Walking into the Islamic Center of Milwaukee on any Friday for congregational prayers, one is struck by a strong and thriving Muslim community. More than 1,500 worshippers, representing multiple ethnicities and races usually fill the prayer hall. A large overflow crowd packs the gymnasium, where they listen to the sermon and participate in the prayer via telecast.
Yet, many Milwaukeeans know little about them. At the same time, the unprecedented hostile rhetoric of some U.S. presidential candidates toward Islam in the current campaign season, combined with war in predominantly Muslim countries and the wave of immigration from the Middle East westward, have made Islam in America a hot topic of debate.
With political candidates using fear of terrorism to discriminate against Muslims and the rising Islamophobia that results from conflating ISIS and its atrocities with ordinary Muslims, getting to know our Muslim neighbors is all the more important.
Who Are Milwaukee’s Muslims?
The number of Muslims living in greater Milwaukee is estimated to be between 15,000 and 20,000, consisting of predominantly younger families. They are a family-oriented community, known for their great diversity and attention to academic achievement, with generally above-average vocational and financial status. Muslim physicians, engineers, teachers and business owners are a noticeable presence in Milwaukee, with many living near area mosques.
There are eight mosques, two full-time Islamic schools and a number of organizations that sprang up to serve local Muslims as well as others, including a day care center, a senior center, a free community clinic, a public Islamic library, hair salons that offer privacy to Muslim women who cover their hair in public and a multitude of restaurants and ethnic grocery stores selling halal foods, particularly meat, prepared according to Islamic laws, making them permissible for Muslims to eat.
Many of Milwaukee’s Muslims say they are alarmed at the hysterical diatribes, bigotry and racism that have become normalized by some of the Republican presidential candidates. Donald Trump and others have stated that they would prevent Syrian refugees, particularly those of the Muslim faith, from entering the country. Some have also said they would encourage surveillance of mosques and create a national database to track American Muslims. What is most alarming are the millions of followers that are euphoric at this blatant bigotry.
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This rhetoric is in marked contrast with Republican President George W. Bush, who in an extraordinary gesture, stood inside the Islamic Center of Washington, D.C., only six days after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and said:
The face of terror is not the true faith of Islam. That’s not what Islam is all about. Islam is peace. These terrorists don’t represent peace. They represent evil and war. When we think of Islam we think of a faith that brings comfort to a billion people around the world. Billions of people find comfort and solace and peace, and that’s made brothers and sisters out of every race—out of every race.
America counts millions of Muslims amongst our citizens, and Muslims make an incredibly valuable contribution to our country. Muslims are doctors, lawyers, law professors, members of the military, entrepreneurs, shopkeepers, moms and dads, and they need to be treated with respect. In our anger and emotion, our fellow Americans must treat each other with respect.
Othman Atta, a Milwaukee attorney and the executive director of the Islamic Society of Milwaukee (ISM), the largest Islamic organization in Wisconsin, which operates three mosques and the full-time, K-12 Salam School, sees a significant difference between what was being said after 9/11 and today.
“Although there were Islamophobic statements after 9/11, it was limited to particular well-known Islamophobes,” Atta said. “Now we are seeing the mainstreaming of this. These individuals who are encouraging anti-Muslim sentiment are some of the same people that have racist attitudes towards others as well. According to polls, negative attitudes towards Muslims have increased significantly since 9/11; much of this is due to certain media sources, presidential candidates and particular groups that have political or religious agendas.”
The Muslim community is responding. There is increased effort to establish more significant relationships with groups that are not bigoted or racist, and there are many of them, said Atta. Requests from schools, churches and peace and justice organizations to visit the Islamic Center or to invite Muslim speakers for educational opportunities are on the rise.
