The San
Francisco FBI's own documents show that it recorded Muslim religious leaders'
and congregants' identities, personal information and religious views and
practices. The documents also show that the FBI labeled this information as
"positive intelligence" and disseminated it to other government agencies,
placing the people and organizations involved at risk of greater law
enforcement scrutiny as potential national security threats.
The "Mosque Outreach" documents, from between 2004 and 2008, detail information and activities including: FBI visits to the Seaside Mosque five times in 2005, documenting the subject of a particular sermon and congregants' discussions regarding a property purchase for a new mosque.
Despite an
apparent lack of information related to crime or terrorism, the FBI's records
of these discussions show they were classified as "secret," marked "positive
intelligence" and disseminated outside the FBI.
FBI meetings with members of the South Bay Islamic Association four
times from 2004 to 2007, documenting discussions about the Hajj pilgrimage and
"Islam in general."
At the same
time many Muslims are approached by the FBI to become informants. According to
the Council on American Islamic Relations, it is getting regular calls from
people across the country who are being approached by the federal government to
act as informants. Ibrahim Hooper, CAIR spokesman says "we are concerned
about what kind of pressure is being used to get that cooperation."
In April,
Yonas Fikre, 33, from Oregon said he was imprisoned and tortured for 106 days
last year in the United Arab Emirates after he refused to become a U.S.
government informant and answer agents' questions about Portland's largest
mosque. Fikre tells Willamette Week that Emirates officials denied him sleep,
kept him in a freezing cell, beat him with wooden sticks and plastic pipes, and
threatened to kill him if he didn't cooperate with U.S. agents. A U.S. citizen,
Fikre says his captors repeatedly grilled him with the same questions
Portland-based law enforcement agents had asked him a year earlier about his
mosque, the Islamic Center of Portland, Masjed As-Saber. A State Department
spokesman also confirmed to WW that one of the agents who questioned Fikre
works for that agency, employed in diplomatic security.
In May,
Fikre was indicted on allegations that he conspired to smuggle money to Sudan. Federal
prosecutors contend that Yonas Fikre conspired with his brother Dawit
Woldehawariat, of San Diego, Calif., and Seattle resident Abrehaile Haile to
illegally wire $75,000 to United Arab Emirates and Sudan. The allegations came
two weeks after Fikre, 33, and Portland attorney Thomas Nelson held a news
conference in Sweden where they alleged Fikre had been tortured by police
acting at the behest of the FBI. Fikre has been living in Sweden since his
release from a United Arab Emirates prison.
Campaign against building
of new mosques
"Where
there are Muslims, there are problems." This alarmingly sweeping comment by the
New York Post best reflects the dilemma of the American Muslim community. The
New York Post comment came amid heated discussion and opposition to the
proposed Sheepshead Bay (NY) Mosque. In a hard hitting article titled "New
Yorkistan? Don't rule it out!" Shavana Abruzzo wrote: "There's no denying the
elephant in the room. Neither is there any rejoicing over the mosques proposed
for Sheepshead Bay, Staten Island and Ground Zero because where there are
mosques, there are Muslims, and where there are Muslims, there are problems."
However, in November 2011, opponents of the Sheepshead Bay mosque lost their
case when the Board of Standards and Appeals gave approval of the mosque.
However, still protest continued as late as last month while construction of
the mosque goes ahead. In the post-9/11 America, it has become difficult to
build new mosques/Islamic institutions or expand the existing places of worship
which became frequent target of hate attacks.
In
February, the Michigan Islamic Academy (M.I.A.) filed a lawsuit in U.S.
District Court against Pittsfield Township, saying it violated federal law by
denying a zoning change that would allow construction of a 360-student school.
In March, a Southern California mosque filed a federal lawsuit alleging that
the small suburban city of Lomita engaged in religious discrimination when it
rejected an application to rebuild and expand the worship facility. In May, a
judge's ruling has stopped construction of a Nashville (Tenn.) suburban mosque
that has been at the center of a rowdy debate for more than two years.
Concerned
that prejudice rather than genuine zoning issues might be at work, the U.S. Department
of Justice has opened 28 cases nationwide involving local denials of mosque
construction applications since 2000. Of the 28 cases, 11 have resulted in full
investigations and four remain open, according to The Hour online.
Mosque attacks common nationwide
The
anti-Islam and anti-Muslim rhetoric has created a hostile climate for the
Muslims that resulted in discrimination, hate crimes and attacks on their
religious places.
On August
6, a mosque in Jolpin, Missouri, was burned to the ground in the second fire to
hit the mosque in little more than a month. A fire reported on July 4 has been
determined to be arson. One simply has to type the words "mosque fires" into a
search engine to determine how common fires like the Islamic Society of Joplin (Missouri)
mosque are. The American Civil Liberties Union and the Council on
American-Islamic Relations have tracked dozens of fires, fire bombings and
incidents of vandalism at mosques around the country over the past five years.
A few
examples: A mosque in Queens, N.Y., was
firebombed in January with worshippers inside. There were no injuries. An arson attack on a Houston, Texas, mosque
was reported in May 2011. Construction equipment
was set afire at the site of a mosque being built in Murfreesboro, Tenn., in
August 2010. An Oct. 31, 2011, arson
fire at a mosque in Wichita, Kan., caused an estimated $120,000 in damage. Someone in April 2011 burned three copies of
the Quran, the Muslim holy book, and left a threatening letter near the
entrance of the Islamic Center of Springfield mosque (Missouri). The anonymous
letter claimed that Muslims would "stain the earth" and that Islam wouldn't
survive. The mosque had earlier been vandalized with graffiti.
American Muslim response
The
seven-million strong American Muslim Community has responded to the post-9/11
challenges with intensive outreach by building bridges with all ethnic and
faith groups, holding interfaith peace picnics and interfaith iftar (fast
breaking) during the month of Ramadan. At the same time the community is more
proactive politically. The CAIR and other American Muslim civil advocacy groups
have launched voter registration campaigns to encourage Muslims to
participation in the country's political process.
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