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HEADLINES
ACLU report says US laws hindering Muslim charities and faith
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: The American Liberties Union (ACLU) on June 16, 2009 released an extensive report about how the U.S. terrorism finance laws and policies were unfairly preventing the seven-million-strong American Muslim community from practicing their religion through charitable giving. The 164 page report, "Blocking Faith, Freezing Charity," is the first comprehensive report that documents the serious effects of Bush administration terrorism finance laws on Muslim communities across the nation. Read More
By naming unindicted co-conspirators the govt irreparably damaged
the reputation of individuals and mainstream Muslim organizations
The U.S. government has smeared the reputations of Muslim charities, Muslim community organizations, and associates of Muslim charities without affording these organizations and individuals their day in court or any other opportunity to clear their names, the ACLU report on Muslim charities says. Read More
MLFA fund raiser for Dr. Afia and Holy Land Foundation
AMP Report: The Muslim Legal Fund of America (MLFA) held an event on June 13, 2009 at the American Community Center in Santa Clara to raise funds for the legal defense of Dr. Afia Siddiqui and the Holy Land Foundation. Read More
Muslim groups condemn fatal shooting at Holocaust Museum
AMP Report: American Muslim advocacy groups have condemned a shooting incident at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., during which a security guard was killed and the alleged gunman was wounded. Read More
Well crafted speech with little substance for the Muslims
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: Just before the well-orchestrated Obama speech, the leading Cairo newspaper Al Ahram asked me: Do you think Obama’s messages of reconciliation are part of a media stunt—an attempt to achieve political gains—or a sincere attempt to bridge gaps with the Muslim world? My response was: I am afraid that his repeated reconciliation messages may prove a media stunt if they are not followed by changes in his administration’s policies towards the Muslim World in general and Afghanistan, Iraq and the Palestine issue in particular. Read More
American Muslims welcome Obama’s Cairo speech
AMP Report: American Muslim organizations have welcomed President Barrack Obama’s speech in Cairo in which he pledged to “seek a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world, one based on mutual interest and mutual respect.” Read More
Attorney General’s statement on Muslim civil liberties hailed
AMP Report: American Muslim civil advocacy groups have welcomed the statement of Attorney General Eric Holder on the civil liberties of the seven million strong American Muslim community. Attorney General Eric Holder released the statement in conjunction to President Obama’s historic speech in Cairo, Egypt. Read More
ADC official appointed member of Homeland Security Advisory Council
AMP Report: In Albuquerque, New Mexico, The Department of Homeland Secrutiry, Secretary Janet Napolitano, today (June 5, 2009) swore-in American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) National Executive Director Kareem Shora as a member of the Homeland Security Advisory Council (HSAC). Read More
Muslim charity leaders given 65-year jail terms
AMP Report: On May 27, 2009, five founders of the Holy Land Foundation received prison terms of up to sixty-five years on charges of supporting the Palestinian group Hamas. The five were never accused of supporting violence and were convicted for funding charities that aided needy Palestinians. The government’s case relied on Israeli intelligence as well as disputed documents and electronic surveillance gathered by the FBI over a span of fifteen years. Read More
FBI Tactics in NY Synagogue ‘Plot’ questioned
AMP Report: Civil liberty advocacy groups have questioned the FBI’s tactics leading up to the arrest of four New York men for allegedly plotting to attack Jewish institutions in that state. Read More
Neo-COINTELPRO operation against the Muslim community
FBI infiltrated spies into South California mosques
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: The American Muslim community is alarmed and dismayed at the recent revelation, that the FBI has been infiltrating spies into a number of mosques in Southern California. The Orange County Register (February 24, 2009) revelation was a shock to the community that the FBI used paid informants in mosques to spy on the community. Read More
Congressman Wolf’s attempt to silence CAIR
AMP Report: In an apparent attempt to silence a leading American Muslim civil rights advocacy group – the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) - Republican Congressman Frank Wolf from Virginia has expressed deep disappointment at the FBI’s “insufficient response” to his letter that apparently sought negative information based on smears against CAIR by Muslim-bashers like Steven Emerson. Read More
An African-American elected as CAIR chairman
