Group Protests Over Anti-Arab T-Shirts

About 20 people opposing U.S. involvement in the Persian Gulf on Saturday carried signs and chanted slogans outside a Glendale T-shirt shop, which until last week sold a T-shirt that protesters said symbolizes the country’s growing animosity toward Arabs.

“There has been a rising tide of anti-Arab and anti-Muslim sentiment since the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait,” said Ahmed Nassef, spokesman for the Los Angeles Coalition Against U.S. Intervention in the Middle East. “We must fight against this frightening wave of hysteria.”

The protest was held at Loco Shirts in the Glendale Galleria to symbolize the proliferation of T-shirts and other items carrying derogatory, anti-Arab messages, Nassef said.

Loco Shirts had sold a T-shirt showing an F-14 fighter, its guns fixed on Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein riding a camel. The message on the shirt read: “I’d Fly 8,400 Miles to Smoke a Camel.”

Mark Specht, owner of Loco Shirts, said the shirt was not intended to be racist. He said its message simply expressed opposition to Hussein and the Iraqi invasion. “These shirts are not Arab-bashing shirts,” Specht said. “These are political beliefs. They’re not meant to be criticism of Arab people.”

Specht pulled the $11 shirts out of his store last Wednesday when he learned of plans for the rally. He said he did so out of concern for the safety of his patrons.