Don't put American Muslims on trial

Asim Rehman is vice president of the Muslim Bar Association of New York, a professional association for Muslim lawyers and law students living in New York.

The United States Constitution provides for the equal protection of all, regardless of race, religion or nationality. This includes, of course, Americans who happen to be Muslim.

So when a prominent politician decides to hold congressional hearings on one religious group within our society, it should give us all pause - as Americans - about whether these proceedings are fair or warranted.

Rep. Peter King (R-Seaford) plans to hold House Homeland Security Committee hearings in March on radicalization within the American Muslim community - and claims Muslim leaders have failed to cooperate with law enforcement in the effort to disrupt terrorism plots. As King puts it, "There is a real threat to the country from the Muslim community and the only way to get to the bottom of it is to investigate."

These are shocking words. The very idea that Congress should focus national security hearings on an entire community of faith should be deeply troubling to all Americans, and harkens back to the dark days of the McCarthy era.

First, law enforcement officials have disputed King's assertions about Muslim Americans cooperating with police. For example, Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca dismissed King's remarks. "Muslim Americans," he said, "have been pivotal in helping to fight terrorism."

Likewise, recent research by the Triangle Center on Terrorism and Homeland Security at Duke University and the University of North Carolina found that Muslim Americans uniformly reject violent extremism and, since 9/11, have provided information leading to the arrest of at least 48 individuals on terrorism-related crimes.

But the real issue with King's hearings is not the Muslim community's relationship with law enforcement. The issue is whether, in our legitimate quest to keep our country safe, a national security hearing should focus on an entire community of faith.

Clearly, it should not. Violent acts are committed by individuals, not communities. Neither law enforcement nor Congress should blame or target a congregation, a whole neighborhood or millions of hardworking, law-abiding American Muslims because of the acts of individuals. American Muslims are not a single homogenous entity, but an ethnically, racially, spiritually and economically diverse group. Let's focus on finding the individuals responsible for violence, and not put an entire community of faith on trial.

Hearings that focus on one ethnic or religious group will only promote division and undue suspicion. The last year has seen a wave of anti-Muslim sentiment in our country, bringing with it socially acceptable intolerance and acts of violence against Muslims. Only a few weeks ago, near Detroit, a man was caught with explosives in an alleged attempt to attack one of Michigan's largest mosques.

John O. Brennan, assistant to the president for homeland security and counterterrorism, said it best: "Describing our enemy in religious terms would lend credence to the lie propagated by al-Qaida and its affiliates to justify terrorism that the United States is somehow at war against Islam. The reality, of course, is that we never have been and will never be at war with Islam. After all, Islam, like so many faiths, is part of America."

For all their diversity, American Muslims want the same things as any other Americans. Good schools. A strong economy. Responsible government. Safety at home and abroad. King is right that groups like al-Qaida pose a serious threat. Congress should focus on that threat instead of scrutinizing an entire community of faith.