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PAL-C Newsletter
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Seek
Legal Advice Before Talking to the FBI
May 24, 2010
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PAL-C Headquarters,
Washington D.C., USA
Board
of National Directors
Shoaib Kothawala Najeeb
Ghauri Salim Adaya
Dr. Salman Naqvi
Mossadaq Chughtai Pervaiz Lodhie
Dr. Rafiq Rahman
Arif Mansuri Qaisar
Madad Asim Ashary
Nayyer Ali
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Quote
"I see the
strength and resilience of the American people. Terrorists want to
scare us. New Yorkers just go about their lives unafraid.
Extremists want a war between America and Islam, but Muslims are part of our
national life, including those who serve in our United States Army.
Adversaries want to divide us, but we are united..."
President Barack Hussein Obama, West Point Commencement
Address, May 22, 2010
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Joins
In Issuing the Following
URGENT COMMUNITY ALERT:
Seek Legal Advice Before Talking to FBI
The FBI is contacting
Pakistani, South-Asian and other Muslim Americans to solicit information
and advice about addressing violent extremism.
We strongly urge individuals not to speak with law
enforcement officials without the presence or advice of an attorney.
"I've done nothing wrong. I've got nothing to
hide. I want to help law enforcement."
· Seeking the advice of counsel before
you talk to law enforcement is the smart thing to do.
·
Speaking to law enforcement without an attorney present or
advice of counsel--however well-intentioned--places you and your family at
great risk of criminal prosecution or adverse immigration consequences (including
deportation). (In fact, in at least one recent case, individuals were
arrested and jailed on charges--such as alleged immigration
violations--completely unrelated to cases agents were investigating.)
·
There is
no legal obligation to speak to law enforcement officials.
You are only required to provide identification to law enforcement
officials if asked, and immigrants are required to carry proof of
immigration status at all times. Declining to speak cannot be presumed as
guilt.
·
Any statements made during contact with
law enforcement can be used against you at a later time. Lying to a federal officer, even
by omission, is a crime.
Steps You Can Take:
1. Be Smart. Protect yourself. Know your
rights: Watch the Muslim Advocates' "Got Rights?" video. It provides
crucial information about how to handle contact from law enforcement
officials. Click here to view the video online.
2. Protect your friends, family & community:
Forward this alert and share Muslim Advocates' "Got Rights?" video with your networks and listservs.
(It's available in five languages: English, Arabic, Farsi,
Somali and Urdu.)
3. Learn more: Join Muslim
Advocates for a webinar
to answer questions about how to safely and effectively work with law
enforcement on Tuesday,
May 25th at 12pm PST/ 2pm CST/ 3pm EST. Click here to register.
4. Say your lawyer will contact them:
If approached by the FBI or law enforcement, ask for their business cards and
say that your lawyer will contact them.
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Pakistan and Times Sq.
By Nicholas Kristof | New York Times
If we want Times Square to be safer from terrorists, we need to start by
helping make Pakistan safer as well...
I can't tell you how frustrating it is on visits to rural Pakistan to see
fundamentalist Wahabi-funded madrassas as the only game in town. They offer
free meals, and the best students are given further scholarships to study
abroad at fundamentalist institutions so that they come back as respected
"scholars."
We don't even compete. Medieval misogynist fundamentalists display greater
faith in the power of education than Americans do.
Let's hope this is changing under the Obama administration. It's promising
that the Kerry-Lugar-Berman aid package provides billions of dollars for
long-term civilian programs in Pakistan, although it's still unclear how it
will be implemented. One useful signal would be for Washington to encourage
Islamabad to send not only troops to North Waziristan but also teachers.
We continue to be oblivious to trade possibilities. Pro-American Pakistanis
fighting against extremism have been pleading for years for the United
States to cut tariffs on Pakistani garment exports, to nurture the textile
industry and stabilize the country. Pakistan's foreign minister, Shah
Mehmood Qureshi, told me that his top three goals are "market access,
market access, market access." But Washington wants to protect North
Carolina textile mills, so we won't cut tariffs on Pakistani goods. The
technical word for that: myopia.
Education and lower tariffs are not quick fixes, sometimes not even slow
fixes. But they are tools that can help, at the margins, bring Pakistan
back from the precipice. It has been reassuring to see the work of people
like Greg Mortenson, whose brave school-building in Pakistan and
Afghanistan was chronicled in "Three Cups of Tea." Ditto for
Developments in Literacy, or D.I.L., which builds schools for girls in
Pakistan that are the most exhilarating things I've seen there.
