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arab american institute
Musk’s Attack on the Arab American Institute and Other Groups Is Irresponsibly Dangerous
That his post has been viewed by nearly 20 million people makes it even more concerning, as it only takes one deranged individual who has read it to decide to respond by striking out in an act of violence.
Mar 03, 2025
This past week began on a deeply disturbing note. Elon Musk reposted on X (formerly Twitter) a dangerously false attack on more than a dozen American entities who had received USAID or State Department grants over the past decade. The original post referred to the groups as “terrorist-linked.” In his repost Musk commented, “As many people have said, why pay terrorist organizations and certain countries to hate us when they’re perfectly willing to do it for free?”
The groups listed in the original post had apparently been compiled by an individual with an anti-Arab or anti-Muslim bias. He appears to have gone through a list of grant recipients and randomly culled out entities with “Arab” or “Muslim” in their name or who had done work in the Middle East. I don’t know all of the groups mentioned, but those I do know—for example, American Near East Refugee Aid (ANERA)—have been in the forefront of providing lifesaving support to refugees or victims of war or natural disasters, and, in the process, building better ties between the U.S. and affected communities in need across the Middle East. Other groups I recognized had equally important, impressive records of service.
What was obviously most troubling to me was that my organization, the Arab American Institute, was second on the list. This was upsetting for two reasons: The charge was profoundly off-base and irresponsibly dangerous.
As welcoming and inclusive as the U.S. can be, we also must acknowledge that our country has a history of hate and violence, a disproportionate amount of which in recent decades has been directed at Arab Americans and supporters of Palestinian rights.
The fact is that the institute received a State Department grant in 2018 (during the first Trump administration) to create partnerships between Arab American elected officials and public servants with local elected officials in Tunisia. The institute, which was founded in 1985, has a proud history of encouraging Arab Americans to get elected to local office. As our work progressed, we realized that many of these young leaders had never been to the Middle East, and if they had gone at all, it had simply been to the countries from which their parents had come. I had long hoped to create a program that would enable them to both get exposure to and an understanding of the broader Arab World, and to be able to share their experiences and what they had learned in American political life with their counterparts in Arab countries.
The initial phase of the program was so successful that the State Department supported expanding it into Morocco and then Jordan. It was a delight to see these young Arab and Arab American participants working together in a collaborative manner, discussing problems they face in municipal governance and actions that could be taken to improve constituent services—how to address local needs and challenges. They worked together in building local democracy and finding solutions that made a difference in people’s day-to-day lives—issues like trash collection, creating community tech hubs, and providing support for families with disabled children. The program ended in 2023.
For an individual infected by an anti-Arab or anti-Muslim bias to identify these people-to-people efforts with support for terrorism is so wrong that it defies understanding. And for a person of Mr. Musk’s standing in this administration to have amplified this message with a repost and comment is irresponsibly dangerous.
As welcoming and inclusive as the U.S. can be, we also must acknowledge that our country has a history of hate and violence, a disproportionate amount of which in recent decades has been directed at Arab Americans and supporters of Palestinian rights. After a former employee of mine at the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee was murdered in 1985, I was asked to testify before the U.S. Civil Rights Commission and the U.S. Congress on hate and violence directed against my community. In my testimony I noted how the environment for hate crimes against Arab Americans was fostered by those who have incited against us. I observed that when we have been called terrorists or terrorist supporters (sometimes by respected pro-Israel groups), it has spurred some to use violence against us. I know this personally from the content of death threats I have received over the years.
In the last two decades alone, there have been four convictions of individuals who have threatened my life and the lives of my family and my staff. These threats have most often been accompanied by accusations of terrorism or support for terrorism.
And so, I take it seriously when a person as powerful and well-positioned as Mr. Musk irresponsibly charges my institute with being a supporter of terrorism. That his post has been viewed by nearly 20 million people makes it even more concerning, as it only takes one deranged individual who has read it to decide to respond by striking out in an act of violence.
Some have cautioned us not to react to Musk’s incitement, hoping that it would just fade away. I disagree. In the end, the best defense we have is to point out both how wrong he has been and the danger posed by his words.
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Democrats' Unquestioning Support of Israeli War Crimes Puts 2024 at Increasing Risk
In our 30 years of polling Arab American voters, we haven’t witnessed anything like the role that the war on Gaza is having on voter behavior.
Sep 30, 2024
For Arab Americans, Israel’s war on Palestinians in Gaza looms large and will play a significant role in this November’s election. This is one of the key observations emerging from a mid-September nationwide poll of 500 Arab American registered voters conducted by John Zogby Strategies for the Arab American Institute.
