People gathered at the Arafa Islamic Center on Monday to discuss Donald J. Trump's statements advocating that Muslims be barred from entering the United

Donald, come home.

That was the message on Monday night in Queens, as two dozen men finished their prayers in a basement mosque beneath a discount store on Hillside Avenue in Jamaica, Queens, just a block away from where Donald J. Trump grew up.

They were saddened, frightened and, frankly, dumbfounded by Mr. Trump’s latest declaration — that in reaction to the San Bernardino killings last week he wanted to ban all Muslims from entering the country until the nation’s leaders can “figure out what is going on and why.”

And they had a request: “People always ask, where are the moderate Muslims?” Ali Najmi, 31, a defense lawyer and a co-founder of the Muslim Democratic Club of New York, said during a discussion after prayers at the Arafa Islamic Center. “We’re right here; we’re right in Donald Trump’s neighborhood. He needs to come back home.”


Mr. Trump said on Monday that he wanted to ban all Muslims from entering the country until the nation’s leaders can “figure out what is going on and why.”

For all his Manhattan pomp, Mr. Trump is a son of Queens. His father, Fred C. Trump, was the son of German immigrants, and he began his career as a developer with a house in Woodhaven. Donald Trump grew up in a stately mansion with columns on Midland Parkway, in the wealthy enclave of Jamaica Estates that Fred Trump partially built. Although he moved on from the borough, he frequently mentioned his experiences of taking the F train on Hillside Avenue into Manhattan, and how Queens gave him perspective on the city’s diversity.

Now, not far from Mr. Trump’s childhood street, a dozen mosques are spread out along Hillside Avenue — there are 93 in Queens, one third of the city’s total, according to Tony Carnes, the editor of “A Journey Through N.Y.C. Religions,” which collects data on faiths. In all, Mr. Carnes said, there are 770,000 Muslims in New York City.

Many of them make their homes in Queens. There are close to 64,000 Pakistani and Bangladeshi immigrants in the borough, according to the American Community Survey from 2014; many of them are Muslim. The Muslim community also includes Afghans, Bosnians, Albanians and more. Halal meat shops and barbecue restaurants in neighborhoods like Jamaica, Jackson Heights and Astoria are bustling.
"who is a Muslim? You will see Muslims from every race here,” said Mohammed Tohin, 47, at the Arafa Islamic Center. Mr. Tohin works in real estate and is a Community Board 8 member. “You’ll see white, black, Asian-American. So who is he pointing at — that’s the question I’m asking. Is it me? Is it someone white? Is it the brother born here?”


Mohammed Rana, 39, an assistant imam at the Islamic Center of Jackson Heights. “If people go and do something bad, we are very sad," he said. "Muslims never accept these kinds of things.”

Across the borough’s neighborhoods, Muslims responded to Mr. Trump’s comments with hurt and surprise. “I love this country, 100 percent,” said Mohammed Rana, 39, an assistant imam at the Islamic Center of Jackson Heights, who is from Bangladesh. When he heard people blaming Muslims for violence, especially after the attacks in Paris and California, he said: “If people go and do something bad, we are very sad. Muslims never accept these kinds of things.”

If Mr. Trump were to have attended the post-prayer discussion Monday, he would have heard Yusuf Abdul Wadud speak in a thick New York accent. Mr. Wadud, 59, was born in the United States and raised Catholic. He converted to Islam more than 30 years ago.

“Donald Trump is preaching hatred, fear and separation,” Mr. Wadud said. “ISIS is hatred. Islam is love. No Muslim would ever pick up a gun and shoot people. Donald Trump is using this because his crowd wants to hear this. Donald Trump is playing right into the hand of ISIS.”

Shaukat Choudhury, 70, who, for 46 years, has lived in an apartment on the same street, Midland Parkway, as Mr. Trump’s childhood home, said he that at first could not take the remarks seriously. “I very much laughed out loud,” he said. “I said, ‘Here goes Trump – again!’”


Yusuf Abdul Wadud at the Arafa Islamic Center on Monday. “Donald Trump is preaching hatred, fear and separation,” he said.


But Mr. Najmi was personally offended because he, too, was born and raised in Queens. His parents were Muslim immigrants from Pakistan, and this fall, he lost his bid to become the first person of South Asian ancestry to be elected to the City Council. He graduated from Oberlin College and from the law school of the City University of New York, and continues to be a community organizer. On Twitter on Monday, he invited Mr. Trump back for some halal kebabs and a cup of chai tea in the old neighborhood.

“I’m outraged that anyone born and raised in Queens would say something like that,” said Mr. Najmi, who grew up in Glen Oaks, Queens. “Especially since Queens County is home to so many immigrants — it’s the symbol of immigrants in America.”

Alhaz Mowlana A. Kalam spoke in front of Kabab King, a popular restaurant on Diversity Plaza, a pedestrian walk in Jackson Heights. When told of Mr. Trump’s comments, he shook his head. “It’s crazy, it’s crazy,” he said. And he had another thought for Mr. Trump. “Look at the all the mosques in this area,” he said. “We are so many that we are praying on the street. He’s not going to be president if he says something like this

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2015/12/09/nyregion/among-muslims-in-donald-trumps-old-queens-neighborhood-shock-and-dismay.html?_r=

Muslims have no right to question how Americans govern their country. There is death sentence for any Muslim to Christian apostates in Islamic countries. Christians are being killed and persecuted in Muslim countries worldwide. its high time Christians react.

There is no church in Saudi Arabia, but there are mosques all over Christian countries. And they have the nerve to say we hate them. do they know what hate means??

Islam is a threat to world peace. Other countries should follow suite. #NoToIslam.

PS: DONT QUOTE ME.

Dis guy just loose day by day, in another way round is for security purpose sha! But he too talk abeg.

I think Donald Trump is the force the Muslims in America have been waiting for to do some introspection and weed out the terrorist cells in their midst.

I am no fan of political correctness. For nations like America and the West, a Muslim immigrant today is a potential cultural trouble tomorrow, if it doesn't escalate into terrorism.

I am an advocate of behaving like the Romans when in Rome.

Free speech must never be silenced to cater for religious sympathies. Freedom for all must be enforced in a republic irrespective of whatever archaic cultural heritages an immigrant imports into his new society.

I have no sympathies for America, France, UK or Germany. Their injuries are self inflicted and political correctness would be the very cause of the chaos they're trying to avoid.

Do I think the religion inspired violence in those countries would abate? No! It has only started, and every Muslim immigrant is a potential sleeper cell to be activated from the outside by the right circumstances.

They will never be patriotic. This is the lesson moderates in such countries only learn at a funeral.

As for Muslim converts that are citizens with national heritage, their patriotism has not been questioned by their actions yet, but immigrants are nothing but Greek gifts.

Theo van Gogh was killed by a Moroccan Dutch on the streets of Amsterdam. He thought he was safe in his own country where freedom was an abundant right. Yet a fatwa issued in faraway Iran was enough to activate a supposed fellow Dutch country man to carry out his religious obligation.
As he rode his bicycle on the peaceful streets to his office, Theo van Gogh forgot that not all Dutch were truly Dutch, and not all men have a heritage of freedom.