A while back Manish had a post featuring a multimedia exhibit titled “DISAPPEARED IN AMERICA.”
Since 9/11, thousands of American Muslims were detained in a security dragnet. To date, none have been prosecuted on terrorism charges. The majority of those detained were from the invisible underclass of cities like New York. They are the recent immigrants who drive our taxis, deliver our food, clean our restaurant tables, and sell fruit, coffee, and newspapers. The only time we see their faces are when we glance at the hack license in the taxi partition, or the ID card around the neck of a vendor.
SM Tipster “Joykee” sends us this article hot off the NYTimes press:
For years, the father said, he watched as his daughter, now 16, became more and more drawn to the family’s Muslim religion. At 14, she began wearing a full-length veil and teaching religion classes at mosques around the city.
A year ago, she withdrew from her Manhattan high school because, a school official said, she felt uncomfortable with typical teenage banter. She told her family she wanted to go to an Islamic all-girls school, and when they could not afford to send her, she chose to study at home.
The father, a Bangladeshi watch salesman who describes himself as far more devoted to American education than to prayer after 13 years as an immigrant illegally in the United States, said he pushed for his daughter to return to public school.
Then last fall, the daughter he also describes as loving Bollywood soap operas and shopping with girlfriends startled him and her mother by seeking their approval to marry a young American Muslim man they had never met and whom she barely knew. The father refused the marriage overtures, which were made by the young man’s father in a call from Michigan.
A few months later, when the teenager stayed out overnight for the first time, the father, fearing an elopement, went to the police for help.
It is a decision he regrets deeply. His daughter and another 16-year-old girl are now described by the government as would-be suicide bombers and are being held in a detention center for illegal immigrants in Pennsylvania. He is sure that his visit to the police set off the F.B.I. investigation that led to a chilling assertion, in a government document, that the girls are “an imminent threat to the security of the United States based on evidence that they plan to be suicide bombers.” Family and friends call that absurd.
It gets worse. According to the mother’s account it’s not obvious how the second girl fits in.
Little is known about the second 16-year-old. The mother of the Bangladeshi girl, conveying her daughter’s account, said the two girls met for the first time at 26 Federal Plaza after her daughter’s arrest. But when the other girl, a Guinean who was facing deportation with her family, noticed her daughter’s veil, she gave her a traditional Muslim greeting, and federal agents seemed to think they were friends. The second girl ended up in the Pennsylvania detention center, too.
Obviously this is a second hand biased account (as Times critics will no doubt point out) and we have no idea why the FBI suspected the second girl, but it’s still a chilling perspective from a community that doesn’t understand why this is happening. It gets worse still.
A bond hearing in the Bangladeshi girl’s case is to be held this morning in York, Pa., but the government has asked that it be closed, based on an affidavit filed by a counterterrorism supervisor in the F.B.I.’s New York office. The case underscores the difficulties faced by anyone who is charged only with civil immigration violations, but is in fact being held in a counterterrorism investigation, lawyers said.
There are no firm time limits on immigration detention, so the burden is on the girls to prove that they are not potential suicide bombers, rather than on the government to prove they are.
The girls have no right to a court-appointed lawyer, and according to the government document that described the Guinean girl, her family had not retained one.
The Bangladeshi girl’s father, who sells cheap watches wholesale and, he said, earns less than $16,000 a year, hired a New York immigration lawyer for $2,500. But the lawyer declined to attend her first hearing, according to a motion he filed seeking to handle the matter “telephonically,” because of “time constraints.”
I just sent an email off to a friend at the ACLU. Hopefully they are all over this.
See other sources:
–Newsday
–The Herald
Update: A contact has informed me that the ACLU has already made the offer to help upon hearing of this.
Ah… the american Ishrat Jahan.
The article ignores the deep Islamic networks within America, one cannot break the Islamist network without jailing Muslims.
Lets hope the girl gets a fair trial.
As the article states, thousands of undocumented aliens were picked up and detained, and not even one has been convicted of a terrorism-related crime. Many of them had been ordered or allowed to leave by immigration judges, but they were still held WITHOUT CHARGE (end run around the Constitution). Big Brother also went after, among others, a white lawyer who was a convert to Islam for aiding terrorist…and then released him when they found it was all bullishq.
