Muslim Students Harassed During Prayer at USF

Incident at USF Parking Garage

• 🕌 Muslim students at the University of South Florida were harassed while attempting their morning prayer at the Collins parking garage.
• 😠 Three unknown men approached the students, shouting slurs and threats, including "You're going to burn in hell" and "I spit on the grave of Muhammad."
• 🥓 The men also taunted the students with bacon and told them to "take that towel off of your head."

Impact on Students

• 😥 Students described feeling their safety was stripped away and experiencing a profound sense of violation.
• 🗣️ The harassment included personal attacks, such as telling students to "go back to a country that I've never been to" and calling them "devil."
• 🌐 The perpetrators are reportedly part of a group that live streams and posts such incidents on social media across the country.

Community and Religious Reactions

• 🕊️ One student emphasized that being Muslim is a "religion of peace" and expressed a desire to uphold that reputation against ignorant individuals.
• 🙏 A representative from Calvary Church Brandon contrasted their conversational approach to sharing Christianity with the aggressive tactics seen in the video, stating that the actions on video were not love but "misplaced zeal."
• ✝️ He also stated that the perpetrators do not represent his religion and that such actions cast a bad shadow on Christians.

Official Response and Calls for Justice

• 🚓 USF police are actively working to identify and ban the men involved.
• ⚖️ The university anticipates referring the perpetrators to the state attorney's office for criminal charges.
• ✊ The targeted students are hoping for hate crime charges to be filed.