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Subject: [NIFL-ESL:7464] FW: A Nation of Immigrants Meets the Challenge
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------ Forwarded Message
From: "Belanger, Maurice" <mbelanger@immigrationforum.org>
Date: Wed, 20 Mar 2002 20:35:08 -0500
To: "Belanger, Maurice" <mbelanger@immigrationforum.org>
Subject: A Nation of Immigrants Meets the Challenge
National Immigration Forum
Date: March 20, 2002
To: Forum Associates and interested advocates
From: Forum Policy Staff
Re: More Stories Relating to the Aftermath of the Events of September 11
----------------------------------------------------
(One in an occasional series)
CONTENTS
1. "More Immigrants Seeking Protection," The Associated Press, February
17 2002
2. "Some Affected by 9/11 Are Hard to Reach," The New York Times,
February 16, 2002
3. "Backlash Changes Form, Not Function," Washington Post, March 4,
2002
4. "Final Rules for U.S. Compensation Fund For Sept. 11 Will Raise Some
Payments," The Wall Street Journal, March 8, 2002
5. "Better late than never for citizen, 96," Atlanta Journal
Constitution, February 26, 2002
6. "Six Months After Sept. 11, NY Is Learning How to Cope," Newsday,
March 10, 2002
7. "Study Finds Deadly Spike in Racial Violence Against Asian
Americans," Los Angeles Times, March 11 2002
----------------------------------------------------
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS: More Immigrants Seeking Protection
By DEBORAH KONG
AP Minority Issues Writer
February 17 2002, 10:09 AM PST
Estela Riccio has lived in the United States for more than three decades,
but it was after Sept. 11 that she finally decided to become a citizen.
"That day I realized this is my country," said Riccio, an Argentine woman
who lives in Houston and submitted her citizenship application two weeks
ago. "It's like they did something to me that day. I realized I am an
American."
A mixture of patriotism and insecurity has spurred many immigrants to do the
same since the attacks, immigration attorneys and advocates say. Between
September and December, the Immigration and Naturalization Service received
260,770 applications for citizenship -- a 52 percent increase from the same
period the year before.
INS spokeswoman Eyleen Schmidt said the surge may also be partly driven by a
jump in application and fingerprinting fees -- from $250 to $310 -- that
takes effect Tuesday.
Many immigrants are seeking the protection of citizenship because they feel
vulnerable in the face of the terror investigations and other government
actions that followed the attacks.
"Before Sept. 11, I wasn't thinking about it, but after Sept. 11, I got
scared and I said, 'Let's get it over before any new policy comes in,'" said
Eddie, a Palestinian businessman in Detroit who has a green card. He
declined to give his full name for fear that his comments could jeopardize
his application.
"I've been here almost six years and I never had a problem. I'm like
everybody else, working, paying taxes, raising a family," said Eddie, the
father of three, ages 1 to 5.
Becoming a citizen would allow him to vote, and to no longer worry that "one
day they're going to pick me up and leave my kids with no father."
Mo Abdrabboh, an attorney in Dearborn, Mich., said there's been a spike in
people asking about citizenship eligibility since Sept. 11. Many Arabs feel
as if "they're under a microscope" and fear being deported or detained, he
said.
In Houston, attorneys at the Texas Center for Immigrant Legal Assistance
have seen a 25 percent increase in the number of people interested in
applying for citizenship since the attacks, said supervising attorney Wafa
Abdin.
The INS does not have information on the ethnicity of those who applied for
citizenship between September and December, but immigration attorneys and
advocates say immigrants of all backgrounds have shown a greater interest.
On a recent afternoon, Eric Gonzalez waited behind about 40 others at the
San Francisco INS office to get more information on how to apply for
citizenship.
Gonzalez, who came to the United States from Guatemala about 20 years ago,
said he has been content to hold a green card as a legal permanent resident
until now.
"I've been a little bit of a procrastinator," he said. But after the
terrorist attacks, he believes "the laws are going to get tougher. You feel
more secure if you're a citizen."
That's a natural reaction, said Cecilia Munoz, vice president of the
National Council of La Raza, a Hispanic advocacy group. People delay
applying for citizenship for various reasons, from the cost of fees to love
of their home nation.
