Vigilantes in Oakland: In California, Muslim-owned liquor stores become a target

I’ve got your 40 ounces right here!

The issue of liquor stores in poor African-American neighborhoods such as those in Oakland, California has long been an issue of contention with urban activists. Seen by many as magnets for criminal behavior and contributing to alcohol abuse among the poor, liquor stores were one of the first targets in the 1992 Los Angeles riots. It gets even more complicated when you consider that 80% of Oakland’s 360 liquor stores are owned by Yemeni Muslim immigrants.

Aside from the obvious implications of Muslims selling alcohol (and in turn contributing a large share of the donations for several Bay Area mosques), this fact brings a religious dimension to a community conflict where Muslims can be found on both sides of the struggle. While a few Muslim community members (mainly African-Americans) have raised the issue of Muslims contributing to the decline of inner-city neighborhoods through their domination of the liquor store business, the war of words has never escalated into violence. For that, it took an offshoot Muslim group (well, make that an offshoot of an offshoot) to finally take matters – and several crowbars – into their own hands last week at two stores. “The suspects entered the store and questioned why a Muslim-owned store would sell alcoholic beverages when it is against the Muslim religion,” Oakland police said in a statement.

Then, in full view of video cameras, the store was vandalized until broken bottles of hard liquor littered the floor. A few days later, store clerk Abdel Hamdan was kidnapped and thrown in a trunk while others lit the store on fire. Spokespeople from the Nation of Islam joined the Yemeni American Grocers Association to condemn the attacks. “That is not our way,” said Nation of Islam spokesperson Tony Mohammed. “Our job is to kill the appetite (for alcohol) in the black community.” After denying any knowledge of the attacks, a spokesman for the splinter Black Muslim sect that runs a bakery (their slogan: “A Taste of the Hereafter”) and other small businesses in North Oakland (and apparently thinks the Nation of Islam is too soft) turned himself in to authorities.

Yusuf Bey IV – whose father founded the sect and died last year amid charges of corruption and rape – turned himself in along with an accomplice to face charges of robbery, vandalism, and making terrorist threats. While this particular string of attacks may have been solved, the larger issue of alcohol in poor neighborhoods – and Muslim complicity in its proliferation – has yet to be addressed by the larger immigrant Muslim community in a more productive manner. Barring that, more violence may be on the way.

Shahed Amanullah is editor-in-chief of altmuslim.com