A planning commission in Sterling Heights, Michigan voted 9-0 earlier this week to deny a zoning use exemption for a proposed mosque . As the team petititioning for the mosque proposal (they were accompanied by rights activists) left the meeting, they were booed and heckled by a crowd assembled outside, including chants of "go back to your country" and "God bless America". There were reports that the mosque supporters were spit at as they left the meeting. Now, this would not be a surprise in many places, but Michigan is home to the largest Arab American community in the US. Nearby Dearborn is 30% Arab-American. The proposed mosque is meant to augment a Shia mosque in nearby Madison Heights.
So how did it come to this in a place that has a number of mosques, and tens of thousands of Arab-American residents?
What makes this story interesting is that it involves a persecuted Iraqi minority. Chaldean-Assyrian Christians form a community based in Northern Iraq and Southern Turkey (Mosul has a significant population), many reside in areas controlled by Kurds. They have faced persecution for centuries, notably genocidal ethnic cleansing towards the end of the Ottoman empire. Most of Iraq's Christian population is Chaldean and they are an integral part of the country's history in many ways, come of them surprising. Tariq Aziz, Saddam Hussein's deputy PM was a Chaldean Christian for example. With the deteriorating conditions in the region, much of the community has fled their homes. Some refugees have been resettled in Michigan where a sizable Chaldean community has existed since Saddam took power in the 60s (apologies for the Washington Times link).
Heated comments were made during public hearings to discuss the mosque proposal. Some of the mosque opponents said:
“This mosque is going to bring people like this. I do not want to be near people like this,” one resident, Saad Antoun, said at the City Council meeting as he held up a photo of women in burkas. “This is not humanity. … It is not right to live with people like this. This is not acceptable at all because these people are scaring the public. And they don’t care. … Can we prohibit this kind of public thing? We see them at the mall every day. We see them at shopping. Can we prohibit this? Can we make law against this? It’s scary and disgusting.”
Another resident, who refused to give his full name and address because he said he was harassed the last time he did so at a City Council meeting, said: “My grandfather built a house that backs up to this so-called mosque, worship, whatever it is. These guys are forcing out of this neighborhood. I have young children, they watch the news and now they’re getting scared. … These people who are coming in are not beneficial to this area at all. Worship, no worship, whatever it may be. This facility is to store weapons, training, whatever it is.”
After concerns were raised about the size of the facility (23,000 sq feet on a 4 acre plot), the proposal was revised to reduce spires and domes over the worship space, but that did not sway the zoning commission or opponents. The
local Fox News affiliate said the opposition "stoked... sentiments of Islamophobia" and actually did a decent segment on the controversy (including video).
The mayor of the town posted a statement on Facebook opposing the mosque, which read in part:
My heart breaks for the Chaldean people in Iraq and throughout the world who are being terrorized by Islamic terrorists. I will do EVERYTHING in my power to protect, support and defend the Chaldean population in Sterling Heights. I had nothing to do with this mosque and do not want it built here.
More below the orange graffiti:
That post was later deleted and he backpedaled saying it was a planning decision.
To round things out, we have Pamela Geller in the mix who posted a letter from a Chaldean group onto her website alongside this commentary:
A member of the Iraqi Christian community in Michigan wrote to alert me of a proposed mega-mosque going up in a Chaldean Christian community in Michigan. How frightening it must be to them when their Chaldean brethren in Iraq and Syria are being systematically cleansed from their centuries-old homelands under Muslim rule.
The letter made the following claim:
This mega-Mosque will decrease the home values of the residential area. Additionally, when the homeowners want to sell their homes not only will they now be limited as to who they can sell their homes too (only Muslims, who else would buy a home next to a mega-mosque?), but they will have to sell their homes at a discounted price. This all benefits the Muslim community, at the expense of the Iraqi Christian community. Iraqi Christians consider this another attempt by the Muslim community to persecute, bully, harass us; they have been doing it for 1400 years in the Mid East and now they want to follow us in the U.S. as well with their usual tactics.
We have some
hyperbole at the other end too:
"What is the difference between Daesh (Arabic name for ISIS) and those who oppose building the masjid (Arabic word for mosque) in Sterling Heights?" Al-Qazwini said in a Detroit mosque. "There is no difference. ISIS is a bunch of bigots, hateful, who hate others. Those people are also a bunch of bigots who hate others."
Al-Jazeera quoted a couple of community activists/leaders:
“I don't think there is a tension between the Chaldeans and the Muslims in the area, it is just a matter of sorting out what is right from wrong,” said Joseph Kassab [president of the Iraqi Christians Advocacy and Empowerment Institute], whose West Bloomfield, Michigan-based non-profit helps refugees settle in the United States. “In this country Chaldean-Americans cherish the values of this country which is freedom of religion and speech that they were and are still deprived of in their own country.”
“The newer wave of Chaldeans who live in Michigan suffered a lot of hate and targeting in Iraq after the 2003 invasion” led by the U.S., Dawud Walid [executive director of the Council on Arab-Islamic Relations Michigan] said. “The Chaldean community didn’t have militias to protect them like Sunni and Shia groups. They had churches burned down and clergy targeted. The Chaldean community is becoming almost extinct in Iraq. … But Michigan is not Iraq and the Muslim community here had nothing to do with their suffering in Iraq.”
This is most likely heading for the courts. In particular, the
zoning issues will likely be litigated given the appearance of discrimination in the public debate and comments by the mayor. Perhaps also because a Chaldean Christian community center
broke ground last year in the same area. It is half the size of the proposed mosque, but also located on a lot half the size (2 acres versus 4).
Some of what's happening in the Middle-East is profoundly distressing to communities here, and is creating faultlines.
There have been recent incidents of vandalism at Muslim community centers/mosques and Sikh gurdwaras in the area.