But "when immigrant people really feel their rights are jeopardized, they
file for naturalization as a way of protecting their rights" and gaining new
ones, like voting, she said.
That's one thing that Riccio, a shipping manager at a Houston gift shop, is
hoping to do by becoming a citizen.
Thirty-three years ago, she and her Argentine family were living in Uruguay.
They fled an unstable government, along with "bombs, shootings and closed
schools" and initially settled in New York, where her father -- a jeweler --
set up shop in the city's Diamond District, she said.
"This is home," Riccio, 53, said of the United States. "I want to be part of
everything, the good and the bad that's going to come."
======================
THE NEW YORK TIMES: Some Affected by 9/11 Are Hard to Reach
By DAVID W. CHEN - February 16, 2002
A day after three major charities announced a last-minute extension for
victims of the Sept. 11 terrorist attack to apply for emergency cash grants,
charitable organizations and social service agencies scrambled yesterday to
get the word out to a group that has probably received the least, and most
contradictory, information to date: non-English-speaking immigrants.
But even with a two-week postponement of the deadline to March 8, some
groups believe that logistically it is still too difficult to contact the
tens of thousands of people in Lower Manhattan who have not applied. As a
result, some groups said yesterday that they still thought the deadline was
arbitrary and hasty, and therefore should be waived altogether.
Together, the three charities - the American Red Cross, the Salvation Army
and Safe Horizon - have disbursed more than $250 million in emergency
assistance to 50,000 displaced workers and other individuals who lost income
because of the attack. And on Feb. 8, the charities established a Feb. 22
cutoff date for applicants to make appointments, saying that it was time to
shift attention from emergency assistance to long-term help.
On Thursday, though, the charities decided to postpone the deadline, in part
because of concerns that some people were still unaware of the deadlines, or
even of the programs. And yesterday, the Sept. 11 Fund - which has been the
primary source of money for Safe Horizon and has provided another $70
million in assistance to displaced workers - held a press conference to
reach out to the ethnic press and emphasize that non-citizens, too, are
eligible for assistance, regardless of their status.
Immigrant advocacy groups said that while they were pleased by the
extension, they were still concerned that immigrants would be reluctant to
apply by March 8 because of linguistic and cultural barriers.
"What we're hearing from community groups is that they are still reaching
people every day who are unaware of the benefit programs and the eligibility
requirements," said Margie McHugh, executive director of the New York
Immigration Coalition. "So it's a slow process both to get the correct
information, identify people who are eligible and arrange times for them to
go to the centers."
While each charity has established its own eligibility criteria, the basic
requirements have included anyone who worked below Canal Street, lost a
significant portion of income or has been unemployed any time between Sept.
11 and either Dec. 31 or Jan. 11.
Business entities, by contrast, have no deadline, and in fact are eligible
for assistance from additional sources, including the federal government,
said Nicole Elkon, a spokeswoman for the 9/11 United Services Group, which
is coordinating relief efforts among several charities.
Jeanine Moss, a spokeswoman for the Sept. 11 Fund, said: "It's very
challenging to establish the boundaries under which you can help people. We
have a responsibility not only to help people, but also to keep faith with
our donors and our donors' intentions."
======================
WASHINGTON POST
Backlash Changes Form, Not Function
Sept. 11 Aftereffects Include Quiet Sting Of Bigotry, Some Say
By Mary Beth Sheridan
Monday, March 4, 2002; Page B01
The spate of violent hate crimes against Muslims, Arabs and Sikhs reported
in the weeks after Sept. 11 has largely ended, but officials and advocates
are now concerned about a surge in other, less-publicized kinds of
discrimination.
These complaints, generally involving bias against Muslims and Arab
Americans in offices, schools and public places, are harder to quantify.
Many people are afraid to register complaints, and the acts are often more
subtle than a graffiti attack or a brick through the window, advocacy groups
say. But tallies compiled by U.S. government offices and nonprofit groups
suggest that the backlash against Arabs, Muslims and Sikhs following Sept.
