A terror attack has gone unnoticed in the eyes of the media last week after three Ku Klux Klan members assaulted Hispanic men and women in a Los Angeles public park.
According to The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, the men were yelling racial slurs and “heil Hitler” while flying a Confederate flag in Stephen Sorensen Park. The men then attacked three Hispanic teens, prompting the family of one of the teens to intervene in the fight. The white supremacists produced knives in response and started to threaten the family members.
“They just started beating them up. They started coming towards us, and they pulled out some knives, and they were saying they would kill us,” said one of the teen’s fathers.
According to the Independent, the incident was not referred to as terrorist attack despite the FBI definition what what constitutes terrorism:
“The unlawful use of force or violence against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives.”
Another stabbing incident involving KKK members and three counter-protesters during a rally in Anaheim was also not defined as terrorism by local or national media.
“The only time the word terrorism or terrorist is used is when the perpetrator happens to be an Arab or a Muslim,” said Abed Ayoud, legal and policy director for Washington DC-based think tank American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee.
“When the perpetrator happens to be a white American then the terminology is changed. So if it’s a white person then often we will hear that they have mental issues, they are troubled, different descriptions for their mental state.”
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