More Muslims Calling Triangle Home

By Yonat Shimron

Reprinted by permission of the News and Observer of Raleigh, North Carolina.

When her husband got a job at IBM, Zerqa Abid worried the Triangle would not be a good place to rear her two daughters in the Muslim faith. Five years later, she has come to the conclusion it may be the very best.

"I feel it's easier to raise a practicing Muslim here than in Pakistan," said Abid, who sends her daughters to the Al-Iman School in Raleigh and lives in an apartment complex popular with many Muslims. "For me, this is the best place Allah could have placed me."

With low unemployment, half a dozen mosques, two Islamic schools and a thriving mix of adherents from all over the world, the Triangle is attracting many Muslim families - so many, Islam stands to become North Carolina's second-largest faith before the decade's end.

Today, as the community celebrates Eid ul-Fitr, the happiest day of the Islamic year, thousands of Muslims will kiss, hug and congratulate one another for completing the 30-day fast of Ramadan. They will have other reasons for rejoicing too.

Raleigh Muslims will recite morning prayers in the $ 1.5 million Islamic Center that opened on Atwater Street at the corner of Ligon three months ago. The white cinder-block building is already drawing record crowds. Muslims in Durham are looking forward to building a bigger mosque on Pilot Street within the next five years. And in Chapel Hill, Muslims just bought a five-acre lot off Eubanks Road - a lot they hope to transform into Orange County's first Islamic center.

With anywhere between 6,000 and 10,000 faithful in the three-county region, (no official figures exist), Triangle Muslims will soon surpass the number of Jews living here, estimated at about 5,000 families. It's a pattern that's unfolding nationwide as the Muslim population catches up with the Jewish population. Each has roughly 6 million U.S. adherents.

But Muslims have yet to assume the same kind of clout as Jews. In the Triangle, Muslims have been ambivalent about entering politics. Recently they have begun to advocate for themselves. Last spring, Muslims invited state officials working with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to discuss workplace accommodations for Muslims. Community members are now gathering signatures for a petition asking that the United States pressure Russia to stop attacking the Chechnyan rebels, who are Muslim.

"There's a growing consciousness among Muslims that our numbers are growing and our influence needs to reflect that," said Ihsan Bagby, a professor of international studies at Shaw University.

But political involvement has not come easily. Bagby says many Muslims feel that since the United States is not a Muslim nation, they shouldn't get involved. Others view politics as dirty and politicians as double-dealers. A small group is now insisting that regardless of one's perspective, it's important for Muslims to be involved.

"If we want a clean environment for our children, we need to be vocal on drugs, drinking, etc.," said Iyad Hindi, a software engineer in Raleigh who is the secretary of the local chapter of the Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations. "We feel we can be of influence in lots of things that affect our lives."

Unlike the Muslim community in California's Silicon Valley, which is made up almost entirely of professionals, the Triangle Muslim community is more diverse. While the majority work as engineers and computer programmers, there are a growing number of business- and working-class Muslims. Many drive cabs; others run convenience stores and sandwich shops.

During the monthlong fast of Ramadan, at least seven people in Raleigh's homeless shelter converted to Islam. The Muslim community at Shaw University now wants to buy a house for community members who need a temporary place to stay, Bagby said.

Muslims have formed a strong community here. They care for one another and lend a helping hand, said Ikramuddin Aukhil, the former chairman of the Raleigh Islamic Association.

"When the cemetery needed to be cleaned, people of all ages came," said Aukhil. "When we needed to paint the mosque or do landscaping, people lined up."

At no time is community consciousness higher than during the month of Ramadan, when Muslims are especially mindful of those less fortunate. The purpose of the monthlong dawn-to-dusk fast is to come closer to God, develop self-restraint and remember the needy.

Ramadan is the holiest month of the Islamic lunar year - the month when the Prophet Mohammed received his first revelation from the Angel Gabriel back in the 7th century.

Today, on Eid ul-Fitr, the Abid family of Raleigh will recite a prayer at dawn, eat dates, shower and dress in their very best clothes. They will then head to the mosque for morning prayers.

On Saturday, Zerqa Abid and her neighbors will host an open house. Her apartment complex, The Palms, off Lake Boone Trail, has become a kind of Muslim enclave, home to some 40 to 50 families.

This year, the community decided to rent the clubhouse from noon to 3 p.m., to introduce their neighbors to Islam. Along with finger foods, they'll have exhibits about their faith and books and pamphlets on its beliefs.

"We want our non-Muslim neighbors to get a correct impression of us," said Abid, who edits a Muslim family magazine.

Abid loves the Muslim community here and trusts her neighbors to help rear her daughters, Qurrat-ulain, 9, and Khaula, 6.

"I didn't want to come here," Abid said. "I heard stories about the public schools, sexual education, peer pressure. But here the whole community is helping to raise the child in the right way. This is a blessing."

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