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Pittsburgh Post-Gazette - November 6, 2007
Muslims, Jews form post-9/11 friendships
in Pittsburgh
By Sally Kalson
Farooq Hussaini, left, Nayyra Ilyas and her husband, Mohammad, share in the conversation at September's get-together.
On a Sunday afternoon in late September, an unusual group of people got together in a Point Breeze house. Half of them were Muslims, who, in the midst of Ramadan, talked about their beliefs and practices around the holy period. The other half were Jews, who talked about the meaning and rituals of the recently completed holy days, Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur.
As the sun set, the Muslims repaired to a side room for evening prayers, while the Jews laid out a meal of Asian, Jewish and American dishes that everyone had brought. Soon all were gathered around the table sampling sweet rice, spicy chicken and noodle dishes, laughing and chatting.
Muslims and Jews elsewhere may be thinking the worst of each other, but this group came together in the wake of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, looking for common ground. On Sunday it will celebrate its fifth anniversary.
The Pittsburgh group, one of a few that have formed around the country, has 24 members, and most were present that day: Farooq and Karen Hussaini, Mohammad and Nayyra Ilyas, Safdar and Rahila Khwaja, Kazim Rezaf, and Waseem Ahmed; Janice Gordon and Rob Kraftowitz, Allen Baum and Liz Witzke-Baum, Jean Clickner, Carrie Ban, James Osher and Carol Shubert.
Mostly Pittsburgh-area professionals, they gather every six weeks or so in each other's homes to talk about religion, culture, world affairs and current events.
"When 9/11 happened, after the shock wore off, my response was, 'My gosh, I don't know a single Muslim,' " said Ms. Gordon, of Point Breeze.
"I felt that was a huge problem for me. I was very eager to make a connection with someone in the Muslim community who was like-minded."
She found a partner in Suraiya Farukhi, a public relations specialist from Monroeville and a native of Pakistan. The women met when Ms. Farukhi spoke at a program of Ms. Gordon's congregation. Ms. Farukhi and her husband, Nayeem, have since moved to Chicago for work.
"Suraiya and I got together at Starbucks and found our goals were completely in sync," Ms. Gordon said. "We both wanted an ongoing group of Muslims and Jews who could get to know each other over time and become comfortable in each other's company."
The two women handpicked people they thought would be interested. The Muslim Community Center in Monroeville was Ms. Farukhi's primary connection, although not everyone in the group is a member there. Ms. Gordon contacted fellow members of Dor Hadash, the Reconstructionist congregation in Squirrel Hill that is her primary source of Jewish friends.
The first meeting had 22 people, evenly divided. They discussed goals and agreed that food would play an important role.
No one was sure how much staying power the group would have, so this month's fifth anniversary is a happy occasion. Thirteen current members are from the original group.
Rahila Khwaja, an original member who lives in Murrysville, said she and her husband, Safdar, joined in part as a defensive measure, and wound up finding more than they expected.
"Especially after 9/11, we felt we had to defend ourselves and come out of the island mentality we were living in," she said. "We had to let people know what kind of people we were and what our faith stood for. But in the process we made very good friends who I'm sure we can trust in other things also.
"There is so much propaganda against the Jews in Muslim countries," she continued. "I come from Pakistan, where people consider them enemies. So it was very important that I could sit in the same room, talk with them, share a meal. My ignorance of the Jewish people has changed. It's ignorance that causes a lot of fear, and if you learn about different people then you really don't have anything to fear."
Rob Kraftowitz, another original member and Ms. Gordon's husband, said the meetings give him a sense of hope. "I've learned from my Muslim friends about their religion and have found many things in Islam that are very similar to what I have been taught as a Jew," he said. "That's different from what I felt before, when I just assumed that we were on two different wavelengths. In fact, a lot of what we believe and practice is very much the same."
In the early days, group members focused on educating each other about their holidays, beliefs and practices. Over time, they felt freer to tackle deeper topics.
Discrimination on the basis of religion or ethnicity is an occasional theme, as is the U.S. invasion of Iraq. (Did Saddam pose a real threat; was it related to oil or to Muslim-Jewish tensions?) Hezbollah's rocketing of northern Israel in 2006, followed by Israel's invasion of southern Lebanon, also was a hot topic.
The group read and discussed Rabbi Michael Lerner's book, "Healing Israel/Palestine: A Path to Peace and Reconciliation." And at the recent meeting during Ramadan, several Muslim members said they were in a quandary about how to help their fellow Muslims abroad without getting into trouble because so many charities were under suspicion by the U.S. government.
The group is fairly stable now, and members want to keep it a manageable size. But they also wanted to have an impact on their respective communities. So in April, they all invited friends to attend a larger gathering at the Squirrel Hill library. Everyone brought food, and 70 people attended. The group is planning to do it again…..
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/07310/831372-51.stm#
Washington Post - November 1, 2007
Swastika found on Columbia prof's door
NEW YORK -- A Jewish professor found a swastika on her office door at Columbia University on Wednesday, the latest symbol of bias and hatred found at the school in recent weeks, police said.
Elizabeth Midlarsky discovered the swastika painted on her door at Teachers College, a graduate school of education affiliated with Columbia. Madonna Constantine found a noose on her office door at the college on Oct. 9. Both are professors of psychology and education.
The New York Police Department's hate crime unit is investigating both incidents. No arrests have been made, police said.
School leaders said they felt the college was being targeted because of its "deep, multicultural work."
"We are committed to maintaining that tradition by operating as an open, tolerant community," Teachers College President Susan Fuhrman and Provost Tom James said in a statement. "We will not be intimidated by these incidents."
Teachers College, founded in 1887, describes itself as the nation's oldest and largest graduate school of education.
Midlarsky's research focuses in part on altruism, and she has studied heroic rescues during the Holocaust. Her profile on the Teachers College Web site says she is working on a project on school violence.
The discovery of the noose roiled the Ivy League campus, and students, faculty and administrators had denounced the incident targeting Constantine, who has written extensively about race.
A few days later, a caricature of a yarmulke-wearing man and a swastika were found on a university bathroom stall door. Police at the time said there was no reason to believe the two incidents were linked.
Police have said they believe one or more copycats could be responsible….
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/31/AR2007103103242.html
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