MJF Newsroom

This community memorandum offers input from organizations working with impacted BAMEMSA and SWANA communities on key initial recommendations, as a starting point, for federal government agencies in implementing a comprehensive White House Islamophobia strategy. This memorandum also offers concerns with the existing process for developing the White House Islamophobia strategy, provides a community-rooted framework of structural and gendered Islamophobia and contains key agency recommendations. While these recommendations are wide-ranging, we note that they are not exhaustive. This community memorandum was developed by Muslims for Just Futures with consultation from our working-class community members and Palestine Legal, Afghans for a Better Tomorrow, HEART, DREAM of Detroit, Muslim Women For, American Muslim Bar Association (AMBA), Center for Constitutional Rights, and Savage Daughters. Overall, 95 community-based organizations, national networks, and coalitions working across communities have endorsed the recommendations and joined this memorandum

According to disturbing reporting from Wired, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Turner pointed to ceasefire protesters outside Majority Leader Chuck Schumer's house as a basis for keeping open the backdoor search loophole within Section 702 of FISA; (slides from his presentation). Instead of reining in intelligence agencies for rampant, warrantless spying on people nationwide, Chairman Turner is falsely scapegoating protestors to push through 702 reauthorization, undermine reform, and further entrench mass surveillance.

We strongly reject the use of anti-Palestinian, anti-Arab, and anti-Muslim racism by congressional members to justify keeping the backdoor-search loophole in Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). We reject the continued use of mass surveillance, which utilizes racist and Islamophobic logics against all of our collective communities.

Chicago becomes the largest city in the U.S. to endorse a ceasefire in Gaza after historic City Council Vote

Today, Chicago became the largest city to endorse a ceasefire, supported by the work of a multi-racial, multi-faith coalition of 165 community organizations and over 100 Chicago City Council staffers. This vote comes 116 days after the start of Israel’s most recent onslaught in Gaza. Since October 7, 2023, Israel has killed more than 26,400 Palestinians, mainly women and children, and injured over 64,400. The vast majority of Palestinians in Gaza are displaced and face starvation and disease as Israel blocks humanitarian aid from entering Gaza, including water, food, and critical medicine. 

100 Days of Building Power and Solidarity: Observations and Recommendations about Immediate and Long-Term Infrastructure Needs for Palestinian, Muslim, and Arab Groups in the U.S. This report highlights the emerging needs of organizations working closely with Palestinian, Arab, Muslim, South Asian, and Black communities in the United States as the genocide in Gaza passes the 100 day mark in January 2024. The observations and recommendations in this report synthesize conversations around needs and recommendations for infrastructure and solidarity to address the current crisis and plan for the long-term.

Over 100 grassroots, advocacy, and movement organizations calling upon broader movements, civil rights organizations, and anti-hate groups to firmly reject the government’s attempts to manipulate hate violence, antisemitism, and Islamophobia to further expand state criminalization. We reject the state’s attempts to use this increased violence to expand hate crime laws. These initiatives do not address community safety. Instead, they simply expand state power and criminalization while ignoring the fact that the state itself has laid the groundwork for this violence.