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The FBI says the man responsible for the New Year's Day attack in New Orleans pledged allegiance to the terrorist group, ISIS. Shamsud-Din Jabbar was a 42-year-old Army veteran from Houston. He died in an exchange of gunfire with police following the attack. The Islamic Society of Greater Houston tells NPR that Jabbar was not an official member at any of its 21 mosques in Houston. But as member station KERA's Stella Chavez reports, some Muslims in the city are worried about a backlash against their community.
BASEM HAMID: (Singing in Arabic).
STELLA CHAVEZ, BYLINE: Inside Medical Center Islamic society, men, women and children gathered for midday Friday prayers.
HAMID: (Singing in Arabic).
CHAVEZ: Basem Hamid, one of the imams at this mosque, dedicated a majority of his sermon to addressing the horrific attack.
HAMID: This act has no place in Islam and has no place amongst Muslims and is not accepted by any standard. There is no excuse, and there is no justification for it.
CHAVEZ: Hamid didn't just condemn the attack. He singled out what he believes is fueling a lot of hate and anger and misinformation, particularly online and on social media.
HAMID: This is how people get radicalized, by getting exposed to unreliable sources of Islam.
CHAVEZ: Hamid and other imams in Houston say they've been talking to each other about how to combat this problem. Houston has the largest and most diverse Muslim population in Texas, which includes immigrants, as well as Native-born U.S. citizens. Umme Kulsum is originally from India but has lived in Texas for a number of years. She's married and is raising four children. She follows the news closely and said she had two fears when she heard about the attack in New Orleans.
UMME KULSUM: The first fear in my mind was, I hope it's not someone from our community. That was the first fear. Then it's like, now, what will happen? What next? What will be the Islamophobic reactions we might face in our community?
CHAVEZ: Shariq Ghani is the executive director of the multi-faith organization in Houston.
SHARIQ GHANI: The clergy that I've spoken to aren't very concerned about retaliation or secondary attacks. What they're most concerned about is how this impacts us our neighborliness here in Houston, our social cohesion. Will it lead to a rise in Islamophobia or othering communities here in our city?
CHAVEZ: Some say this is an uncomfortable echo to what they felt more than two decades ago. Mohamed Salama is an IT worker who was at the Medical Center Islamic Society for Friday prayers.
MOHAMED SALAMA: I lived through September 11, and I have - to this day - have very vivid memory of both how sad it was, and then afterwards, how difficult it was to be a Muslim in the U.S. and how concerned I was about practicing - simply just going to mosque.
CHAVEZ: But at this mosque on this first Friday of 2025, congregates gathered for prayers, pretty much as usual. The men and women chatted as the children played outside.
For NPR News, I'm Stella Chavez in Houston. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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