Its early in the facts of this case, but don’t blame me if I’m skeptical of the government’s assertions.
In fact, chances are the feds scan Sepia Mutiny (brown mutiny??? suspicious!) for terroristic activities. If they are, here’s a friendly message to them: $#*& you and have a nice day. Go after Bush, Wolfowitz and crew, the real terrorists.
There’s a contingent of NY area immigrant advocates that are working on this. If you’re interested in getting involved, drop me a line and I’ll pass your name along.
Well, I don’t think Bush and Wolfowitz are the ‘real’ terrorists as said commenter put it, but this story is deeply troubling. I am glad the ACLU is looking into this story…..
this is why i’m in law school!
Well, just because we’re paranoid, it doesn’t mean that nobody’s out to get us. It may have escaped your attention, but we are at war.
Also, I have Indian friends who have been here on H1B visas for years, and would love to have a green card. Why should this family jump the queue? If they find out this girl knows nothing, then put the whole family on the next plane to Bangladesh.
The assertion that thousands of Muslims have “disappeared” is an absurd slander.
This article is suggesting that they are still being held, but may I suggest that you look for them in Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Syria, etc.? There is no trial needed to deport someone not permitted to enter.
I’ve seen no claims that most of the detained were illegal immigrants. As a matter of fact, many had queued up at the INS to provide information on themselves voluntarily, and were locked up and … well, then people didn’t know where they were. The US government wont give a precise number of how many people it has detained, nor will it provide their names. While they may not have been citizens, they’re still (under current legal precedent) entitled to due process. The fact that not one terrorism prosecution has come out of this shows that it was largely a wild goose chase.
There were some detentions of ILLEGAL aliens after 9-11. They have all been charged with crimes, released, or deported. Some immigrants (not many) with other status were also investigated, and those investigations have concluded. In all, some 50 or so are still being detained, exclusive of those already charged. Two are being held as enemy combatants. There are no 1000’s of “disappeared” people. Perhaps you are receiving your information from those same savants who maintain that the Apollo moon landings were faked on a Hollywood back lot, or that the 9-11 attacks were committed by Mossad.
For a look at a report, generally hostile to US detention of illegal aliens suspected of terrorist links, please see this report. The numbers are nothing like what you allege. The highest figure that they could come up with is less than 2,000 in the months immediately following the attacks, and they are no longer held. Quoting from this report:
This report does the US no credit, but it falls far short of your allegations. Perhaps you would share with us your sources for these extravagant claims. Perhaps you could supply specifics about names, the circumstances of their detention, and the efforts to obtain information on them. Or is this more “taqqiya” from the usual sources?
Mitch, Usually it isn’t the best tactic to start an argument by referencing a website called “Jihad Watch” maintained by a writer from the ultra-conservative New York Post. You’ve automatically negated the need to read any further.
I’m sorry but your arguments mirror those found in the conservative echo chamber that makes up half of the blogosphere. This is about locking people up and throwing away the key without ever presenting evidence or being held accountable. It spits on the Bill of Rights, citizen or not. Your last sentence is particularly revealing:
“Perhaps you would share with us your sources for these extravagant claims. Perhaps you could supply specifics about names, the circumstances of their detention , and the efforts to obtain information on them. Or is this more “taqqiya” from the usual sources?”
Ummm. Isn’t this what we are in fact complaining about? As far as efforts to obtain information on them I suggest you visit the ACLU or HRW website. Details can be found there.
Jailing American citizens and foreign nationals without recourse to trial, torturing people on a wide scale, profiling and deporting tens of thousands (if not more) people does zero to help national security in combating violent anti-American Islamist fundamentalism (in part because it’s morally reprehensible and hinders efforts like community policing).
Also, I assume that your attitude towards what the U.S. government can do when it’s “at war” would extend to profiling and prosecuting to the fullest extent of the law on any and all technicalities all White Michigan Christian residents, since the 2nd largest “terrorist” attack in United States history was conducted by Timothy McVeigh, a White Christian from Michigan.
Also, I have Indian friends who have been here on H1B visas for years, and would love to have a green card. Why should this family jump the queue? If they find out this girl knows nothing, then put the whole family on the next plane to Bangladesh.
