Obama warns over prejudice against Muslims
US President Barack Obama has called for unity among Americans, warning that prejudice and discrimination against Muslims undermines the country’s national security.
In his weekly radio address on Saturday from the White House, Obama said the recent anti-Muslim sentiment in the country will help the ISIL terrorist group.
“Terrorists like ISIL are trying to divide us along lines of religion and background,” the president said. “That’s how they stoke fear. That’s how they recruit.”
“Prejudice and discrimination helps ISIL and it undermines our national security,” he added.
The president’s remarks came after leading Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump created a furor by proposing that Muslims should be denied entry to the US.
Obama didn't mention Trump by name, but spoke out against the divisiveness the tycoon’s inflammatory comments have stoked in the US and around the world.
Trump’s statement, which has drawn widespread condemnation both domestically and internationally, came in response to the mass shootings in San Bernardino, California, last week, in which a married couple described as "radicalized" by authorities allegedly killed 14 people.
Muslim American activists have warned that Trump's racist and anti-Muslim remarks were only intensifying a wave of Islamophobia across the US.
The president added on Saturday that the recent mass shooting in San Bernardino shouldn't be blamed on a particular community and said all Americans, irrespective of their faith, grieved over the terror attack.
Obama also praised American Muslims serving in the US military as “patriotic.”
According to a recent study, white, right-wing Americans present a far greater terror threat to the United States than individuals linked to the al-Qaeda or ISIL extremist groups.
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