DEARBORN HEIGHTS — Community activists and organizers held a meeting at the Islamic House of Wisdom on Wednesday, Sept. 19 and decided to start working on solutions to combat Islamophobia and increase youth social and spiritual engagement.

Imam Mohammad Ali Elahi, the spiritual leader of the House of Wisdom, called for the gathering as the second meeting of the religious center’s advisory council. The activists met last month to denounce the rise of the “Islamic State” and the execution of American journalist James Foley. 

Elahi started the meeting by praising the increased number of women in the gathering. He then relinquished the chairpersonship of the meeting to Judge Charlene Elder, who was present in her personal capacity. 

Elahi said he had received an email from a fellow imam containing a link to a music video that features girls with hijabs dancing with men at a nightclub. He said the sender of the email claimed that he had seen the girls at the House of Wisdom and made a sectarian comment.

The Imam who sent email later apologized for the sectarian comment.

“I said first of all, I don’t remember those girls and I wish they would come to the House of Wisdom, so they can learn the lesson of modesty,” Elahi said of his reply to the email, adding that he prefers people be happy and dancing rather than angry and violent.

“I said, by the way, it was wrong that they were dancing on a [gender] mixed [floor],” Elahi added. “If they were by themselves, there would be no religious problem. But let’s give them credit that they kept their hijab on even at a nightclub.”

The attendees erupted in laughter after Elahi’s comment.

The video in question is addressed in the story “local rapper defends controversial music video.”

More than 20 prominent community members attended the meeting, including psychologist Hoda Amine; Fatina Abdrabboh, the Michigan director of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC); Henry Ford College professor Ali Awadi; Hassan Bazzi, president of the Dearborn Heights Community Organization; and assistant U.S. attorney Abed Hammoud.

The meeting turned into a symposium, where the attendees discussed multiple issues facing the community, including drug abuse, lack of engagement, high divorce rates and civil rights.

Bazzi told the crowd that an anti-Muslim resident had turned up at the Dearborn Heights City Council meeting last week and complained about the growing Muslim population in the city and the serving of halal chicken in the schools, adding that the same individual plans to speak in front of the school board on Monday.

Abdrabboh said the anti-Muslim speaker’s appearance in front of the school board could be an opportunity for the community to urge the board to follow the Crestwood School District’s legal settlement with the Department of Justice, which requires the district to improve services for bilingual students.

The attendees eventually decided to vote on prioritizing the issues and chose youth engagement and combating Islamophobia as areas of focus for the next meeting, which will be held next month.