US Senator Convicted Over Comments To Arab Americans During Senate Hearing On Hate Crimes

CHICAGO — John Kennedy, a US senator from Louisiana, has been criticized for his hatred of Arabs and Muslims and for calling people names during a Senate hearing on hate crimes. Kennedy accused the American Muslim leader of a civil rights organization of supporting Hamas and Hezbollah.

Illinois Senator Dick Durbin convened a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing titled “A Threat to Justice Everywhere: Turning the Tide of Hate Crimes in America” in Washington on Tuesday to discuss the alarming rise in such crimes against Arabs, Muslims and other minority and religious groups.

He began by highlighting the case of Wadee Alfayoumi, a 6-year-old Palestinian-American boy who died on October 14, 2023, when he was stabbed 26 times by the landlord of the building where his family lived in Plainfield, Illinois. His mother, Hanaan Shahin, was seriously injured in the attack.

However, matters spiraled out of control when Senator Kennedy, a Republican member of the committee (who, incidentally, is not a member of Kennedy’s famous political dynasty), accused an Arab-American civil rights leader who testified at the hearing of being a supporter of Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran.

Maya M. Berry, executive director of the Arab American Institute, read a lengthy statement detailing the increase in hate crimes in the U.S. in recent years, not only against Arabs and Muslims, but also against Jewish Americans.

Citing the most recent official data, she said that in 27 states and the District of Columbia, “law enforcement agencies reported a total of 10,881 hate crimes in 2023, up from 10,171 in 2022 and 9,304 in 2021. This total includes 180 anti-Arab hate crimes, up from 104 in 2022 and 98 in 2021; and 2,073 anti-Jewish hate crimes, up from 1,311 in 2022 and 1,029 in 2021.”

Rather than comment on the numbers, Kennedy told Berry, “You should put your head in a bag,” after accusing her of being a Hamas supporter, a charge Berry immediately denied.

In response to Kennedy’s shocking personal attack, she said, “Hamas is a foreign terrorist organization that I do not support. But you, by asking the executive director of the Arab American Institute that question, are highlighting the problem of hate in our country.”

Kennedy, however, persisted, accusing Berry of also supporting Hezbollah and “Iran, which has a Jew-hatred.” He ignored her repeated answers that she supported none of them.

“I find this line of questioning extremely disappointing,” she said. “I do not support violence, whether it is Hezbollah or Hamas or any other entity associated with it. As a Muslim, I do not support Iran either.”
Kennedy ignored her protests and continued his accusations, telling Berry, “You should put your head in a bag.”

Arab and Muslim organizations in the US condemned Kennedy for his comments, including the Muslim Civic Coalition in Washington, which said: “The Congressional hearing exposed the state of the American political system and it is ugly, paid for by special interests and paved with prejudice and racism.

“Every resilient community is marginalized, often dehumanized, and regularly confronted with hateful rhetoric from our own government officials – African-American, Chinese, Indigenous, Latino, Arab, Muslim, Jewish.
“This congressional hearing on hate was a reminder that we have come far and we have far to go. This congressional hearing showed that we must be determined and yes, we will one day turn hate into inclusion.”

The hearing was not the first time Kennedy had been criticized for his comments about members of other ethnic groups, races or nationalities.

On May 17 last year, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (no relation), who ran as an independent candidate in this year’s U.S. presidential election but withdrew in August, accused him of racist remarks. He said: “United States Senator John Kennedy of Louisiana went on an irresponsible tirade insulting the people and government of Mexico. He declared that if it weren’t for us, Mexicans would be ‘eating canned cat food and living in a tent in the back of an Outback.’ He also suggested that the U.S. invade Mexico to take out the drug cartels.”

C. Arabic news