I mean no disrespect to Omar Regan and his family, but it seems like Imam Luqman’s shooting death was ages ago because so many other “hot issues” have occupied our time since his death. I live in the metropolitan Chicagoland area and since Imam Luqman’s death we’ve had Dr. Rana and David Headley arrested on alleged terrorism charges. A young man in the Boston area was arrest on terrorism charges. Nidal Hassan allegedly killed 13 people at Ft. Hood. A Muslim in Springfield, Illinois and another in Colorado and another in Dallas, Texas were arrested in separate cases of alleged terrorism. In the past few days the story of the 5 young Muslim men from the DC area in Pakistan allegedly pursuing a role in jihad has become the top story for many.

But to me it still does not make sense. In all of these other cases no one died. Imam Luqman was shot to death. Granted, I don’t live in Michigan so I’m not privy to the strategic planning taking place there around Imam Luqman’s shooting. What came of the calls for an independent investigation? The FBI was sending a forensic team in to conduct an internal investigation of the shooting. The local police were to conduct an investigation as well. Did any of this happen and if so, what were the results?

In Illinois Muslims issued press releases on many of the cases referenced above. But when it came to the shooting death of Imam Luqman – nothing. And it was not because the community leadership did not know about it – they knew about it and chose to remain silent.

There was a major gathering of Muslim leaders recently which included moments of silence for the victims at Ft. Hood (which I think is a worthy undertaking) but as far as I can tell there wasn’t a word said about Imam Luqman. There were 900 Muslims in that room along with Illinois’ governor, state senators, university presidents, clergy and lay leadership from all the larger Christian denominations and on and on. How is it that Imam Luqman’s shooting death did not get mentioned in this event?

Frankly, I’m a bit shocked that, at least in Illinois, the silence is not only among the immigrant Muslims. The African American Muslims are not saying much either. Or, at least they are not saying much in public. Perhaps there are strategic reasons for this and I happen not to be privy to them. I hope that is the case.

I read the affidavit of the special agent upon which the arrest warrant for Imam Luqman was predicated and I was disturbed by the words attributed to Imam Luqman. But then I was asked to put a lot of it into the context of the urban setting in which he was living and working and in divorcing myself from my suburban middle class outlook momentarily, I was able to better contextualize the words. That, in turn, lessened the nefarious-ness of the message. I point this out because I want to suggest that I am not averse to keeping an open mind on this issue.

How is it that we are not in an uproar over the possible negligent homicide (if not worse) of a committed community leader who was doing the work I and many like me don’t have the guts to do?

I wish Omar Regan and his family well. Thank you for allowing me to vent a bit here and thank you for sharing the interview with Omar Regan.

WS,
Junaid
http://www.americanmuslimjournal.typepad.com

It is a quarterly magazine and subscriptions are $15 per year and it also can be purchased at Barnes and Nobel locations.

http://www.muslimquarterly.com/

Umar:

Could you fill folks in on MQ a little?

SDW

It is also nice to see that the Muslim community in the Detroit area has mobilized over their outrage over the killing of the imam.