AMP Report: The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), nation's leading Muslim civil rights and advocacy group, on March 3, 2009 elected an African-American as its new board chairman. North Carolina State Senator, Larry Shaw replaces Dr. Parvez Ahmed, an Indian-American and a professor of the University of North Florida, who was elected CAIR chairman in May 2005. Omar Ahmad, a Palestinian-American, was the founding president of CAIR that was established in 1994. Read More
Bigotry at the Capitol Hill: Senator Kyl hosts anti-Islamic Dutch lawmaker
AMP Report: Continuing the Islamophobic policies of the Republican Party, Republican Senator Jon Kyl Thursday (2/26/2009) hosted screening of an anti-Islam film ‘Fitna’ at the Capitol building and invited anti-Islam far-right Dutch lawmaker, Geert Wilders, as his guest. Read More
Obama embraces Bush’s “war on terror” policy without naming it so
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: President Barrack Obama has virtually embraced his predecessor George Bush’s “War on Terror” policy without naming it so. Asked in a CNN interview why he hasn't used the oft-repeated "war on terror" phrase coined by the Bush administration, Obama said he believes the U.S. can win over moderate Muslims if he chooses his words carefully. "Words matter in this situation because one of the ways we're going to win this struggle is through the battle of hearts and minds," Obama said. The “war on terror” catchphrase burned into the American lexicon soon after the 9/11 attacks is deliberately being replaced by the Obama administration in a bid to repair America’s negative image in the Muslim world. Read More
Judge agrees with defense: 2006 plea negotiations should be revisited
Alexandria, VA - February 20, 2009: At a pre-trial hearing today, federal judge Leonie Brinkema denied a government motion requesting her to reconsider a previous ruling. At the last hearing, Judge Brinkema ruled that the government must provide information to the defense and the court regarding the original 2006 plea negotiations between the Department of Justice and Dr. Al-Arian's attorneys. Read More
Obama ducks question on Israel’s nuclear capability
but expresses concern over Iran’s nuclear program
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres said in July 1998 that Israel "built a nuclear option, not in order to have a Hiroshima but an Oslo." However, President Barrack Obama, at his first White House press conference on February 9, ducked the question: “Do you know of any country in the Middle East that has nuclear weapons?” Read More
Gaza: Hamas, Hizballah, and the New Middle East?
By Dr. Hatem Bazian: The current Israeli logic is: Force and might will bring about a change in the hearts and minds of the Palestinians, who in due time will accept a superior reality imposed by Israel and supported by the United States and discredited Arab leaders. The question that now confronts Israel and its allies is what their long-term strategy is, if they succeed in dethroning a democratically elected Hamas and imposing a new Palestinian government. Read More
Will Obama policies bring real change for the Muslims?
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: In a bid to repair relations with the Muslim world that were damaged under the Bush administration, President Barack Obama told the Muslim world Tuesday that “Americans are not your enemy.” In an interview with Al-Arabiya TV channel, Obama said: “My job to the Muslim world is to communicate that the Americans are not your enemy — we sometimes make mistakes — we have not been perfect.” Read More
Remembering Martin Luther King, Jr.
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: Monday, January 19 marks the Martin Luther King Day to celebrate the life and contributions of a great social peacemaker and iconic civil rights leader. This year the MLK Day has special significance. It falls on the eve of Barack Obama's inauguration as the first African-American President of the United States. Read More
Untold reasons for the Israeli massacre of Palestinians in Gaza
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: The year 2009 began for the 1.5 million Palestinians in Gaza with an all out air, land and sea assault from the Israeli armed forces. With an overt support of the Bush administration, meaningful silence of President-elect Barak Obama and complicity of the US client Arab regimes, Israeli massacre of Palestinians in Gaza continues for the 10th day today (January 5, 2009) with air strikes, naval bombardment and ground forces assault on unarmed men, women and children. Read More
2008: Another Difficult Year for American Muslims
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: The New Jersey Press Association President calls Islam ‘internal’ threat to U.S; rightist columnist Cal Thomas urges ban on building new mosques in America and a Muslim woman in Georgia sent to jail for not removing head scarf (hijab). These episodes of bigotry, Islamophobia and discrimination of the month of December symbolize the dilemma of American Muslims in 2008 like the previous years since 9/11. Bigotry and Islamophobia reached its climax during the 2008 presidential election campaign when the Republican Party resorted to fear-mongering to prop up Republican presidential candidate, John McCain. Read More
Israeli massacre of Palestinians in Gaza:
