"Clerics' airline suit brings backlash"

Thursday, May 10, 2007

Clerics' airline suit brings backlash 
Lawmaker: Don't sue people for reporting suspicions 
By Oren Dorell
USA TODAY


When six Muslim clerics filed a lawsuit against US Airways claiming the
airline infringed on their freedom to worship last fall, Rep. Pete King of
New York and others saw something different - an attempt to intimidate
airline passengers from reporting suspicious activity.

That's because the lawsuit named as defendants "John Does," unnamed
passengers and airline workers whose reports of suspicious activity led to
the removal of the six imams from the flight Nov. 20 at the Minneapolis-St.
Paul International Airport. 

"Since 9/11 we're asking ordinary citizens to be the eyes and ears for law
enforcement," says King, whose district on Long Island lost more than 100
people in the terror attacks. "If they're afraid of coming forward because
of fear of being sued, then it would be a huge victory for the terrorists."

King and other lawmakers are moving ahead with an attempt to ban such
lawsuits over the objections of some Democrats and certain Muslim groups who
say the suits may stop bigots from harassing law-abiding Muslims. 

In late March, King and supporters in the House added an amendment to a
transportation bill that would protect witnesses who report suspicious
behavior from being named in lawsuits. It passed 304-121; all the nay votes
were cast by Democrats. The amendment now must survive a conference
committee made up of members of the House and Senate. That will occur later
this month, said Drew Hammill, spokesman for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

Conference committee members will likely be appointed "in the next week or
so," said Jim Manley, a spokesman for Sen. Harry Reid, the majority leader.

Homeland Security Committee Chairman Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., says the
measure could allow "people to be singled out," without recourse to justice
in court.

"People should feel comfortable to report suspicious activity," Thompson
says. "But they should also not infringe on the rights of other people.
What's being offered . is a slippery slope that would lead to out-and-out
profiling of different people. It's Arabs and Muslims this week, and next
week could be African-Americans, Baptists and so on."

The Council on American-Islamic Relations, whose New York chapter president
is representing the imams, agrees. "We're trying to defend people's legal
and civil rights," said Ibrahim Hooper, a spokesman for CAIR. "The civil
rights movement was maintained by a lot of people who were seen as
troublemakers in their day, and in the hindsight of history they're seen as
heroes."

The details of what happened at the airport are found in accounts from
airline crew and passengers provided to airport police and Minneapolis
police. 

According to police reports: 

A passenger handed a note to a flight attendant about "suspicious" behavior
of six men he had seen "chanting Allah . Allah," prior to boarding and
cursing U.S. involvement with Saddam Hussein. The gate agent reported being
suspicious because the men prayed so loudly.

The men boarded together but began switching seats and wound up spread out
in the rear, middle and front of the plane. Two were in the row closest to
the cockpit. One got up twice to talk to the others in the plane's middle
and rear. 

Two flight attendants said two of the men asked for seatbelt extensions,
which could be used as weapons, and said the men did not appear big enough
to need them. An attendant said the men put the extensions on the floor
instead of attaching them to their belts. An Arabic-speaking passenger
seated next to one of the men said the man expressed "extreme Muslim
fundamentalist views."

Three of the men had one-way tickets. Only one checked a bag. The lawsuit
alleges that the imams sat in separate seats to not arouse suspicion. 

Nonetheless, the pilot and a U.S. air marshal deemed the behavior suspicious
and the pilot wanted them to go, according to the police report. A security
expert said the passengers and crew did not overreact.

"These people would not be the first people witnessing to their religion in
a public place," says John Pike, director of the military think tank
Globalsecurity.org. "But the sum totality of their actions does suggest that
they were either being deliberately provocative to provoke an incident or
the stupidest bunch of hijackers I've ever heard of."

Hooper says the incident was sparked by ignorance of Muslim religious
practice. He says Muslims should not have to curtail their practices just
because seeing them pray in public may cause people to "freak out."

Zuhdi Jasser disagrees. Jasser, chairman of the American Islamic Forum for
Democracy, says that "for the American public to have anxiety at the gate is
not an irrational fear."

A public interest legal group that has always found itself on the side of
plaintiffs in religious discrimination cases is siding with the "John Does."

Kevin Hasson, president of the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, says fear
of suspicious behavior is "understandable" given that America is at war with
Islamic terrorists and "all radical Islamists are Muslim."

Hasson, whose group has represented people of all faiths, including Muslims,
and has offered to represent the "John Does" for free, is worried the imams'
lawsuit will harm legitimate claims of discrimination.

"The public perception will likely be one of Muslim lawyers running amok,
trying to change public behavior by sowing fear of being suddenly hit by an
unexpected lawsuit," he says. "That is far too close to the very stereotype
the lawsuit says it is trying to eliminate."

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