On his first visit made as president to a USA mosque, Obama said “thank you” to Muslims for their contributions to the country since colonial times, commenting that this is a phrase that the community does not hear enough.
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“And of course, recently, we’ve heard inexcusable political rhetoric against Muslim Americans that has no place in our country”, Obama said without naming Trump, who has called for a temporary bar on the entry of Muslims into the United States, or anyone else.
Whilst reiterating the importance of Muslim Americans in uniting the country as “one American family”, the president also called on the Islamic community to help tackle radicalization.
The president said many Americans do not know a Muslim person and form a “hugely distorted impression” based on TV, film and negative news reports.
“You’ve seen too often people conflating the horrific acts of terrorism with the beliefs of an entire faith”, he added. “It couldn’t have come at a better time…Coming to a mosque is a public reminder that Muslims have been part of America since our nation’s founding”.
Before he questioned Ted Cruz’s eligibility for the White House, Trump spent more than a year stoking “birther” questions about Obama’s birth certificate and whether he was a Muslim. President George W. Bush did so days after the Sept 11, 2001, terror attacks to reassure American Muslims.
“Overwhelming majority of world’s Muslims, and I repeat an overwhelming majority, who embrace Islam as a faith of peace”, he said.
According to the Pew Research Center, Islam is the fastest growing religion. Children need to see themselves, and they need to see representations of the people and stories around them. At a Holocaust remembrance ceremony held at the Israeli Embassy last Wednesday, the President declared that he “cannot imagine a greater expression of Christianity than to say, ‘I, too, am a Jew”. Muslims and terrorism should not be equated.
Obama was introduced by Sabah Muktar, a University of Maryland, Baltimore County student who thanked him for using his visit to assure Muslim Americans that they should not feel threatened. However, when respondents were asked which religion they consider troubling, Islam was the most common answer.
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“It can’t just be the work of any one faith alone”, the president said.
