CAIR SEEKS RELEASE OF FLA. MUSLIM ARRESTED AFTER ACQUITTAL - TOP
(WASHINGTON, D.C., 4/7/09) - A prominent national Islamic civil rights and advocacy group today called for the immediate release of a Florida Muslim arrested yesterday by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) even though he was recently acquitted of federal charges.
The Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) held a news conference this morning in Tampa to call for the release of Youssef Megahed, a former University of South Florida student who was found not guilty of explosives charges on Friday.
VIDEO: CAIR Seeks Release of Fla. Muslim Arrested After Acquittal SEE ALSO: CAIR Seeks Megahed Release; Father: 'No Freedom for Muslims'Youssef Megahed Faces New Battle After Seizure by Immigration Officials
“While we applaud President Obama’s efforts to reach out to the Muslim world, his administration needs to address the growing concerns American Muslims have about different standards of justice being applied to them,” said CAIR National Executive Director Nihad Awad. “The un-American arrest of a legal permanent resident who has just been found not guilty by a jury of his peers damages the president’s encouraging message to Muslims in this nation and worldwide.”
Awad noted that just yesterday CAIR joined a coalition of American Muslim groups in applauding President Obama's Monday address to the Turkish parliament in which he noted the positive contributions of American Muslims. At the news briefing expressing support for the president’s international outreach initiatives, the Muslim groups asked him to deal with domestic civil liberties and due process issues raised by cases such as the one in Tampa.
SEE: American Muslims to Obama: ‘Charity Begins at Home’Video: CAIR Director Discusses President’s Outreach to Muslim World
CAIR, America's largest Muslim civil liberties group, has 35 offices and chapters nationwide and in Canada. Its mission is to enhance the understanding of Islam, encourage dialogue, protect civil liberties, empower American Muslims, and build coalitions that promote justice and mutual understanding.
CONTACT: CAIR-Tampa Executive Director Ramzy Kilic, Tel: 813-514-1414 or 813-486-2529, E-Mail: rkilic@cair.com; CAIR National Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper, 202-488-8787 or 202-744-7726, E-Mail: ihooper@cair.com; CAIR Communications Coordinator Amina Rubin, 202-488-8787 or 202-341-4171, E-Mail: arubin@cair.com
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CAIR-FL: LOCAL MUSLIM LEADERS DEMAND MEGAHED'S RELEASE - TOPKevin Graham, St. Petersburg Times, 4/7/09
Local Muslim leaders and advocates today called on immigration officials to release Youssef Megahed, who was detained just days after a jury acquitted him of federal explosives charges.
"This seems to be a double jeopardy. What kind of message are they sending to the jury and the honorable Judge Merryday?" Ramzy Kilic, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations' Tampa chapter, said of Megahed's being taken into custody Monday.
Samir Megahed said he still hasn't spoken to his son and doesn't know his whereabouts.
"My feeling at this point is I am not living in the United States. I am not under the American flag," he said, adding that around the world the American flag stands for freedom. "I think there is no freedom here." (More)
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FBI REACHING OUT TO MINNEAPOLIS SOMALI COMMUNITY - TOPKane Farabaugh, Voice of America, 4/7/09
When more than a dozen young Somali immigrants from the Midwestern state of Minnesota went missing last year, the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigations made finding them a top priority. The FBI believes that many of the men went to Somalia to train with the militant group al-Shabab. The investigation has generated increased suspicion and fear in the Somali community.
As the head of the Abubakar As Saddique Islamic Center in Minneapolis, Omar Hurre is struggling to find answers as to why and how members of his center disappeared without a trace.
"Nobody knows the situation, how these young people decided to go to Somalia, who convinced them if there is any person who did that," he said. "Who paid for the trips, if there is anybody who paid for them? Most of the community is just waiting for those answers from the law enforcement community."
But according to Hurre, there have been few answers from that law enforcement community, which includes the FBI.
"The part that is frustrating is the way that they are doing their investigation," he noted. "The people that they are targeting, mostly students who are not familiar with or have never been in investigations or interrogations before, and have a kind of phobia with the law enforcement agencies."
Hurre's concerns are echoed throughout the Somali community in Minneapolis and St. Paul. Many have have come forward with complaints about the FBI, says Taneeza Islam at the Council on American Islamic Relations in Minnesota.
