Message of Tolerance in Little Tokyo

Vigil participants carry a banner as they walk from JACCC through Japanese Village Plaza to JANM. (MARIO G. REYES/Rafu Shimpo)

By J.K. YAMAMOTO, Rafu Staff Writer

“Vigilant Love” was the theme of a solidarity community vigil against violence and Islamophobia held Thursday in Little Tokyo.

A diverse coalition of community groups organized the event in response to rising anti-Muslim sentiment in the wake of terrorist attacks in Paris and San Bernardino.

The program began with a gathering of about 100 people in the plaza of the Japanese American Cultural and Community Center. Some started with Muslim prayers or incense offerings.

Introductory remarks were made by traci ishigo, program coordinator for JACL Pacific Southwest District, and Sahar Pirzada, youth development manager at CAIR (Council on American-Islamic Relations) Los Angeles, event coordinators representing the younger generations of their respective communities.

Shakeel Syed, executive director of the Islamic Shura Council of Southern California, offered a short prayer for peace: “Give us the resolve to stand together in the midst of trials and tribulations of today … Instill our hearts with love and empty our hearts and other hearts from harboring hate for other people … Keep our children and grandchildren safe in a time when everyone is looking over their shoulder with fear.”

In the JACCC Plaza, representatives of different faiths hold up a banner reading, “Standing Up for Unity and Peace and Against Islamophobia and Fear.” (MARIO G. REYES/Rafu Shimpo)

Gilda Velez of SEIU noted that of the 14 people killed in San Bernardino, 10 were members of her union, the majority of those wounded were also members, and many more were traumatized by the experience. She noted that at a vigil held on Monday, she met local Muslim leaders who are gathering resources and donations for the victims’ families and the survivors.

“We need to stand together with San Bernardino because San Bernardino could be any of our communities … The only way that we can defeat terrorism and hate is by the people being united,” Velez said.

She added that one of the victims, Shannon Johnson, commuted to San Bernardino from Koreatown every day and “died a hero” because he shielded a co-worker from the bullets.

Naiya Kim holds a candle during the vigil. (MIKEY HIRANO CULROSS/Rafu Shimpo)

Offering condolences to the families of those killed in recent attacks, Rinban Noriaki Ito of Higashi Honganji Buddhist Temple said, “We condemn violence that is ever growing, but we should also acknowledge that the cycle of ongoing violence and retaliation leads only to more violence and hatred.”

Noting that when the Earth is seen from space, no national boundaries are visible, Ito talked about the Buddhist concept of interconnectedness. “Even though we lead separate and distinct lives, even though there are differences in ethnicity, religion and culture, in reality we are all part of life with a capital ‘L.’ That includes not only humans but all living things. It is our attachment to our ego and our ignorance that prevents us from seeing that reality.

“The differences should in fact be enjoyed, but in reality so often those differences lead to fear and eventually to building up walls to divide rather than to unite. Today we are here to bring us together, to make us realize that we have a responsibility to care not only for our families and our inner circle of friends, but to care for all people and all living things … We show our love and our support to our friends in the Islamic community.”

Rabbi Aryeh Cohen, a professor at American Jewish University said, “We are commanded to reach out to each other, to stand strongly together and to say we do not build the world in the image of God by denigrating other people. The beautiful mosaic of God’s people cannot be contained within the parameters of one liturgical tradition, of one set of religious symbols … God is reflected in all the facets of belief which are expressed by all the religious traditions … We come here tonight to say that we will meet hatred with love.

Muslim participants pray in JACCC Plaza. (MIKEY HIRANO CULROSS/Rafu Shimpo)

“We will forgo the false security of scapegoating some Americans … We remember what happened when after Pearl Harbor we let our fear get the better of us and we forgot that Japanese Americans were our brothers and sisters and we sent them to concentration camps … While American troops were fighting Hitler’s Nazi ideology of anti-Semitic genocide in Europe, Father (Charles Edward) Coughlin was preaching anti-Semitism in America …

“We will not let this new wave of intolerance, bigotry, racism and Islamophobia stand … We must actively seek peace, we must know each other, visiting each other’s temples, mosques, churches, synagogues, gurdwaras … We must talk to each other. We must rid our communities of hatred.”

Rev. Mark Nakagawa of Centenary United Methodist Church said he has been working with Syed for years as members of a Christian-Muslim consultative group that meets every month. “It is out of that relationship that Shakeel and I have found commonalities and work together with all of you to bring peace and justice.”

