On Sept. 29 at 5:31 p.m. a fire was reported in the basement entrance of the Alhikma Islamic Center on 32nd Street in south Minneapolis. Firefighters extinguished the fire, in which the kindling was made up of clothes and trash, before it was able to spread further inside the building. The inside of the mosque was left largely undamaged and no one was injured. The Minneapolis Fire Department concluded the fire was an accident, writes MPR News.
Muslim leaders are calling for further investigation. “Neither police nor firefighters interviewed anyone on the scene or asked to view surveillance footage of a person leaving the entrance before flames erupted,” shares Jaylani Hussein, the executive director of the Minnesota chapter of the Council of American-Islamic Relations, with MPR News.
Abdririzak Kaynan, the mosque’s imam, shares with The Sahan Journal that a day care, which is located in the basement of the mosque, serves around 50 children. When he asked the police to investigate the fire as a hate crime, he said the police took it “lightly.” Ahmed Anshur, who is with the Islamic Association of North America, highlighted another fire at Dar Al-Farooq Islamic Center in Bloomington. The Sahan Journal was told that after prayers on Friday, Sept. 5, a fire broke out after an unidentified male was observed walking near the shed that erupted in flames…