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Chronology of Islam in America (2005)
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali
March 2005
Poll: 39 percent of Americans back torture
March 1: More than one in four Americans would go so far as to utilize nuclear bombs if need be in the fight against terrorism, according to a national survey reported today by The Gallup Organization. Gallup asked Americans whether they would be willing or not willing “to have the U.S. government do each of the following” and then listed an array of options. For example, “assassinate known terrorists” drew the support of 65% of all adults. “Torture known terrorists if they know details about future terrorist attacks in the U.S.” won the backing of 39%. Finally, the option of using “nuclear weapons to attack terrorist facilities” drew the support of 27% of adults, with 72% opposing, which would shatter the taboo on using these weapons militarily since the attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Foreigners targeted by Homeland Security
March 2: America has unjustly detained more than 5,000 foreign nationalists since December 2001, without charging any of them with a terroristic crime, said David Cole, a law professor at Georgetown University.
"Our government says, 'We will sacrifice foreign nationals' rights, Arabs and Muslims most notably, for Americans' security,'" said Cole of the U.S. Preventive Detention Campaign. Cole believes our nation is experiencing the largest example of ethnic profiling after the Sept. 11 attacks since World War II, when the U.S. government interned Japanese-Americans.
Arab and Muslim professors at US universities remain target
March 3: Arab and Muslim professors at the Middle East and Islamic Study Centers at the US universities are target of the neoconservatives and the Evangelical Christian right while the funding coming from the Arab and Muslim endowments is labeled as “blood money,” says Dr. Hatem Bazian, Professor at the Near East and Ethnic Studies Department, University of California, Berkeley. In a speech entitled “Empire's embedded intellectuals” at the University of California Berkeley, Dr. Bazian pointed out that the case of Colombia University of New York is the latest attack on Arab and Muslim professors where four professors are under attack by pro-Israel students. He said that the Colombia University President, based on the film Columbia Unbecoming developed by the David Project, has established a special committee to investigate the Middle East Studies program. While forming this committee the university has by passed the normal procedure to entertain students’ complaints against a professor. The 40-minute film was first screened in March 2004 to a handful of university alumni. Then it was shown to high-level in the university administration and eventually to the Columbia University president, Lee Bollinger. In October, Natan Sharansky, Israel’s minister for Jerusalem and Diaspora Affairs, also watched and admired the film. In the film a number of selected students gave testimony about the alleged intimidation they face in the class room, in particular about Joseph Massad which resulted in canceling his class on Palestine this semester.
Census: U.S. Arabs well paid, educated Median income higher; more have degrees
March 8: The 1.2 million people of Arab descent living in the United States tend to be better educated and wealthier than other Americans, the U.S. Census Bureau reported. The population of U.S. residents whose ancestry is solely or partly Arab is less than a half-percent of all Americans. The details in the report covered the people who identified themselves in the 2000 census as having only Arab ancestry. Arabs are nearly twice as likely as the typical U.S. resident to have graduated from college -- 41 percent to 24 percent. The median income for an Arab family was $52,300, about $2,300 more than the median income for all U.S. families. And the proportion of U.S. Arabs working in management jobs was higher than the U.S. average, 42 percent to 34 percent. Arab-American groups say the 1.2 million tallied in the census is probably an undercount since many people of Arab ancestry came from countries with oppressive governments and may be reluctant to fill out government forms.
No 'true' al Qaeda sleeper agents have been found in US
March 9: A secret FBI report obtained by ABC News concludes that while there is no doubt al Qaeda wants to hit the United States, its capability to do so is unclear. The 32-page assessment says flatly, "To date, we have not identified any true 'sleeper' agents in the US," seemingly contradicting the "sleeper cell" description prosecutors assigned to seven men in Lackawanna, N.Y., in 2002. The report continues that "US recruits are hard to find and al-Qa'ida detainees have reported that US citizens can be difficult to work with, one senior detainee claimed that US citizens and others who grew up in the West, were too independent and thought they knew more about US operations than senior planners."
Alleged abuse of Muslim inmate probed
March 11: The Justice Department's Office of the Inspector General said it had ''found a disturbing pattern of discriminatory and retaliatory actions against Muslim inmates" by the warden and guards at an unnamed federal prison, one in a series of criticisms the internal watchdog leveled against the federal Bureau of Prisons in connection with its treatment of Muslims. Inspector General Glenn A. Fine also disclosed that an FBI agent sent an e-mail to field offices ''identifying the names and addresses of the proprietors and customers of a Muslim-based website," along with instructions to ''take whatever action it deemed appropriate" against any local people on the list. The report was the latest in a series of semiannual reviews of civil rights and civil liberties violations required by a provision of the USA Patriot Act, the law enforcement powers enacted after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
Bank closes mosque account
March 11: A Palos Hills bank in Chicago closed the account of a Bridgeview mosque because the mosque donated $10,000 to an Islamic charity that is now under federal scrutiny for allegedly helping terrorists. Family Bank and Trust Co. told the Mosque Foundation to take its business elsewhere in a December letter to mosque leaders. In a later meeting with mosque leaders, bank officials said they took the action because the mosque wrote two checks totaling $10,000 to the Islamic American Relief Agency, said Mosque Foundation President Oussama Jamal. Jamal said the mosque made its donations in August and September, before the U.S. government froze the charity's assets and raided its Missouri offices in October. At that time, the Treasury Department alleged the organization was part of an international front group for Al Qaeda, a charge denied by Islamic American Relief.
Four Iranian brothers released after long immigration detention in Los Angeles
March 16: Four Iranian brothers detained for more than three years after their arrest in an FBI terrorism probe were freed after U.S. immigration authorities eased certain travel restrictions. The Mirmehdi brothers - Mohammed, Mostafa, Mohsen and Mojtaba were released after the government revised its offer and reduced the restrictions, said Virginia Kice, a spokeswoman for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The brothers have been held since October 2001. Federal authorities alleged they supported a Los Angeles-based cell of the Moujahedeen Khalk, or MEK, which opposes Iran's regime and is classified by the State Department as a terrorist organization. The brothers acknowledged attending protest events against Iran's current regime, but denied belonging to the MEK. They never faced criminal charges. They were sent into detention to await deportation for allegedly lying in the 1990s on their applications seeking political asylum, and for their suspected ties to the MEK. Last August, the Board of Immigration Appeals ruled evidence tying the brothers to terrorism was inconclusive.
ACLU seeks documents in denials of visas to foreign scholars
March 16: The American Civil Liberties Union asked the Bush administration to turn over documents detailing the use of immigration laws to bar foreign scholars from the United States because of their purported support of terrorism or on other ideological grounds. Citing three prominent cases in the past year, the ACLU said the administration appears to be denying visas to Muslim and Hispanic academics because it disagrees with their political views. The ACLU said the Patriot Act appears to have been invoked in the case of Tariq Ramadan, a Swiss citizen and Muslim scholar whose work visa was revoked last year just days before he was to begin teaching at the University of Notre Dame. The Department of Homeland Security cited security concerns but released no specifics. Another recent incident cited by the ACLU is the denial of a visa to former Nicaraguan Sandinista leader Dora Maria Tellez, who was to have taught a course this spring at Harvard Divinity School. Tellez said last month the visa had been unfairly denied on security grounds. Tellez, a historian, participated in a famous attack by Sandinista rebels on Managua's congress building in 1978 during the revolt that toppled dictator Anastasio Somoza a year later. She leads a party allied with the Sandinistas. The third incident involved more than five dozen Cuban scholars refused permission to take part in the Latin American Studies Association's meeting in Las Vegas last October. State Department spokesman Richard Boucher defended the action at the time, saying the Cubans' aim was to "spout the party line."
