AT AN ALLIED AIR BASE IN KUWAIT, 25 March 2003 — Arab News spoke to an American Muslim whose grandmother lived in Saudi Arabia to see how — under the circumstances of partaking in the war on Iraq — he has adapted to being a Muslim in the US Marines.
Kareem’s grandmother emigrated from Ethiopia to Saudi Arabia at the age of seven and the family lived in Makkah until she turned 18 and married. She and her husband traveled to the US, where they settled in California. They had four children, and Kareem is the son of their oldest daughter, Jamilla.
Kareem said that up until his grandmother’s death, she retained a fierce pride of the Saudi identity, culture, language and religion.
As a result, Kareem said he attended Islamic school all the way up through junior high school, where he learned to write and read Arabic. The Eid festivals, he remembers, were always a huge and happy family affair.
At the age of 20, Kareem joined the navy. He worked as a cryptologist and interpreter, and for 12 years he learned Japanese and worked at the US Embassy in Tokyo. In 2001, he went to CCS (Officer Candidate School), and joined the Marines.
He said the Marines gave him a better opportunity to achieve his goal — working in the communications field. Asked what it is like being a Muslim in the Marines, Kareem says the biggest misconception that he has to deal with is about Islam.
“They automatically tie it to terrorism,” he said.
“As I see it, that’s because of their upbringing and their American way of life. But for me, growing up in an Islamic household, I know the Qur’an and that there is absolutely no justifiable link in Islam to terrorism.”
Kareem said that whenever he has the opportunity to speak about Islam to his friends and colleagues, they are open and interested in what he has to say.
“I know how it is, but when we actually have the chance to sit down and talk about it, they begin to understand it and accept it a bit more.”
Asked about how life is for him and other Muslims in the Marine Corps, Kareem said: “Most of us tend to keep quiet about it. Religion is a very personal thing. But if people have an interest in it, then I’m happy to talk.”
Asked how life has changed for a Muslim in the Marines since Sept. 11, Kareem said several interesting situations have arisen. He decided to talk about when he and some other Marines were in Washington, “when Sept. 11 happened.”
That day they took a taxi somewhere in the city, and asked the driver where he was from. When the driver said Afghanistan, he noticed that his two partners visibly stiffened. To defuse the tension, Kareem asked the driver about his life in Afghanistan and what had happened to him. The driver explained that he had been forced to live under Soviet rule and eventually sought asylum in the United States. As they listened to his story, Kareem says, his colleagues visibly relaxed and became interested in what he had to say. As a result, he hopes they will not judge again so quickly next time they encounter someone in unusual circumstances.
“As long as you can sit down and talk things over, it gives everyone a chance to clear their thoughts,” he says.
Kareem has strong opinions when asked how he feels if a Muslim is accused of, or is thought to have committed, a crime or an act of terror.
“Whenever anybody commits a crime, the media tends to focus on the social, economic, or religious background of that person to find a way to justify the crime,” he said. “So whenever someone commits a crime, they concentrate on whatever society is focusing on at the time. And that’s when people start stereotyping.”
He gave several recent examples of racial stereotyping in the United States.
“In 1992-93 in North Carolina, a woman tossed her kids into the water and said the person who did it was a black man. They turned the town upside down looking for him and then it turned out she did it herself. Then you had the DC sniper, originally they tried to blame it on a terrorist. And then there is Moussaoui — people said he didn’t look like an Arab. Tell me, what does an Arab look like? People have to stop racial stereotyping.”
Finally, when asked how he felt about the US operation in Iraq, Kareem was unambiguous. “Personally, I don’t look at this as a lash against Islam. We’re trying to get rid of an evil dictatorship and improve the lives of the Iraqi people.”
Asked if he feels a kinship with the region or its people, Kareem explained that he used to travel to Saudi Arabia every summer with his grandmother “who was very proud of her roots here.” But for him — a second generation American — he never felt the region was his home, as she did.
“I grew up in California, and I’m used to swimming pools in the backyard and the California lifestyle,” he said. “I view my Saudi roots as an important part of my family history, and I am proud of that.”
