adolescent Health and the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation, highlights the large number of adolescents nationwide who stand to benefit from greater access to coverage. The percentage of adolescents who are uninsured and eligible for coverage is highest in some of the states where legislatures rejected Medicaid expansion. Texas has the highest percentage in the nation, with nearly 18 percent of eligible adolescents lacking coverage. In Florida, just over 16 percent of eligible adolescents are uninsured. Starting January 1, all states must cover children ages 6 to 18 in families with incomes up to 138 percent of the federal poverty level, or just under $27,000 a year for a family of three. Previously, the national
minimum eligibility level was 100 percent of the federal poverty level. Robinson points out that several provisions of the ACA are already in effect for adolescents, including a ban on denying coverage to children under 19 who have pre-existing conditions, formerly a common
practice among private insurers. According to the report, one in four children between the ages of 12 and 17 has special health care needs. “The information [about the Affordable Care Act] is coming from so many sources and it can be overwhelming at times. All the
emphasis has been on the adult population ... But there are unique benefits for adolescents as well,” Robinson says. Open enrollment begins October 1. To learn more about your coverage options under the Affordable Care Act, visit signup.healthcare.gov.
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CALENDAR / ANNOUNCEMENTS
Phoenix Prayer Times
OCTOBER 2013
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Tucson Prayer Times
October 2013 • Thul Quida/Thul Hijja 1434 H
October 2013 • Thul Quida/Thul Hijja 1434 H
ISLAMIC WEEKEND SCHOOLS
Directions to the Islamic Cultural Center Cemetery
Islamic Community Center of Phoenix: Islamic Cultural Center: Muslim Community Mosque: Masjid Omar ICNEV Weekend Islamic School ACA Weekend School Sultan Education in Chandler Greenway Islamic Academy
Sunday at 9:45 am-1:20 pm. Sunday at 10:00 am Sunday at 10:00 am until 2:30 pm. Saturday & Sunday from 10:00 am until 1:00 pm. Tel: (480) 346-2081Classes held on Sunday K thru’ grade 12 from 10:00 a.m. - 2:00 p.m. Sunday 10:00 am-1:15 pm. www.azacademy.org/weekend Saturdays & Sundays - children/adults 480-593-7066 Tajweed, Islamic Studies, & Arabic Language 602-565-0500
From the Islamic Cultural Center (ICC):
Check our website for up to date information www.tempemasjid.com
1) Go South on Forest to University Drive. Turn right. 2) Go West on University to the I-10 highway. Take I-10 East. 3) Proceed on I-10 East (~12 Miles). Exit at Queen Creek Rd. (EXIT #164). 4) Turn right on route 347 South. Proceed for about 14 miles. 5) Turn right on route 238 West. Proceed for about 8.7 miles. 6) Turn right on unnamed/unpaved street after you see the street sign which reads “36 miles” and proceed to the cemetery.
IN CASE OF DEATH • Call Sandy at Angel’s Burial, at 480-962-6435 • Total cost is $1,800.00
ISLAMIC CENTERS IN ARIZONA
PHOENIX Arizona Cultural Academy 7810 S. 42nd Pl. • Phoenix 602-454-1222 Islamic Center of Arizona 9032 N. 9th St. • Phoenix
Islamic Center of N. Phoenix 13246 N. 23rd Ave. 85029 602-371-3440 Islamic Comnty Ctr of Phx 7516 N. Black Canyon Hwy. Phoenix • 602-249-0496 Muslim Community Mosque 1818 N. 32nd St. • Phoenix 602-306-4959 Masjid Al-Rahmah 2645 E. McDowell Rd. • Phoenix 602-275-5493 Masjid Muhammad Ibn Abdullah
5648 N. 15th ave. Phoenix, AZ 85015 602-413-5279
Al Rasoul Mosque 5302 N. 35th Ave. • Phoenix 602-864-1817
CHANDLER Masjid AsSalam 1071 N. Alma School Rd.• Chandler 480-250-7522
PEORIA Greenway Islamic Center 6724 West Greenway • Peoria, Islamic Center of East Valley AZ www.greenwaymasjid.com 425 N. Alma School Dr. • Chandler TEMPE 602-388-9900 Islamic Comnty Ctr of Tempe LAVEEN 131 E. 6th Street • Tempe 480-894-6070 Islamic Center of Laveen P.O. Box 1107 • Laveen Masjid Al Mahdi 602-361-4401 1016 S. River Dr. • Tempe MARICOPA 480-557-9699 Masjid Bilal Ibn Rabah Masjid Omar Bin Al-Khattab 44370 W. Arizona Ave. Maricopa Arizona 85138 6225 S.McClintock • Tempe contact# (602)312-7913 480-775-6627 MESA Masjid-el-Noor 55 N. Matlock • Mesa 480-644-0074 SCOTTSDALE Islamic Center of N.E. Valley 12125 E. Via Linda • Scottsdale 480-612-4044
CASA GRANDE Masjid Sajda is located c/o: The Legacy Suites 540 North Cacheris Court Casa Grande`, Arizona 85122 480.332.8618
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