Worshipers inside the Dar Al Farooq Islamic Center in Bloomington were participating in their morning prayer servicet 5:05am Saturday morning, about an hour before the sun would rise and a new day would begin, when the building began to shake around them. According to the FBI report, what appears to have been an IED (Improvised Explosive Device) caused explosive damage to the main office. Either the IED shattered the office window when it detonated, or that the window was shattered by another object before the bomb as thrown inside. The FBI is currently investigating, and the Federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives has joined the investigation as well.
Richard Thorton who is the Special Agent in Charge of the investigation said that investigators know it was an IED but now they must figure out the “who and why” (Star Tribune).
In the late afternoon of August 5th, the Minnesota chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-MN) offered a $10,000 reward for any information leading to the arrest and conviction of anyone responsible for the attack on the mosque. Amir Malik, the CAIR-MN Civil Rights Director had the following to say about the reward, “We hope a reward will help law enforcement authorities quickly apprehend the perpetrator of this act of violence targeting an American house of worship.”
CAIR National Executive Director Nihad Awad had the following to say about solving the crime: “The swift apprehension and punishment of the perpetrator will send a clear message that attacks on mosques, or on any other American houses of worship, will not be tolerated.” (CAIR Press Release)
Unfortunately, this isn’t the first time that CAIR-MN has had to call on the FBI to investigate a possible hate crime. On August 1st it was discovered that the Al Maghfirah Cemetery in Castle Rock had been vandalized: Nazi swastikas and messages like “Leave, you R dead,” and other profanities were spray painted across the cemetery. Walls, furniture, and other property at the cemetery were also damaged (twincities.com)
Minnesota is not the only state that has been experiencing these sorts of crimes directed at Muslims. CAIR has called for investigations in multiple states, as there have been dozens of other incidents targeting mosques in Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Kentucky, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Texas, Tennessee, and Virginia. This is an uptick compared to the period of January to March 2016, as CAIR had only reported 19 such incidents during the same time period.
CAIR has recently released a report showing anti-Muslim incidents were up 58% in 2016 as compared to 2015 (CAIR Press Release). A report from the United States Department of Justice does show an increase in hate crimes due to religious beliefs since 2007; in 2007 11.8 percent of hate crimes were due to a person’s religion. This percentage peaked at 23.1 percent in 2012 and has steadily decreased since. Religion being a reason for a hate crime was 16.7 percent in the year 2015, which was the last year there was data. In years between 2011 and 2015, the most common motivation for a hate crime was listed as religion.
