View Video of Infocom Raid News Conference in Texas

Fri Sep 7 16:22:14 PDT 2001

Source: Direct Submission
Organization: CAIR
Email: cair1 at ix.netcom.com
Date: Fri, 7 Sep 2001 16:51:49 -0400 (EDT)
Title: CAIR-NET: View Video of Infocom Raid News Conference in Texas

TEXT:

In the Name of Allah, the Compassionate, the Merciful

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AMERICAN MUSLIM NEWS BRIEFS - 9/7/2001

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HEADLINES:

* VIEW VIDEO OF INFOCOM RAID NEWS CONFERENCE IN TEXAS
* WIRE SERVICE COVERAGE OF MUSLIM REACTION TO INFOCOM RAID:
	1) MUSLIM GROUPS PROTEST FBI RAID OF INTERNET BUSINESS
	SUSPECTED OF TERRORIST TIES (AP)
	2) US MUSLIMS BLAST SEARCH OF MIDEAST INTERNET PROVIDER (AFP)
	3) FBI DENIES BIAS AS US RAID SHUTS ARABIC WEB SITES (Reuters)
* RACISM CAN MAKE YOU CRAZY (Globe and Mail)
* REP. BERKLEY (D-NV) DENIES MAKING COMMENTS ATTRIBUTED TO HER IN
TEL AVIV NEWSPAPER (Las Vegas Review-Journal)
* PAUL FINDLEY APPEARS ON BOOK TV 9/8
* SHIN BET STILL TORTURES PALESTINIANS
* PRO-PALESTINIAN POLITICAL CARTOON (Philadelphia Inquirer)
* KILEY ATTACKS MURDOCH'S FRIENDSHIP WITH ISRAEL (Guardian)

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VIEW VIDEO OF INFOCOM RAID NEWS CONFERENCE IN TEXAS

To view the video of yesterday's conference by Muslim leaders
outside Infocom's  headquarters in Richardson, Texas, go to
http://www.cair-net.org or http://www.islamicity.com/.
Local media coverage improved dramatically following the news
conference.

NOTE: Many of Infocom's servers are now back online.

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WIRE SERVICE COVERAGE OF MUSLIM REACTION TO INFOCOM RAID

MUSLIM GROUPS PROTEST FBI RAID OF INTERNET BUSINESS SUSPECTED OF
TERRORIST TIES

By DAVID KOENIG, The Associated Press, 9/6/2001

As federal agents conducted a second day of searching an Internet company
as part of an anti-terrorism campaign, Muslim leaders charged authorities
acted on scant evidence and anti-Arab stereotypes...

...Mark Enoch, a lawyer hired by InfoCom after the raid began early
Wednesday, said the company had no links to terrorist groups and was
cooperating with the FBI, even helping agents navigate the computer
system. A search warrant requested by federal authorities was sealed by
U.S. Magistrate Judge Paul Stickney of Dallas, and agents outside
Infocom's offices declined to comment on the investigation.

InfoCom's Internet operations manager said agents cut off Internet service
to the company's 500 clients...

...Nihad Awad, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic
Relations, linked the raid with U.S. opposition to international efforts
to criticize Israel's handling of the conflict with Palestinians.

"We suspect that all these attempts are to please the Israeli government
but not to protect the U.S. interests," Awad said. "Siding with Israel, a
racist country and state, I think does not do us any good."

Others viewed the raid broadly as the product of anti-Muslim bias.

"We have deep concerns that this once again is an attempt to rush to
judgment and to marginalize the American Muslim community simply because
... many of them are immigrants," said Mahdi Bray, political adviser to
the Muslim Public Affairs Council. "There is a pattern of bias that often
permeates all of these types of investigations."

Bailey declined to say why authorities targeted InfoCom, but she denied
any bias...

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US MUSLIMS BLAST SEARCH OF MIDEAST INTERNET PROVIDER
Agence France-Presse, 9/07/2001

WASHINGTON, Sept 6 (AFP) - US Muslim leaders Thursday condemned a federal
search at the Texas offices of a Middle East Internet service provider,
calling it part of an "anti-Muslim witch hunt..."

...The search disrupted satellite television service in the United Arab
Emirates, according to reports from Dubai.

"American Muslims view yesterday's action as just one of a long list of
attempts by the pro-Israel lobby to intimidate and silence all those who
wish to see Palestinian Muslims and Christians free themselves of a brutal
apartheid-like occupation," a coalition of nearly a dozen Muslim groups
said in a statement. "We believe the genesis of this raid lies not in
Washington, but in Tel Aviv."

Among the groups voicing their discontent were the American Muslim
Council, American Muslims for Jerusalem and the Council on American-
Islamic Relations.

One of InfoCom's clients was the Qatar-based Al-Jazeera satellite
television network, the coalition said, a popular Arabic news outlet
frequently criticized by Israel for its reporting on the situation in the
Palestinian territories.

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FBI DENIES BIAS AS US RAID SHUTS ARABIC WEB SITES
By Marcus Kabel, Reuters, 9/6/2001

DALLAS, Sept 6 (Reuters) - An 80-strong U.S. terrorism task force raided
the Texas-based host of Arabic Web sites, including that of the Arab
world's leading independent news channel, prompting charges on Thursday of
an "anti- Muslim witchhunt."

But the FBI, which took part in the raid on Wednesday at privately held
InfoCom Corp., in the Dallas suburb of Richardson, denied any anti-Arab
bias and said it was executing an unspecified federal search warrant...

...Several American Islamic groups condemned the search as "an anti-Muslim
witchhunt promoted by the pro-Israel lobby in America," according to a
statement from 10 organizations, including the Muslim Public Affairs
Council.

