Translator: Rama Al-Ghafari Reviewer: Peter van de Ven
I always wanted to be a mom.
So when I welcomed my daughter after 12 years of marriage,
you can just imagine my joy.
I welcomed that baby and the challenges of being a mother, with open arms.
I thought my challenges would be the normal stuff,
like maybe picking her up late from school
or helping her with her homework
or even trying to sneak vegetables into her food.
Well, at least, that's how I pictured it
until the massive wave of Islamophobia spread across the country.
I never imagined explaining discrimination
to a young child at an early age
would be one of my challenges as a mother.
But unfortunately that is my reality.
As a Muslim mother, it's something that I had to mentally prepare for.
I did not want her to grow up in fear; I always think about that.
Growing up apologizing to the world for something she has nothing to do with.
I don't want her growing up
afraid of the backlash a Muslim receives every time there is a terrorist act.
I don't want her growing up
seeing the fear, disgust, and disappointment on my face
every time I hear a headline news of someone hijacking our faith.
I want my daughter to grow up being judged based on her character
and not based on her religion.
Is that too much to ask for?
Her life should be lived and defined
by the way she chooses her choices and how she lives it,
and not by her faith and those who practice it.
She should not be judged by the way the media negatively portrays her faith.
When I was young, my father thought it was best to move me to Palestine.
But I was born in Washington state, here in the US.
He wanted to move us to a country where he was born and raised.
After high school, I came back to the US,
and it became obvious to me
that something screams about me I'm not American enough.
This is the common question that I always get:
"So, where are you from?"
And when any of the states that I lived most of my life in
is not satisfying enough,
they would like to move to the next question
that to them is probably more clarifying:
"So where were you born?"
And you could imagine the look on their face when I say
Washington State.
Something about me screams I'm not American enough.
I don't know if it's the way I look, my skin color, my height
or my accent -
which I don't think I have one, by the way.
(Laughter)
But I'm still trying to understand what an American should really look like.
The world that we live in
is not what I imagined my daughter would grow up in.
This world seems to be filled with stories of hate.
In Texas, a high school student was sent home for building an alarm clock.
Imagine your kid, excited to wake up in the morning to go to school
so he can show his teacher an alarm clock that he spent hours building,
just to be handcuffed a moment after and taken to jail.
In Philadelphia,
a guy was questioned
for doing math problems on the plane.
I never thought math problems can be that scary,
but if you are a Muslim, it can take a whole new meaning.
Another person who was asked to be removed from the airplane as well
because he chose to speak Arabic on the phone with his family member
as he was boarding his flight.
Imagine sitting hours in the airport, looking forward to going to your family,
just to be asked to leave the airplane because you spoke in a language
that people around you are not comfortable with.
Unfortunately, these stories are gradually taking from disappointment
and frustration, insults, to now becoming physical assaults.
There's this story in San Diego that profoundly touched me.
Because it's a story of a mother with her child in a stroller,
and she was also pregnant.
She was attacked because she covers up;
she wears a Hijab.
And her stroller was shoved into her stomach.
Imagine how afraid she was, not just for her life,
but for her child watching this happening.
I'm sure the physical scars were healed,
but emotional scars stay with you forever.
Discrimination scars stay with you forever.
And then it goes from physical assaults to, unfortunately, gun shots and killing.
In Brooklyn, an Imam, a religious leader, who was gunned execution style
as he was going home from his Friday prayers.
Imagine your brother, your son, your father getting killed or shot
just because of the way they look or their skin color
or their Muslim garments.
These are stories, day in and day out, that you don't hear in the media.
The untold stories that go often unreported.
And if they do get reported, unfortunately, they are soon forgotten.
We wanted to have the idea of bridging people together,
and getting them to understand the other side.
The Atlantic Institute of Jacksonville,
a nonprofit that aims to bridge cultures
and faith together,
decided that what better way to bring everyone together in one room,
Muslims and non-Muslims,
than to have them all invited to a Ramadan Iftaar dinner.
We thought, "Hey, great conversation, great food and maybe some good laughs."
Muslims and non-Muslims sat side-by-side having a great conversation,
listening to a funny speaker
as he was connecting the similarity of our world today
with his favorite movie, "The lord of the rings,"
while we were eating delicious Samosas and having delicious Baklava.
That was great to see.
I saw in that room the mutual respect and trust between us.
I think the non-Muslim friends realized at that moment
that we are not the boogeyman after all.
I needed people to understand that we are also Americans.
I am American.
I was born here, so I am American by birth,
Palestinian by blood,
and Muslim by faith.
And I'm proud to be all of those.
And I want my daughter to feel proud too.
This is America, the land of the free.
The freedom that should not limit me to pass along to my daughter
my language, my culture or my faith.
One of the moments that I felt very proud of
is when Jacksonville Florida State College approached me and said,
"Hey, we are having a discussion about refugee crisis,
and we would like you to be one one of the panelists over there."
And I said, "Wow that's great!
We are actually going to talk about real things that are happening,
real crises."
And I saw people there concerned, have questions
and afraid of the unknown.
It was a great event,
and people left with a great understanding
of what it takes,
of the process of becoming a refugee and the asylum process.
And they also understood that they are afraid,
and they need our help as much as we do.
See,
this is not a blueprint for all the answers,
but it's a start.
There isn't a day that goes by where I don't look at my daughter
and wonder what kind of a world she is living in now.
What is it going to be like for her when she grows older?
She's born here, she's half Palestinian, half Indian and full Muslim.
Oh yeah, I said Indian.
I thought why not?
Let's complicate things a little bit more and add Indian to the mix.
But I knew that there is definitely hope.
Each of us here have the answers to that.
We can spread peace and love and respect amongst us, amongst our friends,
amongst our families
and most importantly, amongst our children.
Teach them from now.
We can teach them that love and respect should exist
so we can have this country in such a safer place,
where we can all live together side by side.
We can be the stories of change.
You can be the person who stays on the sideline,
watching discrimination, hate and racism happen,
or you can be like Larycia Hawkins, who's a professor at Wheaton College.
She took a stand.
She stood in solidarity
with her Muslim friends and family members that she knew,
and she risked her comfortable job to give a message.
So let us be the stories of change.
Let us make a difference.
Because hate is never the answer.
Thank you.
(Applause)