Arab-Americans Reassured on Threats, Arson

Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley said Monday there is no evidence that any organized effort is behind a series of bomb threats and an arson attack that have been directed against Arab-Americans in the city since the outbreak of the Persian Gulf War.

Los Angeles Deputy Police Chief Ron Frankel, who joined the mayor at a meeting with representatives of the city’s Arab-American residents, said investigators believe that only “mean-spirited, despicable individuals,” acting independently, are suspects in bomb threats and a lone case of arson in Sherman Oaks.

Meanwhile, police spokesman Cmdr. William Booth reported that the number of bomb scares in the city has declined to about two a day. In the first seven days after the conflict began, Booth said, there were 65 bomb-related calls to the department.

Booth attributed some of the bomb scares to the public’s “heightened sense of awareness” to suspicious packages.

After meeting with seven Arab-American representatives for more than an hour Monday, the mayor said he believes that residents “must strengthen (themselves) against any tendency to stereotype” any ethnic group in relation to the war.

“Arab-Americans are loyal, law-abiding citizens,” the mayor said at a press conference. “We must protect ourselves against any attempt to tear apart the multiethnic community we have in Los Angeles.”

Maher Hathout, representing the Islamic Center of Southern California, said that those at the meeting had been reassured that the mayor and Police Department were “sparing no effort in preserving American ways” of tolerance.