A city labeled “the capital of American jihad” by Wall Street Journal The situation in Gaza has become very divided, with residents refusing to vote for any of the candidates in the presidential elections.
Dearborn, a small city near Detroit, Michigan, is home to the largest Arab American community in the United States.
The mood among locals has changed significantly as the death toll in Gaza continues to rise, with little indication of a political solution in the near future.
Dearborn residents believe that US political leaders are playing a major role in the suffering caused by the ongoing conflict in the Middle East. Their apathy towards the upcoming elections is decreasing by the day.
Abu Bilal, owner of Oriental Fashion, a clothing store on Warren Avenue in Dearborn, demanded to know “where the humanity is” as he spoke of the killings of 90 Palestinian civilians with The Guardian.
A city labelled by the Wall Street Journal as the “capital of American jihad” has been fiercely divided by the war in Gaza, with residents refusing to vote in presidential elections.
A man getting a haircut at Al-Rehab Barber Shop on Maple Street in Dearborn said – in Arabic – that he doesn’t care who becomes president after the November election. It won’t make any difference to him…
Her hairdresser agreed, saying she didn’t vote in 2020 and doesn’t plan to this year.
Joe Biden won the key state in 2020 by just 154,000 votes, and the loss of political spirit could be detrimental to his ability to win the key state in November.
Voter turnout in Dearborn was 10 percent higher in 2020 than in the previous election in 2016; Biden also won 10 percent more votes than Hillary.
These statistics suggest that voters were enthusiastic in 2020, but word on the streets of Dearborn, according to The Guardian, is that attitudes this year couldn’t be more different.
During the February Democratic primary, 6,432 Dearborn voters chose “uncommitted” in protest of Biden’s support for Israel’s war.
Biden held a campaign rally at a school near Dearborn on Friday, but Arab Americans across the country have rejected the campaign’s attempt to win their votes.
Dearborn, a small city near Detroit, Michigan, is home to the largest Arab American community in the United States.
“The whole community was aware (that the administration had sent campaign officials to meet with the community), and I think that says a lot, that they see us as nothing more than votes and that it has become normalized for our people to be killed at home,” said Jenin Yaseen, an artist whose family is from a village outside Nablus in the occupied West Bank.
“Dearborn is made up of people from Yemen, Iraq, Lebanon and other places who have been directly affected by American imperialism,” he added.
Biden campaign members visited Dearborn in January and were once met with an empty room because Dearborn Mayor Abdullah Hammoud refused to meet with them.
Hammoud, along with two other Arab-American state representatives, rejected the campaign meeting because its purpose was to discuss the election and not the war.
The 33-year-old mayor was unimpressed by President Joe Biden’s “bizarre” comments about a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, which the president made while enjoying a scoop of ice cream with comedian Seth Meyers.
Hammoud criticized Biden in February, shortly before casting his vote for the “uncommitted” instead of his party’s leader at a Dearborn polling place.
“I think it’s strange that you’re eating ice cream in an ice cream parlour – that’s the moment you talk about a ceasefire,” she told DailMail.com when asked about the president’s latest comments.
Political commentator Steven Stalinsky called Dearborn the “jihad capital of America” in a Wall Street Journal op-ed.
Biden campaign members visited Dearborn in January and were once met with an empty room because Dearborn Mayor Abdullah Hammoud (pictured) refused to meet with them.
He then referred to Benjamin Netanyahu’s statements about having a plan to invade Rafah inside Gaza.
“I am not looking for words or words of encouragement. I am looking for actions. They want a lasting, permanent and fair ceasefire.
“We do not want to return to the status quo of occupation and apartheid, of bombing, of siege, of devastation and destruction for the Palestinian people. And that means establishing a just Palestinian state,” he said.
In April, Muslim protesters were heard chanting “death to America” and “death to Israel” during a demonstration in Dearborn.
Protesters gathered in the city to mark Quds Day in support of the Palestinian people and in opposition to Israel.
The protest came less than a week after seven aid workers from World Central Kitchen were killed in an Israeli airstrike in Gaza, sparking global outrage.
A video shared by the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) shows Tarek Bazzi, a local activist, delivering remarks at a podium as chants of “Death to America!” can be heard in the background.
“It’s not just Genocide Joe who has to go,” Bazzi said, referring to President Biden.
“It’s the whole system that has to go. Any system that allows such atrocities and such evil to happen, and supports it, does not deserve to exist on God’s Earth.”
Bazzi then turned his attention to Israel.
“So when these fools ask us whether Israel has a right to exist… the chant ‘death to Israel’ has become the most logical chant shouted around the world today,” he said.
Then the spectators repeated the chant.
Bazzi explained that the protests have become “so anti-American” because “it is the US government that provides the funding for all the atrocities.”