Making the US System Work

By Mohammad J. Khan

No two immigrants to the United States have come for exactly the same reasons. For some of us it was a matter of irresistible attraction, like iron fillings to a magnet. For others it was a matter of being pushed by events at home. For most, it is a combination of individual factors. For certain, however, those of us from Pakistan do not come for purely economic reasons. There are places closer to home where we could make money faster, if that were our only goal. Nor have we come for religious reasons, since strict observance of the tenets of Islam tests our determination to integrate into an economic system and to raise children in a culture where days are not structured around the five prayers, weeks around Friday services, nor years around the Holy month of Ramadan.

We live, nevertheless, in harmony with our Christian and Jewish neighbors with whom we enjoy legal equality under the American system of separation of church and state. Those of us who remain in America have concluded that in this dynamic society and richly varied culture we can retain our own values while striving for personal fulfillment and a secure future for our children.

Of course I understood little of this when I left my home in Rawalpindi for medical studies abroad and a career as a pharmacist in a New Jersey suburb of New York City. Although my first goals were educational and professional, by the time I had satisfied those concerns I was deeply interested in the American political system. Many of my fellow Muslim immigrants were disillusioned by what they perceived as an irrational American bias against Islam. I am political to my fingertips, however, and I found it challenging that a system which, from afar, had seemed the ultimate in open democracy, with the citizens involved at every level, was perceived by American Muslims as closed to them.

There are perhaps historical reasons, but I believe that most of them go back no more than 40 years to the establishment of Israel and the resulting struggle within the American domestic political arena. Although Pakistanis are not Arabs, we and all American Muslims are concerned about the unresolved Palestine problem and, of course, the fact that we are routinely slandered in the American Congress and media because of a political dispute between the Israelis and the Arabs overseas. I can do nothing about the history of the problem, but I think we can contribute to the solution. After all, didn't the Jews—the other major non-Christian minority in America—once have similar problems? And yet my fellow Muslims were telling me it was the astonishing influence of Jews in American political parties and the media that now is locking Muslims out of the system.

I read a great deal about the subject in the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, which seemed to have reached the same conclusions I have about US Middle East policies. No matter whether you are Muslim, Christian, or Jewish, if you examine the Arab-Israeli problem objectively, you reach the conclusion that a Jewish state will not be secure until there is a second state in the Holy Land for the Palestinians. Therefore the problem is one of educating the American media, Congress, and eventually all Americans. When the latter understand the problem, they will do the right thing and, when Americans finally do the right thing, there will be peace in the Middle East.

I contacted the Washington Report chief editor. He described the hard work, single-mindedness, and organizational discipline that had given between five and six million American Jewish citizens such a powerful veto on US foreign policy that it was spilling over and hurting Americans like me whose only offense was to be from the countries that oppose Israel overseas.

We Muslims are well organized, but not for political purposes. However, we brought this editor to speak to our annual banquet in the tri-state area of Connecticut, New York, and New Jersey. He told an audience of several hundred indigenous Muslims and new Americans from Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, Egypt, Syria, and other Islamic states as far apart as Morocco and Indonesia that there are somewhere between five and nine million American Muslims, another two million Christian Arab Americans, perhaps a million Americans like him with extensive personal experience in Middle Eastern and Islamic lands, and one, two or perhaps more millions of activist Americans—Christians and Jews alike—in peace groups, trade groups, and other organizations for whom Middle East peace is a primary concern. All are potential one-issue voters if that issue is to create secure homelands for both Israelis and Palestinians in the land they must share in peace, and thus save American lives in the Middle East.

All American Muslims are concerned about the unresolved Palestine problem and, of course, the fact that we are routinely slandered in the American Congress and media because of a political dispute between the Israelis and the Arabs overseas.

"If we together number 9 to 14 million," he challenged us, "and our message is not on behalf of special interests here or abroad, but only that Americans should act in the Middle East to support American interests and in accord with American traditions of self determination, human rights and fair play—that's not a very difficult program to sell to the American people as a whole."

Of course he received a standing ovation and I know many people congratulated him on his words. But I decided to concentrate on deeds instead. Specifically, how I would put the faith he and I seem to share in the American political system to the test in my own New Jersey community, if his organization would provide logistical support.

"First start to do it, using your own funds," he said. "Then write an article that will help others who want to do some of the same things in their own communities. In return, we will put our office and publications behind your effort."