President Bush’s departing gift to Palestinians
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: There has been a virtually universal condemnation of Israeli massacre of unarmed Palestinian men, women and children in Gaza with the exception of Bush administration and Gordon Brown of Britain. As the US-supplied Israeli F-16 warplanes and Apache helicopters dropped Saturday (December 27) over 100 bombs on dozens of locations in the Israeli-occupied Gaza Strip killing more than 200 persons, the Bush administration was one of the first to offer its support for Israel's attacks by blaming the victims for the massacre. Read More
Arab Americans continue to face discrimination
AMP Report: Arab Americans continue to face higher rates of employment discrimination in both the public and private sectors and continuing challenges associated with government watch lists, immigration enforcement and other actions, according to the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) “Report on Hate Crimes and Discrimination Against Arab Americans” announced on December 4, 2008. Read More
The Holy Land retrial ends with conviction of its five former officials
AMP Report: After a series of legal twists, secret evidence and questionable witness of Israeli intelligence agents, the Holy Land Foundation, once a leading American Muslim charitable organization and five of its former officials were convicted on November 24 on criminal charges related to humanitarian aid given to Palestinians living under Israeli occupation. The defendants said they were engaged in legitimate relief work, while the government claimed that work benefited terrorists. Read More
American Muslims celebrate Obama’s victory
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: A New York African-American Muslim teenager says he was beaten on election night by four white men furious that Barak Obama was elected as the nation's next President. The incident best symbolizes the dilemma of seven-million strong American Muslim community that apparently voted en masse for Obama with a conviction that the impending change would fully restore their civil rights which were abridged during the Bush administration in the name of “fighting terrorism.” Read More
Why American Muslims are poised to vote en masse for Obama?
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: American Muslim voters are poised to vote en masse for Barak Obama, the Democratic Presidential candidate on Tuesday, November 4. According to a Pew Poll, American Muslims are likely to vote 70 to 80 per cent Democrat. The Pew finding was not surprising. The question is why the Muslims are leaning towards Obama and the answer is not difficult – they have been victims of anti-Muslim policies of Bush administration since 9/11. Muslims are genuinely optimistic that a sweeping change promised by Obama will alleviate their plight and guilt by association sufferings Read More
Islamophobia in 2008 election:
Calif. Muslim candidate receives death threat
AMP Report: With a desperate Republican campaign playing fear-mongering card to prop up John McCain, the bigotry and Islamophobia is filtering down to local politics. A Muslim candidate, Todd Gallinger, for Irvine City Council (California) has reported receiving a phoned death threat after being smeared by a council member’s Islamophobic remarks. Read More
CAIR study 2008: American Muslims remain target of civil rights abuse
AMP Report: Seven years after 9/11, Seven-million strong American Muslim community remains target of workplace bias, discrimination, profiling and hate crime, affirms a study released Wednesday by the Council on American-Islamic Relations’ (CAIR), a prominent national Islamic civil rights and advocacy group. Read More
Make the American Muslim voice relevant, vote Obama
By Khurrum Wahid: Coming out strong for Senator Obama will accomplish two things. First, we say "Give me back my country. Give me back the America that was respected around the world and made me feel like I belonged." Second, the American Muslim community will earn our right to demand a voice in policy and creating a better America for all of us. Read More
FEC urged to probe Anti-Muslim DVDs sent to swing states
AMP Report: The Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), a prominent national Islamic civil rights and advocacy group, Tuesday filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) over the distribution of an anti-Muslim film to 28 million homes in presidential election swing states through mail and bundled in newspaper deliveries to voters in swing states. Read More
Fear-mongering in 2008 presidential election
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: Fear is a frighteningly effective sales pitch -- one that has worked like a charm for Republicans since the days of the Cold War Red Scares, and especially since 9/11. Read More
American Muslims seven years after 9/11
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: Seven years after 9/11, Muslims in America remained at the receiving end with assault on their civil rights and their faith in the name of “war on terror.” Muslims are the prime targets of the post 9/11 reconfiguration of American laws, policies, and priorities. Read More
Why the US image declined in the Muslim World?