It costs $1,500 to sponsor a D.I.L. classroom for a year, and that's just
about the best long-term counterterrorism investment
available. MORE
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New
Release:
Reading Corner
"A timely and stimulating contribution to a critically important
issue: The West's (and especially America's) relationship to
Islam." Zbigniew Brzezinski, Former National Security Advisor
The most comprehensive study ever done on the American Muslim community, Journey
into America explores and documents how Muslims are fitting into U.S.
society, seeking to place the Muslim experience in the U.S. within the
larger context of American identity. In doing so, it is a major
contribution to the study of American history and culture.
Renowned scholar Akbar Ahmed and his team of young researchers traveled
through over seventy-five cities across the United States-from New York
City to Salt Lake City; from Las Vegas to Miami; from large enclaves such
as Dearborn, Michigan, to small towns like Arab, Alabama.
They visited over one hundred mosques and visited homes and schools to
discover what Muslims are thinking, what they are reading, and how they are
living every day in America.
Ahmed illuminates unexplored Muslim-American communities through his
pursuit of challenging questions: Can we expect an increase in homegrown
terrorism? How do American Muslims of Arab descent differ from those of
other origins (e.g. Somali or South Asian)? Why are so many white women
converting to Islam? He also delves into the potentially sticky area of
relations with other religions. For example, is there truly a deep divide
between Muslims and Jews in America? And how well do Muslims get along with
other larger religious groups, such as Mormons in Utah?
Much like Ahmed's widely hailed Journey into Islam: The Crisis of Globalization
(Brookings, 2007), Journey into America is equal parts anthropological
research, listening tour, and travelogue. Whereas the previous book took
the reader into homes, schools, mosques, and public places in heavily
Muslim nations, Journey into America takes us into the heart of America's
Muslim communities in America. It is absolutely essential reading for
anyone trying to make sense of America today, especially its Muslim
population-the challenges it faces, the challenges it poses, and its
prospects for the future.
List of Contents
Chapter 1: Muslim Odyssey
PART 1: AMERICAN IDENTITY
Chapter 2: Defining American Identity
Chapter 3: Searching for American Identity
PART 2: ISLAM IN AMERICA
Chapter 4: African-Americans as First Muslims
Chapter 5: Immigrant Muslims: Living the American Dream/American Nightmare
Chapter 6: Muslim Converts: Shame and Honor in a Time of Excess
PART 3: ADJUSTING AND ADAPTING
Chapter 7: Jews and Muslims: Bridging the Great Divide
Chapter 8: Mormons and Muslims: Getting to Know You
Chapter 9: The Importance of Being America
Praise for Journey into America:
"Professor Akbar Ahmed turns his intrepid approach to cultural
dialogue and inter-faith understanding onto American society, in this
brilliant follow-up to "Journey into Islam". His insights should
be required reading for anyone grappling with national security, national
identity and national cohesion in today's complex era."
Colonel David Kilcullen, author of Washington Post Bestseller and
Economist Book of the Year, The Accidental Guerrilla
"Journey to America is an essential pillar in the effort to build the
interfaith bridge of understanding. It will inform, provoke, and inspire
Americans of all colors, cultures, and faiths." Congressman Keith
Ellison culture.
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The great Pakistan
aid debate
By: David Rogers | Politico
Jacqueline Novogratz preaches
"patient capital" to an impatient world. Jim Bever is a beaver
about building dams.
Roshaneh Zafar in Lahore, Pakistan,
welcomes a hybrid approach, if only the U.S. would get off the dime. And in
his seventh-floor sanctum atop the State Department, Deputy Secretary Jack
Lew is still the same unaffected, good-government guy from Boston City Hall
and Tip O'Neill's office. Only he laughs a bit nervously now that special
envoy Richard Holbrooke keeps calling him his "unindicted co-conspirator."
Welcome to the great Pakistan aid debate:
a $7.5 billion, five-year commitment; its own corporate-sounding logo, KLB;
and new urgency after the Times Square car bomb attempt May 1...
In truth, AID knows it will have to
transform itself if the program is to be successful. And with new
leadership of the agency under Rajiv Shah, a former Gates Foundation
executive who made his first visit to Pakistan as AID director in April,
that's very much the hope.
