Always the victim.
Via WISTV:
Hawaii has 5,000 or so Muslims- less than 1 percent of the state’s population- who are finding themselves thrust into an international spotlight after the state’s top lawyer launched a challenge to President Donald Trump’s revised travel ban, saying it contradicts the islands’ welcoming culture that values diversity.
Named as a plaintiff in the federal lawsuit fighting the ban is Ismail Elshikh, the imam of the island of Oahu’s only mosque – a converted plantation-style house in a hilly Honolulu neighborhood a few miles from Waikiki beach where Muslims who gather in the prayer room know they’re facing Mecca when the view of iconic Diamond Head is at their backs.
Elshikh’s mother-in-law is a Syrian living in Syria who won’t be able to visit her relatives in Hawaii because of the ban, and that will deprive the rights of Elshikh, his wife and their children as U.S. citizens, said Hawaii Attorney General Doug Chin.
It was difficult for the shy and reserved Elshikh to make the decision to join the lawsuit and he is not speaking publicly because of legal reasons and fears for his security in a state that has seen a rise in threats to Muslims that started just before Trump was elected, said Hakim Ouansafi, who is the president of the Muslim Association of Hawaii.
“It took some thinking. It took some convincing,” Ouansafi said.
Chin said the small size of Hawaii’s Muslim community had no bearing on his decision to challenge the travel ban because “they are part of our community. They should not be labeled presumptively as terrorists.”[…]
Pennsylvania-born Esma Arslan remembers being nervous about wearing her headscarf on her first day of seventh grade at Iolani, a prestigious Honolulu private school. “I got over those fears very quickly,” said Arslan, now 21, whose parents are from Turkey. “Personally for me, it’s always been a positive experience here.”