Mosques attacked and threatened following the recent violent wave of attacks in Paris have been labeled hate crimes and police investigating them as such.
Police were called in Austin, Texas on Monday to check on vandalism at the Islamic center for morning prayer, according to the Daily Mail. When they arrived, they found a Quran torn and covered in feces at the entrance to the mosque.
"A few individuals who did what they did, they don't represent 1.6 billion Muslims," said Faisal Naeem, a board member for the Islamic center. "They don't represent me for sure and the Austin Muslim community."
Naeem noted that nothing like this has ever happened since the center opened three-and-a-half-years ago.
In Florida, threats were reported on Friday, on the voice messaging system of the Islamic Society of Pinellas County in Pinellas Park and at the Islamic Society of St. Petersburg, according to USA Today. Martin Schnitzler of Seminole was arrested on Tuesday and charged with using a telephone to make violent threats, which is a felony with a possible 10-year federal prison sentence.
FBI at the Tampa, Fla. field office said all the calls came from the same person. Dave Couvertier, spokesman for the FBI Tampa field office, said the suspect was identified and questioned over the weekend, claiming no one was planning on acting on those threats.
Flowers and signs of support now sit outside the Islamic Center of Pflugerville after vandalism overnight pic.twitter.com/zGHaqLh7s2
— Shannon Murray (@ShannonM_KVUE) November 17, 2015
"I don't know what it takes for the FBI to consider a threat against American Muslims legitimate more than a person saying he wants to firebomb Muslim community centers," said Hassan Shibly of the Council on American-Islamic Relations in Florida.
Connecticut saw gunshots fired at the Baitul Aman mosque in Meriden on Friday, just hours after the attacks in Paris. Mosque leaders don't know the motive, said Salaam Bhatti, spokesman for the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community in New York.
"It's a teachable moment," Bhatti said. "As we do raise awareness of attacks in mosques, we will see mosques do not respond in violence. Islam teaches us to teach peace."
Nebraska's Omaha Islamic Center was spray painted with a crude drawing of the Eiffel Tower on an outside wall, according to Fox News. Nasir Husain, general secretary of the center, said Muslims in central American cities are afraid.
"We have men, women and children who come to the masjid to pray every day and since these Paris attacks, they have reduced the frequency of their visits to the masjid with fear for their lives," said Husain.