AMP Comment: Seven years after 9/11, hostility towards the US remains at shocking levels in the Muslim world where the US has followed a double standard policy. Its relationship with the Muslim nations has been based on a kind of hegemony which had taken shape in the Cold War era and continued in the post-Cold War period. Read More
American Muslim community mourns the death of W. D. Mohammed
AMP Report: American Muslim community mourns the death of Imam Warith Deen Mohammad who will be remembered as a person who brought the Nation of Islam carefully and consistently into mainstream Islam that rejected racial and ethnic divisions. Read More
Islamophobia at the GOP convention
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: Seven-million strong American Muslim community was dismayed at the Islamophobic rhetoric at the Republican Party Convention that ended in St. Paul, Minnesota on September 4, 2008. Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney and former New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani in their speeches made bigoted remarks that equated Islam with terrorism. Read More
Dr. Sami Al-Arian is freed on bail
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: American Muslim civil rights groups have welcomed the release on bail of Dr. Sami Al-Arian, a Palestinian political activist and former professor of the University of South Florida. Dr. Al-Arain had been in federal custody for more than five years and was released in Virginia today after Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agreed with his attorneys that to hold him was a violation of his constitutional rights. Al-Arian had been held by ICE for 130 days and the legal limit was 90 days. Read More
The plight of prisoner No. 650 (Dr. Afia Siddiqui)
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: After intensive civil rights groups pressure and angry protests in Pakistan, the US authorities have formally acknowledged arresting Dr. Afia Siddiqui, a Pakistani neuroscientist, five years after her mysterious disappearance in Karachi with her three teen age kids. Read More
Fear mongering in the name of satire
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: Depicting Barack Obama and Michelle Obama as militants and terrorist sympathizers feeds into the terrible rise in anti-Muslim sentiment during the 2008 election campaign. Read More
Al-Arian granted bail but remains in prison
AMP Report : At a bail hearing at Alexandria, Virginia, Judge Leonie Brinkema has ordered a prominent Palestinian activist, Dr. Sami Al-Arian, released but he remained in prison since the judge refused to block immigration authorities from detaining Al-Arian as a prelude to his deportation. Read More
American Muslims alarmed at the new profiling policy
AMP Report: American Muslim community is alarmed at the proposed Justice Department policy change that would allow the FBI to investigate Americans without evidence of wrongdoing, relying instead on a terrorist profile that could single out Muslims and Arabs. Read More
“Holding Muslims at Arm’s Length”
AMP Report: The Boston Globe columnist Derrick Z. Jackson says that Obama himself has said “Christians and people of other faiths lived very comfortably” with each other when he lived in Indonesia. It is time for him to live comfortably with Muslims in his campaign. Read More
Dr. Sami al-Arian indicted on contempt charges
AMP Report: Palestinian activist and a former professor of South Florida University, Dr. Sami al-Arian, has been indicted on June 25, 2008, in Alexandria, Virginia on two counts of criminal contempt for refusing to testify before a federal grand jury. Read More
Pew surveys and the politics of demography
AMP comment: The Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life released the second report of the U.S. Religious Landscape Survey on June 23, 2008 which again uses its 2007 flawed report about the population of Muslims in America. Read More
From embedded newsmen to embedded media generals
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: The New York Times revealed last April that in summer 2005, confronted with a fresh wave of criticism over Guantanamo Bay, the Bush administration prepped some 75 retired military officers to serve as paid television commentators. Disclosure of the program triggered a furor among the public and in Congress but the news chiefs and on-air hosts at CNN, FOX, ABC, NBC, and CBS, had little reaction to the revelations concerning the "Embedded Media Generals." Why, because the corporate media is a fully-integrated part of the state power-structure. Read More
Another Islamic charity vindicated
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: Judge Dennis Saylor’s latest ruling to quash the January jury conviction of the defunct Islamic charity leaders vindicates what the civil right activists and groups have been saying that the American Muslim charities are being targeted to intimidate the seven-million strong American Muslim community that remains besieged more than six years after 9/11 terrorist attacks. Read More
Keffiyeh: The Politics of Symbolism
AMP Comment: The campaign against the innocent use of keffiyeh in a commercial ad is the latest episode of anti-Arab, anti-Muslim and Islamophobic diatribe which is the best seller in the post-9/11 America where our administration has created a culture of fear, hate, anger and division among all Americans. Read More
Surveillance of LA, San Diego mosques sparks calls for hearing
AMP Report: Alarmed by a report that the mosques in Los Angeles and San Diego are under surveillance, civil rights groups have called for congressional hearings. The call for public hearings followed a San Diego newspaper report that a group of military reservists and law enforcement officers at Camp Pendleton stole the data from a federal surveillance program that monitored mosques in Southern California. Read More
An Online Petition in Support of Syed Fahad Hashmi
Syed Fahad Hashmi is a Muslim American citizen being held in a federal jail on two counts of providing material support --and two counts of making a contribution of goods or services -- to Al Qaida. As his case goes to trial, we wish to register our concern about the conditions of his detention, constraints on his right to a fair trial, and the potential threat his case poses to the First Amendment rights of others. Read More
Why US soldier shot at Quran for practice?
