In the immediate aftermath of Sept. 11, some Muslim New Yorkers faced discrimination and Islamophobia that continued for years.

Now, with the city led by its first Muslim mayor, some have described this moment as a “new” New York, one where Muslims feel more accepted than ever before.

What You Need To Know

With the city now led by its first Muslim mayor, some say Muslims feel more accepted and empowered than in the years after 9/11

One advocate says Muslim New Yorkers faced detentions, raids and widespread surveillance in the years after Sept. 11

The NYPD monitored Muslim communities from about 2002 to 2014 and later acknowledged the efforts produced no leads

Advocates say community organizing helped curb abusive practices and increase accountability

Memories of a post-9/11 New York still remind Fahd Ahmed of darker times in the city.

“It brings up a lot of intensity of the hurt from that period because we had to carry the hurt for the families as well,” said Ahmed, executive director of Desis Rising Up and Moving. 

He recalled Muslim families across the city whose loved ones were detained and jailed in post-9/11 sweeps.

“We had families that would call our hotline. Women that would say that police bust down the door and grabbed my husband and my brother, and took them away. Kids saying, ‘My father left for work four days ago and he hasn’t come home, and we don’t know where he is,’” Ahmed said. 

At the time, Ahmed was working full time at New York-Presbyterian Hospital. He decided to focus fully on activism, helping families secure the release of loved ones from New Jersey jails.

As an organizer with Desis Rising Up and Moving (DRUM), a community social justice organization based in Jackson Heights, Queens, Ahmed worked with immigrant families navigating detentions and heightened law enforcement scrutiny.

City officials said at the time that surveillance of Muslim communities was necessary to keep New Yorkers safe.

“None of these people had anything to do with issues of national security,” Ahmed said. “And so then we saw a shift to where law enforcement, rather than picking people up en masse, started to send in informants and undercovers into the community to surveil on them.” 

Ahmed said law enforcement also put him under surveillance, alleging that the FBI and the NYPD raided his Flatbush apartment three times. He said the NYPD kept a close watch on DRUM and sent in an informant who attempted to join.

The NYPD monitored Muslim communities for more than a decade, from about 2002 to 2014, eavesdropping in cafes and placing informants in student groups, mosques and political organizations.

Then-Police Commissioner Ray Kelly insisted the department’s efforts were lawful and helped protect the city from terrorist attacks.

But in a federal civil rights case in 2012, the NYPD acknowledged the surveillance efforts generated no leads.

“At that period, anything could be said about Muslims, and it would just go uncontested. The swath of people that were just saying things about Muslims, about Islam, about immigrants, was very big,” Ahmed said. “People were afraid. We saw people hiding their language, hiding visible markers of their religiosity, and the level of fear was quite widespread.”

Still, Ahmed said the Muslim community has made significant strides through years of organizing, gaining broader acceptance and trust.

“In the aftermath of 9/11, it just felt like the NYPD could do anything it wanted with our communities,” he said. “And I think, less to the credit of the NYPD, and more to the credit of our organized communities, I think now they have to be more responsive, more circumspect, and know they can’t openly and freely abuse our communities. And that’s the result of continued organizing.”

Ahmed believes that progress has reached new heights with the election of the city’s first Muslim mayor.

“It really injected a lot of confidence into our communities, on people feeling that they have now the space and ability to actively assert who they are and recognize that we are part of the fabric of New York City, and part of the struggles in making this a better city and a better society,” he said.