11 is not over:
* The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has received so many
allegations of illegal bias against Middle Eastern, Muslim and South Asian
workers that it has created a category, Code Z, to track them. It has
received more than 300 complaints since Sept. 11 -- and that doesn't include
similar cases filed in state or local government offices. "This is totally
unprecedented," said EEOC Chairwoman Cari M. Dominguez.
* Complaints of discrimination received by Arab American, Muslim and Sikh
groups have soared. Since Sept. 11, the Council on American-Islamic
Relations, based in Washington, has received more than 1,700 reports since
of workplace bias, airport profiling, discrimination in schools, physical
assault and other incidents, compared with 322 in all of 2000.
* The U.S. Department of Transportation has received 98 complaints from
airline passengers alleging discrimination, including 26 who said they were
kicked off flights. That's up from 10 reports in the same period a year
earlier.
Some officials say the complaints have dropped off in recent weeks. However,
"it's not decreasing to pre-9/11 levels," said Kareem Shora, legal adviser
at the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee in Washington.
Those trying to track discrimination tied to the Sept. 11 attacks say the
task can be complex. Reports of employment discrimination, for example,
often rise during a recession, because more jobs are cut overall. Falling
sales at restaurants or gas stations owned by minorities can reflect a
weakened economy as well as boycotting customers.
And the complaints do not constitute an epidemic in themselves. Chet Lunner,
spokesman for the Department of Transportation, said the 98 discrimination
allegations logged since Sept. 11 represented a big jump. But 1.8 million
people fly every day in the United States, he said. "While it's not perfect,
it puts it in perspective," he said.
Nonetheless, officials acknowledge that many cases may go unreported. And to
some Muslims and Arabs, the level of prejudice is alarming, leaving them to
wonder just how much the United States has accepted them.
"It gives me a very unsecure feeling. I feel like I want to hide behind the
closet. That is not the way I want to see my children. They're born here,"
said M. Siddique Sheikh, chairman of the Pakistan American Business
Association, based in Burke, and a 32-year U.S. resident.
Mohamed Ahmed, 44, of Herndon, is among those who say that the Sept. 11
attacks changed the atmosphere in the workplace. To Ahmed, an Egyptian
waiter who immigrated 17 years ago, discrimination had never been a barrier.
He worked hard, married an Iowa native and had four children, giving them
names as American as a TV sitcom: Michael, Sabrina, Angie, Jackie.
"My family are white and American, 100 percent," Ahmed declared proudly.
But when he returned to his job as a waiter at the Country Club of Fairfax
in October after a vacation in his homeland, he said, he faced insults about
Middle Easterners, including a boss's comment that Egyptians were bad
people.
"Maybe you come to shoot us," the boss mocked him, according to Ahmed.
Ahmed says he was fired in December, after four years on the job, when he
tried to take home a container of leftover food from a banquet -- a common
practice among employees, he said. He has filed a discrimination complaint
with the Fairfax County Human Rights Commission.
The country club said in a statement that it "adheres to federal and state
laws regarding discrimination and has in this particular case. Because of
the matter under investigation, the club feels it is inappropriate to
address the facts of the case publicly."
Some kinds of prejudice are more subtle than a job dismissal. There are the
Muslim or Arab American truck drivers who report being stopped frequently
for inspections, for example, and the business owners hit with a mysterious
drop in sales.
Sheikh says local Pakistani-born merchants were "affected big-time" by
clients who stayed away after the Sept. 11 attacks. Sales at his Texaco
station and sub shop are still well below what they were this time last
year, due partially to prejudice, he believes.
He said that many customers have gone out of their way to show kindness and
a positive attitude. As a businessman, however, "the negative will kill you
before the positive helps you."
Some Muslim and Arab immigrants say there is so much nervousness in their
communities that people are Americanizing their names to avoid
discrimination. They recount incidents that aren't as severe as hate crimes
but underline their sense of exclusion.
Hikmat Beaini, a lawyer with the Fairfax County Human Rights Commission,
recalls taking his children on a trolley tour of Washington in December. As
he boarded the tourist vehicle, he said, the driver grilled him about his
origin. Beaini, who is originally from Lebanon, declared that he was a U.S.
citizen -- period. The other tourists stared at him nervously, and two
promptly got off the bus, he said.
