Incident reports spiked between October-December 2023, following the October 7th attacks and the war in Gaza.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations, Michigan chapter published its annual civil rights report in April, citing that there was a sharp increase in anti-Muslim and anti-Arab discrimination in 2023 in Michigan.
CAIR-MI Staff Attorney Amy Doukoure says there was a 340 percent increase in intakes between October-December last year, following the October 7th attacks and Israel’s military response in the war in Gaza, where over 34,000 Palestinians have been killed.
“We believe that those are directly related to the attack on Gaza. And overall, it was somewhere around a 60% increase in overall intakes for the entire year over what we received the year before,” she says.
CAIR-MI held a virtual press conference sharing details of their findings earlier this month.
Doukoure says the increase in incident reports surpassed the backlash on American Muslims and Arab Americans post 9/11.
Amy Doukoure, Staff Attorney at the Council on American-Islamic Relations, Michigan chapter. Source: CAIR Michigan
She says before October 7 most incident reports were of law enforcement discrimination and school bullying, but it has now shifted to complaints from students and employees for violations of First Amendment rights, “for people’s social media posts, doxing or harassment online, and hate crimes,” she says.
In October the fatal stabbing of 6-year-old Wadea Al Fayoume in Chicago rocked the Muslim community, leading to outrage and a response from President Biden against Islamophobia. That has led to a string of other attacks on Muslims and Arab Americans across the U.S.
Doukoure says CAIR-MI is doing educational workshops in the community to inform them of their rights and working to resolve issues for those impacted, institutions and parties involved.
“Our big thing is educating the community about what their rights are so that they know how to advocate for themselves in these instances,” she says.
Doukore says the Muslim civil rights organization also works with educational institutions and private employers to inform them of their obligations toward accommodating Muslims and following the First Amendment.
She says political discourse plays a role on the impact of American Muslims, Arab Americans, and other marginalized groups in Michigan.
In a small community meeting in March, Michigan Republican Congressman Tim Walberg (R-Tipton) said Palestinians should not receive humanitarian aid and nuclear weapons should be used in the war in Gaza.
“I don’t think any of our aid that goes to Israel to support our greatest ally, arguably maybe in the world, to defeat Hamas, and Iran and Russia and probably North Korea’s in there and China too, with them helping Hamas. We shouldn’t be spending a dime on humanitarian aid. It should be like Nagasaki and Hiroshima. Get it over quick.”
Doukoure says this type of rhetoric has dire consequences.
She says CAIR-MI is already seeing a similar increase of discrimination incident reports for this year, based on data collected in the first quarter of 2024.
“We’ve already taken… just over a third of the total intakes that we took in for the entire year last year… we’re on track to have even more anti Muslim bigotry in Michigan than we had in 2023, even in the direct aftermath of October 7,” she says.
She says while hate crimes are going down, now there is an increase of adverse action for First Amendment rights.
“We’re seeing a lot of law enforcement, especially in Detroit over the last few days, arresting people or issuing citations for people who are engaged in peaceful protests,” she says.
Like CAIR-MI, the American Civil Liberties Union’s Michigan chapter has seen an increase of complaints, especially on college campuses.
Ramis Wadood is a staff attorney for the ACLU of Michigan, who focuses on immigrant rights and policing. He says many of the complaints received by their office came from the University of Michigan.
“Many people consider one of the state’s premier public universities. We kept a special eye on the University of Michigan because it was where we were getting the most complaints about repression of student activism, student speech, anti-Muslim, anti-Palestinian, anti anti-Semitic incidents on campus,” he says.
Ramis Wadood is an ACLU of Michigan staff attorney. Source: http://www.aclumich.org.
That prompted ACLU of Michigan to send a letter to the university to inquire about the incidents and present recommendations on how to move forward. Wadood says as a public university there are constitutional requirements that the university must follow.
“Around December… it got to a point where there was enough to send a letter to the university raising some concerns about them going in the wrong direction with regards to their approach to student activism, and student conduct on campus,” he says.
He says one of those incidents resulted in a 50 plus police officers and 10 police agencies going on campus to stifle protests, following a student led sit-in on November 17 in which protesters said about 40 students were arrested, and some students were giving citations barring them from entering a public building.
Wadood says things have gotten worse since December, with the university drafting a policy for “disruptive” protests, and giving community members only a week to respond.
ACLU of Michigan sent a second letter, along with a pending FOIA request, asking the university to reconsider their draft policy or potentially find themselves in legal trouble.
“Where we are now is that the university continues to go into very dangerous direction, both legally and as a matter of good policy and fostering a good campus environment,” he says.
Ramis Wadood, ACLU of Michigan from Nargis on Vimeo.
Wadood says the nonprofit continues to monitor the situation.
“I think the the complaints still a steady stream, you know, we get a handful of complaints every week, not just from University of Michigan, not just from universities, but other schools, other employees are facing issues with their employers,” he says.
Wadood says administrators in the police are running out of patience, are getting increasingly frustrated.
“(What) We’re seeing now is a quicker and harsher response from administrators and from the police in terms of stifling and repressing protests, whether those are protests on the street or on campus,” he says.
Wadood says the country has a history of repressing conversations around Palestine.
University of Michigan Ann Arbor’s students are taking part of the on-campus encampment for Gaza efforts across the nation, led by the group TAHRIR, a coalition of 80 organizations seeking universities to divest from Israel.
“The vast majority of protests we’re seeing on college campuses and elsewhere, are pro Palestine protests, or anti war protests. And and I think this country has a history going all the way back to the mid 20th century of repressing any conversation about Palestine, legal experts and advocates have called us to Palestine except exception to free speech. And I think we’re seeing that play out,” Wadood says.
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