Adam Gadahn, Muhammad Ali, Malcolm X

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Adam Gadahn, Muhammad Ali, Malcolm X
Why do some Muslim converts change their whole names and others only part?
By Nora Caplan-Bricker

Posted Tuesday, June 29, 2010, at 12:36 PM ET

Al-Qaida spokesman Adam Yahiye Gadahn released a video last Sunday in which he called President Obama a "treacherous, bloodthirsty, and narrow-minded American war president" of a "declining and besieged empire." Numerous reports suggest that Gadahn was born with the name Adam Pearlman, in California. Why do some converts to Islam change part of their name, but not the whole thing?

It varies. Gadahn, in fact, did not alter his name on conversion. His father, Philip Pearlman, changed the family name to Gadahn after his own religious epiphany in the mid-1970s—several years before Adam was born. Adam converted to Islam in 1995 and moved to Pakistan to join al-Qaida shortly thereafter. Gadahn has also gone by a number of aliases, most commonly Azzam al-Amriki (which means "Azzam the American"). The adoption of pseudonyms is common practice among jihadists—even those who were born in Muslim countries and have their own Arabic names will make up new names when they enter terrorist circles. These often refer to their place of origin. Omar Hammami, a Somali terrorist who was born in Alabama, calls himself "Abu Mansoor Al-Amriki."

Like the motivations to convert in the first place, the reasons to change or keep one's name vary from person to person. That said, the majority of Muslims who enter the faith choose to alter their names to mark the beginning of a new chapter in their lives. Experts on American Muslims suspect that converts to Islam are more likely to adopt new names than those who switch to other religions, and to make use of their new names in day-to-day life rather than assuming them purely for symbolic reasons. It's not clear why that might be the case, although the adoption of Islamic beliefs and traditions may reflect a more substantial departure from mainstream American culture than, say, converting to Judaism or Christianity.

Some Muslim converts go so far as to take an entirely new name, like Muhammad Ali (formerly Cassius Clay) and Yusuf Islam (formerly Steven Georgiou, via Cat Stevens). But most choose instead to add a new name informally, for use in particular contexts—at the mosque or among Muslim friends, for example. Minnesota Congressman Keith Ellison, who converted to Islam as a teenager, has said in interviews that he goes by Keith Muhammad in his Muslim community. Some converts cite social as well as religious reasons for taking an Arabic name: They want to blend in with friends of Middle Eastern descent at their mosque.

There's nothing in the Quran to suggest that converts to Islam must change their names at all. In fact, more than a few scholars and religious leaders believe that new Muslims should specifically avoid the practice. The Quran doesn't mention name changes, but it does elaborate on the importance of genealogy and personal and familial history. This has been viewed as an implicit prohibition against taking a new last name, since that would represent a severance from one's heritage. Modern-day converts can keep their last names to comply with the Quran while assuming a new first name to mark their personal transformation. It has become popular to search for an Arabic name with the same meaning as the name a person is leaving behind. For example, the English Claire might become the Arabic Munira, since both refer to something that is "bright or shining."

From the 1950s through the 1970s, many of the people who converted to Islam in the United States were African-Americans joining the Nation of Islam. Members of this sect often rejected their last names, but for reasons that had more to do with their heritage than their new Muslim faith. Whatever family names had been assigned to their ancestors by white slave-owners were replaced with the letter X. In his autobiography, Malcolm X wrote that the X was a variable, standing in for the original family name that slavery had erased from history.

The Explainer thanks Paul M. Barrett of Bloomberg Businessweek, Zareena Grewal of Yale University, and Marcia K. Hermansen of Loyola University Chicago.

Nora Caplan-Bricker is a Slate intern.

Article URL: http://www.slate.com/id/2258090/

US citizen stuck in limbo in Egypt because he is on US no-fly list

By PAUL SCHEMM | Jun 16, 2010

CAIRO – A Virginia man said Wednesday he has been stuck in limbo in Egypt for the last six weeks, living in a cheap hotel and surviving on fast food after his name was placed on a U.S. no-fly list because of a trip to Yemen.

Yahya Wehelie, a 26-year-old Muslim who was born in Fairfax, Virginia to Somali parents, said he spent 18 months studying in Yemen and left in early May. The U.S. has been scrutinizing citizens who study in Yemen more closely since the man who tried to blow up a U.S.-bound airliner on Christmas was linked to an al-Qaida offshoot in Yemen.

Wehelie was returning to the U.S. with his brother Yusuf via Egypt on May 5 when Egyptian authorities stopped him from boarding his flight to New York. They told him the FBI wanted to speak with him.

He said he was then told by FBI agents in Egypt that his name was on a no-fly list because of people he met in Yemen and he could not board a U.S. airline or enter American airspace. His passport was canceled and a new one issued only for travel to the United States, which expires on Sept. 12. He does not have Somali citizenship.