In addition, the ISM has always been involved in giving back to the Milwaukee community. It contributes thousands of dollars to stock the food pantry at the Islamic Da’wa Center, a mosque and community center serving Muslims that live on the north side of Milwaukee. The ISM also underwrites part of the free health clinic run by the Muslim Community and Health Center (MCHC), conducts blood drives, regularly provides and serves meals at St. Ben’s Community Meal and volunteers to help as needed across the city. Volunteerism is highly encouraged in the Muslim community.
“Most people have not had an opportunity to interact with Muslims and people fear what they don’t know, especially if they are being inundated with hateful and bigoted ideas,” said Atta. “Creating opportunities to interact is important in dispelling those fears.”
The Islamic Society of Milwaukee is part of Doors Open Milwaukee that takes place in September, giving the Milwaukee community an opportunity to visit a mosque and meet their Muslim neighbors.
How It All Started
Milwaukee’s Muslim community began as a loosely connected network made up of university students and families from a wide range of countries, as well as African American Muslims, each with their own cultural practices and religious understanding. It has grown into a close-knit community that is well established in Milwaukee.
In 1982, the building housing the Islamic Center on South 13th Street and Layton Avenue was purchased. It became the second mosque in the Milwaukee area. The first was a smaller facility, Masjid Sultan Mohammad, at 317 W. Wright St., which had its beginnings in the Nation of Islam, a black separatist movement, but it disassociated from that movement and joined mainstream Islam in the 1970s.
Today a large number of families have settled in the vicinity of the Islamic Center. Another concentration of Muslim families live in Brookfield, Elm Grove and Waukesha. That community, in conjunction with the Islamic Center, recently established a mosque in Brookfield to serve that growing community of Muslims.
Atta attributes the growth not only to immigrants and converts to Islam, but to the children and grandchildren of the many families that have made Milwaukee their home. American Muslims are increasingly American born.
Introducing Milwaukee’s Muslims
The local Muslim community is a rich mosaic of individuals of various professions and backgrounds. Here are a few of their stories.
Muhammad Isa Sadlon
Muhammad Isa Sadlon converted to Islam in 1989. Formerly Christopher Goldsmith, Sadlon was a prominent member of Milwaukee’s art, business and nonprofit sectors when he was introduced to Islam in 1987 by a Jewish friend in New York who had become Muslim. Growing up in Milwaukee, Sadlon attended Catholic schools, including Marquette University High School, before becoming a student at UW-Madison.
Soon after graduation, Sadlon was a rising star in the Milwaukee community. He became manager of the 480-room YMCA and food service. Within a short time, he rose to become corporate vice president of the YMCA properties.
After that he was hired as executive director of the Milwaukee Art Museum. Under his leadership, museum membership went from 3,000 to 25,000. Sadlon also managed all phases of the Calatrava project.
In 1991, upon his return from the Hajj, or pilgrimage to Mecca, many of Sadlon’s family members, colleagues and the Milwaukee community learned of his new faith. He encountered tremendous negative reaction. Someone even told him, “Islam was not a faith for white people.”
Sadlon chose not to respond, but to let his practice show his character, he said. He was amazed at how overwhelmed some people were with his decision, although it had no impact on them. “Although I was Muslim, my faith didn’t burden me, but it burdened everyone around me,” he said. “Being Muslim has helped every aspect of my life; it has made everything easier for me.”
After 20 years with the Milwaukee Art Museum, Sadlon retired to spend time on other projects, working with many mosques and organizations across the state, including two years as executive director of the Islamic Society of Milwaukee. Sadlon continues traveling around the world, creating educational programs and conducting lectures and workshops to help build bridges and dispel misinformation about Muslims. In the United Kingdom, Sadlon started educational programs in 17 cities.
Dr. Dima Adl
Dr. Dima Adl loves the Milwaukee community, she said. She finds Milwaukeeans to be very friendly people.
A graduate of Aleppo Medical School in Syria, Adl came to Milwaukee almost 10 years ago after training in Memphis, Tenn., and working for a couple of years in Virginia. She came to Milwaukee to join her brother, who was working as a dentist here. A pulmonary, critical care and sleep disorders specialist at Columbia St. Mary’s Hospital, she was joined by her parents and another brother, who worked as a biomedical technician.
