MANCHESTER, N.H. (AP) – A woman from Bangladesh, wearing a burka, points to a small cut under her 11-year-old son’s left eye – an injury received when he was a hit by a snowball this week.

“They tell him ‘go back Iraq’,” said his mother, who owns a convenience store in Manchester. “After the war … the kids start hating him.”

Samuel, a slight sixth-grader, is an American. His mother immigrated from Bangladesh 15 years ago. They have experienced teasing and name-calling, just part of the problems 40 members of New Hampshire’s Muslim community brought to a meeting Friday night.

Attorney General Peter Heed, Episcopal Bishop Douglas Theuner and other law enforcement and government officials met with Muslims in the basement of a Manchester mosque.

It was the third such meeting since the Sept. 11 attacks. Some measures have been implemented in New Hampshire since then, like cultural and sensitivity-training for police officers and a hot line for anyone who believes they are being harassed or discriminated against because of their religion.

Salman Malik, secretary of the Islamic Society of Greater Manchester, said Muslims were lucky in New Hampshire in the two years following the terrorist attacks. There were no murders or violence or serious backlash, he said.

“What we’re beginning to see now, as time passes, is the discriminatory process is not as obvious,” said Malik, an American-born oral surgeon. “It’s little things.”

Little things include visas stalled in government agencies, employment and housing discrimination and verbal harassment, he said.

Even something such as eye-contact can be a problem.

In some Muslim cultures, it is considered a challenge to authority or sign of disrespect to meet another person’s eye. In America, Malik said, people think they’re being shifty or acting suspicious.

Malik is especially frustrated with a law passed after the attacks requiring all non-citizen Muslims to go to Concord for certain licensing procedures.

“We’re easy targets. We’re not well-organized. We don’t have money, we don’t have connections,” said Malik.

Heed said the key is striking the right balance between security and nondiscriminatory policies. But he acknowledged the frustration rules like the licensing procedures brings to Muslims.

“Part of the reason the state is doing that is to be very secure and to observe,” said Heed. “We would like to look at the way the licensing policy works, so we can balance security with making things less discriminatory and more fair.”

Overall, Heed and other Muslims said New Hampshire has tried to be welcoming.

“You can sense their hurt and frustration,” said Heed. “But most of the problems are small. Things are not out of hand in New Hampshire.”

AP-ES-12-13-03 1304EST