We write today with deep sadness as an American Jew and an African American, respectively, the Executive Director and Civil Rights Attorney of the Philadelphia chapter of the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights organization. Both of us are quite familiar with the tragic history of our people and the protracted legacy of traumatic oppression exacted upon our respective communities.
An interfaith press conference about the Pittsburgh synagogue massacre, hosted by CAIR-Philadelphia and Masjidullah at the Friends Center yesterday, received wide media coverage last night on radio, TV, and internet.
Jewish, Christian, and Muslim religious leaders at the press conference condemned the mass murder at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, as well as calling attention to the environment of racism, xenophobia, and calls to violence in which the anti-Semitic murders took place. Many speakers noted a climate of fear and divisiveness stoked by the irresponsible rhetoric of the president of the United States.
An interfaith group of religious leaders came together for a press conference Tuesday to denounce the mass shooting inside a Pittsburgh synagogue and President Donald Trump's latest attack on undocumented immigrants.
They said a prayer of mourning, at Friends Center in Center City, for the 11 men and women who were gunned down inside the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh on Saturday, calling out each of their names. The leaders represented area mosques, churches, and synagogues who called the massacre the direct result of a larger scheme of hate that began more than two years ago.
On Tuesday, October 30, 2018, clergy and leaders from the Jewish, Christian, and Muslim religious communities will gather at the Friends Center for a press conference in reaction to the massacre at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
CAIR-Pennsylvania, the state affiliate of the Council on American Islamic Relations, denounced the shootings at the Tree of Life Synagogue near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania earlier this morning.
As Jacob Bender, CAIR-Philadelphia Executive Director, emphasized in his recent “Director’s Desk” article “On Losing a Battle,” despite the waves of sad and angering events in our country, we are keeping our spirits up by channeling our energies to serve and empower the American Muslim community in these difficult times.
On Friday August 24, CAIR-Philadelphia -- together with two other American Muslim organizations: Emgage Pennsylvania and MPower Change -- organized a voter registration drive as part of National Muslim Registration Day (#NMVRD #mymuslimvote). The drive took place at Islamic Society of Chester County in West Chester, and CAIR-Philadelphia Executive Director Jacob Bender and Outreach and Education Director Ahmet Tekelioglu spent the afternoon registering many new Pennsylvania voters arriving for Jumma (Friday afternoon prayers).
As part of National Muslim Voter Registration Day, a national grassroots campaign to reach and register U.S. Muslim voters, three organizations (the Philadelphia Chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, Emgage Pennsylvania, and MPower Change) will tomorrow conduct a voter registration drive at the Islamic Society of Chester County in West Chester, PA.
The Philadelphia chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) today condemned the Ku Klux Klan, a white supremacist organization, and its leafleting of moviegoers attending screenings of “BlacKkKlansman,” director Spike Lee’s new feature film. The offending leaflets, rife with crude anti-Semitic anti-Black, sexist, and anti-immigrant stereotypes, were left on cars in the parking lots of movie theaters in York, PA, and in several locations in Maryland.
