

The parents of a 7-year-old boy say he was beaten by five students on a school bus, allegedly while they made references to Muslims and the boy’s Pakistani heritage.



Abdul Usmani's father, Dr. Zeeshan-ul-hassan Usmani, told BuzzFeed News that his wife and three sons have left the US for Pakistan after this latest incident in a long history of discrimination towards his children and family.



“These are six and seven year old kids calling him names, with one kid punching him in the face, while two other kids attacked him, kicked him, and held his arms back,” Usmani said of his son.



He described his son “as American as you can get.”

“They keep beating him all the way from school to home on the bus,” Usmani said of the ride home from Weatherstone Elementary School in Cary, North Carolina, last Friday. Abdul, his father said, is traumatized by the attack and has a sprained arm.

Lisa Luten, a spokesperson for the Wake County Public School System, told BuzzFeed News that the principal of the school immediately began investigating the alleged incident after the family told them about it.

“[The principal] interviewed seven students sitting near this child, and none of the students, nor the bus driver, witnessed any type of altercation or incident,” Luten said, adding that the principal has one more child to interview and has not been able to get in contact with the Usmani family since Friday.

Speaking about allegation of discrimination based on religion or race, Luten said, “When [the family] originally shared the information, they didn't share any info about religion or race, and just that their child was bullied.”