"You have these types of things. Are they dying out? I think so. But any
other attack against America, we're going to pay the price. That's what
we're worried about," he said.
Many Arab, Muslim and Sikh activists praise the government for moving
quickly and forcefully to avert violent hate crimes. Officials from
President Bush on down have visited mosques and urged Americans not to
retaliate against people they perceive to be Muslims and Arab Americans.
Federal and local government agencies have also reached out to Arab, Muslim
and Sikh communities to follow up on discrimination cases. The Justice
Department's civil rights division, for example, has held forums across the
country on hate crimes and bias, including one in Fairfax recently.
Despite such efforts, however, many cases of discrimination are not reported
to the government, activists and officials say.
Some people fear retaliation. That's the concern of a Gaithersburg
construction worker of Middle Eastern origin who says he has endured
constant insults and threats from co-workers since the Sept. 11 attack.
He said he informed his boss, who replied coldly, "Well, don't you think
these people have a right to be angry?" The construction worker, a
44-year-old U.S. citizen employed by the company for more than a decade,
said he was also told that filing a complaint would be "detrimental to your
career."
"It's been very tough for me," he said, his voice breaking. He registered a
complaint last fall with an Arab American civil rights group but only
summoned the courage to file one with the EEOC last week, he said. He asked
that his name be withheld to protect his children and his employment.
Advocates say some Muslims and Arab Americans fear not just retaliation from
employers, but from the authorities. The federal government's detentions and
interviews of thousands of Arab and Muslim visitors has sent a chill through
the community, say the advocates.
"With some Muslims, there's a sense that, 'If I report [discrimination] to
the government and get in their system, I'll be constantly harassed,' " said
Joshua Salaam, the civil rights coordinator for the Council on
American-Islamic Relations.
There are differing reports on the severity of discrimination against
Muslims or Arab Americans in the Washington area since Sept. 11. Some county
human rights commissions said they had several more reports than usual;
others had no increase.
"This is a very diverse community. . . . People are used to being next to
someone else who is from somewhere else," said Michael Dennis, of the
Montgomery County Human Rights Commission, which has not registered an
uptick in cases.
The data collected by Muslim and Arab American advocacy groups paint a
different picture. The Council on American-Islamic Relations, in a
state-by-state breakdown of complaints, says the District came in third,
with 113 complaints, followed by Virginia, with 99. Maryland was ninth, with
54.
Salaam said such figures didn't necessarily indicate high intolerance in the
metropolitan area. Rather, he said, they could reflect the size of the local
Arab and Muslim population, and the fact that his organization is based in
the capital and well known in this region.
==========================
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
Final Rules for U.S. Compensation Fund For Sept. 11 Will Raise Some Payments
By MILO GEYELIN - March 8, 2002
Responding to criticism that the federal compensation fund for victims of
the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks doesn't go far enough, the Justice Department
released final rules doubling payments to family members for pain and
suffering, while relaxing a number of other provisions to make the program
more attractive.
Under the new rules, announced by the special master appointed to administer
the fund, Kenneth R. Feinberg, the fund would pay spouses and children of
victims $100,000 each for their pain and suffering, up from the $50,000 each
that was envisioned when interim rules were announced in December. (The
final rules leave unchanged the $250,000 pain-and-suffering award on behalf
of each victim who died.) In addition, 401(k) retirement plans won't be
deducted from any awards, and victims can expect fewer deductions for other
forms of compensation they may get, including Social Security and workers'
compensation. The new rules also virtually guarantee a minimum $250,000 for
most applicants while placing no upper limit on what families of high-wage
earners can receive.
"It will be very rare that claimants will receive less than $250,000, except
in unusual situations where a claimant has already received very substantial
compensation from collateral sources," Mr. Feinberg said at a news
conference in Washington.
The changes reflect concerns voiced at scores of meetings between Mr.
Feinberg and victims' families. Some families complained that the interim
rules betrayed the intent of the fund to provide them fair compensation by
allowing too may deductions for other forms of compensation they are in line
to receive. Others complained that the damage award for pain and suffering
was too low and that victims were being forced to forgo their right to sue
for damages while getting too little in return.
