Hijab-wearing White House staffer quits Trump administration in 8 days

February 27, 2017

Washington, Feb 27: A bold Hijab-wearing Muslim ex-White House staffer of Bangladeshi-origin has said she quit her job after US President Donald Trump announced his controversial travel ban, lasting just eight days in the new administration.

HijabRumana Ahmed was hired in 2011 to work at the White House and eventually the National Security Council (NSC).

"My job there was to promote and protect the best of what my country stands for. I am a hijab-wearing Muslim woman I was the only hijabi in the West Wing and the Obama administration always made me feel welcome and included," she wrote in an article published in The Atlantic.

Ahmed said that like most of her fellow American-Muslims, she spent much of 2016 watching with "consternation" as Trump "vilified our community".

"Despite this or because of it I thought I should try to stay on the NSC staff during the Trump Administration, in order to give the new president and his aides a more nuanced view of Islam, and of America's Muslim citizens.

"I lasted eight days. When Trump issued a ban on travellers from seven Muslim-majority countries and all Syrian refugees, I knew I could no longer stay and work for an administration that saw me and people like me not as fellow citizens, but as a threat," she said.

Ahmed said the evening before she left her job at the White House, she notified Trump's senior National Security Council (NSC) communications adviser, Michael Anton, of her decision.

"His initial surprise, asking whether I was leaving government entirely, was followed by silence -- almost in caution, not asking why. I told him anyway," she wrote.

"I told him I had to leave because it was an insult walking into this country's most historic building every day under an administration that is working against and vilifying everything I stand for as an American and as a Muslim," Ahmed said.

She told Anton that the administration was attacking the basic tenets of democracy. She said Anton just looked at her and said nothing.

Ahmed, whose parents immigrated to the US from Bangladesh in 1978, said inspired by then president Barack Obama, she joined the White House in 2011, after graduating from the George Washington University.

"The days I spent in the Trump White House were strange, appalling and disturbing," she wrote.

Ahmed's personal account comes amid a spike in incidents of intimidation and assault targeting hijab-wearing women across the US following Trump's electoral triumph.

Comments

shaji
 - 
Monday, 27 Feb 2017

This wicked Trump is another face of Iblees and hope he will be taught good lesson by Americans in near future. He is ruining US and giving rise to hate. He is trying to be modern world Hitler like the one in another part of this world.

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March 27,2020

London, Mar 27:  British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said Friday he has tested positive for the new coronavirus, but remains in charge of the U.K.'s response to the outbreak.

Johnson's office said he was tested on the advice of the chief medical officer after showing mild symptoms.

It said Johnson is self-isolating at his 10 Downing St. residence and continuing to lead the country's response to COVID-19.

In a video message, Johnson said he had a temperature and a persistent cough.

Over the last 24 hours I have developed mild symptoms and tested positive for coronavirus.

I am now self-isolating, but I will continue to lead the government’s response via video-conference as we fight this virus.

Together we will beat this. #StayHomeSaveLives pic.twitter.com/9Te6aFP0Ri

— Boris Johnson #StayHomeSaveLives (@BorisJohnson) March 27, 2020
"Be in no doubt that I can continue, thanks to the wizardry of modern technology, to communicate with all my top team, to lead the national fightback against coronavirus."

Earlier this week Britain’s Prince Charles announced that he had tested positive for the virus.

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News Network
April 26,2020

Apr 26: The Chinese city of Wuhan, where the global coronavirus pandemic began, now has no remaining cases in its hospitals, a health official told reporters on Sunday.

"The latest news is that by April 26, the number of new coronavirus patients in Wuhan was at zero, thanks to the joint efforts of Wuhan and medical staff from around the country," National Health Commission spokesman Mi Feng said at a briefing.

The city had reported 46,452 cases, 56% of the national total. It saw 3,869 fatalities, or 84% of China's total.

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News Network
April 16,2020

Brussels/Amsterdam, Apr 16: As the novel coronavirus continues to wreak havoc in the western world since its outbreak in Wuhan last December, researchers believe that the Chinese leadership is trying to absolve President Xi Jinping by using a section of the western media to influence public opinion globally.

"There are clear indications that China is conducting activities in a persistent and systematic manner to influence public opinion-making, academia, think tanks and political decision-making among the member states of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) in general and western capital cities in particular," Siegfried O Wolf, Director of Research at Brussels-based think tank South Asia Democratic Front, said.

Some western media say some Chinese officials were secretly aware that they were facing a pandemic from the new coronavirus but allowed Wuhan to host a mass banquet for tens of thousands of people and millions began their annual trip home for the Lunar New Year celebrations.

The pandemic has since then affected 210 countries and territories around the world. Over 2 million people have been declared positive in which over 134,000 lost their lives.

"The frequency and extra-ordinary large scale of Chinese sponsored events in European political hubs, like in Brussels, and the subsequent media coverage can be seen as evidence for Beijing's public diplomacy efforts. However, the rising skepticism within the EU regarding Xi Jinping's development projects and the emerging questioning of Chinese sources funding Free Universities, like the one in Berlin, shows that this strategy produced mixed results so far," Wolf said.

He added, "However, one must also state that these efforts helped China to gain certain leverage among many non-Chinese media, western as well as non-western ones. Today, we can observe that China's political leadership tries to instrumentalise this influence for a major image campaign to distract from the fact that it carries the initial responsibility for the dramatic spread of COVID-19 by holding back key information."

Wolf also said that the current internal dynamics in China, like the shirking of responsibilities by the local authorities, are most-likely part of a twofold strategy. Firstly, there is the strategic component - namely, to reaffirm to the general public that the Communist Party of China is still in full control of the situation. The second strategic pillar is one of 'whitewashing'.

"Concretely, Beijing's obvious aim is to distract the domestic and international attention from the real, but hidden causes of the Coronavirus outbreak and its potential reputational and political consequences for Xi Jinping and his BRI," he stated.

Yoana Barakova, a Research Analyst at European Foundation for South Asian Studies (EFSAS), an Amsterdam-based think-tank, said, "The death of Dr. Li Wenliang, one of the very few medical professionals who tried to warn the world in December 2019 about the looming threat, sparked widespread condemnation around the international community in early February. Yet, little did he know that his legacy would continue much later after his demise, with the emboldened Chinese government trying to cover up its missteps through hardcore censorship after being exposed for undermining and underestimating the initial danger."

The researchers believe that the deterioration in press freedom under Jinping's regime has become more evident in recent days, with local authorities trying to control the state narrative by cosmetically placing media's focus on government's superficial attempts to tackle the crisis.

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