Loyalty and Cooperation is a Two-Way Street

On Saturday, July 25th, local Muslim leaders met with Congressman Keith Ellison to discuss the community’s state of affairs and address challenges currently facing Muslims in Minnesota. The discussion focused on everything from positive contributions to the growth of the community, including the free Muslim-run health clinics in the Twin Cities, to the missing Somali men and Muslims’ cooperation with law enforcement.  Congressman Ellison encouraged everyone to contribute to America and answer President Obama’s call to service. 

I recalled a similar meeting in the past with a few law enforcement and government officials, including Thomas Heffelfinger, the former U.S. Attorney for Minnesota.  I spoke during and after the meeting to these officials that cooperation requires trust. I gave them an example of a Canadian-Arab, Maher Arar, who was traveling to the US, stopped by homeland security and then sent to Syria to be tortured.  I explained that these stories, passing in our grapevines, create fear and distrust of law enforcement.  I further explained that loyalty is a two-way street and encouraged them to speak to their higher-ups about how such abuse makes it difficult for us to conscientiously encourage cooperation with the FBI. 

Fast forward in time and the Muslim leaders are discussing a case of the missing Somali Youth and this time before Congressman Keith Ellison.  Senator Joe Lieberman, who rushed to hold a Senate hearing on the missing Somali youth, was invited by Congressman Ellison to visit Minnesota and meet the Somali community.  This was an excellent move by Congressman Ellison, who is one of few officials to meet with Somali leaders and treat them with the dignity and respect that they deserve as fellow Americans. 

Senator Lieberman refused to accept the invitation.  It is interesting to note that Senator Lieberman rushed all the way to Israel to meet the fascist and anti-Arab Avigdor Lieberman, Israel’s new foreign minister, and invited him to the US but he has refused to meet a community that he is leading a terrorism investigation on.  This is not ethical and calls into question Lieberman’s qualifications in the current missing Somali men investigation.  We need to demand that those holding Senate hearings are doing so in the spirit to promote safety and cooperation and not for political reasons. 

According to Somali Voices, a coalition of nearly a dozen local Somali organizations, the entire Somali community has been under suspicion and scrutiny for the misguided actions of a handful of men. In a recent press release, they stated: “..members of the Somali community have reported being stopped on the streets and in the malls, Somali businesses have been raided, students have been approached by federal agents in campus libraries, community leaders have been denied boarding passes without due process, agents have talked their way into homes without warrants, non-English-speaking Somalis have been interviewed without translators, agents in unmarked cars have staked out in front of Somali mosques, informants have allegedly been sent inside the mosques.”

More troubling is that the Minneapolis FBI holds a civil rights meeting every three months consisting of local community leaders working on civil right issues. The Muslim and Somali voice is completely void at these discussions since no legitimate Somali or Muslim organization is invited to attend. 

This week, I was rather disgusted to read an action alert by the Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) that the FBI allegedly sent an informant to a family’s home, falsely claiming that the father and three sons had been injured in a car accident. This scheme was developed to convince the wife, who had previously lost a teenage son in a car accident, to travel to the hospital where a fake “doctor” arrested her.

CAIR wrote a letter to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder and requested he investigate the matter and take appropriate action on this issue, but there is silence from the public at large. The public and the media have a responsibility to challenge the abuse of power and the cruel tricks deployed by law enforcement on a politically weak community.

Again, loyalty and cooperation is a two-way street.

Source: StarTribune

By Fedwa Wazwaz