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Muslims,
Arabs in US Bitter About Interrogation Rounds
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| Ashcroft:
real purpose of interrogation is to show Arab & Muslim
communities that they are being watched. |
By
Steve Smith, IOL correspondent in Washingtons
WASHINGTON,
March 23, (IslamOnline) - State interrogations of and raids on Arab
and Muslim individuals and institutions in the United States have
intensified, sending shockwaves through these communities and
raising questions as to the Bush administration’s intentions
towards them.
The
latest clampdown has followed Wednesday's announcement by U.S.
Attorney General John Ashcroft, of a new round of interrogations of
some 3,000 foreigners in the country. They are to be questioned in a
bid to root out any connections they might have with militant
groups, he said.
The
announcement has been roundly criticized by Arab-American and civil
liberties groups and have brought Ashcroft's own credentials as a
rightwing Christian under the hot lamp.
Critics
of the questioning say it is part of a multi-phased and -faceted
racial profiling of Arabs and Muslims that has swept the United
States since the Sep. 11 terrorist attacks.
The
campaign has succeeded in intimidating entire sections of the U.S.
population but not in netting terrorists or their supporters, they
say, citing a recent Justice Department report.
In
it, Ashcroft's department acknowledged that interviews with a first
batch of 5,000 Muslims aged 18-32 have yielded only a few arrests
for immigration violations.
The
Justice Department said the second round of interviews would
complement the first set, which had targeted young Muslims who had
come to the United States from countries where the al-Qaeda group of
Saudi dissident Osama bin Laden was said to be active.
The
department, in its report, admitted most interviews to date have
uncovered no knowledge about the terrorist attacks.
Ashcroft,
however, said the real purpose of the months-long process was to
send a message to the Arab and Muslim communities that they are
being watched.
"Such
a climate could cause would-be terrorists to scale back, delay or
abandon their plans altogether," Ashcroft told reporters. He
said this proactive strategy "may well have contributed to the
fact that we have not suffered a substantial terrorist attack since
September 11th."
Officially,
all the interviews are voluntary, meaning interviewees can choose
not to cooperate. During the first round, however, teams of two or
more investigators -- typically from the Federal Bureau for
Investigation (FBI) and the Immigration and Naturalization Service
(INS) – often paid unexpected visits to the interviewees and
forced their way into their homes and places of work.
Arabs
interviewed during the first round told IslamOnline on condition of
anonymity that the officials routinely asked them and Muslims
“what they thought of bin Laden, al-Qaeda and the war in
Afghanistan, and whether there were things they did not like about
the United States.”
Usually
armed, the investigators told interviewees their eligibility for
successful immigrating to the United States would improve if they
volunteered information about anti-American statements or
individuals who were possibly angry at America, say young Muslims
who were interviewed.
The
young Muslim males also were required to account for their
background, contacts in the United States and elsewhere, places
visited prior to arriving in the United States, and their future
plans.
The
policies put in place since Sept. 11 against Arabs and Muslims
include the arrests, interrogations and detentions of well over
1,000 individuals; the mass detentions of non-immigrant students;
the 'voluntary' interviews of 5,000 men; and the roundup of 6,000
individuals who have outstanding deportation orders.
“The
latest actions, coupled with sweeping new provisions in the USA
Patriot Act ... create an atmosphere of suspicion and intolerance
towards the Arab/Muslim communities,” said Susan Akram, author of
the forthcoming law review article "Race, Civil Rights, and
Immigration Law After Sept. 11, 2001: The Targeting of Arabs and
Muslims.
“Among
the most problematic measures is the revival of racial profiling,
which had largely been discredited by the courts when applied to
African-American and other communities before Sept. 11,” she said.
Civil
liberties defenders and leaders of the Arab and Muslim Americans say
that such policies also raise very serious First Amendment issues,
as all the measures are designed or implemented in a way that chills
the speech and association rights of Arabs and Muslims, and deprives
the rest of the American public of the discourse of these additional
viewpoints, particularly on issues relating to the Middle East.
“Provisions
in the Patriot Act, along with these targeted actions, also revive
the discredited notion that an individual can be deported or denied
entry solely because her views are unpopular with the U.S.
government," Akram said.
Some
Arab and Muslim Americans say they now live in an atmosphere of
coercion and fear that could prove counter-productive in the U.S.
administration's self-proclaimed "war against terror".
"Many
Muslims responded to the government's call for translators after
September 11," said Raed Tayeh of the Washington-based American
Muslims
for
Global Peace and Justice. "Now they know the government doesn't
care about them anyway. This will only create hostility and
animosity among the Muslim community."
Worshippers
at the Dar-al-Hijra mosque, a few minutes' drive from the Pentagon
in Northern Virginia, told IslamOnline they noticed muscular men in
dark glasses video-taping their car license plates and taking
pictures of those who entered the house of worship.
"They
were not trying to hide themselves," said one worshipper.
"I think they are trying to let us know they are monitoring the
place. This could actually mean that their video cameras have no
tapes."
Many
attribute this wave of intimidation to the attorney general himself.
"He said bad stuff about Islam before," said the same
worshipper. "The funny part is that he is meant to be
religious."
The
Muslim man, who asked not to be identified by name, referred to an
Ashcroft interview with syndicated columnist Cal Thomas published on
the Christian Internet site crosswalk.com.
In
it, Ashcroft was quoted as saying: "Islam is a religion in
which God requires you to send your son to die for him. Christianity
is a faith in which God sends his son to die for you."
Muslim
groups said these and other of Ashcroft's statements included
inaccuracies about Islam.
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