After a masked suspect threw a chunk of concrete through the door of St. Paul’s As Sunnah Islamic Center last May, leaders hired a security guard and upgraded the building’s security system.
“The incident was a wake-up call for us,” said Imam Abdullahi Nur.
The May 12 vandalism caused an estimated $10,000 in damage—in addition to the cost of the security upgrades.
More than eight months later, “the community is still in shock,” Imam Abdullahi said.
The mosque received a boost in its security efforts, when it learned last fall that it had received a $150,000 grant from the Federal Emergency Management Agency for nonprofit organizations “at high risk of a terrorist attack.”
During a four-week period last April and May, four mosques were targeted by arson and vandalism, including Masjid Omar Islamic Center and Masjid Al Rahma in Minneapolis, and As Sunnah and the Oromo American Tawhid Islamic Center in St. Paul.
As many as 11 Minnesota mosques have been damaged or defaced in the last 18 months, part of an unprecedented wave of attacks, said Mohamed Ibrahim, deputy director of the Minnesota chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-MN).