"Everybody is scared. They don't know what's really happening. Just up until recently, the FBI hasn't even really said they are conducting an investigation here. We don't know what type of information they are trying to gather." (More)
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NJ: SECURITY CHIEF TOLD TO LEAVE IMAM ALONE - TOPElizabeth Llorente, NorthJersey.com, 4/5/09
A statewide coalition of civil rights and immigration advocacy groups is urging Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano to reconsider the agency's efforts to deport a popular Muslim cleric.
The New Jersey Immigration Policy Network sent a letter requesting that Napolitano review a DHS appeal of an immigration judge's decision last year to grant permanent U.S. residency to Mohammad Qatanani, the imam of the Paterson-based Islamic Center of Passaic County.
"We are deeply concerned that the appeal may not be based on sound public policy and judicial principles," wrote NJIPN Executive Director Charles "Shai" Goldstein.
The Department of Homeland Security, the parent agency that houses various immigration offices, wants to deport Qatanani because it says he lied on a permanent residency application when he did not disclose that in 1993 he was arrested and convicted by Israeli authorities while he was visiting the West Bank. DHS argued during a trial last summer that Qatanani had ties at that time with Hamas, a Middle East group that the United States classifies as a terrorist organization.
Qatanani argued that he did not lie because, though detained for three months by Israelis for questioning, he was never told he was officially arrested or convicted. He also says he's never had ties to Hamas.
Over the four days of trial at Immigration Court in Newark, numerous law enforcement officials, including the sheriffs of Bergen and Passaic counties, characterized Qatanani as an asset to the community who had helped them build bridges to Arabs and Muslims. (More)
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VIDEO: CAIR DIRECTOR DISCUSSES PRESIDENT'S OUTREACH TO MUSLIM WORLD - TOPFOX 5, 4/7/09
Click here to watch the video.
President Obama continues to reach out to Muslims, this time declaring that the United States is not at war with Islam.
That marks three times in the last three months the president has reached out directly to Muslims.
With more about the importance of his efforts is Nihad Awad, the executive director and co-founder of the Council on American-Islamic Relations.
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CAIR: AMERICAN MUSLIMS TO OBAMA: ‘CHARITY BEGINS AT HOME’ - TOPPenny Starr, CNS News, 4/7/09
(CNSNews.com) A coalition of American Muslim groups praised President Barack Obama’s speech in Turkey on Sunday as a sign of improving relations between the United States and Muslims around the world, but some charged that Obama is ignoring the faithful in his own country.“We support and we do encourage the president to reach out to the Muslim world,” Mahdi Bray, executive director of the Washington-based Muslim American Society’s Freedom Foundation, said Monday at the National Press Club. “But as my grandmother once said, charity begins at home.”Bray was one of the panelists representing American Muslim groups that are part of the American Muslim Taskforce on Civil Rights and Elections, which sponsored the press conference. . .
Other groups that are members of the task force include the American Muslim Alliance, American Muslims for Palestine, Council on American-Islamic Relations, Islamic Circle of North America, Muslim Alliance in North America, Muslim Student Association-National, Muslim Ummah of North America and United Muslims of America.Mara Verheyden-Hilliard, an attorney and a founder of the Partnership for Civil Justice, and North Carolina State Senator Larry Shaw, a Democrat and a Muslim, also were on the panel. (More)
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OBAMA'S ENTREATY TO ISLAM SURPRISES MUSLIMS - TOPMatthai Kuruvila, San Francisco Chronicle, 4/7/09
President Obama's speech to the Turkish parliament Monday left Muslims across the United States stunned by the dramatic way he continues to build bridges with their brethren.
"He is uniquely qualified among all the American presidents to really reach out and change the mood of the relationship between America and the Muslim world," said Akbar Ahmed, a former Pakistani ambassador and now a professor of Islamic studies at American University in Washington, D.C. "He's the first president to talk about respect for the Muslim world."
In his speech, Obama recast an often adversarial U.S. relationship with Muslims into other terms - referring to friends or friendship 10 times. It was the most significant in a series of gestures to reach out to the Muslim community since his inaugural address, when he called for a "new way forward" with Muslims "based on mutual interest and mutual respect."
"The United States is not, and will never be, at war with Islam," Obama said to applause, according to a White House transcript of Monday's speech. "In fact, our partnership with the Muslim world is critical, not just in rolling back the violent ideologies that people of all faiths reject, but also to strengthen opportunity for all its people."
Obama also tapped into his own unique heritage, which was a lightning rod in the campaign. Republicans used his middle name, Hussein, as a slur to suggest he was anti-American. At the time, Obama did relatively little outreach to Muslims, most notably not visiting a mosque while going to the sanctuaries of other faiths.