Adl is also the mother of two daughters. They attend Salam School and participate in extracurricular activities outside of the school, including swimming and music. “It is important that they have as many experiences outside the school as they do inside; it is important to be open minded,” she said.
The majority of her friends and colleagues are not Muslim, and they have been incredibly supportive and even apologetic after some of the outlandish remarks being made by presidential candidates against Muslims, she said. “Not only do they express disagreement, but they are very open to showing support publicly,” she said. “The current crisis is making everyone stronger.”
Dr. Eugene Pruitt
Dr. Eugene Pruitt sees the current attacks against Muslims as an opportunity for conversation. He said if more people had opportunities to get to know Muslims, they would see their strong sense of family and community, and they would see Muslims as “being very hospitable and having a great deal of love and care about each other, as well as others.”
A well-known physician of internal medicine, Pruitt has been in practice in Milwaukee since 1980. He graduated from Harvard University and Howard Medical School. Like many other African American Muslims, his beginnings were with the Nation of Islam. Then in 1975, after the death of Elijah Muhammad, he and thousands of others followed Elijah’s son, Warith Deen Muhammad, as they severed ties with the Nation and joined mainstream Islam.
Pruitt and his wife, Charlotte, raised three children in Milwaukee. He is most struck by Milwaukee’s Muslim community’s incredible diversity, he said. Having traveled to many places, he has seen cities where the Muslim community is more homogeneous, representing a particular ethnicity, but that is not the case in Milwaukee.
Pruitt was one of the individuals who helped establish the Islamic Da’wa Center on Milwaukee’s North Side. Now, employed at the Medical College of Wisconsin, Pruitt attends Friday congregational prayers there. Anywhere from 20-50 Muslim physicians from the Medical College of Wisconsin attend the prayer, a fact that Pruitt said he loves.
When he eventually retires, Pruitt says he wants to put all of his effort into finding ways to empower young people, to help them acquire skills that will help them provide for themselves and build strong communities.
“I see my destiny, my greatest opportunity in life, through Islam,” he said. “I find no greater way to live my life.”
Dr. Randa Suleiman
Dr. Randa Suleiman, an assistant professor at Cardinal Stritch University, teaches graduate-level classes in the teacher prep program. Both she and her husband, Samir, a network engineer, immigrated from Jordan to the United States 22 years ago. Their three boys grew up in Milwaukee, with the oldest, 20, now a student at UW-Madison
Suleiman said she enjoys working at Cardinal Stritch University because she feels a close connection with their Franciscan mission of social justice and service, something that resonates within her own Muslim faith.
Anisa Schaub
Anisa Schaub, originally from Indonesia, lives with her husband, Leo, and four children. Indonesia is the most populous Muslim country. Although she has lived in the United States for 20 years, she has been in the Milwaukee area for only three.
An avid cook and baker, she plans to start her own culinary business. Leo, an American convert to Islam, is an engineer, working in the area of green energy. Schaub’s family came to Milwaukee for her husband’s new job and for the Salam School, the large Islamic school housed on the Islamic Society of Milwaukee property, in addition to the many high-quality programs at the various area mosques and the Islamic Resource Center, options that were not available in the small Iowa town of Waverly, where they had lived.
Hashim Zaibak
Hashim Zaibak was born in Gaza, Palestine. After finishing pharmacy school in Chicago, he moved to Wisconsin in 1999 to accept a job with CVS as a pharmacist. During his 14 years at CVS, he always chose to be placed in the pharmacies serving the inner city.
“No one wanted to work there because they felt it was challenging, but I felt these were the patients I could have the most impact on,” he said. He even felt it was a religious obligation to find a way to make things easier for the many homebound and disabled patients that he had.