A full year of this devastating assault on Gaza has reshaped the Arab American electorate, souring their attitude toward the Democratic Party, sapping their enthusiasm to vote in this election, and negatively impacting their inclination to vote for Vice President Kamala Harris for President.
Since we first began polling Arab Americans 30 years ago, the community has consistently favored the Democratic Party, with the margin of that support holding steady at nearly two to one for the past decade and a half. The Biden administration’s handling of the crisis in Gaza, however, has eroded that support resulting in Arab Americans now evenly divided between the two parties—38.5% for each. Equally revealing is the fact that by a slight margin (46% to 44%) voters in the community say they would prefer to see Republicans controlling the next Congress.
Arab American voter turnout has consistently been in the 80% range. But this year only 63% of the community say they are enthusiastic about voting in November, likely impacting voter turnout in November.
All of this has taken a toll on Harris’ prospects for winning Arab American votes in her contest with former President Donald Trump. While President Biden won 59% of the Arab American vote in 2020, compared with 35% for Trump, this year’s poll shows that in a multi-candidate matchup both candidates are in a virtual dead heat in the 41-42% range. More ominous for Harris is that when only considering likely voters, Trump leads 46% to 42%.
Arab American voter turnout has consistently been in the 80% range. But this year only 63% of the community say they are enthusiastic about voting in November, likely impacting voter turnout in November.
While a few unscientific “polls” have suggested that a third-party candidate would garner a majority of the Arab American vote, this AAI poll shows that not to be the case. All of the third-party candidates combined receive just 12% of the Arab American vote. Instead, it’s Trump who is the beneficiary of the community’s anger and, I might add, even despair over the Biden administration’s failure in addressing the crisis in Gaza.
This may be surprising given Trump’s record and recent statements, but there are a few factors that may account for this development. On the one hand, it may be that as a result of the year-long trauma, there is a desire to punish Democrats. Additionally, it appears that despite Trump’s dismal record with regard to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and his total support for Israel’s aims in the war, the data from the AAI poll shows that sub-groups previously aligned with the Republican Party are returning to the fold and voting for that party’s candidate. All of which lends emphasis to the way the Gaza crisis has impacted this election.
Further evidence of Gaza’s role is the 81% of Arab Americans who say that Gaza will be an important consideration in their vote. For example, when asked if Harris were either to demand an immediate ceasefire and unimpeded humanitarian aid to Palestinians in Gaza or to withhold diplomatic support for and arms aid to Israel until it implements a ceasefire and withdraws its forces from Gaza, Harris’ vote among Arab Americans would increase to around 62%. This new Harris tally captures one-third of Trump voters, while virtually wiping out the votes that would go to the third-party candidates. If Trump were to make the same demands on Israel, he too would benefit increasing his vote tally to 56%. This increased vote count for Trump comes from one-quarter of Harris voters and one-half of the votes going to third-party candidates.
The year-long unfolding genocide in Gaza and the catastrophe now facing Lebanon has impacted every component sub-group within the community
While these measures are needed and important to end the war, announcing such a policy change in the midst of a campaign might be considered a heavy lift. Other less dramatic steps could have been taken to win more Arab American support. For example, Harris lost an important opportunity to send a message to Arab Americans demonstrating concern for Palestinians when her campaign refused to include a Palestinian American with family in Gaza to speak at the Democratic convention. When asked if it would have made a difference in how they would vote if the Harris campaign had invited a Palestinian American to speak, the response was a substantial “yes.” If the campaign had done so, Harris’ vote tally from Arab Americans would have increased to 61%. That moment was squandered, but others may still arise and if Harris still wants Arab American support, then these opportunities shouldn’t be passed over.
In our 30 years of polling Arab American voters, we haven’t witnessed anything like the role that the war on Gaza is having on voter behavior. The year-long unfolding genocide in Gaza and the catastrophe now facing Lebanon has impacted every component sub-group within the community, with only slight variations among religious communities and countries of origin, immigrant or native-born, gender and age groups. With little over one month remaining before the election, Arab Americans and, as our polls of U.S. voters have shown, those who share their concerns (young and non-white voters) will be watching to see if their deeply felt concerns with Gaza and now Lebanon will be recognized and respected with a promise for change.
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How a Senate Hearing Designed to Combat Hate Ended Up Exhibiting It
One side wanted to understand the problem of hate and what can be done to understand and arrest its growth, while the other side seemed more intent on pouring gasoline on the fire. It was shameful.