The fund was signed into law in September as part of $15 billion bailout
bill for the airline industry passed by Congress that, among other things,
limited suits against the two airlines involved in the attacks, UAL Corp.'s
United Airlines and AMR Corp.'s American Airlines.
Under the final rules, Mr. Feinberg has the authority not to deduct future
Social Security and workers' compensation benefits that are conditioned on
unpredictable events, such as a spouse remaining unmarried or earning under
a prescribed income threshold. Instead, only Social Security and workers'
compensation benefits paid from Sept. 11 through the date of the award would
be deducted.
Families of illegal aliens who died are granted amnesty for immigration
purposes, and their employers, whose records they would need to file a
claim, won't be prosecuted for hiring them illegally. People injured in the
attacks are eligible for compensation if they sought medical treatment
within 72 hours, up from a 24-hour window written into the interim rules. In
addition, all claimants will be allowed to seek free consultation from the
fund on precisely how deductions for other sources of compensation might
apply to them before they decide whether to participate.
About 400 victims' families have filed eligibility claims, but under the
rules, awards won't begin to be handed out until 120 days after families
have completed the application process. Mr. Feinberg said in an interview
that the changes are intended to "maximize claimant participation." He
estimated that the cost of paying claims to some 3,500 eligible death and
injury victims will fall between $4 billion to $5 billion, after deductions
for other forms of compensation.
===========================
ATLANTA JOURNAL CONSTITUTION
Better late than never for citizen, 96
Mark Bixler - Tuesday, February 26, 2002
The national anthem began on Monday morning and Maryam Kangani pulled
herself up with a walker, frail and trembling at age 96. She did as her son
showed her, and put her right hand over her heart.
Then Kangani raised her hand for the oath and became one of the oldest
immigrants in metro Atlanta to be sworn in as a U.S. citizen.
The Iranian native, who lived in the city of Shiraz when anti-American
chants of "Death to the Great Satan" were part of the political landscape,
said through an interpreter: "I like America. America is nice."
But Kangani also applied for citizenship because it gives her the option of
bringing a 46-year-old daughter from Iran to the United States for treatment
of a brain tumor, said her son, Bahram Karimi of Duluth.
Kangani first visited the United States in the 1970s, after her son came
here to study. She moved here for good in 1989 and applied for citizenship
five years ago, at age 91.
Federal law says most new citizens must speak English, but immigrants are
exempt if they have medical problems that prevent learning. Kangani speaks
Farsi. She could not learn English because a stroke left her with
memory-loss problems, said Laleh Sharifi, her attorney.
She spends her days in her son's house in Duluth, watching television shows
in Farsi, beamed into the house by satellite. Some days she eats rice, lamb
stew and kabobs, standard fare in Iran. Other days she gravitates toward
American fare.
"She loves to eat pizza," her son said.
The Immigration and Naturalization Service says a small but growing number
of elderly immigrants are citing the medical exemption to become citizens.
Officers recall another woman in her 90s who became a citizen in Atlanta
last year.
It's rare enough, though, that Kangani was the guest of honor for Monday's
citizenship ceremony in Room 103 of the INS headquarters in downtown
Atlanta. She sat in a blue chair on the front row, her son in the seat to
her left, one of 58 immigrants from 29 countries to take the oath.
Rosemary Melville, INS director in Atlanta, introduced Kangani: "We're very,
very proud of her and her great accomplishment in becoming a U.S. citizen
today."
The crowd applauded.
Melville led them in the oath at 11:02 a.m.
"You are now citizens of the United States," she declared.
Kangani's son hugged her. A young man sitting nearby stood up and strode
across an aisle to shake her hand. Next came a woman from the Daughters of
the American Revolution to give U.S. flags to all the new citizens.
Kangani kissed the woman's hand. Then she clutched the flag to her chest and
kissed it, too.
=========================
NEWSDAY
Six Months After Sept. 11, NY Is Learning How to Cope
March 10, 2002
THE MAKESHIFT MEMORIALS outside New York City's firehouses have begun to
fade away. Taxi drivers once again zip through crowded streets like maniacs.
