ANAHEIM, Calif., May 22 (UPI) -- The California office of an Islamic civil liberties group has called on police to treat an attack on a pro-Palestinian display as a possible hate crime.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations, known as CAIR-LA, in Anaheim, Calif., wants law enforcement to investigate the arson of the display at the University of California-Irvine.
The display, a replica of Israel's new wall built on Palestinian land made of cardboard boxes and built by the Society of Arab Students, was burned late Thursday or early Friday morning.
Display sponsors said the symbolic wall was built to demonstrate the negative impact Israel's barrier had on the daily live of Palestinians. It was one of a number of activities during a Palestine awareness week organized by the Muslim Student
Union.
"Because of the ethnic and religious nature of the display and its sponsors, we urge campus police and the FBI to investigate this attack as a possible hate crime," CAIR-LA Public Relations Director Ra'id Faraj said in a statement.
"Muslim and Arab students should feel safe in exercising their First Amendment rights, free of intimidation or harassment."
