A US conservative news publication has reported on an interesting development concerning the Muslim Student Associations (MSA). According to the Townhall.com report, a hashtag campaign has broken out targeting what was said to be systematic racism experienced by African-American Muslims in the MSA:
November 25, 2015 On Friday, a hashtag campaign targeting what was described as systematic racism exploded over social media. The tag, #BlackinMSA, drew out the experiences of African American Muslims who experienced prejudice in Muslim Student Association (MSA) Chapters, on college campuses.
The Muslim Students Association, founded in 1962, is the oldest Muslim Brotherhood organization in the United States, according to archival Brotherhood records submitted in Federal Court. A NYPD intelligence report describes MSA as “potential incubators” of terrorism, and multiple MSA leaders and members have been arrested on terrorism related charges since 9/11.
Social media users complained of coldness and bias from Arab and South Asian Muslims towards Black Muslims, including the use of the Arabic term “Abdeed” (slave) as a term for Blacks. Additionally, tweets focused on discrimination in the appointment of non-Arab Muslims to leadership positions within the MSA.==
But the primary driver of the conversation appeared to be the lack of involvement with MSAs related to Black Lives Matter and related protests.
The campaign received only limited pushback from what appeared to be Arab Muslim twitter accounts, predominately focused
The hashtag campaign appears to have been the brainchild of Tariq Touré, steering committee member for the Muslim Anti-Racism Collaborative (MuslimARC). MuslimARC also directed the hashtag discussion with a poll question, and other tweets, raising questions about MSAs willingness to engage in the BLM movement and recent protest actions at University of Missouri.
According to Co-founder Margari Hill, MuslimARC was created in response to a call to action on the issue of the role of African American Muslims issued by Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) Michigan Chapter head Dawud Walid. Walid receives a “special thanks” on MuslimARC’s website.
Read the rest here.
According to a Hudson Institute report authored by the GMBDW editor, the Muslim Student Association was the earliest known public front organization of what would later become the US Muslim Brotherhood and many USMB leaders were active in the early days of MSA. In 2011, the MSA was listed as a “constituent organization of the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), itself a major part of the USMB. Previous posts have discussed important individuals close to the USMB who have emerged from an MSA background such as Mazen Asbahi who then candidate Obama appointed as his campaign Muslim outreach advisor. Asbahi was a former MSA leader who resigned his position after less than two weeks on the job when the GMBDW detailed his ties to the USMB.
The Investigative Project has compiled a report on the history and extremism of the MSA.