Metro Detroit Muslims condemn threats at two U.S. campuses

DawudWalid Leave a Comment

http://www.detroitnews.com/article/20120914/METRO/209140445/1361/Metro-Detroit-Muslims-condemn-bomb-threats-at-two-U.S.-campuses

Metro Detroit Muslims condemn bomb threats at two U.S. campuses

  • By Serena Maria Daniels
  • The Detroit News

Muslim Americans in Metro Detroit are condemning bomb threats at two American universities following days of deadly violence at U.S. embassies in the Middle East that included the killing of four U.S. diplomats in Libya.

The unrest was sparked by an anti-Muslim video produced by an Egyptian-American that went viral on YouTube this week.

Dawud Walid, executive director of the Michigan chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, said there is “no grievance, no matter how legitimate” that justifies the bomb threats made Friday against campuses in Texas and North Dakota.

At both the University of Texas at Austin and North Dakota State University, the threats led officials to order evacuations.

A spokesman with Wayne State University said the campus did not have any safety problems Friday. Officials from the University of Michigan could not immediately be reached.

“The escalating tensions going on overseas involve a very minuscule percentage of the 1.6 billion Muslims around the world,” Walid said.

The University of Texas at Austin and North Dakota State University on Friday both ordered campus buildings evacuated because of bomb threats.

A spokesman with North Dakota State said the school received a call Friday morning from a man with a Middle Eastern accent claiming to have placed bombs all over campus and saying that he belonged to al-Qaida.

Local imams plan a news conference 10 a.m. Saturday at the Islamic House of Wisdom in Dearborn Heights to address the escalating violence overseas and to discuss the caricatures and parodies depicted in a video shot by a California man.

An ambassador and three other Americans were killed Tuesday following angry demonstration over the anti-Islamic video. Demonstrations have occurred in more than a dozen nations ranging from Egypt and Yemen to Great Britain and Israel.

Officials speculate that Libyan extremists hijacked a similar protest in Benghazi, where U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens and three of his colleagues were killed.

 

DawudWalid

Dawud Walid is currently the Executive Director of the Michigan chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-MI), which is a chapter of America's largest advocacy and civil liberties organization for American Muslims and is a member of the Michigan Muslim Community Council (MMCC) Imams Committee. Walid has been interviewed and quoted in approximately 150 media outlets ranging from the New York Times, Wall St Journal, National Public Radio, CNN, BBC, FOX News and Al-Jazeera. Furthermore, Walid was a political blogger for the Detroit News from January 2014 to January 2016, has had essays published in the 2012 book All-American: 45 American Men on Being Muslim, the 2014 book Qur'an in Conversation and was quoted as an expert in 13 additional books and academic dissertations. He was also a featured character in the 2013 HBO documentary "The Education of Mohammad Hussein." Walid has lectured at over 50 institutions of higher learning about Islam, interfaith dialogue and social justice including at Harvard University, DePaul University and the University of the Virgin Islands - St. Thomas and St. Croix campuses as well as spoken at the 2008 and 2011 Congressional Black Caucus Conventions alongside prominent speakers such as the Rev. Jesse Jackson and Congressman Keith Ellison. In 2008, Walid delivered the closing benediction at the historic 52nd Michigan Electoral College in the Michigan State Senate chambers and gave the Baccalaureate speech for graduates of the prestigious Cranbrook-Kingswood Academy located in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan. Walid was also a featured speaker at the 2009 and 2010 Malian Peace and Tolerance Conferences at the University of Bamako in Mali, West Africa. He has also given testimony at hearings and briefings in front of Michigan state legislators and U.S. congressional representatives, including speaking before members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus in Washington, D.C. Walid has studied under qualified scholars the disciplines of Arabic grammar and morphology, foundations of Islamic jurisprudence, sciences of the exegesis of the Qur’an, and Islamic history during the era of Prophet Muhammad through the governments of the first 5 caliphs. He previously served as an imam at Masjid Wali Muhammad in Detroit and the Bosnian American Islamic Center in Hamtramck, Michigan, and continues to deliver sermons and lectures at Islamic centers across the United States and Canada. Walid was a 2011 - 2012 fellow of the University of Southern California (USC) American Muslim Civil Leadership Institute (AMCLI) and a 2014 - 2015 fellow of the Wayne State Law School Detroit Action Equity Lab (DEAL). Walid served in the United States Navy under honorable conditions earning two United States Navy & Marine Corp Achievement medals while deployed abroad. He has also received awards of recognition from the city councils of Detroit and Hamtramck and from the Mayor of Lansing as well as a number of other religious and community organizations.

More Posts

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *