There are two Eid celebrations on the Muslim calendar. One is celebrated at the end of Ramadan, which is a month-long period of fasting and prayer. The second is celebrated on the 10th day of the 12th Islamic month.
News12 According to the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR), New Jersey has the highest population density in America of people who identify as Muslim. (Still far less the Jewish population)
East Brunswick Muslim residents say they’ve been actively pushing to have two Muslim holidays added to the calendar for at least a decade. “We have a great opportunity here to make sure the Muslims here are recognized,” says Zaid Hussein, of CAIR.
It was not clear if the district would be adding Eid to the school calendar. Currently, the holiday counts as an excused absence, (where no tests or important school events are scheduled) for students who do take off.
Jack Rider says
Just wait & see how tolerant the muslim community is when it gets a firm hold on local government and the local school board. One should note that muslims believe that islam should replace secular government altogether and that humanity does not have the right to make its own laws apart from islam’s revelations.There is a real test in a democratic society’s accommodation of islam. To bar or prohibit its practice would be against the First Amendment. On the other hand to not examine it for what it is, to not take steps to shape its allowable behaviors, would be to invite a constant conflict between constitutional principles and the prerogatives that islam takes for itself, like polygamy, honor killings and female genital mutilation. That constant conflict will also include islam’s jihad when it is so inclined.