HONOLULU: Hawaii has 5,000 or so Muslims — less than 1 percent of the state’s population — who are finding themselves thrust into an international spotlight after the state’s top lawyer launched a challenge to President Donald Trump’s revised travel ban, saying it contradicts the islands’ welcoming culture that values diversity.
Named as a plaintiff in the federal lawsuit fighting the ban is Ismail Elshikh, the imam of the island of Oahu’s only mosque — a converted plantation-style house in a hilly Honolulu neighborhood a few miles from Waikiki beach where Muslims who gather in the prayer room know they’re facing Makkah when the view of iconic Diamond Head is at their backs.
Elshikh’s mother-in-law is a Syrian living in Syria who won’t be able to visit her relatives in Hawaii because of the ban, and that will deprive the rights of Elshikh, his wife and their children as US citizens, said Hawaii Attorney General Doug Chin.
It was difficult for the shy and reserved Elshikh to make the decision to join the lawsuit and he is not speaking publicly because of legal reasons and fears for his security in a state that has seen a rise in threats to Muslims that started just before Trump was elected, said Hakim Ouansafi, who is the president of the Muslim Association of Hawaii.
“It took some thinking. It took some convincing,” Ouansafi said.
Chin said the small size of Hawaii’s Muslim community had no bearing on his decision to challenge the travel ban because “they are part of our community. They should not be labeled presumptively as terrorists.”
Also, the lawsuit is a way to protect a minority community in state familiar with the wrongs committed when Japanese Americans were sent to internment camps during World War II, Chin said. “And we should speak for them in ways that people did not speak for the Japanese back in the 1940s when everything was happening,” he said.
The first Muslims in Hawaii can be traced back to the 1800s, Ouansafi said. Today, Hawaii’s Muslims have ties to 46 countries, including Asian and Arab countries. About 30 percent are American-born who converted to Islam, he said. And about 80 of Hawaii’s Muslim families are originally from the six countries named in the revised travel ban.
“It’s beautiful mix,” Ouansafi said.
Youssef Dakroub, born and raised in Lebanon, met his wife who is from Hawaii in Dubai. They moved to Oahu in 2006, where he now owns a Moroccan and Lebanese food restaurant in downtown Honolulu.
Dakroub, who describes himself as Muslim but not religious, said the lawsuit challenging the travel ban reinforced his belief that Hawaii is the right place for him to live.
“Hawaii is home,” he said.
Pennsylvania-born Esma Arslan remembers being nervous about wearing her headscarf on her first day of seventh grade at Iolani, a prestigious Honolulu private school. “I got over those fears very quickly,” said Arslan, now 21, whose parents are from Turkey. “Personally for me, it’s always been a positive experience here.”
Hawaii’s temperate climate brought Amro Nassar to Maui, where he used to be imam of the island’s only mosque.
Born in California to parents from Egypt, Nassar said he hasn’t encountered any problems because of his religion. “Hawaii is a melting pot of different beliefs and cultures,” he said. “One can blend in, not stand out.”
Ouansafi, who is from Morocco and is the executive director of the Hawaii Public Housing Authority, said he considers Hawaii the most inclusive and safest place for minorities to live in the US But he is troubled by the recent spate of hate threats directed at Muslims.
The threats started before the election and increased when Trump became president, prompting the association to install security cameras, he said.
On Jan. 27, a man followed two Muslim children getting off a city bus and harassed them, Ouansafi said. A spokeswoman for the Honolulu Police Department said a harassment case was opened and an investigation is ongoing.
About two weeks ago, the mosque recorded an anonymous caller yelling: “Killing Muslims is God’s will.”
Hawaii’s lawsuit also argues that the travel ban will hurt the economy of a state that depends on a constant stream of visitors from all corners of the world.
The Honolulu mosque is already seeing the impact, Ouansafi said.
Before Trump’s election, the popular Friday afternoon prayer service used to see many Muslim tourists show up to join local residents in prayer.