You have no understanding of the immigration system or what it’s like for people or the role it plays in the American economy. The DHS spends far more on enforcement than on reducing the greencard backlog (which would help your friends more than scapegoating people less fortunate). If you want more information on this issue, visit the Families For Freedom website–you’ll learn such interesting facts as over 1,000,000 have been deported since 1996. Better yet, make some friends with people who’s loved ones or friends are getting deported and see what they’re actually like and what they’re going through.
It’s hyperbole, not slander. The underlying sentiment–that the United States government has behaved in an incredibly unaccountable and callous manner towards populations from Muslim countries like Indonesia, Pakistan, and Jordan (among many others) is valid. It’s true that upwards of 80,000 people were required to register through one program alone. It’s true that about 14,000 people were put into deportation proceedings as a result of this selective enforcement, and most of them will be deported after Kangaroo Court. It’s also true that there are enforcement actions going on right now against Mexicans, Indians, and others who don’t fall into the narrow profiling because the government is more interested in looking like it’s doing something about national security than actually doing anything. And I’m just talking about the “post 9/11” stuff–not including the War on Drugs, the detentions of Haitian folks, the increasing criminalization of immigrants through legislation and polciy, etc.
Actually, even undocumented people are entitled to an administrative hearing before they’re deported (but you’re right, it’s a bullshit trial and in a better world, they would get a real trial with a real state-provided lawyer and everything, since they’re being treated like criminals). Further, most of the people who are getting deported are visa overstays, not people who were never permitted to enter. Beyond that, there are several people (like Hamdi or Padilla) who were declared enemy combatants and jailed indefinitely without recourse to courts.
You’re entirely misled. If you want to define “after 9/11” as “the first year after 9/11” then you might have a point (although I’m not even sure about that). However, as you can see from the fact that we’re talking about this right now because of an article, these enforcement efforts have been ongoing.
There have been thousands of people deported or detained through profiling tactics and probably over 100,000 who have been investigated primarily for their country of origin, ethnicity, or religion. I tracked policy on this issue for 18 months–try googling “Special Registration”, “Absconder Initiative”, “Operation Tarmac”, “Operation GameDay”, “Operation Predator”, “Operation LibertyShield”, and many others. You might also try looking up “extraordinary rendition”, a policy under which the U.S. government has moved prisoners to third countries in order that were more torture-friendly.
Also, beyond it being pretty disgusting to call another human being “illegal”, most of these folks that we’re talking about actually haven’t committed a crime–they’re mostly visa overstays, which is an administrative violation (which is why they don’t get a trial). It’s all pretty convenient for the government. Try using “udocumented person.”
A Department of Justice policy change in February 2002 discontinued the “hold until cleared†practice, allowing those being detained only for lack of FBI clearance to be released or removed.
You need to read the Department of Justice’s Inspector General’s report about how poor the FBI’s clearance procedure was, how many people ended up staying in jail longer than they need to, etc.
Beyond that, here’s some more reading material, Mitch: an article; an executive summary of a report, and some first person testimonials (big pdf) by people who were affected by one of these policies as well as some articles.
I don’t care how frightened you are of dying–you need to recognize the privilege you have of accidentally being born in a wealthy country while other people are not, and it’s not okay to break up their families and scapegoat them while they cut your lawn for a pittance just because you’re afraid (particularly when it serves no national security purpose at all).
Also, you’re making Americans look bad by spouting off without learning what’s going on first.
@ Abhi: The New York Post is about as “ultra-conservative” as the New York Times is “ultra-liberal.” The posting I referred to is merely a list of terrorist activities by Muslims in the US and prosecutions of those actions. Don’t bother reading it if you don’t care to. I supplied a criticism of US policies as well, and even that source could not back up the lies about thousands of “disappeared.” Even they could not come up with evidence of more than three people who were locked up indefinitely without charges. I believe Hamdi has since been sent back to Saudi Arabia, on condition that he renounce his US citizenship and never return. That leaves one, maybe two. I’m not familiar with one and cannot find a name. Padilla’s case is in the courts. You could call him held without charge if you like, but the real argument is how to try him.
