I was angry as I stood behind President George W. Bush at a mosque on September 17, 2001. Only six days earlier, al-Qaida had attacked our nation. I had seen the smoke rising from the Pentagon as I traveled to the Capitol Hill headquarters of the Muslim civil rights organization I co-founded, the Council on American-Islamic Relations. I did not know then how many people had perished, but I knew countless families would be grieving that day. I was as sad as I was furious.
The attacks on Washington, D.C., and New York City ultimately killed more than 2,900 people, including eight young children on board the hijacked planes. They also sparked a wave of hate that would take the lives of more innocent people, including Balbir Singh Sodhi, a man of the Sikh faith, who was murdered on Sept. 15, 2001, in Arizona by a bigot who thought any person of color with a beard and a turban was to blame for al-Qaida’s crimes.