The numbers of praying tourists have since declined and some Muslims who are not from countries covered by the ban don’t want to travel to Hawaii anymore, Ouansafi said.
“They can take their money and take it elsewhere,” he said. “We have princes and we have rulers from Muslim countries that do come. They don’t want to be stuck at the airport. They don’t want to be insulted in the street.”
Travel ban challenge puts Hawaii’s few Muslims in spotlight
Travel ban challenge puts Hawaii’s few Muslims in spotlight
Food rations are halved in one of Africa’s largest refugee camps after US aid cuts
Funding for the UN World Food Program has dropped after the Trump administration paused support in March, part of the widespread dismantling of foreign aid by the United States, once the world’s biggest donor.
That means Komol, a widowed father of five from Uganda, has been living on handouts from neighbors since his latest monthly ration ran out two weeks ago. He said he survives on one meal a day, sometimes a meal every two days.
“When we can’t find anyone to help us, we become sick, but when we go to the hospital, they say it’s just hunger and tell us to go back home,” the 59-year-old said. His wife is buried here. He is reluctant to return to Uganda, one of the more than 20 home countries of Kakuma’s refugees.
Food rations have been halved. Previous ration cuts led to protests in March. Monthly cash transfers that refugees used to buy proteins and vegetables to supplement the rice, lentils and cooking oil distributed by WFP have ended this month.
Each refugee now receives 3 kilograms (6 pounds) of rice per month, far below the 9 kilograms recommended by the UN for optimal nutrition. WFP hopes to receive the next donation of rice by August. That’s along with 1 kilogram of lentils and 500 milliliters of cooking oil per person.
“Come August, we are likely to see a more difficult scenario. If WFP doesn’t receive any funding between now and then, it means only a fraction of the refugees will be able to get assistance. It means only the most extremely vulnerable will be targeted,” said Colin Buleti, WFP’s head in Kakuma. WFP is seeking help from other donors.
As dust swirls along paths between the camp’s makeshift houses, the youngest children run and play, largely unaware of their parents’ fears.
But they can’t escape hunger. Komol’s 10-year-old daughter immerses herself in schoolbooks when there’s nothing to eat.
“When she was younger she used to cry, but now she tries to ask for food from the neighbors, and when she can’t get any she just sleeps hungry,” Komol said. In recent weeks, they have drunk water to try to feel full.
The shrinking rations have led to rising cases of malnutrition among children under 5 and pregnant and breastfeeding mothers.
At Kakuma’s largest hospital, run by the International Rescue Committee, children with malnutrition are given fortified formula milk.
Nutrition officer Sammy Nyang’a said some children are brought in too late and die within the first few hours of admission. The 30-bed stabilization ward admitted 58 children in March, 146 in April and 106 in May. Fifteen children died in April, up from the monthly average of five. He worries they will see more this month.
“Now with the cash transfers gone, we expect more women and children to be unable to afford a balanced diet,” Nyang’a said.
The hospital had been providing nutrient-dense porridge for children and mothers, but the flour has run out after stocks, mostly from the US, were depleted in March. A fortified peanut paste given to children who have been discharged is also running out, with current supplies available until August.
In the ward of whimpering children, Susan Martine from South Sudan cares for her 2-year-old daughter, who has sores after swelling caused by severe malnutrition.
The mother of three said her family often sleeps hungry, but her older children still receive hot lunches from a WFP school feeding program. For some children in the camp, it’s their only meal. The program also faces pressure from the aid cuts.
“I don’t know how we will survive with the little food we have received this month,” Martine said.
The funding cuts are felt beyond Kakuma’s refugee community. Businessman Chol Jook recorded monthly sales of 700,000 Kenyan shillings ($5,400) from the WFP cash transfer program and now faces losses.
Those who are hungry could slip into debt as they buy on credit, he said.