Nakagawa read a statement from the National Japanese American United Methodist Caucus, which expressed support for “our Syrian refugee brothers and sisters as well as with refugee brothers and sisters from around the globe. The Japanese American experience is an experience that includes exile and homelessness. We know the damage that is caused by mass hysteria … As Christians, our heritage includes biblical stories of God’s people being an exiled people from the time of Moses in the Old Testament to the time of Jesus and the Apostle Paul in the New Testament …

“We call all people, especially in this country, to extend hospitality to refugees from all nations who seek to come upon our shores. With the exception of native peoples, all of us descend from people who were once strangers from another land but now citizens and residents of this land. In the plight of the Syrian refugees we see our stories in their unfolding saga taking place right before our very eyes. We are called to do no less than to welcome them in the spirit of hospitality and love which defines this season.”

Jyotswaroop Kaur, education director of the Sikh American Legal Defense and Education Fund, expressed condolences to those affected by the San Bernardino shootings and offered a Sikh children’s prayer that promises “the presence of the divine love all around you and yours.”

“We all have a responsibility to speak up when something isn’t fair,” said Muffy Sunde, a member of the Freedom Socialist Party, who attended the event. “This is completely wrong. We should open our borders to any refugees of war.” In reference to the ongoing civil war in Syria, she added, “The U.S. created this problem, so they can pay to resolve the problem.”

Outside the Japanese American National Museum, Dr. Greg Kimura, JANM president and CEO, addresses the gathering. (MARIO G. REYES/Rafu Shimpo)

Participants went on a solidarity walk through Japanese Village Plaza to the Japanese American National Museum, carrying a banner and singing “We Shall Overcome,” accompanied on guitar by Nancy Gohata and Phil Shigekuni. Syed urged everyone to hold hands with a stranger and “make a new friend this evening.”

Outside JANM, the number of participants swelled to about 350. They were welcomed by the museum’s president and CEO, Greg Kimura, who said, “It is so gratifying to see so many people who have come out tonight … as a community of many, many faiths and people of every stripe, every color, every background to gather together in unity to resist the temptation that happens in times of national crisis for people to turn on the most vulnerable in their community.”

He pointed out that the rally was being held in front of the former Nishi Hongwanji building, “where Japanese Americans from Los Angeles were lined up and put on buses and taken away for the duration of the war, first to the horse stalls of Santa Anita Race Track and then behind the barbed wire of concentration camps further east … We truly are standing on holy ground for Japanese Americans …

“We memorialize those terrible events … by acknowledging the suffering that they endured … to honor them by making sure that similar mass injustices based on race, color, religion, ethnic background never ever happen again.”

Citing recent “anti-Islamic, anti-Syrian, anti-refugee, anti-immigrant rhetoric” from public figures, Kimura said the purpose of the rally was to uphold “values that we hold deeply as Americans, standing against discrimination, standing against prejudice, standing for equal justice under law, standing for human rights and human dignity.”

At the conclusion of the program, attendees formed a giant peace sign. (MARIO G. REYES/Rafu Shimpo)

Kathy Masaoka of Nikkei for Civil Rights and Redress said in a solidarity statement, “We came together 14 year ago in this same space after 9/11 when our world completely changed. Some of you may have been there that night as well. Although we have not stopped the war or Islamophobia, we are not the same community that stood here 14 years ago.

“After 9/11, we built a relationship of trust and friendship with the American Muslim community here in Los Angeles, working with the Southern California Shura Council, the Muslim Public Affairs Council and the Council on American Islamic Relations. Over the past almost 15 years, we held workshops together, went to Manzanar Pilgrimages, broke bread at Ramadan ‘Break the Fast’ events, spoke at each other’s programs like the Day of Remembrance, and created a program called Bridging Communities to help our young people get to know each other’s history, values and communities better.

“In the process, we have learned about Islam and know that it does not support violence or hate, but rather peace and compassion. Time and again, we witnessed the questioning of the American Muslim community’s loyalty just as the Japanese Americans’ was in question. They too have had to speak out each time there has been a terrorist attack as if they are to blame. They are not.

“We joined them at the Federal Building when the Immigration and Naturalization Service (ICE today) conducted special registration of mainly men from Muslim countries, we joined them in protesting any monitoring of their communities by the LAPD, and we join them today in speaking out against the hysteria and religious intolerance that will blame American Muslims, Sikhs, South Asians or Arab Americans for these attacks.

“We believe that building understanding and friendship is not only American but the only way to overcome the hate and violence of others. We are building off of our religious values, our cultural values and the values we learned through the struggle for redress and standing up for civil liberties. Your presence here tonight is a testament to those values.”

In addition to ishigo and Pirzada, other speakers included Haroon Manjlai, public affairs coordinator for CAIR-LA; Salam Al-Marayati, executive director of the Muslim Public Affairs Council; traci kato-kiriyama, director and co-founder of Tuesday Night Project; Sean Miura, producer and lead curator of Tuesday Night Café; and Wilbur Sato, who was interned at Manzanar.

The vigil concluded with participants forming a giant peace sign. The timing was impeccable as rain began to fall shortly thereafter.