http://www.jsonline.com/news/gen/jun05/334848.asp

More U.S. Muslims aspiring to be lawyers
9-11 attacks influenced career choice, some say
By NAHAL TOOSI
ntoosi@journalsentinel.com
Posted: June 18, 2005

Yes, this is all we need. A few great islamic lawyers.

She already had accomplished plenty: a master's in business administration, an analyst's position at Bank One, and motherhood, too. Still, Aisha Zaidi hadn't fulfilled her dream of becoming a lawyer.

Muslim Lawyers

Asifa Quraishi started an e-mail network, MuslimJD, in 1996 for Muslim lawyers and law students. The group became the National Association of Muslim Lawyers, which incorporated in 2000. She joined the University of Wisconsin Law School faculty last year.

Quotable
If we play our cards right, we can really be a voice.

- Asifa Quraishi,
who teaches at the University of Wisconsin Law School

On The Web
National Association of Muslim Lawyers

Then came Sept. 11, 2001. In the aftermath of the terrorist attacks, Muslims in America faced heightened scrutiny. Federal agencies began questioning and detaining Muslims. Some were deported. Many had a hard time boarding a plane. Others were too nervous to leave the country for fear they wouldn't be allowed to return.

As the headlines kept coming, Zaidi reconsidered her career goals.

"Being Muslim in this country, with everything that happened, it just seemed like we needed Muslim lawyers and we needed to defend ourselves," said Zaidi, 32, of Mequon. So last fall, while nine months pregnant with her second child, Zaidi enrolled in Marquette University Law School.

More American Muslims are entering the legal profession, and they are finding a young but increasingly sophisticated network will support them. Though exact figures are not tracked, leaders in the Muslim legal community said the interest in law school is definitely on the rise in their community, as it has been in the general population.

While demographics explain some of the trend - the number of Muslims in the United States is disputed (from 1 million to 7 million), but it's believed to be growing through immigration, births and conversions - some aspiring Muslim lawyers say the aftermath of the 2001 attacks proved hugely influential in their career choice.

Furthermore, the new generation of Muslim lawyers, for the most part, grew up in the United States and doesn't face the language barriers that kept past generations of immigrant Muslims from entering law. And while medicine and engineering have long been high-status jobs within immigrant Muslim communities, lawyers are starting to get the same respect.

Saleem Safdar, who recently served as president of the National Muslim Law Students Association, was in the first of the World Trade Center towers hit by the hijacked planes. He was a first-year law student then, and during the surreal moments afterward, he knew the world of American Muslims would change.

The law students association, which began as a small, loose-knit group in 1997, now numbers about 300. Many who join say they want to enter civil rights law, while some are interested in national security - two areas not necessarily opposed to one another, he said.

"I was born here," said Safdar, a New Jersey resident of Pakistani descent. "I can relate to what the American people are going through, and at the same time, I can relate to the other perspective of immigrants who are suffering in this country."

In 1996, Asifa Quraishi started an e-mail network for a couple dozen Muslim lawyers and law students. She called it MuslimJD. The group grew rapidly and became the National Association of Muslim Lawyers. It incorporated in 2000. Quraishi now teaches Islamic and constitutional law at the University of Wisconsin Law School.

"If we play our cards right, we can really be a voice," said Quraishi, 37.

The association recently hired its first executive director, Farhana Khera, 35, who also is the group's president. She said post-Sept. 11 suspicions of Muslims , including mass interviews and roundups of Muslim men by the FBI and other law enforcement agencies, led many Muslims to seek legal assistance within their religious community. Sometimes, even the law students found themselves giving advice.

Khera, a former counsel to U.S. Sen. Russ Feingold, a Wisconsin Democrat, said that knowing a lawyer will understand your cultural and religious background increases the comfort level of a Muslim client. But in the end, Muslim American lawyers are trained in the same legal system as any other lawyer in the United States and have the same rights and responsibilities.

"I think Muslim American lawyers want to keep our nation safe, they want to be safe for themselves, their families and all Americans, but they are also committed to protecting the founding principles of our county, freedom and justice for all," Khera said.

The Muslim lawyers association's upcoming priorities include getting involved in the debate over reauthorizing the USA Patriot Act, which many believe unfairly targets Muslim and immigrant communities. Also, the group wants to help Muslim charities - some of which have been accused of funding terrorist groups - become more transparent in their finances and better managed.

Not only have Muslim law networks grown more mature, but other advocacy groups are using them for support or offering their own.

In 2002, the non-profit Muslim Scholarship Fund was established to assist Muslim students studying subjects in the humanities, journalism, law and other fields where the organization believes Muslims are underrepresented. Also in 2002, the Muslim Legal Defense and Education Fund formed to help Muslims facing prosecution.

While immigration and civil rights are special magnets, Muslim lawyers are entering a variety of legal areas, from construction law to tax law. In family law, for instance, Muslims say they could play a helpful role in certain cases, such as making sure an Islamic marriage contract can withstand scrutiny in a U.S. court.

Zaidi, for instance, is considering estate law. She expects she'll have plenty of non-Muslim clients as well as Muslim ones. And while she's frustrated with what she sees as the stress that American policies have brought on Muslims in the United States, she's the first to say she's grateful to be able to study American law.

"I am so blessed to be in this country," said Zaidi, who is of Pakistani descent. "If my parents hadn't immigrated, I wouldn't have this opportunity."