Wehelie said his brother Yusuf was allowed to return home, but only after he was detained for three days by Egyptian police on suspicion of carrying weapon. He said his brother was shackled to a jail wall and interrogated by a man who claimed to work for the CIA. He was then dumped in the street outside the prison when he feigned illness.

Wehelie said he had no dealings with a terrorist organization while in Yemen and does not see himself as a particularly observant Muslim. He said he was studying information technology at the Lebanese International University in the capital San'a and only visited a mosque a handful of times. He said he had also studied a little Arabic.

"It's amazing how the U.S. government can do something like this," he told The Associated Press from his ramshackle hotel in downtown Cairo.

"I'm cool with all their fighting terrorism and all that, I'm cool with that. I like that, more power to them," he said in American-accented English, wearing baggy basketball shorts and a long white T-shirt.

"My home is America and I don't know why I can't go back there," he said, adding that he even suggested to the FBI to "put me ... in an airplane with a bunch of U.S. marshals or whatever, in handcuffs. Just get me back home."

While in Yemen, Wehelie married a Somali woman whose family had close ties to his own. She remains in Yemen and was to have joined him when he returned home.

His family said Wehelie was never physically abused but subjected to enormous psychological pressure and denied access to an American lawyer his family hired for him.

When he asked the FBI agents how he could return to the U.S., he said one made a reference to how "Columbus sailed the ocean blue," possibly suggesting he take a sea route.

FBI spokesman Paul Bresson said the bureau does not comment on whether a particular person is on a watch list. While Bresson did not discuss the FBI's interest in Wehelie, he did note several recent high-profile terror plots, including an attempted car bombing and the failed Christmas Day jetliner bombing, as reminders of the need to remain vigilant.

Egyptian authorities confirmed there is a Somali-American stranded in Cairo waiting for his name to be lifted from a U.S. no-fly list.

Wehelie said the U.S. embassy is for now paying the $16 a night for his hotel, which he will one day have to reimburse, and gives him coupons to eat at U.S. fast food chains.

"I can't even eat at Hardees anymore. I ate everything they had there for like two weeks straight," he said. "Now I can't even walk in there."

He said he was eating pizza now and that his fast food diet has left him feeling unhealthy.

In a news conference Wednesday in Washington by a Muslim civil rights group, his mother Shamsa Noor said she sent her sons to Yemen to learn Arabic and get some direction in their lives and now she feels guilty for that decision.

"It is very frustrating. I feel so guilty because I'm the one who sent them there," Noor said.

The family said Yemen was a natural choice because education was relatively inexpensive and many Somali natives live there.

Wehelie's brother Yusuf also spoke at the news conference.

"What happened to me was wrong and I want to make sure it does not happen to any American citizens," he said.

Officials at the Council on American-Islamic Relations, which sponsored the news conference, said they are aware of at least two other cases where American citizens who are Muslims are similarly denied return to the United States.

CAIR's executive director, Nihad Awad, said the organization understands the need to question travelers and the need to protect national security. But he said the no-fly list is being used as a weapon to punish American Muslims without providing due process.

"We are very concerned that this apparent targeting of American Muslims sends a very wrong message to American Muslims that they are second-class citizens," Awad said.

Wehelie said he is having trouble sleeping and spends his days at Internet cafes and watching the World Cup in the hotel's threadbare common room.

Wehelie has no intention of returning to Yemen and cannot imagine living in another country.

"My foundation is in America," he said.

Walking through Cairo's teeming streets, Wehelie winced as he passed a fast food outlet.

"I just want a home-cooked meal, man. I miss my mom's cooking."

SOURCE: http://www.eturbonews.com/16758/us-citizen-stuck-limbo-egypt-because-he-us-no-fly-list

Mich. town serves up blend of Mideast and Midwest

By JEFF KAROUB, Associated Press Writer Jeff Karoub, Associated Press Writer – Tue Jun 8, 11:01 am ET

DEARBORN, Mich. – With a massive mosque, minarets and scores of Arabic-signed stores and restaurants, parts of this city look like the Middle East.

But Dearborn is a lot closer than Beirut, Damascus or Cairo. And while this Detroit suburb may be better known as the hometown of Ford Motor Co., it's also where the Mideast meets the Midwest.

A third of the city's 100,000 residents trace their roots to the Arab world. Originally these immigrants came here to work in booming auto factories. Today they have created corridors of culture and commerce unlike anywhere else.

Warren Avenue is the epicenter of Arabic life in Dearborn. It's grown over the past few decades from a few Arab-owned establishments to a road bustling with Middle Eastern restaurants, markets, boutiques and bakeries.

One of the most prominent and popular is Shatila Food Products, whose website boasts of "sweets of the Middle East from the heart of the Midwest." The bakery, founded in 1979, ships its desserts nationwide. Its distinctive, round retail store draws customers from across the state and beyond.

Amal Shatila, the bakery manager and sister of owner Riad Shatila, came from Lebanon in 1989 and joined her brother in the business.

"I came, running away from war," she said. "I came to visit and stay away for a while — then I ended up staying for good."