Too much foreign aid still goes to Beltway
contractors and never leaves the United States.
At a recent Senate hearing, Shah cited a
technical training school in Afghanistan that he said cost taxpayers 35
percent too much. Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), who oversees AID's budget, is
threatening to withhold his support unless the agency changes its
"ivory tower" culture and an attitude that "no matter what
your idea is, we know better, so we don't need you."
One
who has felt that rejection is Zafar, a 41-year-old Pakistani development
economist trained at the Wharton School and Yale University.
Established in 1995, her Kashf Foundation today boasts as many as
1,400 loan officers and a client list of more than 300,000, a
microfinancing network with a portfolio near $40 million and a record of extending
hard-to-get credit to Pakistani women. Lew himself was on hand in Islamabad
last year to present an award to Zafar for her work.
But
when she turned to AID, seeking money to double her operation and expand
into vulnerable areas of Pakistan like Swat and Hazara, her application
went nowhere, even as Washington struggled to get its programs up and
running.
"Both sides need to trust one another. There are good
entities," Zafar told POLITICO. "This is not about whether Kashf
gets the funds. It's really about ensuring that the promise behind the
Kerry-Lugar bill is fulfilled." MORE
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What I understand about Faisal Shahzad
As a
Muslim Pakistani, I can't tell you why he did it. But I know one violent
nut can change how Americans see me
By Wajahat Ali | Salon.com
Last Saturday, I was drinking my chai, reading the latest Green Lantern
comic, and participating in the glorious American hobby that is Googling
when I saw the news about the foiled NYC Times Square terror plot. I
immediately began reciting the "Post-Crisis Minority Mantra,"
familiar to many ethnic minorities and religions in these troubled times:
"Please don't let it be a Muslim or Pakistani dude.
Please don't let it be a Muslim or Pakistani dude."
Back then, it wasn't. They had footage of a suspicious white guy.
"Phew! Thank God!" I said out loud.
But I had to invoke the mantra repeatedly over the next few days, as
details emerged and the truth became all too clear: The terrorist was a
recently naturalized U.S. citizen from Pakistan named Faisal Shahzad. A
Muslim Pakistani.
"No! Not again! Why, God, why??"
A Muslim born and raised in America with Pakistani parents, I was the
"token" at early age. Growing up, I was like any other socially
awkward, overweight, dorky American kid who wanted to date Alyssa Milano
and beat Contra on my Nintendo without using the secret, unlimited life
code -- except my T-shirts were smeared with turmeric and lentil stains instead
of PB and J, and in place of Lunchables my mom fed me homemade,
green-colored, lamb patty burgers. I was the kid comfortable with all his
identities -- Muslim, American, Pakistani -- and as such, I became the one
people consulted when uncomfortable questions had to be asked, or
misconceptions and stereotypes needed to be explained.
After news of the averted attack, I was hit with a blitzkrieg of texts,
Facebook updates and gchat pings. Friends from varying backgrounds --
Mexican-American, African-American, Arab-American -- wanted to know what I
thought about another "Rage Boy" foolishly attempting to commit
violence with an amateurish terror plot.
Several made a similar confession: How glad they were that the suspect
didn't belong to "their tribe." What I did know, with a sinking
feeling, was that many moderate, peaceful Pakistani Muslims like me were
further doomed to collective mistrust and suspicion... MORE
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U.S. Is Still
Using Private Spy Ring, Despite Doubts
By Mark Mazzetti | New York Times
WASHINGTON - Top military officials have continued to rely on a secret
network of private spies who have produced hundreds of reports from deep
inside Afghanistan and Pakistan, according to American officials and
businessmen, despite concerns among some in the military about the legality
of the operation.
Earlier this year, government officials admitted that the military had sent
a group of former Central Intelligence Agency officers and retired Special
Operations troops into the region to collect information - some of which
was used to track and kill people suspected of being militants. Many
portrayed it as a rogue operation that had been hastily shut down once an
investigation began.
But interviews with more than a dozen current and former government
officials and businessmen, and an examination of government documents, tell
a different a story. Not only are the networks still operating, their
detailed reports on subjects like the workings of the Taliban leadership in
Pakistan and the movements of enemy fighters in southern Afghanistan are
also submitted almost daily to top commanders and have become an important
source of intelligence.
The American military is largely prohibited from operating inside Pakistan.
And under Pentagon rules, the army is not allowed to hire contractors for
spying. MORE
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