New York - Two days after the San Bernardino attacks, a poll showed that majority of Americans view the Muslim community in the United States positively.
New York – Two days after the San Bernardino attacks, a poll showed that majority of Americans view the Muslim community in the United States positively.
Reuters has released the first poll on views of Muslim Americans after the mass shooting in Paris and San Bernardino.
The poll shows 51 percent of Americans view Muslims living in the United States the same as any other community.
Only 14.6 percent of those surveyed said they are generally fearful of Muslims.
Reuters quoted Amaney Jamal, a politics professor at Princeton as saying that it’s “healthy” to see the majority positively viewing Muslims, but cautioned about growing fears.
“If terrorism is designed to create a larger gap between Muslims and Westerners, unfortunately they’re succeeding,” Jamal said.
“The threat of terror is going to be fought by Muslims and non-Muslims together. You would like to see those gaps close so people are working together and not being fearful,” he added.
Since the Paris terror attacks, American Muslims have raised concerns about anti-Muslim behavior among the public, as well as local officials in many parts of the United States.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) said in a statement that the group received more reports about acts of “Islamophobic discrimination, intimidation, threats, and violence targeting American Muslims” in the week and a half after the terror attacks in Paris last month than they have since 9/11.
The CAIR statement that detailed the uptick in threats was released on Nov. 29, before Syed Rizwan Farook, an American citizen, and his Pakistan-born wife attacked a San Bernardino holiday party and fatally shot 14 people.
