Karen,
Let me give you a bit of background on why this conference was held in Oak Lawn. Chicago has a relatively large Arab population (mostly clustered on the southwest side of the city), as do some of the blue collar suburbs, including Oak Lawn, that are located directly southwest of the city. The Arab populations for some of the suburbs adjacent to Oak Lawn are high enough to merit a mention in their Wikipedia profiles. According to Wikipedia, the Arab populations of Hickory Hills, Burbank, Brdigeview and Chicago Ridge are 5.5%, 4.6%, 7.2% and 6.9%, respectively.
There have been problems. You may recall that Patrick Fitzgerald targeted a couple of Muslim charities headquartered in the area. Immediately after 9/11, one of my godchildren, who was attending Oak Lawn High School at the time, told me that there had been some confrontations at the school involving some of the Arab students who were supportive of the terrorists. Some of these confrontations required police intervention. At the behest of the school, none of these incidents were reported by the local media.
I have friends in Oak Lawn and I've actually been to a couple of wedding receptions at the Oak Lawn Hilton.
Regards,
Glenn |
