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December 17, 2005
US: Black Muslims In New Intimidation Tactics
The problems began on Wednesday evening, November 23, when two shops in Oakland, California, were attacked by a dozen well-dressed Black Muslims, who smashed liquor bottles and warned the shopkeepers not to sell alcohol to Muslims.
In the early hours of Monday morning, 28 November, a shop was gutted by fire, and the 19-year old store clerk had been kidnapped. He was discovered at 2pm that afternoon in a Safeway car park in El Cerrito, locked in the trunk of a car.
The police examined video surveillance of the store attacks, and issued warrants for the arrest of six members of the Black Muslims, an organisation founded by Yusuf Bey, who died in 2003 of colon caner, while fighting court charges of sexual abuse.
Two members of the Black Muslim organisation surrendered to police, 19 year old Yusuf Bey IV, son and heir of the founder of the Black Muslims, and Donald Cunningham, a 73-year old associate of Yusuf Bey senior. Both are involved with the bakery franchise Your Black Muslim Bakery. Cunningham and Bey managed to secure bail of $200,000 each, and on Dec 9 we reported that Yasir Hakeem Azzem, aged 19, and 24-year old Kahlil Raheem were arrested. These again worked for Your Black Muslim Bakery, which was founded by Yusuf Bey senior in 1968.
The tactic of smashing up shops which sell alcohol was used by Black Muslims, who in this case worked for a Bey-owned laundry, against a store in North Richmond as far back as 1993, according to the Mercury/Contra Costa Times.
It appears that the group is now employing a tactic of intimidation without smashing of liquor bottles and refrigeration units. According to Daily Review Online, the son of a shopkeeper in West Oakland has claimed that members of the Black Muslim organisation had physically intimidated by sheer numbers.
Abellh Ali claimed that around 6pm on Wednesday (14 December) he was in his father's store, the Happy Times.
"These guys drove up in three cars, came in here and stood in rows," Ali said. "One of them put this card down on the counter and told me to behave like a real Muslim (and not sell alcohol).There at least 100 Yemeni owned stores in the Bay Area, and these feel particularly threatened by the current threats and actions of the Black Muslims. Muhamed Saleh Muhamed, president of the Yemeni-American Grocery Association, said that the counter clerk at Happy Times had felt threatened.'They came in three abreast, carrying a flag, like it was the president of the United States,"said Ahmed Ali, a relative.
Abellh Ali said he called 9-1-1. The police got here in five minutes, but the men were gone by then, he said.
The Black Muslim organisation is intimately linked with local politics and gangster-like behaviour, with violence only a few steps away from the group's public activities. Following the 2003 death of Yusuf Bey, the founder of the lucrative businesses associated with the Black Muslims, there have been deaths and attacks as people appear to be trying to mount take-overs of the group.
In 2004, 51 year-old Waajid Aljawaad Bey, the chief executive officer of Your Black Muslim Bakery was found in a decomposed state in a shallow grave in the Oakland Hills, and in June this year John Bey, an adopted son of Yusuf Bey and manager of one of the Bey Black Muslim-owned companies, was ambushed by gunmen and wounded. On Tuesday, October 25, 24-year old Antar Bey, a son and heir of Yusuf Bey, was shot dead as he was filling his car at a gas station.
We have reported extensively on the Black Muslims. These are the articles:
Posted by Giraldus Cambrensis at December 17, 2005 9:36 AM
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