Shatila has expanded as other Middle East businesses have built up around it.

"The community is growing up — everyone has their own business," she said.

Some earlier immigrants also were entrepreneurs, but many opted to work in the many local auto plants. That included Dearborn's sprawling Rouge complex, used for manufacturing since 1917.

As those jobs dwindled, more immigrants opened their own businesses with the help of extended family. Many of those mom-and-pop shops are represented at the city's annual Arab International Festival, a three-day event along 14 blocks on Warren Avenue, scheduled for June 18-20 this year. It typically draws about 300,000 people and features food, merchandise booths, entertainment and carnival rides.

It's your typical fair in many respects, but one where you can smell the sizzling kafta, see women in traditional hijabs, or head scarves, and hear the sounds of Arab and Arab-American musicians.

Still, automaking is inextricably linked to the community: Ford has employed Arabs across all positions, from lineworker to executive.

Visitors can get a firsthand look at the refurbished Rouge complex through public tours operated by The Henry Ford organization, which includes the nationally recognized Henry Ford Museum and Greenfield Village and receives more than 1 million visitors annually.

Another must-see museum on the Mideast in the Midwest tour is the Arab American National Museum in Dearborn. It's the first national institution of its kind and documents the collective Arab-American story through interactive exhibits and other programs. The domed structure featuring a traditional Arab fountain opened five years ago and drew 56,000 visitors last year.

"People don't understand to what extent world cultures feed and learn from each other," said Anan Ameri, director of the museum. "America is a country of immigrants. It has been shaped by these immigrants and the immigrants have been shaped by living in America."

Even Dearborn's local Walmart has hundreds of food and retail staples geared toward Arab-American shoppers, such as a date-filled, whole wheat cookie called Mamool and an assortment of grape leaves, olives and chickpeas.

Ameri said it was natural to house the museum in the Detroit area, which has one of the nation's largest Arabic populations, and particularly Dearborn, where the community is among the most concentrated.

She said that while immigrants from other countries like Greece, Ireland, Italy and Poland came in large numbers at one time and then declined, "the immigration from the Arab world never stopped. ... The Arab-Americans have been coming to this country continuously."

She added: "While maybe people become integrated and assimilated in a larger society, there's always this infusion of immigrant blood that keeps that culture alive."

Although Michigan recently banned smoking in restaurants and bars, visitors can still find specialty shops that sell the traditional Middle Eastern hookah, an Arabic water pipe filled with flavored tobacco.

For a twist on that Mideast-meets-Midwest vibe, check out Famous Hamburger in Dearborn.

At first glance, it's an American hamburger joint. But while Western-style burgers are the main course, hummus, pita wraps, and fattoush and tabbouleh salads are on the menu along with nachos, wings and fries. And everything is halal, meaning the meat and other items have been prepared according to Islamic dietary rules.

The restaurant also has a unique cross-cultural history. It started with Hussein Hider, who came to the U.S. in 1914 from Lebanon, then decided his homeland needed a real burger joint. Inspired by a certain Midwest chain, the elder Hider returned to Lebanon and opened Little White Castle near Beirut in 1969.

A year later, seeking a safer location as the civil war in Lebanon intensified, Hussein and his son Feisal moved the restaurant to downtown Beirut and renamed it Famous Hamburger.

In the late 1980s, Feisal moved to the U.S., opened restaurants in two small locations, then in 2003 opened the current eatery on Schaefer Avenue in the largely Arabic east side of Dearborn. His son Mounir Hider, 32, an automotive engineer, is now part of the third generation to work in the family business.

"It's a burger that went to the Middle East and came back with a little more info," said Mounir. "We can assimilate and at the same time we can offer something. We can select the best of both worlds."

___

If You Go...

AMERICAN ARAB CHAMBER OF COMMERCE: 12740 W. Warren Ave. Suite 101; http://www.americanarab.com/ or 313-945-1700. Organizes Arab International Festival, June 18-20, which draws 300,000 annually to the heart of city's Arab business district.

ARAB AMERICAN NATIONAL MUSEUM: 13624 Michigan Ave.; http://www.arabamericanmuseum.org/ or 313-582-2266. Free parking behind building.

FAMOUS HAMBURGER: 5808 Schaefer Road; http://www.famoushamburger.com/ or 313-945-0002. Main location. Free parking in front.

ROUGE FACTORY TOUR: http://www.thehenryford.org/rouge/index.aspx or 800-835-5237. Tours of the historic and refurbished Ford Motor Co. factory complex are operated by The Henry Ford organization, which includes The Henry Ford museum and Greenfield Village. Buses depart regularly from the museum, 20900 Oakwood Blvd., at the corner of Oakwood and Village Road.

SHATILA BAKERY: 14300 W. Warren Ave.; http://www.shatila.com/ or 313-582-1952. Free parking alongside bakery.

From: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap_travel/20100608/ap_tr_ge/us_travel_trip_mideast_in_the_midwest