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali An unnamed sergeant’s use of the Quran for target practice emanates from an unabated and persistent anti-Islam and anti-Muslim propaganda, desecration of the Quran and attacks on mosques. Read More
Muslim, Arab Groups express concern on latest
Government Report on “Homegrown Terrorism”
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: Four leading Arab-American and Muslim-American advocacy groups have expressed deep concern about a recently released Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee report on “homegrown terrorism.” The report - titled Violent Islamist extremism, the internet, and the homegrown terrorist threat - claims that the threat posed by violent extremists now comes “increasingly from within” the U.S. Read More
Mock attack on the fake mosque in Illinois sends a wrong message
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: Six years and eight months after the 9/11 tragic attacks, Muslims in America remain at the receiving end with the reconfiguration of American laws, policies and priorities to target them. The latest assault on the Muslim community comes in the form of a simulated attack on a fake “mosque” by the law enforcement authorities in Illinois. Read More
The ordeal of Al Jazeera cameraman Sami Al-Hajj
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: After six and a half years of imprisonment in Guantanamo Bay military prison, Al Jazeera cameraman, Sami Al-Hajj, was released on May 2, 2008 in a very bad shape. He was carried off a US air force jet on a stretcher when he arrived in Khartoum, Sudan, and immediately taken to hospital. Al-Hajj’s case symbolizes the policy of torture and human rights violation of the Bush Administration. Read More
Evangelicals highjack the National Day of Prayer
Abdus Sattar Ghazali: “Evangelicals attempt to exclude non-Christians from National Day of Prayer,” this Mother Jones headline best reflects the controversy over the National Day of Prayer (NDP) observed this year on Thursday, May 1, 2008. The National Day of Prayer was once a symbol of American unity and faith in God that transcended boundaries but in recent years the decades-old tradition has become mired in divisions. Read More
Probe in the mysterious death of Riad Hamad sought
The San Antonio chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-San Antonio) has called for a Justice Department investigation into the death of Riad Hamad, whose body was found earlier this month in a Texas lake. The body had been bound with duct tape. Read More
McCain declines to drop 'Islamic' terror label
The presumptive Republican presidential nominee Senator John McCain has declined to stop using the adjective "Islamic" to describe terrorists and extremist enemies of the United States. Rea More
Dr. Al-Arian suspends hunger strike after 8 weeks
On the 57th day of his hunger strike, Dr. Sami Al-Arian has suspended his fast, at the urging of his family, friends and supporters, Tampa Bay Coalition for Justice and Peace, announced on April 29. Read More
Sami Al-Arian in deadlocked terrorism case could face a new indictment
Sami al-Arian, a computer science professor imprisoned for more than five years after pleading guilty to a single terrorism-related charge when his trial deadlocked, is back in legal limbo this week. He faces either deportation or a new indictment that could extend his incarceration for years. Read More
Dr. Sami Al-Arian put in solitary confinement
AMP Report: Dr. Sami Al-Arian, a former Florida professor currently on his second hunger strike in federal detention to protest unjust treatment by the U.S. authorities, has been placed in solitary confinement, with no medical monitoring, in a Maryland detention facility. Read More
Civil rights advocates urge Justice Department to honor Al-Arian plea agreement
AMP Report: On March 31, 2008, Representatives of several American Muslim civil right groups visited Dr. Sami Al-Arian, a former Florida professor currently on his second hunger strike in federal detention to protest unjust treatment by the U.S. authorities. Meanwhile, Civil rights advocates urged the Justice Department to honor Al-Arian’s plea agreement. Read More
Abuse of judicial system to keep Dr. Al-Arian in prison
By Abdus Sattar Ghazali: Dr. Al-Arian is in Catch-22. Gordon Kromberg, an assistant U.S. attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia, is setting up Dr. Al Arian for a perjury/obstruction trap. If Dr. Al-Arian again refuses to testify because of the 'no-cooperation' agreement, he will be charged with obstruction of justice and could receive several additional years in prison. If he testifies, he faces a 'perjury' trap based on past practice with other acquitted Palestinian defendants.Read More
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