Two men tried to break into The Arab American News office in the early hours of Friday, March 11, while the staff was inside. We thank the local media, community members and responding police officers for the overwhelming support and attention that we received after the incident.

It is too soon to speculate about the motives of the suspects. Fortunately, one of them has been arrested and we expect Dearborn’s detectives and the Wayne County Prosecutor’s Office to provide answers.

When a suspect banged on the newspaper’s back door with a hammer, it sounded like shots. The initial fear was backed by the damage in the glass, which resembled a bullet-hole.

For a second, most staff members thought it was a hate attack related to the xenophobic insanity unfolding across the nation. The suspects might have been unintelligent thieves who were looking to rob the office, but the fact that hate is a possibility is telling of the climate we live in today.

Every week, we hear of attacks against people speaking a language other than English, vandalism against houses of worship, assaults motivated by ethnic and religious prejudice and random mass shootings attributed to mental instability.

We were justified in thinking that it could be another one of those attacks when we thought we had heard gunshots.

That’s not the land of freedom, diversity and prosperity we came to call our home. This is not our America.

Our America is the one that cared for us. True Americans have concern for their neighbors, like the hundreds of readers of all backgrounds who left messages of support through social media.

We hope that those who believe in true American principles will emerge triumphant from this polarization. This nation has always moved forward.

No matter what the motive of the break-in was, we will continue to report the truth and tell your stories.