(Ahlul Bayt News Agency) - Usama Alshaibi said Monday he was repeatedly punched and kicked by four men after he arrived at the party early Sunday in Fairfield, a southeastern Iowa city of about 9,500 residents where he moved with his wife last year. The 41-year-old, who was born in Baghdad but grew up in Iowa City, said the men called him an epithet used to refer to Arabs as well as “Osama bin Laden” and beat him before he got away.
Alshaibi is producing a film called “American Arab” for Chicago-based Kartemquin Films about discrimination against Arabs in the U.S. He won critical praise for an earlier documentary, “Nice bombs,” about reuniting with his family during the war in Iraq.
A Fairfield police report says a Family Video manager called 911 to report a man in his parking lot crying and screaming at 12:19 a.m. Sunday. Responders found Alshaibi bleeding from his forehead and nose, with some scratches on his hands as if he had fallen to the ground. Alshaibi said he went to the hospital later Sunday, was treated and released.
Fairfield Police Chief Julie Harvey said Monday officers believe Alshaibi’s claims are credible because he was clearly assaulted, and they continue to search for the alleged assailants. She said Alshaibi has been unable to pinpoint the home where the assault allegedly occurred because he was intoxicated when he arrived and disoriented when he left.
“Is it a hate crime? Yeah, by what they were calling him,” she said. “We just don’t have an idea of where the incident took place at. It’s a high rental district. There’s a lot of people in and out, in and out. We just got to locate the house and then go from there.”
Alshaibi, his wife, another filmmaker who was with him that night and Kartemquin all said the report was not a publicity stunt.
“This isn’t how I would promote my film,” Alshaibi said. “I thought I was going to die.”
According to Kartemquin Films, which made the critically acclaimed documentary “Hoop Dreams,” Alshaibi’s film will tell the story about what it was like to share the first name with a criminal mastermind after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and the stories of other Arab-Americans. The project has received a $75,000 grant from the MacArthur Foundation.
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