The assertion at issue is that “thousands” have “disappeared.” I don’t expect you to supply thousands of names, but a few dozen would be helpful. Surely someone noticed the absence of such large numbers. Or do you expect me to account for every illegal alien in the US before you are satisfied that they are all safe and happy?
@ Saurav: Let’s concede that whether you call it slander or hyperbole, the original allegation was a lie. There are no thousands of “disappeared.”
“After 9/11” is not restricted to 9/12/01, so your surmise is correct.
One easy way to stay out of immigration wrangles is to stay out of the US unless lawfully admitted. You speak as though illegal aliens (no euphemisms, please, we’re American) had a right to be here, and deportation is a violation of that right. There is no such right. Every country, by definition, controls its own borders and territory. This is just a basic principle of sovereignity. Whether you like it or not, US immigration law is made in Washington, not Islamabad or Dhaka. As a citizen and a voter, I support enforcing our immigration laws, despite the wishes of those who violate them. When and if they are to be changed, and I believe they should be, there is a process for doing so.
Mitch, I’ve learned that it’s impossible to remove with reasoned arguments something that was put in someone’s head without reason. If the important matter in this situation to you, after all that everyone has told you and provided you with is that someone on a blog was a little hyperbolic about government abuses, then that’s your business. However, if you want some names, click on the link to the personal testimony, see some documentaries about this issue, and visit http://www.disappearedinamerica.org/ which has flashing names at the top right. I’ll repeat: at least thousands of people have been deported because of misdirected and racist government backlash after 9/11 (at least approx. 20,000). This is part of an overall problem in which over 1,000,000 people have been deported since 9/11.
As for your point about the “rule of law”, how about taking it up with the business men who profit from the undocumented labor rather than the laborers. Also, if the U.S. had not been instrumental in maintaining poverty around the world, it wouldn’t get to cherrypick the software engineers and doctors from other countries while allowing in and deporting the restaurant workers and garment workers when it sees fit. You need to learn more about this issue and the human toll it takes on families and people. I mean, the original issue we were talking about here is a pair of 16 (!) year old girls who were separated from their families, locked up, denied lawyers, denied the right to see what they were being charged with (!), and otherwise horribly treated by the U.S. government. Regardless of what you think about “illegal immigration” policy, surely you can have some sympathy here, right?
post script:
here are a “few dozen” names of people who were targeted and whose cases came to light and were made public (which is the vast minority of people). Keep in mind also, that many of these people had families who are now either forced to return with them (like Shabih Ul Hassan) or who are toiling away in the U.S. without the primary wage earner (like Muhammad Ali’s). I didn’t source them, so google their names if you want more info:
Muhammad Ali (Bangladesh), Iskander Ismail (Indonesia), Rafiqul Islam (Bangladesh); Muhammad Junaid (Pakistan); Shabih Ul Hassan (Pakistan); Mohammed Butt (Pakistan, died in U.S. custody); Faruk Abdel Muhti (stateless (Palestinian, died after being released after 2 years); Maher Arar (Canadian citizen, picked up in transit at a U.S. airport, and deported to Syria (via Jordan), where he was tortured and held for a year), Mohammad Bachir (stateless, Palestinian, detained for 18 months before release); T.I. (Bangladesh, in deportation proceedings, fears physical attack and persecution if returned to Bangladesh); Harun Ur Rasheed (Bangladesh); Purna Raj Bhajrachary (Nepal); Asif-ur-Rehman Safi (French); Ahfaz Khan (Pakistan); Malek Zeidan (Syria); Tony Ebibillo (Nigeria); Al-Badr Al Hazmi (picked up in immediate aftermath of 9/11, interrogated heavily, accused of having ties to Al Qaeda, not allowed to contact a lawyer for upwards of a day while he was questioned, not allowed to videotape FBI search of his home, released after a week in jail); Afzal Kahn (Pakistan); Tarek Mohammad Fayed (Egypt); Ansar Mahmoud (Pakistan); Mohammad Irshaid; Syed Jaffri (Pakistani, deported to Canada); Arif Mahmoud (Pakistan); Ejaz Haider (Brookings Institute scholar, temporarily detained); Mohammad Sarfarez Hossain (high school student, parents deceased, deportation to Pakistan stopped primarily because of Congressional intervention); and Khalid-Faiz Mohammad (Pakistan).
whoops: important correction–over 1,000,000 people have been deported since 1996 (when really harsh immigration laws were passed), not 9/11. From 2002-2004 it’s probably about 500,000 people (the vast majority of whom were removed for non-“9/11 profiling” reasons, under different methods of damaging people’s lives).
