The events of Patmeena Sabit’s novel resonate with the sociocultural treatment of Muslim minorities in the United States in the wake of the September 11, 2001, attacks. The destruction of the World Trade Center in New York by the terrorist organization al-Qaeda propelled the US government to launch its global “War on Terror,” an extended military campaign focused in the Middle East and Central Asia (al-Qaeda was based in Afghanistan at the time). These events had a significant impact on the perception of Muslim Americans, Middle Eastern Americans, and Central and South Asian Americans, as they became wrongfully associated with the terrorist attacks. This led to a rise in hate crimes against Muslim Americans (or Americans perceived to be Muslim), beginning with a 1,617% escalation in discriminatory attacks between 2000 and 2001 (Alfonseca, Kiara. “20 Years After 9/11, Islamophobia Continues to Haunt Muslims.” ABC News, 11 Sep. 2021). An ideological movement branding itself the counter-jihad, which painted Islam as a violent religion that threatened the existence of so-called Western civilization, exacerbated the prejudice driving such attacks.

Although the War on Terror would gradually lose favor by the end of the 2000s, Islamophobia remained part of American culture.