Neocon magazine promotes anti-Muslim hate literature
March 17: The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) today called on a prominent national neoconservative magazine to clarify its policy on anti-Muslim hate following revelations that the publication distributed an Internet advertisement for an virulently Islamophobic book. CAIR's request came in response to a complaint from a member of the National Review's e-mail list who received a message promoting an apparently self-published book that, according to the magazine, is a "guide into the dark mind of (the Prophet) Mohammed."The National Review's review of the book states: "(The author) explains why Mohammed couldn't possibly be a true prophet, and reveals the true sources of his 'revelations.'"
Woman leads Friday Prayers in New York
March 18: Amina Wadud, a professor of Islamic studies at Virginia Commonwealth University, who says she has a problem with the Quran, leads Friday prayer in New York’s episcopal Cathedral of Saint John the Divine. The Voice of America, reporting the events said that some observers say the event represents a split between the thinking of older Muslims and a new generation born and bred in the United States. Others say the event was to help publicize a new book written by one of the organizers.
Dell reinstates 31 Muslim workers fired for praying on job
March 21: Dell Computer reinstated 31 Muslim workers, mostly Somalis, at its Nashville factory who were fired after a disagreement over evening prayers. Council on American Islamic Relations said that under the agreement the employees who left work last month will be reinstated, receive back pay and be granted religious accommodation. Managers will also receive additional training on existing religious accommodation policies and practices. Other terms of the settlement weren't made public.
Judge apologizes to ex-terror defendant
March 22: A federal judge in Detroit apologized on behalf of the U.S. government to a Moroccan immigrant who was tried on terrorism charges in a case marred by prosecutorial misconduct, including the withholding of evidence. Judge Gerald Rosen's comments came during a hearing at which Ahmed Hannan pleaded guilty to unrelated insurance fraud charges. Rosen sentenced Hannan, 36 to six months in jail, with credit for the more than three years he already has served. Hannan was deported to Morocco at the end of the week. As part of a plea agreement, the Detroit man waived any right to appeal deportation.
Columbia panel reports no proof of anti-Semitism against Arab professor
March 31: An ad hoc faculty committee charged with investigating complaints that pro-Israel Jewish students were harassed by pro-Palestinian professors at Columbia University said said it had found "no evidence of any statements made by the faculty that could reasonably be construed as anti-Semitic." The committee was formed at the request of Columbia's president, Lee C. Bollinger, after the release of a videotape in which students said they had been intimidated by professors of Middle Eastern studies both in and out of class. Pro-Israel students said they made the video because they had been unable for several years to get administrators to take their complaints seriously. The film was backed by the David Project, a pro-Israel group based in Boston. The report noted that although often combative exchanges occurred between pro-Palestinian professors and pro-Israel students, no students received lower grades because of their views. World Bank study faults 9/11 commission’s "madrassa" estimates
World Bank study faults 9/11 commission’s "madrassa" estimates
March 31: A team of researchers funded by the World Bank has challenged the accuracy of leading estimates of the number of Pakistani students who attend Islamic schools that are considered potential incubators of terrorists - including the estimates of the U.S. 9/11 Commission. The researchers, who conducted a census of more than 100,000 households in Pakistan's largest province, say their data show that no more than 1% - or fewer than 250,000 - of all school-going students in the country attended "madrassas" in 2003. That is far fewer than the "millions" estimated by the 9/11 Commission. "Madrassa enrollment figures cited in the popular press and institutional reports, none of which are substantiated using publicly verifiable data, are sometimes highly inflated," the researchers say in their study, published recently on the World Bank's Web site. Even along Pakistan's often-lawless border with Afghanistan, madrassas account for less than 7.5% of school enrollment, the study says. Ever since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, the U.S. government has regarded madrassas as a dangerous fount of anti-American violence and has made their taming a priority. (http://notapundit.myblogsite.com/blog/_archives/2005/3/31/499006.html)
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