This doesn’t count the immense numbers of people who choose to leave under “voluntary depature”–best orwellian euphemism in immigration law–because they decide, for whatever reason, they’d rather not carry the legal and social stigma of having been deported.
Source: yearbook of immigration statistics, u.s. government (excel file):
More stats are available here.
Mitch “buddy”,
Perhaps you should read the pdf file you thoughtfully linked to.
“On November 5, 2001, the government announced that it had detained 1,182 persons in connection with the September 11th investigation. After that date, the Justice Department stopped issuing an official tally. To this date, it has declined to provide a complete figure of those detained.”
“Community-based organizations reported immigration raids in Arab, Muslim, and South Asian communities in cities across the nation after August 2002, but the number of individuals detained in these raids is not known.”
I just saw Jeff Gannon claim at the National Press Club the other day that Fox News isn’t conservative…you belong to same unreality that that buffoon does. The Times is hardly liberal…some writers are like Frank Rich and Maureen Down…but it’s more centrist than anything. Only a liar would claim that any part of Rupert Murdoch’s media empire is not slanted toward the Republican side.
You’re a liar and a fool who can’t even read documents that he links to.
peace
Saurav
As for your point about the “rule of law”, how about taking it up with the business men who profit from the undocumented labor rather than the laborers. Also, if the U.S. had not been instrumental in maintaining poverty around the world
How has the US been instrumental in maintaining poverty around the world? Is there a central commitee of grasping capitalists sitting in a bunker in Washington in front of a map of the world thinking up ways of ‘maintaining poverty’?
Straw men getting burned down all the time. The mental laziness and assumptions of some on the left is pathetic.
Is there a central commitee of grasping capitalists sitting in a bunker in Washington in front of a map of the world thinking up ways of ‘maintaining poverty’?
They’re probably not in a bunker most of the time, but other than that, pretty much. It’s most recently been called “The Washington Consensus.”
Since this isn’t the time or the place to go into a lengthy examination of how the U.S. has helped keep the world poor, I give you as a modest example this priceless excerpt from a leaked Lawrence Summers memo (then Chief Economist of the World Bank, later Secretary of the Treasury):
Just between you and me, shouldn’t the World Bank be encouraging more migration of the dirty industries to the LDCs [less-developed countries]? I can think of three reasons:
1) The measurement of the costs of health impairing pollution depends on the foregone earnings from increased morbidity and mortality. From this point of view a given amount of health Impairing pollution should be done in the country with the lowest cost, which will be the country with the lowest wages. I think the economic logic behind dumping a load of toxic waste in the lowest wage country is impeccable and we should face up to that.
…
The problem with the arguments against all of these proposals for more pollution in LDCs (intrinsic rights to certain goods, moral reasons, social concerns, lack of adequate markets, etc.) could be turned around and used more or less effectively against every Bank proposal for liberalization.
Saurav
Comrade, your rotting Marxist ship sank a long time ago. I know the pangs of pain this induced were awful, and the hatred of America they ushered in were intense, but your Straw Man fallacies make you look foolish.
ummm…okay. do you know what “straw man” means?
Speaking of “mental laziness and assumptions”…
You lack even a rudimentary knowledge of immigration law.
Saurav
Google it
turdlife
The truth cuts through flab, deal with it.
Wow! compelling argument jaundiced cur…
Mohammed Bachir, the homeless Palestinian who was detained for 18 months, scammed $31,000 in money from me when I was producing a documentary short about victims of post-9/11 discrimiation. He also also scammed members of the Arab community in Orange County, CA, where I believe that he still lives. We must continue to fight to protect the rights of those who are unjustly detained and mistreated. However, we must be prudent and protect ourselves from people like Mr. Bachir who act more out of self-interest than they do to defend the mistreated.