Sep 23, 2024
Our politics and system of governance is in crisis. This was made clear this past week before and during the US Senate Judiciary Committee’s hearing on hate crimes in America.
The hearing was titled, “A Threat to Justice Everywhere: Stemming the Tide of Hate Crimes in America,” and was designed to examine the dramatic increase in hate crimes and to suggest a whole of government approach to deal with this problem. The expert witnesses invited to present testimony were: Kenneth Stern, Director of the Bard Center for the Study of Hate; Maya Berry, Co-chair of the Hate Crimes Task Force at the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights (LCCHR) and Executive Director of the Arab American Institute; and Rabbi Mark Goldfeder, Director of the National Jewish Advocacy Center. Stern and Berry were invited by the Majority (Democrats), while Goldfeder was the pick of the Republican side.
Even before the day of the hearing, the depth of the divisions plaguing American society were evident. Republicans objected that the hearings were designed to focus on hate crimes affecting all vulnerable communities in the US. What they wanted instead was a replication of the hearings that the GOP-led House had convened, ostensibly focused on antisemitism, but which strayed far afield. A few conservative American Jewish organizations were also troubled by this broader approach.
Republicans criticized Stern, who despite having been an official at the American Jewish Committee and the lead author of the controversial International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition, has since become a critic of the way this IHRA definition has been used to restrict free speech and its conflation of some legitimate criticism of Israel with antisemitism.
Berry is one of the leading researchers on hate crime data on the federal and state levels and the problems encountered in hate crime reporting. She was also the force behind the “Jabara-Heyer NO HATE Act” designed to improve federal hate crime reporting. Though highly regarded for her advocacy for all affected communities through her work with LCCHR, she was seemingly targeted by Republicans for one simple reason: She’s an Arab American who has been critical of Israeli policies and of efforts, domestically, to punish critics of those policies.
It was clear from the outset that all would not go well. Democrats made the case that their concern was the overall rise in hate crimes affecting multiple groups, while Republicans derided the entire effort as deliberately sidestepping the “real problem”—antisemitism. For her part, Berry meticulously detailed the statistics of the dramatic rise in recent years in hate crimes against each group: Blacks, Latinos, Asians, Arabs, Jews, Muslims, LGBTQ, and those with disabilities. She then outlined problems with underreporting, the difficulty in reconciling state and federal data, and made specific recommendations for improving reporting and enforcement of existing hate crime legislation.
Stern insisted that universities have an obligation to protect all students and faculty against being “bullied, harassed, intimidated, threatened, or discriminated against,” cautioned Congress against codifying a broad definition of antisemitism, noting it has not been necessary to fight hate for any community. He argued that instead of policing speech— prioritizing one view over another, resulting in an “us versus them” polarization—universities had the responsibility to protect speech and promote civil discourse by challenging students to understand diverse points of view and the people who hold these views. It is the more difficult path to pursue, but, in the end, it is the role of the university to educate not police or punish.
On the other hand, Goldfeder agreed with the Republicans that the hearing should have only focused on antisemitism, arguing that it is not only the most important challenge facing America today, but also that all other forms of hate emanate from it.
True to form, the Republicans who asked questions rejected the broad focus of the hearing, delivering inflammatory remarks against U.S. students protesting the genocide unfolding in Gaza, charging that they were being funded or encouraged by Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran. Goldfeder agreed saying that the students were either directly serving these entities or were their “useful idiots.”
Others harassed Berry, demanding that she denounce Hamas and agree that statements like “intifada” or “from the river to the sea…” were calls for genocide against Jews. Berry calmly rejected this baiting, saying that she of course didn’t support Hamas as it is a “foreign terrorist organization” and she rejected all forms of violence. This, however, wasn’t enough for one Senator, who continued to badger her, causing her to respond that she was only being asked these questions because she is an Arab-American woman. She went on: “It’s regrettable that as I sit here today, I have experienced the very issue that we’re attempting to deal with today. This has been regrettably a real disappointment, but very much an indication of the danger to our democratic institutions that we’re in today.”
The audience of largely Arab and Jewish Americans, who had gathered to witness the hearing, instead of learning about the rise of hate and the crimes that might result from it, left with heightened passions. It was, as Berry noted, disappointing and an indication of how broken we have become. One side wanted to understand the problem of hate and what can be done to understand and arrest its growth, while the other side seemed more intent on pouring gasoline on the fire and watching it burn—all for political gain.
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