The Frozen Zone has shrunk to an area that surrounds the crater where the
World Trade Center once stood. The city's subways are almost back to normal
and the sidewalks of Manhattan seem as densely packed as ever.
Six months after Islamic terrorists turned two fuel-laden commercial
jetliners into savage instruments of death and destruction in America's
largest city, we - the people of metropolitan New York - are starting to
master the elusive essentials of survival and recovery.
Lesson No. 1:
Don't think too much.
The city has begun to regain its rhythm. Every weekday morning, 1.5 million
workers roll into Manhattan from suburbs and other boroughs in a fragile
choreography of 21 city subway lines, one interstate subway, three commuter
rail lines, three car tunnels (not counting the closed Brooklyn-Battery) and
17 bridges.
In this obviously vulnerable environment, it's useful to keep life in
perspective. For example: On a warm day last week - a welcome precursor to
spring - the Manhattan skyline as viewed from the arc of the Queensboro
Bridge looked about as solid as the eastern face of the Rocky Mountains. A
low sun bathed the buildings in a golden hue and made the East River
shimmer.
The message: Life goes on. And for one brief moment, it was easy to believe
that everything would be fine, despite the constant reminders of crisis -
the police sentries, the National Guard checkpoints and that awful gap in
the southern skyline where the Twin Towers once loomed.
Glimmers of optimism are crucial if we are to retain our civic poise and
emotional balance.
Lesson No. 2:
But Keep Thinking.
New York will eventually recoup the 125,100 jobs it lost last year. It will
eventually rebuild on the World Trade Center site. It will eventually
survive the years of red ink that lie ahead. But there is a catch: Another
attack as devastating as the last one could set back the region's recovery
in ways that lie beyond rational calculation.
And yet, six months after Sept. 11, airline security around the country has
plenty of room for improvement. Communications among intelligence agencies,
the military and the police have a long way to go. New Yorkers were not
reassured last week when they learned the feds had failed to tell local
officials of a report that terrorists were planning to sneak a 10-kiloton
nuclear weapon into town.
Fortunately, the report turned out to be false. But the mayor and law
enforcement officials should have been cued in. Federal Homeland Security
Director Tom Ridge has told Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Gov. George Pataki
that lapses of this kind will not happen again. Still, the episode has left
many people understandably nervous.
Lesson No. 3:
We Are One Nation After All.
Not too long ago, conservatives worried that immigration might erode the
commitment of Americans to their traditional values. Working people felt
ignored by a burgeoning yuppie elite. Liberals thought differences among
racial and ethnic groups could tear the country apart. And New Yorkers were
convinced that the rest of the country hated everything about us.
Well, not so fast. Within hours of the Sept. 11 attacks, donations -
eventually adding up to hundreds of millions of dollars - poured into the
city spontaneously from every part of the nation and world. Cops and
firefighters and rescue workers and welders and crane operators became the
new American heroes. The stars and stripes sprouted up in new immigrant
neighborhoods as well as the deep-rug suburbs.
Meanwhile, the death toll from Sept. 11, now at 2,830, spared no part of the
region. The South Bronx suffered and so did Long Island, Queens, New Jersey
and every part of the region. Our lives, it turns out, are more tightly
interwoven than we had realized.
Maybe the best signal of our common purpose came last week when President
George W. Bush made good - and then some - on his vow to ship $20 billion in
aid to New York.
True, the city's relationship with the administration has had its bumpy
moments since Sept. 11. And no, Congress hasn't yet broken into strains of
"I Love New York." But so what? Bush promised to help the region through its
darkest hour, and last week he delivered handsomely.
Lesson No. 4:
This Is No Time for Political Snits.
The region's construction industry has moved with astonishing skill and
speed to clear Ground Zero. It has removed 1.4 million tons of debris way
ahead of schedule. Hotels and retail outlets around the site have begun to
reopen. But for all of the industry's progress, it's not clear that the
government is prepared to move with the same spirit of dispatch and
decisiveness.
Six months after the towers went down, the state and city are still
reconfiguring the outfit that will ramrod the reconstruction effort, the
Lower Manhattan Development Corp. Last week, Pataki expanded its board to
14, to give the city equal representation with the state. Now that the
cantankerous Rudolph Giuliani has left the mayor's office, Pataki apparently
feels better about giving the city an equal voice. That's fine - but his
move also signals how politics has intruded on the process from the start.
