DULUTH, Minn. — In the Woodland Community, the Islamic Center of the Twin Ports was tagged by graffiti.
“I was the one who discovered it. I was moving the lawn, this was last weekend, and I looked over and I thought ‘Oh my gosh! We have some graffiti,’” said Board President of the Islamic Center of the Twin Ports John Dahl.
It was just one day after Hamas invaded Gaza, when Dahl discovered graffiti tagged on the mosque.
“My initial thought was it was a terrorism event or some type of hate crime,” said Dahl. “But then I looked to see what it was and it probably was just some teenagers.”
This wasn’t the first time the Islamic Center of the Twin Ports was graffitied. But after consideration of the current tensions in the Middle East, Dahl reached out for a helping hand.
“And I thought, well this is the second time we’ve had some graffiti. Maybe we can make some lemonade out of lemons and reach over to our Jewish sisters and brothers in the community and see if they can help,” said Dahl.
“It meant a lot in this scary time to have the Islamic community to be thinking of the Jewish community. I know what it feels like to have graffiti on your building, you feel scared and feels like you’re being targeted,” said Debbie Freedman with the Temple of Islam. “The best way to feel more safe is to honor our shared humanity.”
Within an hour of painting, the mosque looked as good as new. All thanks from the help from by the Temple of Islam and community volunteers.
“Vandalizing within itself is a brutal term and especially when a place where people come and pray gets vandalized. It does hurt our sentiment,” said Volunteer Khwaja Jan. “But people from all across faith came here and tried to help make this place a better community.”
“When you ask people to come to a party you’re not sure if anybody is going to attend. So I was so pleased to have people show up. If this were to happen to another group, I hope that they could call upon the Muslim community in town. It would be an honor to go and help out,” said Dahl.