While the nation waits to hear whether Zacarias Moussaoui will spend his life behind bars or be executed for his alleged role in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, many local Muslims and Arab-Americans are not watching so closely.

“In our experience, when there is some type of incident that happens overseas, American Muslims brace themselves for some kind of backlash over here,” said Rabiah Hmed, a spokeswoman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations in Washington. “Most American Muslims don’t associate themselves with [Moussaoui], so they haven’t been following his trial very closely.”