The following letter was published in the Hyattsville, Maryland Gazette on October 11, 2001 on the Community Forum Page.

You worry me. I wish you didn't. I wish when I walked down the streets of this country that I love, that your color and culture still blended with the beautiful human landscape we injoy in this country. But you don't blend in anymore. I notice you and it worries me. I notice you because I can't help it anymore. People from your homelands professing to be Muslims have been attacking and killing my fellow citizens and our friends for more than twenty years. I don't understand their grievances and hatred but I do know that nothing can justify the inhumanity of their attacks.

On September 11, nineteen Arab-Muslims hijacked four jetliners in my country. They cut the throats of women in front of children and brutally stabbed to death others. They took control of these planes and crashed them into buildings killing thousands of proud fathers, loving sons, wise grandparents, elegant daughters, best friends, favorite coaches, fearless public servants, and mothers of children.

So I notice you now. I don't want to be worried. I don't want to be consumed by the same rage and hate and prejudice that has destroyed the souls of these terrorists. But I need your help. As a rational American trying to protect my country and family in an irrational and unsafe world I must know how to differentiate between you.

How do I differentiate between the true Arab-Muslim-Americans and the Arab-Muslims in our communities who are attending our schools and enjoying our parks while they plot the next attack that will slaughter those very same good neighbors and children. The answer to my own question is that it is past time for me to try to determine this. The events of Sept 11, 2001 changed the answer. It is time for every Arab American in this country to determine it for me.

I want to know, I demand to know, if you love America. Do you pledge allegiance to its flag? Do you pray in your many daily prayers that Allah will bless this nation, that he will protect and prosper it? Are you thankful for the freedom that only this nation affords? A freedom that was paid for by the blood of hundreds of thousands of patriots. Are you willing to preserve this freedom with the spilling of your own blood? Do you love America? If this is your committment, then I need for you to start letting me know about it.

Your muslim leaders in this nation should be flooding the media at this time with hard facts on your faith, and what hard actions you are taking as a community and religion to protect the United States of America. Please, no more benign overtures of regret for the death of the innocent, I worry about who you regard as innocent, and condemnation of unprovoked attacks, I worry about what you consider unprovoked. I am not interested in your sympathy, I am interested only in action. What will you do for America, this country, at this time of crisis, at this time of war?

I want to see Arab/Muslims waving the flag in the streets. I want to hear you chanting for Allah to bless America. I want to see young muslims enlisting in the US military. I want to see a commitment of money and emotion to the victims of this butchering and to the nation as a whole. The FBI has a list of over 400 people they want to talk to regarding the WTC attack. Many of these people live and socialize in Muslim communities. You know them. You know where they are. Deliver them up, now!

But I have seen little even approaching this type of action. Instead I have seen an already closed and secretive community close even tighter. You have disappeared from the streets. You have posted armed security guards at your facilities. You have threatened lawsuits. You have screamed for protection from reprisals. The few Arab Americans who have appeared on the media are defensive and equivocating. They seem more concerned with making the US prove who is responsible before they act, and protecting their own people from violence here in the US and abroad.

If the true teaching of Islam proclaims tolerance and peace and love for all peoples then I want chapter and verse from the Koran with statements to back that up. Because even if the teachings of the Koran are good and pure and true, it matters little if large numbers of current Islam practitioners interpret the teachings of Mohammed incorrectly and adhere to a degenerative form of the religion.

I want to know where every Arab American in this country stands, I think it is my right and the right of every true citizen of this country to demand it, a right paid for by the blood of thousands of my brothers and sisters. I am pleading with you to let me know. I want you here as my brother, my neighbor, my friend, as a fellow American. But there can be no areas if ambivalence regarding your allegiance and it is up to you to show me where you stand. Until then, you worry me!