Embracing heritage
But on Monday, Obama, a Christian, continued a post-election pattern of emphatically embracing his heritage, which includes a Muslim father and stepfather and a childhood lived partly in Indonesia, a Muslim nation.
"The United States has been enriched by Muslim Americans," he said in the speech. "Many other Americans have Muslims in their families or have lived in a Muslim-majority country - I know, because I am one of them." (More)
-----CAIR-MI MEETS WITH AZERBAIJANI MUSLIM DELEGATION - TOP(SOUTHFIELD, MI, 4/7/07) - The Michigan chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-MI), along with representatives of the Council of Islamic Organizations (CIOM), yesterday met with four Azerbaijani-Muslim leaders in Detroit.The meeting, which was coordinated by the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, was held at The Muslim Center in Detroit. The Azerbaijani Muslim representatives inquired into current relations between the American Muslim community with the federal government in wake of allegations that the FBI has sent agent-provocateurs and spies into mosques. CAIR, America's largest Islamic civil liberties group, has 35 offices and chapters nationwide and in Canada. Its mission is to enhance the understanding of Islam, encourage dialogue, protect civil liberties, empower American Muslims, and build coalitions that promote justice and mutual understanding.CONACT: CAIR-MI Executive Director Dawud Walid, 248-559-2257, dwalid@cair.com-----
CAIR: THE DELICATE DANCE OF MUSLIM-JEWISH DIALOGUE - TOPThe Forward, 4/2/09
As a sometimes skeptical participant in dialogue, I was pleased to read of the recent vote by the Jewish Council for Public Affairs in support of strengthening Muslim-Jewish ties (“JCPA Approves Effort To Build Dialogue With Muslim Groups,” March 13).
To be honest, most Muslims and Jews will continue to differ on issues relating to Israel, while often seeing eye-to-eye (instead of eye for an eye) on social justice issues. I would, however, caution us all to be aware of how our language and terminologies often make the situation worse. The terms “pro-Israel” and “pro-Palestine” are unhelpfully vague, as well as oppositional. The objections that most Muslims have to Israel also need to be better understood; the objections have to do with what we Muslims perceive as the neo-colonial land grab that is still underway though the settlement-building movement, not to Jews as such.
By all means be cautious, but engage with us. Please do not demonize the Council on American-Islamic Relations, the Muslim Public Affairs Council, the Islamic Society of North America, the Islamic Circle of North America and the rest of our community leaders. You will get more traction with engagement. And while we Muslims perceive ourselves as the less powerful partner in America, we owe it to ourselves, to our dialogue partner and to truth itself to be frank about our concerns and also warm in our compassion. Therefore we will mourn the dead of Gaza, but maintain a hope for peace, not as some fig leaf but as an olive branch from a thousand-year-old tree that will not be bulldozed by any state, insurgent or act of destruction.
Adem CarrollExecutive DirectorMuslim Consultative NetworkNew York, N.Y.
-----GA: MUSLIMS AVOID INTEREST TO FOLLOW FAITH - TOPJulie Wolfe, 11 Alive News, 4/7/09
This story is part of a series called "Keeping the Faith", airing all this week on 11 Alive News Today. This is part two of a five part series.
On a recent Friday afternoon at the Hamzah Islamic Center, the main prayer room is packed with men. Upstairs, women and girls watch the lecture from a flat screen TV. Everyone is barefoot, sitting on the carpet listening to Tareef Saeb.
"Be content," his voice booms through the Alpharetta mosque nestled in the back of an office park. He lectures on an Islamic law that changes the way this recession has affected the Muslim community.
"We are taught to never pay interest," he told 11 Alive News during a sit-down interview. "And that forces us to live within our means."
Chapter 2, verse 275 of the Quran says "Those who devour interest (or usury), they will not stand (before God)".
For devout Muslims, it means no car payment and no credit card debt. Foreclosures are rare. Saeb says, "There's nothing in the teachings that say do not enjoy life. But you enjoy life within your means."
There's another pillar of Islam that Muslim children learn from a young age: "The concept of giving and taking care of the needy is emphasized. It's actually one of the five pillars of Islam. It says that if you sleep on a full stomach, and your neighbor is hungry; you have not met your obligations."
Conservative spending means many in the Muslim community are in a good position to weather the economic storm. But Saeb says the cloud of unemployment is still dark here. Money collected for the poor is helping members pay rent and electricity bills. But Saeb says "We'd rather help them get a job than pay their bills."
The Hamzah Islamic Center is hosting job training sessions to build new skills; hoping for new jobs. Until then, they lean on their faith.