At the same time, the corporation has seemed split on such basic matters as
whether developer Larry Silverstein should proceed now to replace Building 7
of the World Trade Center or whether he should wait until a master plan is
in place. (Hint: He should wait.)
Given his influence on the Port Authority (which owns the World Trade Center
site), the Metropolitan Transportation Authority and the development
corporation, it falls chiefly to Pataki to get swift results in lower
Manhattan. So far, he is off to an uneven start.
Lesson No. 5:
The Real Story Is the People.
The most deeply ingrained memory from the horrors of Sept. 11 involves the
valor of the fallen and the heroism of those who tried to save them. Yet
strangely, most memorials proposed for the site focus on the towers. They
shouldn't. Amid one of the most heinous acts in American history, human
decency triumphed in ways large and small. We must never lose sight of that
remarkable fact. Memorialize the people first.
=======================
LOS ANGELES TIMES
Study Finds Deadly Spike in Racial Violence Against Asian Americans
Crime: A consortium cites misperceptions and generalizations as factors in
the post-Sept. 11 increase.
By RICHARD MAROSI -- March 11 2002
Racist attacks against Asian Americans spiked significantly nationwide after
Sept. 11, claiming two lives and causing injuries to dozens more, according
to a report released today by the National Asian Pacific American Legal
Consortium.
The study, "Backlash: When America Turned on Its Own," tracked 243 incidents
in the three-month period after the terrorist attacks. By contrast,
bias-based attacks against Asian Americans for typical 12-month periods
number around 400, according to the report.
Victims included a Sikh American from Mesa, Ariz., who was shot and killed
by a gunman who yelled "I stand for America all the way," and a Pakistani
American grocer who was killed in Texas. Nonviolent crimes against Asian
Americans ranged from vandalism to verbal harassment. Businesses have been
pelted with Molotov cocktails and homes burned to the ground, according to
the report. Among those targeted have been women and children.
Singled out as targets, according to the report, have been South Asian
Americans, including Indian and Pakistani Americans, but especially Sikh
Americans, a religious group often mistakenly perceived to be Arab because
many of their men wear turbans and long beards.
"Unfortunately, some Americans have fallen into the grave misconception that
all Arab Americans and Muslim Americans are terrorists, and therefore,
anyone who even looks Arab or Muslim has become a potential target for
violent retribution," the report reads.
The study is a compilation of hate crime statistics provided by law
enforcement agencies and supplemented by hate incident reports from
individuals, community groups and media reports. The statistics were
gathered by the consortium and its affiliates: the Asian Pacific American
Legal Center, Asian Law Caucus and the Asian American Legal Defense and
Education Fund.
The consortium recommends that law enforcement step up its collection of
data on hate crimes and urges the passage of a measure that would expand the
federal hate crimes law, which would allow prosecutors to seek additional
penalties for hate crimes in states that lack such laws.
The study also recommends that the government and law enforcement officials
provide diversity and sensitivity training to all employees. It also
criticizes the U.S. Justice Department for interviewing and detaining
thousands of Arab Americans, saying such practices arouse suspicion of
wrongdoing.
In one case cited in the study, a 20-year-old Pakistani college student
detained in a Mississippi jail was beaten by inmates while guards allegedly
ignored his cries for help.
Nearly 80% of the incidents during the three-month period occurred in the
first weeks after the attacks. Twenty-seven percent occurred in schools; 29%
in the workplace, the study reported.
Southern California victims included a 51-year-old Sikh American woman who
was stabbed twice in the head by two motorcyclists at a stoplight in San
Diego, and a Northridge liquor store owner who was beaten by two men with
metal poles.
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=====================================================
Maurice Belanger
Senior Policy Associate
National Immigration Forum
mbelanger@immigrationforum.org
http://www.immigrationforum.org
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** NOW AVAILABLE: Immigration Policy Handbook, 2002. **
** Revised and updated to include immigration in the wake **
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** relating to the immigration policy debate in the United States. **
** An indispensable guide for the advocate, student, lawyer, **
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