Arabs and Middle Easterners are ethnic minorities across the United States, but Peoria has one largest per-capita populations of Lebanese immigrants in America.
Lebanon is a country in the Middle East bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to the west, Israel and Palestine to the south and Syria to the east.
Lenny Unes, the grandson of Lebanese immigrants and leader of Peoria’s Itoo Society, talked with WCBU about how his community processed 9/11.
'No issues, no protests, no violence'
Lebanese immigrants began moving to Peoria in the 1800s. They worked on popular jobs and railroads and distilleries, sending money back home and slowly helping family members emigrate.
By the 1900s, Peoria had a large number of Lebanese immigrants who had come from the mountain village of Aytou. In 1914, they founded the Itoo Society.
Lenny Unes leads the society today. He also runs the printing company, his father, Leonard Unes, started 50 years ago on Spring Street.
Unes remembers sitting at home and watching the 9/11 terror attacks on TV. At first he felt shock, and it took days for the reality of what had happened to sink in.
For Unes, the tragedy felt even more surreal because it occurred just after a decade-long civil war had finally ended in Lebanon.
“When that was going on, we had an influx of immigrants come over to get away,” Unes said. “9/11 came around 20 years ago … so it was the end of the Civil War era, and then all of a sudden, boom, here we are again.”
Across the United States, hate crimes against Muslims rose after 9/11. The FBI later reported the number of anti-Muslim hate crimes increased from 28 in 2000 to 481 in 2001.
Racist and xenophobic attacks on South Asian and Arab Americans from varied faith backgroundsincreased, too.
In the wake of the 9/11 hijackings, some Itoo society members worried about retaliatory acts of hate and violence.
Would they be targeted? Should the Itoo Society cancel public events?
“We knew that there's a certain percentage of the public that's very uneducated, and believe what they want to believe when they hear things,” Unes said. “People just stereotype.”
The Itoo Society held its events anyway. Peorians from all walks of life showed up.
“No issues, no protests, no violence, no nothing,” Unes said. “You know, everybody came, the general public enjoyed it, had a good time.”
'The majority of the people are good, good people'
Unes believes 9/11 generated knee jerk reactions in part because Americans had never before seen a true act of terrorism on American soil.
But for those with family in the Middle East, such an occurrence is not so foreign of a concept.
“We lived in this little bubble of, ‘Nobody could touch America.’ And we found out that's not true,” Unes said. “Other countries in the world, they've seen this before. This is nothing new to me.”
In addition to the nearly 3,000 people who died on Sept. 11, 2001, approximately 801,000 people have been killed directly in the violence of the subsequent wars in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Syria, Yemen and elsewhere.
Today, wars are still being waged on the borders of Lebanon. Within the country, the economy and government face total collapse.
As he reflects on the 20th anniversary of 9/11, Unes says he helps fellow Peorians educate themselves on the ongoing realities of the Middle East.
Unes says the best way to educate oneself is not by watching the news, but by going out of one's way to meet Muslims and Arab-Americans and listen to their stories.
“You don't get a good bias from the news media about the Middle East, ever,” he said. “I've never picked up an article and said, ‘Oh, look at this great thing that's happening in the Middle East.’ You don't hear that. So it makes it hard to educate people that way.”
A common misconception is assuming all Arabs are Muslim, when in fact, people from the region represent multiple faith backgrounds. The Unes family, for example, is Catholic.
Before 9/11, Islam was not a very well-known religion in the U.S., Unes said. After 9/11, he said, Americans conflated Islam with war and the Arab diaspora.
"Back in the day it wasn't really anything you'd heard about. You were Christian, Catholic, Jewish, Presbyterian, Lutheran, Methodist ... anything but Muslim," Unes said. "So I think what happened there, and this is just my own personal observation, you started hearing on this news, hearing about these wars, and hearing this word, 'Muslim,' and people started associating that way."
Unes drew a parallel between ongoing stereotypes of Arabs and Muslims and stereotypes and biases against Black Americans.
"It's a matter of knowing your neighbor. Not stereotyping," he said. "The majority of the people are good, good people ... no matter what religion or country they're coming from."
He continued, "You have a group of people, a small percentage, that's giving a whole population a bad name. And it's not true. I can't just walk down a street and look at somebody, them being African-American, Indian, Arab, Muslim, white ... whatever they are, your first impression can't just be, 'Oh. I don't like him.' You gotta be able to know that person."
Sharing the Middle East with Peoria
Peorians don't need to look far to find a Lebanese neighbor.
The Itoo Society has 450 members, most of whom are local to the central Illinois area. They're working in courtrooms, restaurants, hospitals, factories and other industries.
Unes enjoys telling people about the Middle East. His most recent trip was about five years ago for a wedding.
“Just gorgeous,” he said. “The mountains, the Mediterranean Sea … Lebanon's the only Mideastern country where you can ski and you can swim in the ocean in the same day. Not too many people know that.”
Some of the cities in the Middle East are among the oldest in the world.
“The architecture, the history … You got to realize the Middle East was the beginning of civilization,” he said. “To see those things firsthand, some of those things that were still existing. It's just amazing to me.”
Even five years ago there were parts of the country Unes’ family avoided out of fears related to safety.
“As beautiful as it is, we did see the ugly parts of it, too,” Unes said. “We saw the Syrian refugee camps. It’s what you see on TV. … But that's in every country. There's good and bad.”
A port explosion in Beirut killed 200 people last year. More than a year later, Lebanese people are still reeling from shortages in food, medicine and other supplies as the economy continues to collapse.
The Itoo Society often sends aid overseas and works with local organizations in Peoria to put on fundraisers for the Lebanese community. Learn more online.