That is why I am writing this article. The bargain I offered him is this: If I increase his subscriptions to between 800 and 1,000 in my congressional district, his publication will interview the district candidates about their specific views on how to attain Middle East peace two months before the 1988 general elections. I believe 1000 subscriptions can influence 5,000 votes, enough to decide a tight race.

To start my part of the bargain, I first found out what towns are included in my congressional district. Then I asked the local telephone company for a telephone book for each town. I took out and marked the yellow pages listing churches and clergy, local newspapers, radio and television stations, public libraries, and political and religious organizations, since there are many of them in my district. The Washington Report has a gift subscription rate of $5 applicable to all of those categories. I sent a page each of zip code maps and locality abbreviations and $1000 to cover 200 such subscriptions, to be selected from those lists. They in turn promised to send sample copies of the Washington Report even to institutions not selected, in hopes that some of them would subscribe on their own. I also sent lists of elected officials on the city and state levels which I obtained from the League of Women Voters. It has offices in almost every large city. Where there is no such office, I believe such lists could be obtained from the office of a city councilman or state assembly representative.

I went through the white pages of the same telephone books and marked the Muslim names and mailed those to the Washington Report. I paid special attention to Muslim names in the yellow page listings of physicians. These are busy professionals, but they are in contact with many people daily. The support of such Muslims, who are highly respected by non-Muslims, is essential to any educational effort aimed at the American public as a whole. There are a great many Muslims in my district, and I cannot donate subscriptions for all of them, of course. I believe, however, that when they receive introductory issues, many will subscribe on their own. All of them will receive the issue in which my article appears. Perhaps a few will offer to help me and my friends finish the job in my district, or will send this article to a friend or relative who might start the work in an entirely new locality.

Here is the tally so far in my district. There were about 30 Washington Report subscribers in the district before I became involved. I had provided an additional 50 gift subscriptions earlier, and most of these can be counted upon to renew their subscriptions on their own. Now there are an additional 200 new clergy, media and library subscriptions I have purchased at the $5 rate, and I am confident that another 50 institutions which I located will subscribe on their own. That's 330 subscribers virtually certain by the end of the year. Sometime before then I will start telephoning each, asking only that they contribute one gift subscription of their own, and that they show the Washington Report to neighbors and relatives. Meanwhile, non-Muslim friends already are trying to arrange, or donate, group subscriptions for church and secular organizations to which they belong. Fellow Muslims are now contacting the Halal (Muslim) meat shops in the district, asking them to put issues of the Washington Report on display for sale. Arab Americans and Turkish, Iranian, and Pakistani Muslims have obtained agreement from several Middle Eastern restaurants in the district to do the same.

It helps, but you don't have to be a 24-hour-a-day dynamo like Mohammad J. Khan to be an AET district or campus coordinator. If some of the activities he describes in this article interest you, contact Tom Pfeiffer at AET's toll-free number.

I can see already that in our concern for peace in the Middle East, we Muslims are not alone. Our interest is to see the United States, our new country, loved and respected again in our former homes, which encompass one billion people in 45 countries. It was that love and respect that attracted those of us who grew up in the Islamic world to America. We want our children to be as proud of it as we once were when they visit the lands from which their parents came. Most of all, we want our children to be respected for and proud of their Islamic heritage in this new land in which they have been born.

I believe we will have the requisite Washington Report subscribers in our congressional district by the 1988 election. If so, I think it will indicate that I have "seen the light" about how purposeful and energetic people with no hidden agenda can secure their niche in the American political system. And, if I am right, I am certain of one other thing. At least two candidates contending in 1988 to represent this district in the House of Representatives will "see the light" on US interests in the Middle East. For the first time they will be able to speak like good Americans from conviction and common sense, instead of from fear of an extremist, insatiable, and ruthless pro-Israel lobby. I believe that instead of outbidding each other with promises of more money and more deadly weapons for Israel, we will hear candidates from both parties telling the voters in my district that the best security for Israel is to end 40 years of bloodshed between Arabs and Jews on terms acceptable to both.

There was an Islamic golden age in history when Jews, Christians, and Muslims lived together in harmony and produced one of the truly great world civilizations. We who regard Moses and Jesus along with Mohammad, peace be upon them all, as prophets who brought God's message to mankind, know that there can be such a golden age again. God willing, it will be realized, with our help, right here in our country, America.

Mohammed J. Khan is a pharmacist in Trenton, New Jersey.