Wadea Al-Fayoume and his mother were living thousands of miles away from the latest violence raging through the Middle East, but authorities said they still paid the price because of their ethnicity and religion.
It didn’t matter that Wadea was only 6. Joseph Czuba allegedly found the Palestinian American boy so threatening, he stabbed him 26 times.
Wadea’s mother survived Saturday’s attack in Czuba’s unincorporated Plainfield Township home, where the Muslim family rented a room. She remained in the hospital Monday, unable to say goodbye to her son, who celebrated his birthday less than two weeks ago.
Mourners at Wadea’s funeral included many fellow Palestinian Americans, who have felt ignored or unfairly characterized as Hamas sympathizers in recent days by many of our elected leaders and press.
It should go without saying: Words are important. Those in positions of power do real, potentially fatal damage when they spread bigotry, or fail to warn Americans of the dangers of assigning collective guilt to a single group for the horrific actions of the relative few.
Leaders must be held to high standards for speaking out, especially in times of tension and turmoil, when events on the other side of the globe can quickly have repercussions at home. When those in positions of power don’t speak out, it makes it easier for hate crimes to occur.
Czuba felt safe enough to open his doors to Wadea’s family. The 71-year-old man even built the boy a treehouse, according to Ahmed Rehab, executive director of the Chicago chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations.
But what prompted Czuba to suddenly find his tenants so menacing that he decided to pick up a knife in the midst of his paranoia? He started listening to takes on conservative talk radio — and we can just imagine the vitriol and misinformation he heard — following Hamas’ Oct. 7 bloody assault on Israel, Will County prosecutors said.
The FBI is investigating Wadea’s murder and his mother’s stabbing.
Not just the right who fumble the message against hate
In the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, Republican President George W. Bush stressed, “The face of terror is not the true faith of Islam.” Still, Muslims and Arabs were surveilled and profiled in the name of national security. Anti-Muslim hate crimes in the U.S. also jumped 1700% in 2001, a United Nations report found.
Politicians on the right are openly boastful of their intolerance these days. Preying on the grief of the Jewish American community, they’ve been baring their Islamophobic fangs once again by painting all Arabs and Muslims as barbaric and evil supporters of Hamas.
Former President Donald Trump promised to crack down on Muslim immigration in another Trump administration.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican presidential candidate, said the U.S. shouldn’t accept refugees from the Gaza Strip because they are “all antisemitic.”
U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., disgracefully called the Israel-Hamas conflict a “religious war” and suggested that Israel “level” Gaza, where nearly 3,000 Palestinians civilians have died since Israel pounded the region in response to Hamas’ slaughter of over 1,200 Israelis and foreign nationals.
But it isn’t just Republicans who have fumbled in their messaging.
Many Democrats, in order to profess their devotion to Israel, can’t even get themselves to utter the word Palestinian or express any concern about Palestinian Americans who are stuck in Gaza or have relatives overseas.
President Joe Biden did remind Americans on X, formerly known as Twitter, that the “overwhelming majority of Palestinians had nothing to do with Hamas’s appalling attacks, and are suffering as a result of them.”
But that came on Sunday, right before he learned of Wadea’s murder and expressed condolences and shock.
U.S. Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich., the only Palestinian American in Congress, said “American Muslims and Arab Americans do not feel represented by our government right now” in a statement she issued last Friday calling for a ceasefire and blasting the Biden administration’s “blanket disregard for saving civilians — including Americans — in Gaza.”
Antisemitic acts have been on the rise in our state. Now, Illinois is making international headlines for Czuba’s alleged Islamophobic and anti-Arab attack.
In Chicago, the City Council should take quick action on the proposed “Chi vs. Hate” ordinance, which would allow Chicagoans to report “non-criminal hate incidents” by calling 311 or by using the 311 app.
These incidents could easily snowball into a hate crime, but could be potentially stopped if authorities are put on alert.
“Our research demonstrates that action in advance of potential outbreaks of hate crimes can help mitigate the harm to individuals and property from backlash crimes,” as the 2002 U.N. report on anti-Muslim, anti-Arab hate crimes found.
It is hard to determine in hindsight whether Czuba could have been stopped from his alleged rampage.
If only he’d taken Wadea’s mother’s advice before he allegedly attacked her: “to give peace a chance.”
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