Police in Michigan city put on alert after WSJ opinion piece By Reuters

By Kanishka Singh

(Reuters) – The mayor of Dearborn, Michigan, stated the town’s cops had been ramping up their presence throughout locations of worship and main infrastructure factors following an opinion piece within the Wall Road Journal that he known as “bigoted” and “Islamophobic.”

The WSJ revealed the piece on Friday headlined as “Welcome to Dearborn, America’s Jihad Capital.” Town’s mayor and rights advocates from the Council on American-Islamic Relations and the Arab American Anti-Discrimination Committee condemned the piece as anti-Arab and racist for suggesting the town’s residents, together with spiritual leaders and politicians, supported Palestinian Islamist group Hamas and extremism.

“Reckless. Bigoted. Islamophobic,” Dearborn Mayor Abdullah Hammoud stated concerning the WSJ piece written by Steven Stalinsky, government director of the Center East Media Analysis Institute.

“Efficient instantly – Dearborn police will ramp up its presence throughout all locations of worship and main infrastructure factors. It is a direct results of the inflammatory @WSJ opinion piece that has led to an alarming improve in bigoted and Islamophobic rhetoric on-line focusing on the town of Dearborn,” the mayor added.

Neither the Wall Road Journal nor the Center East Media Analysis Institute replied instantly to requests for remark.

Rights advocates have famous an increase in Islamophobia, anti-Palestinian bias and antisemitism within the U.S. for the reason that eruption of battle within the Center East in October.

Amongst anti-Palestinian incidents that raised alarm had been a November capturing in Vermont of three college students of Palestinian descent and the deadly stabbing of a 6-year-old Palestinian American in Illinois in October.

The most recent eruption of battle within the Center East started on Oct. 7 when Hamas attacked Israel, killing 1,200. Israel has since assaulted Hamas-governed Gaza, killing over 27,000, in response to the native well being ministry. Practically all of Gaza’s 2.3 million inhabitants is displaced. The densely populated enclave additionally faces hunger.