[Ed.: During the stamp's unveiling ceremony, Rep. Tom Davis (D-VA) announced: "This stamp is an appropriate symbol of the values American Muslims represent. I look forward to buying a whole sheet of them and sending them on my Christmas cards."]
An Inclusive Litany
11/26/01
In response to a five-year lobbying effort, the Postal Service
released a stamp with Arabic writing commemorating Islam's two most
important festivals, Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adha. The stamp must be
reissued three times for it to earn a permanent place in the United
States Holiday Collection. But it was unfortunately released a few
days before the attacks on New York and Washington, at which point it
became very unpopular, not least among postal workers threatened with
anthrax exposure. Things got so bad that Aly Abuzaakouk of the
American Muslim Council
said that September 11 "has become a catastrophe for the stamps,
too."