As American As...

He

wanted a congenial space where people might gather, which is why Balbir Singh Sodhi was outside his Chevron station in Mesa, Ariz., two Saturdays ago, surveying the vinca and sage he had just planted. Says Guru Roop Kaur Khalsa, one of Sodhi's ministers: "Even though it was just a gas station, he saw it as a center of the community. He looked for innocence and sweetness and tried to capture it." Then, police allege, a man named Frank Silva Roque drove by in a black Chevy pickup and pumped three bullets into Sodhi, killing him almost instantly, mocking innocence and sweetness. Sodhi appears to have died because he looked Muslim. He was not. He was a Sikh, and his religion was born as a reform of Hinduism. But to some, the turban and beard that most Sikhs wear look like Osama bin Laden's. When the police caught Roque, they claim he explained his actions by saying, "I'm an American."

INTERACTIVE GRAPHICS Map: Hunting Osama Map: Nukes Pipeline Interactive: Taliban P.O.W. Revolt More Graphics Tora Bora Nukes Pipeline Taliban Revolt Last Bastions Women & Islam No Refuge Taliban on the Run Afghan Caves Mood of the Nation Mazar-I-Sharif Terrorist Timeline Al-Qaeda Suspects Flu/Anthrax Sharing Secrets Al-Qaeda's World Ground War 11.4.01 Bush Team Grades Bioterror Threats War in Winter Workplace Safety Afghan Targets Anthrax Pathogen A Ground War An Uneasy Ally Targets Hit Search & Destroy Firepower & Food Frozen Assets Safety Guide Mideast Leaders Agents of Death Afghanistan Military Buildup Terrorist Cells Our Weapons Deadly Paths Twin Terrors   CNN.com Latest news: War Against Terror RECENT COVER STORY Closing In Dec. 24, 2001 Past Issues Taliban Last Days Dec. 17, 2001 ----------------- Lifting the Veil Dec. 3, 2001 ----------------- Hunt for bin Laden Nov. 26, 2001 ----------------- Thanksgiving 2001 Nov. 19, 2001 ----------------- Inside Al-Qaeda Nov. 12, 2001 ----------------- Defender In Chief Nov. 5, 2001 ----------------- Going In Oct. 29, 2001 ----------------- The Fear   Factor Oct. 22, 2001 ----------------- Facing   the Fury Oct. 15, 2001 ----------------- How Real   Is the Threat? Oct. 8, 2001 ----------------- Life on the   Home Front Oct. 1, 2001 ----------------- One Nation,   Indivisible Sept. 24, 2001 ----------------- Day of Infamy Sept. 14, 2001   PHOTO ESSAYS Kabul Unveiled Taliban on the Run More Photos >>> MORE STORIES Where's OBL: Letter from Tora Bora Anthrax: Where the Investigation Stands TIME/CNN POLL: Americans Standing By Bush's War More Stories >>>

Imagine this: you wake up every morning nervous, stalked by faceless enemies. It is nothing personal; they just hate what they think you represent. The attack could come at any time, and there is virtually no defense. If that seems to describe all America at the moment, there is one group for whom the unbearable tension since the World Trade Center attack is doubled. If you are a Muslim or an Arab, or look like one to someone focused primarily on his own rage, you must fear not only bin Laden-style terrorism but also the insults, blows and bullets of your countrymen.

Last Thursday someone threw stone after stone through the windshields of cabs in Manhattan's Central Park, apparently targeting dark-skinned drivers. "A lot of cabdrivers are not driving," says Ali Agha Abba, a Pakistani-American taxi driver in New York City. "I can't afford to not work. So I have to take a chance." Last Monday a man drove a Mustang through the front entrance of the Grand Mosque in Parma, Ohio, the largest in the state. The Sunday before, a Muslim woman in Memphis was beaten on her way to worship. The day before that, a Pakistani Muslim store owner was shot and killed. The FBI called it a hate crime.

True, George Bush spoke out for Muslims at a mosque and before Congress last week, telling them, "We respect your faith. Its teachings are good and peaceful." Last Tuesday FBI agents began a round of bureau meetings with local Muslim and Arab leaders in various states, asking for their help with investigations and assuring their protection. Said a relieved participant: "We know we have the FBI behind us."

And yet...on Monday Louisiana Congressman John Cooksey told a radio show, "If I see someone come in that's got a diaper on his head, that guy needs to be pulled over." (He later apologized.) On that same day, the pilot of a Delta flight in Texas had a Pakistani American removed before takeoff because he said his crew did not feel comfortable with the man aboard. Delta offered him a new ticket--on another carrier. (It later apologized.) In Lincoln, R.I., someone hit a pregnant woman wearing a hijab (head scarf) with a stone. She has been calling midwives to avoid giving birth in the hospital because "I don't want to go to any public place." A CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll of 1,032 adults indicated that 49% thought all Arabs--American citizens included--should have to carry special ID cards.

All told, the Council on American-Islamic Relations counts more than 600 "incidents" since Sept. 11 victimizing people thought to be Arab or Muslim, including four murders, 45 people assaulted and 60 mosques attacked. Thousands were intimidated into not going to work, their mosques, their schools. Some 200 Muslims are estimated to have died in the Twin Towers. Yet, says C.A.I.R.'s Nihad Awad, "Muslims are being accused of something that the community has not done, and it's really an awkward and unfair position to be in." Thousands of answering machines--and actual people--fielded calls like the one that came into the offices of a Muslim organization in Santa Clara, Calif.: "We should bomb your ass and blow you back home." The caller was apparently unaware that "home" is here.

There is no God but Allah, and Muhammad is his prophet. Pray five times a day. Give alms. Fast during the month of Ramadan. If you are capable, make a pilgrimage to Mecca. If these "five pillars" seem foreign to you, you may not be talking with your neighbors. Islam is an American religion. There are some 7 million Muslims in the U.S. That's more than the number of Jews and more than twice the number of Episcopalians. Thirty years ago, the Islamic count was a mere 500,000. The number of mosques rose from 598 in 1986 to 1,372 this year. The number of American-born Muslims now far exceeds the count of immigrants.

Islam, the youngest of the major faiths, was influenced by Judaism and Christianity. Muslims are "people of the book," accepting the Jewish Bible and the New Testament as Holy Scripture while maintaining that the Koran's famously elegant and expressive Arabic is God's final and inerrant word. Similarly, followers of Islam believe Moses, John the Baptist and Jesus were prophets but the final messenger was Muhammad, to whom, they say, the angel Gabriel dictated the Koran. Like Christians and Jews, says Jamal Badawi, a religion professor at Saint Mary's University in Halifax, N.S., their core concerns are "moral behavior, love of neighbor, justice and compassion. We believe that we are created for a purpose, and we are going to be held responsible for our life on earth on the day of judgment." Muslims do not worship Muhammad (who, unlike Moses or Jesus, was a lavishly documented historical figure, dying in A.D. 632) but regard him as exemplary. It is upon the Koran and collections of his sayings (Hadiths) that Islamic law, or Sharia, is based.