(Photo by Zainab Iqbal via Bklyner)
Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams joined members of the Arab community in celebrating their cultural heritage, the latest event in his “Embrace Your Hyphen” campaign to highlight the borough’s diversity, reports Zainab Iqbal in Bklyner.
Seven Arab Americans were honored for their contributions including attorney Tahanie A. Aboushi, a New York Civil Liberties Union board member who helped those detained at JFK after President Trump’s “Muslim ban” first went into effect in late January. Also recognized was NYPD detective Ahmed Nasser who started the Muslim Officers Society, “to pave the way for the approximately 1,500 Muslim officers in the NYPD.”
Adams spoke about the current atmosphere experienced by Arab Americans and other communities.
“We don’t realize we’re boiling away the American Dream and the American experience. We must have an internal thermostat that does not allow one degree of anti-any lifestyle in this country.”
“We say it’s just one incident, it’s just one swastika, it’s just one desecration of a mosque, it’s just one attack of a woman that wears a hijab, it’s just one statement… it’s just one person. It’s not one incident,” Adams said. “It’s the slow increase of the heat that will take away what makes this country great.”
His remarks stemmed from a comparison he drew between a frog in boiling water and “where we are as Americans.” Read what he said, as well as more on the honorees, at Bklyner.