Muslims Are Caught in the Middle : Gulf war: They flock to a mosque, hear pleas for peace, and wonder and worry about relatives in the Middle East.

By TAMMERLIN DRUMMOND and DAVAN MAHARAJ

Jan. 19, 1991 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITERS

GARDEN GROVE — Calling upon Allah to provide a solution to the escalating conflict in the Persian Gulf, more than 1,000 Muslim worshipers gathered at the county’s largest mosque Friday to pray for an end to war in the Middle East.

“In the name of good sense, I appeal that this war should stop now,” Muzzamil Siddiqui, religious affairs director for the Islamic Society of Orange County, said during a regular Friday afternoon prayer service at the Orange Crescent School’s mosque.

“Iraq should withdraw from Kuwait and all the U.S. and allied forces should pull out of the Middle East,” Siddiqui said, his voice rising with emotion.

After the sermon, which was devoted entirely to the war in the Persian Gulf, there was talk of little else.

“There is a great deal of sadness and anguish here today,” said Dr. Nazeer Ahmed, the society’s president. “A lot of people here have relatives in the gulf, and they want the hostilities to come to an end.”

Elsewhere in Orange County, Iraqis, Kuwaitis and other Arab-Americans sat transfixed in front of their television sets for the third day in a row, grimly watching the destruction as they prayed for the safety of relatives left behind.

“This is hell we’re going through,” said one Iraqi from Laguna Niguel, who asked not to be identified. “The Pentagon says the precision bombing is 80% reliable, but what happens to the other 20%?”

The man said he fears that his sister, who lives in an oil-producing town 100 yards from a rocket-launching site, is in grave danger. In fact, he does not know if she is dead or alive.

“You can’t call because all of the phone lines are disconnected,” he said. “All we can do is pray that she is all right.”

Another Iraqi, who lives in Anaheim, described the frustration at not being able to obtain news about the welfare of more than a dozen relatives living in Iraq.

“Before the war, I would get my information from relatives in Europe who would sometimes have access to better information,” said the man, who also asked not to be identified. “But in the last few days, I haven’t been able to find anything out and I’m worried about them.”

Husain Aljasen, a Kuwaiti who was on vacation in the United States with his wife and three children when Iraq invaded his country, has been compelled to stay in the United States since August. Fortunately, he said, the family had enough savings in the bank here to rent an apartment in Fullerton.

Aljasen, an executive for a petroleum company, said he has not heard for three weeks from the relatives he left behind.

“I have some sisters, brothers, uncles, aunts and the whole rest of my family in Kuwait City,” Aljasen said. “I don’t know how they are doing.”

Iraqis and Kuwaitis were not the only Arab-Americans closely monitoring the war. Others fear that Israel will retaliate against Iraq, setting off a chain reaction throughout the Middle East.

“It makes my stomach sick,” said Hassan Hassan, 43, a restaurant owner from Lebanon. “The way it looks, we’re not going to have a small, short war. It looks like they want to spread it all over the Middle East.”

Hassan, who has lived in the United States for 23 years, said his cousins in Bahrain, an island of about 1 million people wedged between Saudia Arabia and Iran, were forced to flee to Saudia Arabia three days ago.

“They were right in the middle of the conflict and no one knows if by accident, some missiles could fly over their homes,” Hassan said. “Some of their children are babies 1 year and 2 years old.”

Times staff writer Kristina Lindgren also contributed to this report.