Backlash Of Hate Crimes Hits Our Queens Community

Karnail Singh was thinking about God when a pair of racist thugs taught him a bitter lesson about mankind.
"They thought I was Arabic and they wanted to hurt me or kill me," said Singh, 60, a resident of the Punjab section of India, who has been in this country for the past six months, visiting his family in Richmond Hill.
In the dawn hours of last Thursday, Singh was on his way to morning prayer at the neighborhood Sikh temple when two men grabbed his neck from behind and began to stab him in the face, hands and torso. "They were cursing at me. I didnt know if I was going to die," said Singh through an interpreter.
He sustained more than 50 stitches and has had to make repeated visits to the hospital.
"Ive always liked New York, but after this I feel so frightened to be here," he said. "This never happened to me where I come from."
Sadly, Singhs experience is not unique.
Since Sept. 11, hundreds of Queens residents have been victims of ethnic stereotyping and bias, ranging from snide and threatening remarks to outright violence.
In interviews with several immigrant and community groups, as well as local police precincts and legal advocacy groups, officials reported that bias crimes in Queens are on an upswing.
"We were stunned to see the number of bias incidents and hate crimes against immigrants in a wide range of Queens neighborhoods," said Margie McHugh, executive director of the New York Immigration Coalition. "Most or all of these attacks seem to be based solely on the victims physical appearance."
The exact number of incidents is unclear, and many incidentsparticularly verbal insults and tauntsgo unreported to law enforcement officials.
During a morning English class at Jamaica High School, a female classmate started quizzing 15-year-old Sadia Choudhury about her country of origin and religion. When Sadia said she was a Muslim, the girl cruelly turned to the rest of the class and announced, "We have a terrorist in our class," Sadia recalled.
Though Sadia gave her teacher and other school officials at Jamaica High School high marks for quickly intervening, the incident left her shaken. "When I got home, I was hysterical," she said. "I was devastated. I was more mad than sad."
Sadia was born in Queens and her parents, Soud and Jharna Choudhury, originally from Bangladesh, have been American citizens for 20 years.
Violence In Queens
A study compiled by the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund on bias crimes since Sept. 11 shows disturbing trends in the number of incidents in Queens. Among them:
A Sikh man in Richmond Hill, was assaulted with a baseball bat and shot at with a BB gun by a group of people. He was seriously injured.
An Indian-owned antique store in Jamaica was vandalized when unidentified individuals threw stones through its windows.
Unidentified men with a paintball gun assaulted two Sikh teenage boys in Richmond Hill. NYPD officers, who witnessed the attack, apprehended the perpetrators.
A Sikh temple in Richmond Hill was attacked by miscreants who drove by and fired rubber balls at the building.
Indian-owned stores in Jackson Heights were vandalized.
An elderly Flushing couple of South Asian descent shopping for groceries was hit in the back by rocks, while anti-Muslim epithets were shouted at them.
While bias crimes are up Citywide, it is notable that one-third of the incidents reported in New York City occurred in Queens. And no county in the nationwide survey was the scene of more bias incidents in the past month than Queens.
Inderjit Singh, chairman of the South Asian Community Council, and a candidate for City Council as an Independent, said that he has heard of 300 bias crimes across the country against Sikhs alone, with at least 25 of those in Queens.
"I have seen five or six of them in Queens with my own eyes," said Singh, who described a man being punched through his car window by a stranger.
"Most people do not understand the levels of violence and harassment that is going on."
This is troubling, considering Queens diverse demographic and boasts of being the borough of immigrants.
Newcomers comprise 31 pecent of Queens total population. Around the borough, it is not unusual to find local schools with student populations speaking 50 languages or more. Astoria, Flushing, Elmhurst, Forest Hills-Kew Gardens, Corona and Jackson Heights were cited by the Dept. of City Planning, as among the largest neighborhoods of immigrant settlement.
The upswing of racial crimes is also troubling, some say, in light of pending legislation in the U.S. Congress that would likely make it tougher on immigrants legal and illegal alike. The legislation would likely toughen up standards for visa applicants, establish national ID cards, increase border vigilance and drastically reduce the number of immigrants and foreign visitors. American consular officials overseas, who issued 7.1 million temporary visas last year and denied 2.4 million others, are being ordered by the Administration to request fewer visas in the future.
The new policy is driven largely by the fact that terrorists, with lapsed visas, were among those who were involved in the WTC plot. In other cases, terrorists were cleared for entry to the U.S. despite being on a government list of undesirables and aliens here on student visas to attend a Berlitz language course in California. They never showed up for class.
Chung Wha Hong, a legislative liaison executive with the New York Immigration Coalition, said her organization fears a backlash as Congress considers a variety of bills to strengthen immigration laws.
"We support eliminating loopholes that prevent dangerous individuals from entering the country," she said. "Its those bills that halt immigration here that concerns us the most."
Sitting in an Egyptian coffee house on Steinway St. in Astoria, one feels the tension in the air as immigrants in their native attire speak in hushed tones. Across the street from the coffee shop is the Immigration Advocacy Services at 24-40 Steinway St. It attracts a steady stream of immigrants, legal and illegal. Some have green cards, others seek citizenship. Many are hoping to bring their families here from Mid-East hot spots.
Debra Gilmore, executive director of the immigration center, said that she has 18,000 active cases in her files. The bench outside Gilmores office is often lined with immigrants waiting to file their applications. For some it will take 10 to 12 years before a visa is issued by the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS). Meanwhile, these illegal aliens live in fear that the Twin Towers disaster will accelerate the agents efforts to track down all illegal aliens and send them back to their hostile homelands.
"The Twin Towers disaster has brought us greater numbers of green card holders who are desperately searching for citizenship," said Gilmore. "If things go well they will be sworn in as citizens within a year." But shes skeptical. "The INS is always backlogged with such applications."