"We are deeply concerned that there is a pattern of stereotyping that
permeates all these types of investigations. There is a marginalization of
the American- Muslim population," Mahdi Bray of the Los Angeles-based
council said at a news conference outside the closed InfoCom office.

The FBI denied the raid was any kind of witchhunt.

"We were executing a search warrant as part of a criminal investigation.
It had nothing to do with anti-Islamic or anti-Palestinian or anti-Middle
East issues or anything like that," said special agent Lori Bailey,
spokeswoman for the Dallas FBI office...

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RACISM CAN MAKE YOU CRAZY
By Rick Salutin, Globe and Mail, 9/7/2001
http://theglobeandmail.com
Search using the term "racism."

...Take the Mideast. For a Palestinian under occupation, any daily trip --
to shop, work or visit - can turn into a hell of delay, humiliation and
possible death, in his homeland! It could drive any of us mad. Every case
of Canadian road rage has less provocation. As for Israel, its behaviour
sadly mirrors much of what was inflicted on Jews by others in the past. I
don't consider this statement controversial. We know most abusers were
abused. Their sense of justification is genuine..."

ACTION REQUESTED: Contact Rick Salutin at rsalutin at globeandmail.ca to
thank him for his courageous article. Please cc the Globe and Mail at
raddis at globeandmail.ca and Canada at cair-net.org on all correspondence.

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BERKLEY DENIES MAKING COMMENTS ATTRIBUTED TO HER IN TEL AVIV NEWSPAPER
By TONY BATT, Las Vegas Review-Journal, 9/6/2001
http://www.lvrj.com/lvrj_home/2001/Sep-06-Thu-2001/news/16937403.html

WASHINGTON -- Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., described Israel as "our
country" during a meeting last week with a top Palestinian official and
said Palestinians could leave if they didn't like living under Israeli
control, according to a Tel Aviv newspaper columnist's account of a
meeting last week including the lawmaker and a top Palestinian official.

Berkley, who aides said has been receiving angry calls from constituents
after a Muslim group started circulating the report, on Wednesday, denied
making the comments. The column ran Tuesday in Ha'aretz, one of Israel's
leading newspapers. "I think there obviously was a mistake in the
translation," Berkley said. "There was no press at this meeting, and there
were several inaccuracies in the story..."

...Written by Akiva Eldar, the column in Ha'aretz described an exchange at
a meeting involving Berkley, other lawmakers, and Saeb Erekat, the chief
Palestinian negotiator in talks with Israel.

Eldar, a former Washington bureau chief for Ha'aretz, did not quote
sources for the information. He could not be reached Wednesday night.
"Berkley reprimanded Dr. Saeb Erekat for daring to use the term
`occupation,' reminding him that `this is our country' and `we' won the
war," Eldar wrote.

The column went on to say Berkley rejected Erekat's suggestion that he
should be given full civil rights by Israel. Berkley told him, the column
said, that if the Palestinians don't like the present situation, she is
not going to prevent them from leaving. The American Muslims for
Jerusalem, a small Washington lobby group critical of Israel, issued a
statement Tuesday criticizing Berkley for being "slavishly supportive of
Israel."

CONTACT: (As always, be firm, but POLITE.)

The Honorable Shelley Berkley
U.S. House of Representatives
439 Cannon House Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20515-4708
TEL:(202) 225-5965
FAX: (202) 225-3119
Toll free: (877) 409-2488

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PAUL FINDLEY APPEARS ON BOOK TV
Silent No More: Confronting America's False Images of Islam
Saturday, September 8 at 8:55 pm and Sunday, September 9 at 10:00 am
http://www.booktv.org/General/index.asp?segID=1701&schedID=81

Former Congressman Paul Findley (R-IL) discusses his book "Silent No More:
Confronting America's False Images of Islam" before an audience at Barnes
& Noble Bookseller in Springfield, Illinois. The book discusses how
Muslims are perceived in America. The author asserts that most Americans
believe Muslims to be fanatics or terrorists, which he describes as a
false image of Islam. After the presentation, Mr. Findley answered
questions from members of the audience.

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SHIN BET STILL TORTURES PALESTINIANS
By Moshe Reinfeld, Ha'aretz, 9/6/2001

A report issued Thursday by the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel
says that the "defensive barrier" set up by the High Court of Justice two
years ago, against the torture of Palestinian suspects during
interrogation, is ineffective.

The organization argues that the court left practical gaps in its ruling,
which allow the Shin Bet security service to continue torturing prisoners
by depriving them of sleep and by keeping them bound for long periods...

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KILEY ATTACKS MURDOCH'S FRIENDSHIP WITH ISRAEL
By Jason Deans, The Guardian (UK), 9/5/2001
http://media.guardian.co.uk/presspublishing/story/0,7495,547296,00.html

Sam Kiley, the former Times Africa correspondent, has spoken out for the
first time about why he quit the paper, blaming its allegedly pro-Israeli
censorship of his reporting on the latest Middle East conflict.

Mr Kiley said Times owner Rupert Murdoch's close friendship with Israeli
prime minister Ariel Sharon, and heavy investment in Israel were the
reasons behind his decision to resign...

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PRO-PALESTINIAN POLITICAL CARTOON
http://inq.philly.com/content/inquirer/2001/09/06/art/AUTH0906.htm

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CAIR
Council on American-Islamic Relations
453 New Jersey Avenue, S.E.
Washington, D.C. 20003
Tel: 202-488-8787
Fax: 202-488-0833
Page: 202-490-5653
E-mail: cair1 at ix.netcom.com
URL: http://www.cair-net.org

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