Even before likely suspects were identified in Tuesday's devastating terrorist attacks, Muslims in the Twin Cities and nationwide held their breath, bracing for the worst.

"We hope we won't feel the heat," said Hamdy El-Sawaf, executive director of the Islamic Center of Minnesota. "We pray as Muslims and pray that God save our nation, the United States of America."

With that, El-Sawaf crossed his fingers for good luck.

His wariness is based on the fact that many Muslims have routinely felt besieged when a terrorist attack is waged against Americans. Most notably, in the aftermath of the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, Muslims in Minnesota and elsewhere reported being harassed because of the initial assumption that "Arab terrorists" had planted the bomb.

Nationwide, the Council on American-Islamic relations said more than 200 incidents of threats and harassment were reported by Muslims in the aftermath of Oklahoma City. The council also reported that a few Muslims wearing traditional Islamic clothing had complained of harassment in the hours after Tuesday's attacks.

At the University of Minnesota, Arab students reported a few uncomfortable encounters with other students and feared those could lead to outright harassment, said Wissam Balsche, president of the Arab Students Association. "People were staring, shaking their heads, giving bad looks - nothing serious, but we don't want people to rush to the wrong conclusion," Balsche said.

Members of the association "denounce any and all acts of terrorism," he said. "People shouldn't be pointing at Arabs or Muslims."

The Twin Cities-based Islamic Resource Group issued its own statement Tuesday, condemning what it called "these heinous and barbaric acts" and implored journalists not to fall prey to anti-Islamic stereotyping.

A similar point was made by Fadia Abul-Hajj, president of the Minnesota chapter of the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, "We're always concerned about this happening, hoping the media won't make us into a scapegoat," Abul-Hajj said. Although speculation about the terrorists has been more muted than in 1995, "there has been talk about Muslims, about Arabs, even before anyone knows who might have done this," she said. "Let's hope the American people have learned from the experience of Oklahoma City, when they started to point fingers and it turned out to be a homegrown terrorist."

Fouzi Slisli, who chairs the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee's media panel, said he fears that "some people will jump to conclusions when we're all still trying to understand how this could happen. Like all Americans, we're in shock - this is an attack on our country."

The Jewish Community Relations Council of Minnesota and the Dakotas issued a statement, calling it "inconceivable that any religion would condone these murders, and all people of all religions must condemn them."

In the past, local Jewish leaders have criticized the scapegoating of Arabs and Muslims "and we don't want anyone jumping to conclusions about this heinous act," said council spokesman Shep Harris. "You can't go looking for scapegoats - it hasn't worked in the past and won't work now."

Calls and e-mails poured in all day Tuesday to the Minnesota Islamic Center's offices in Fridley, with members of the Islamic community trying to glean any information they could about the attacks, El-Sawaf said.

A few parents had come to take their children home, largely because of the uncertainty that pervaded the news of the attacks. But despite El-Sawaf's fear that Muslims might be singled out for harassment, he said he had gotten no such reports by early afternoon.

"I can't even imagine everything that's going on now," he said. "This is much bigger, more serious than any terrorist attack we've ever seen. Any terrorist attack is totally against Islam and our beliefs. God help us. I can only pray to God to save this nation, to shower his mercy and tranquility on it."

Copyright 2004 Star Tribune. Republished with permission of Star Tribune, Minneapolis-St. Paul. No further republication or redistribution is permitted without the written consent of Star Tribune.