Russia sentences activist who helped Ukrainians flee war to 22 years in prison
- Nadezhda Rossinskaya was arrested in 2024 on charges of treason and aiding terrorist activities
LONDON: Russian activist who helped collect humanitarian aid for Ukraine and evacuate Ukrainians from the war zone was sentenced on Friday to 22 years in prison by a Moscow military court, the RIA state news agency reported.
Nadezhda Rossinskaya, also known as Nadin Geisler, ran a group called “Army of Beauties,” which said it had assisted some 25,000 people in Russian-controlled parts of Ukraine in 2022-23, according to a report last year in The Moscow Times.
Authorities arrested Geisler in February 2024 and later charged her with treason and aiding terrorist activities over a post they said she made on Instagram calling for donations to Ukraine’s Azov Battalion.
Geisler denied any wrongdoing, and her lawyer said she was not the author of the post, according to a trial transcript compiled by Mediazona, an independent Russian outlet.
Prosecutors had requested 27 years for Geisler, who is in her late 20s. Mediazona reported that she had asked the court to imprison her for 27 years and one day, so that her prison term could surpass that of Darya Trepova, a Russian woman jailed for delivering a bomb that killed a pro-war blogger in 2023.
Trepova’s sentence, handed down last year, was the longest given to any woman in modern Russian history.
Prosecutions for terrorism, espionage and cooperation with a foreign state have risen sharply in Russia since the start of the full-scale war in Ukraine over three years ago. Pervy Otdel, a Russian lawyers’ association, says 359 people were convicted of such crimes in 2024.
Pro-Palestinian activists say they damaged planes at UK military base
- Campaign group Palestine Action said that its activists had entered the Brize Norton base in Oxfordshire and escaped undetected
LONDON: Pro-Palestinian activists in Britain said they had broken into a Royal Air Force base in central England on Friday and damaged two military aircraft.
The campaign group Palestine Action said that its activists had entered the Brize Norton base in Oxfordshire and escaped undetected.
“Flights depart daily from the base to RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus,” the group said on X accompanied by video footage. “From Cyprus, British planes collect intelligence, refuel fighter jets and transport weapons to commit genocide in Gaza.”
There was no immediate response from Britain’s Ministry of Defense.
Kremlin says Middle East is plunging into ‘abyss of instability and war’
- Asked on Friday if Russia had any red lines when it came to the situation, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters that countries in the region should have their own red lines
ST PETERSBURG:The Kremlin said on Friday that the Middle East was plunging into “an abyss of instability and war” and that Moscow was worried by events and still stood ready to mediate if needed.
Russia, which has close ties with Iran, and also maintains close links to Israel, has urged the US not to strike Iran and has called for a diplomatic solution to the crisis around Tehran’s nuclear program to be found.
Asked on Friday if Russia had any red lines when it came to the situation, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters that countries in the region should have their own red lines.
“The region is plunging into an abyss of instability and war,” Peskov said.
Moscow sees that Israel wants to continue its military action against Iran for now, but Russia has lines of communication open with Israel and the US, Peskov added.
Russian strikes on Odesa kill one, wound at least 13
ODESA: One person was killed and more than a dozen others were wounded in Russia’s latest aerial attack on Ukraine, which targeted the southern port city of Odesa, officials said on Friday.
Emergency services published images of firefighters helping a woman in pyjamas climb from the window of a housing block in flames.
Both Moscow and Kyiv have stepped up their drone and missile attacks after three years of war and peace talks initiated by the United States appear closer to collapse.
Ukrainian police said one person was killed and 13 were wounded in Odesa, including three rescue workers who were hurt at the scene of the attack.
“Residential buildings, higher education institutions, civilian infrastructure and transport were damaged by the strike,” said Oleg Kiper, the governor of the Black Sea region.
The Ukrainian air force said Russia had launched 86 drones in the barrage and that 70 had been downed by air defense systems.
The Russian defense ministry, meanwhile, said its forces had eliminated at least 61 Ukrainian drones.
Odesa, one of Ukraine’s largest port cities and a UNESCO heritage site, has been under persistent Russian attacks since Moscow invaded its neighbor early in 2022.
