Grad Student Assaulted in Alleged Hate Crime

A Muslim Harvard graduate student was verbally and physically harassed at the Harvard Square T-stop Friday afternoon in what police are calling a hate crime.

The incident is the first felony-level hate crime at Harvard in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks and comes on the heels of the recent stabbing of a Saudi Arabian man who was reported to be a student at Boston University.

On her way to weekly congregational prayers, the Harvard graduate student left the Harvard Square MBTA station and was entering the “Pit” area when four white males approached her, according to the police log. She was wearing a hijab, a traditional Muslim headscarf.

The males reportedly said, “What are you doing here? Go home to your own country” and tried to take off her hijab.

“She was shocked and scared,” said Melinda Mott, a friend of the victim and a third-year student at the Divinity School.

Mott said her friend continued on to Friday prayer and that the pair then contacted the Harvard University Police Department (HUPD), who put them in touch with the Cambridge and MBTA Police Departments.

While an MBTA spokesperson did not know last night if T security would be stepped up in light of the incident, he said that overall security has been tightened since the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. MBTA now stations officers at larger stops; officers simply patrolled them prior to the attacks.

Friday’s incident has spurred several Islamic student group leaders to call for heightened awareness and renewed caution in the Muslim community.

Saif I. Shah Mohammed ’02, president of the Harvard Islamic Society (HIS), sent an e-mail out to HIS members after the harassment warning students to be careful.

“This confirms that we must continue to take precautions,” he wrote. “The Pit area is one of those area to be prudent.”

The e-mail, which follows a similar message Mohammed sent immediately after the Sept. 11 attacks, listed several simple precautions members could take to increase their safety.

Recommendations included using police escorts, taking shuttles and carrying safety whistles that HIS will be making available to members today.

“It’s pretty much obvious that there’s still a lot of hate out there and people are just doing things that are based upon their ignorance,” Mohammed said. “It just shows that we need to take precautions, more so than usual.”

Sheila S. Akbar ’02, an HIS member, said the hate crime woke her up to the limits of the Harvard community.

“It’s kind of unnerving that an actual physical attack happened right in what’s sort of the center of our universe,” Akbar said. “I’m shocked because it happened at Harvard, but I’m not shocked that it happened in the Pit.”

While Friday’s incident is the first reported felony-level hate crime to involve a Harvard student after the Sept. 11 attacks, Mohammed said that several students—including himself—have received threatening e-mails. Some of those e-mails have been forwarded to several College deans and HUPD.

In the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks, Sikhs and other South Asians and Arabs have been the targets of hate crimes around the nation.

—Staff writer Juliet J. Chung can be reached at jchung@fas.harvard.edu.