WASHINGTON: US President Joe Biden on Thursday (Dec 12) launched a long-awaited technique for countering anti-Muslim and anti-Arab hate, up sharply for the reason that begin of the Israel-Gaza battle, calling for pressing, continued work to scale back discrimination and bias.
The 64-page doc, which maps out greater than 100 govt department actions, comes weeks earlier than the inauguration of former President Donald Trump, who imposed a journey ban on folks from some majority Muslim international locations throughout his first time period that Biden rescinded on his first day in workplace.
It mirrors a complete technique to battle antisemitism launched by the White Home in September 2023, and comes greater than a 12 months after demise of six-year-old boy Wadea Al-Fayoume, stabbed by a person who focused him and his mom as a result of they have been Palestinian-American.
In a foreword to the technique, Biden referred to as the assaults on the Chicago boy and his mom “heinous acts” and famous a spike in anti-Muslim and anti-Arab hate crimes, discrimination and bullying that he referred to as flawed and unacceptable.
“Muslims and Arabs should stay with dignity and luxuriate in each proper to the fullest extent together with all of their fellow People,” Biden wrote. “Insurance policies that end in discrimination towards complete communities are flawed and fail to maintain us secure.”
The Council on American Islamic Relations, a Muslim civil rights group, referred to as the technique “too little, too late” and faulted the White Home for not promising any adjustments to a federal watchlist and “no-fly” record that features many Arab and Muslim People, and for failing to finish the battle in Gaza, which has been driving Islamophobia.
Jim Zogby, founding father of the Arab American Institute, predicted the incoming Trump administration would disown the technique, however welcomed the White Home’s enlargement to incorporate anti-Arab hate as an alternative of focusing solely on acts directed towards Muslims.
The Trump transition crew had no speedy touch upon the technique or whether or not it could assist it.
Trump, who gained assist from some Muslim voters offended about Biden’s assist for Israel’s battle in Gaza, has mentioned he’ll ban entry to the US of anybody who questions Israel’s proper to exist and revoke visas of overseas college students who’re “antisemitic.”
Tensions between pro-Israel and pro-Palestinian teams surged on some US campuses after the Oct 7 Hamas assaults in Israel, with human rights advocates warning of rising antisemitism, Islamophobia and anti-Arab hate.