In 2011, Zaibak left CVS to launch Hayat Pharmacy. Now with seven locations, 20 pharmacists and more than 100 other employees, he is realizing his dream and fulfilling a religious obligation.
Now, Zaibak has teams that do home delivery for those who have difficulty with travel, pharmacists synchronize medications for patients so they can have all of their medications filled during one visit per month, and educational trainings regarding medications help patients stay healthier. The profit margin may be less than other pharmacies, but as long as he has a sustainable practice, he is happy that he can make a real difference in the lives of his patients, he said. His wife, Bushra, helps in the management of some of the pharmacies. Also Palestinian, she was born and raised in Chicago. Her parents and some of her siblings still live there. The Zaibaks have three children.
“As a Muslim, I believe that by serving the underserved, I am living a life that is pleasing to God,” said Zaibak.
Willie A. Perry Jr.
Willie A. Perry Jr. is an African American convert to Islam, having chosen to convert many years ago while still in high school.
His nearly 30 years as a firefighter prepared him for his current role as director of the Milwaukee Islamic Da’wa Center, he said. “Being accustomed to the mode of responding to the call whenever people need me,” helps Perry as he oversees a very busy food pantry at the Da’wa Center, located in an economically challenged area. Perry recounts the Muslim belief that “you will be held accountable if your stomach is full and your neighbor is hungry.” Since 2007, the Da’wa Center has distributed more than 2.5 million pounds of food, purchased with substantial donations from the Islamic Society of Milwaukee. Perry said the food pantry and the many community activities put on by the Muslims at the Da’wa Center have made for a very different conversation about Muslims by the many non-Muslim patrons.
“Muslims also have to do a better job of letting people know who we are. People need to know it is a divine responsibility to be of service to our fellow human beings and that Islam offers purpose to our life,” said Perry.
Fozia Ahmad
Originally from Pakistan, Fozia Ahmad, a Mequon mother of three, has lived in the area for more than 40 years. Her husband, Khalid, buys and sells commercial real estate. A long-time community volunteer, Ahmad ran a weekend school at the Islamic Society of Milwaukee for 25 years.
As the Muslim community grew, she brought together a large number of Muslim physicians and health professionals to start a free health clinic at the Eighth Street and Layton Avenue property owned by the Islamic Society of Milwaukee. In 2012, the Muslim Community and Health Center (MCHC) became an independent entity. A few years later, the Sakina Senior Center and Adult Day Services opened.
Ahmad reminisced about how when she first came to Milwaukee, “there really was not a place for the Muslim community to meet together, other than in each other’s homes. Now we have a number of mosques and other facilities, and now there are so many activities going on,” she said. What she said she finds especially exciting is that so much of what is being done benefits the broader community.
Marwa and Aateka Samara
The Samara sisters—Marwa, 27, a speech therapist by profession, and Aateka, 23, a certified personal trainer who works in human resources—grew up in Milwaukee. Both have always been very interested in art, they said.
What they realized was missing in the Milwaukee area was modest clothing that was both fashionable and easily accessible, they said. Both sisters wear hijab, the Islamic headscarf. About six months ago, they began a modest fashion blog on Instagram with the handle, “The Samaras.” The Samaras buy clothing items they find in area stores, items you don’t expect to be modest, and they put them together in a way that is both modest and fashionable. The Samaras consider themselves to be Americans that happen to be Muslim. They are proud of both aspects of their identity, they said. The Samaras consider their clothing and hijab to be expressions of their identity.
Now they have 18,000 followers and a large number of them are not Muslim. In the next six months, they hope to launch their own products. Marwa Samara said, “Our goal is to mainstream the hijab and modest clothing, and why not? We are American.”
About the Author:
Janan Najeeb is a prominent member of Wisconsin’s Muslim community. She is a founding member and president of the Milwaukee Muslim Women’s Coalition. She operates the Islamic Resource Center, Wisconsin’s first Islamic public lending library, and last year she founded the Milwaukee Muslim Film Festival.
