NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #31/NN_1992_31.iso/spool/misc/activism/progress/9540

Text File | 1992-12-21 | 8.2 KB | 136 lines

Newsgroups: misc.activism.progressive
Path: sparky!uunet!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!wupost!mont!pencil.cs.missouri.edu!daemon
From: New Liberation News Service <[e-mail]>
Subject: NLNS: Feds Harass Palestinian Activists
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Followup-To: alt.activism.d
Originator: [e-mail]
Sender: [e-mail]
Nntp-Posting-Host: pencil.cs.missouri.edu
Organization: ?
Date: Mon, 21 Dec 1992 15:32:34 GMT
Approved: [e-mail]
Lines: 121


U.S. Government Harasses Palestinian Activists;
Seeks to Restrict Free Speech
Ranganathan Krishnan, The Thistle

(NLNS)--Defense lawyers presented opening arguments on the 27th of
October in a case civil libertarians see as setting bounds for the
government's ability to curb freedom of speech of foreign nationals in the
US. The case being tried in California is part of a 5-year effort by the US
Immigration Department to deport seven Palestinians and the Kenyan wife
of one of them. The eight were first arrested in 1987 and despite many
efforts the government has repeatedly failed to achieve their deportation. In
this latest attempt the government is seeking to deport six of them for
technical violations of immigration law. The other two, Khader Musa
Hamide, 38, a 21-year US resident and Michel Shehadeh, 36, also a long
time resident alien, however, have all their immigration papers in order. The
Immigration Department is charging these two with "engaging in terrorist
activity" on the grounds that they solicited  "funds ..... and [members] for a
terrorist organization."
    This will be the first case tried under the new 1990 Immigration Act.
The law punishes resident aliens for providing "material support" for
"terrorism." The government's case is based on this clause and is organized
in two phases. In the phase now in progress the government will seek to
establish its claim that the People's Front for the Liberation of Palestine
(PFLP), a member organization of the PLO, is a terrorist organization. In
the second phase, the government will contend that the defendants provided
"material support" to the PFLP. The prosecution has not yet presented its
evidence regarding "material support" and refuses to discuss the case.
However the alleged support of the PFLP apparently involves distributing a
magazine that is legally available in the US, including the Library of
Congress, and holding fund-raisers for charitable Palestinian causes
including the PLO's programs for education, political action, social welfare,
etc.  The government will claim that these actions are sufficient to deport the
defendants under the 2-year old statute.

Freedom of speech
    While the technical question of what constitutes "material support"
of "terrorism" will ostensibly be the issue, the significance of the case lies
elsewhere. First, the case may set a precedent for curbing freedom of
speech of non-citizens by defining how the new Immigration Act can be
used by the government. If the government's case is upheld many fear that
the Act will be used to silence immigrants who speak out in favor of causes
that the government opposes. According to Mr. Van der Hout, the defense
lawyer for Mr. Hamide, "Be it South Africans who raise money for the
[African National Congress], Iraqis who raise money for the Kurds .....or
Israelis or other non-US citizens who raise money for the government of
Israel, they would be deportable under the government's interpretation" of
the provision. Defense lawyers contend that lawmakers never intended to
give such a "broad interpretation" to the provision.
    To illustrate that these fears are quite real civil libertarians point to
the entire LA 8 affair.  After the eight people were first arrested in early
1987, William Webster, then head of the Federal Bureau of Investigation,
said they "had not been found to have engaged themselves in terrorist
activity." He added: "If these individuals had been United States Citizens,
there would not have been a basis for their arrests." Robert Jucaem, head of
the immigration law section of the American Bar Association, says that
without proof of illegal activity, it is "an unreasonable use of Justice
Department authority" to try to deport the eight. Having tried other grounds
to deport the eight, now six of them are charged with overstaying on student
visas, working without permission, and in one case with taking too few
courses as a student. Thousands are guilty of such technical violations of
immigration law but the immigration department does not show any
particular drive to prosecute these people.  Civil libertarians point this out as
evidence that the entire affair is motivated by the individual's political beliefs
and activities. They say that with these same motivations the government is
charging the two with engaging in "terrorism" there being no other law that
the government can use to deport these two.
    Justice Department papers filed in the case acknowledge that aliens
have the same First Amendment protections as citizens--but not always.
Government briefs note that policies towards aliens are "intricately
interwoven" with foreign relations. Thus, laws concerning aliens and
constitutional rights, the government says, "may be more generally worded
than would be permissible with regard to domestic affairs."

The PFLP on trial
    The second significant feature of the case is that it essentially puts
the PFLP on trial. By doing so the government will seek to advance its
foreign policy goals. According to Sam  Myers, a Minneapolis lawyer who
is past president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association, "The
decision that the immigration service makes in high visibility cases like this
is first and foremost an expression of US foreign policy."
    The Justice Department cites a portion of the 1990 Immigration Act
that says:  "An alien who is an officer, official, representative or spokesman
of the Palestine Liberation Organization [including the PFLP] is considered
.....to be engaged in terrorist activity." The PLO has long renounced
terrorism as a means to ending Israeli occupation of the West Bank and
Gaza. However, many opposed to the creation of an independent
Palestinian state including the Israeli  and US  governments refuse to deal
with the PLO on the ground that the PLO is a terrorist organization.  The
case will be a test of this assertion and if upheld will provide legitimacy to
the negotiating position that Israel and the US favor.

The Technical Issues
    The technical issue in this case will be: What constitutes "material
support" for "terrorism?" Leaving aside questions of what constitutes
"terrorism" the court will judge whether soliciting funds and members for
an organization which is engaged in education, political action and social
welfare and is considered by the government to engage in "terrorism"
constitutes "material support" for "terrorism." Or must the government
establish the direct involvement of the defendants in a specific terrorist act to
prosecute under this law.
    Van Der Hout said earlier that "We don't think what the PFLP is or
isn't is really relevant to the case. What's relevant is whether [his client]
provided material support to any terrorist activity."
    Civil libertarians point out that membership, advocacy and soliciting
funds and members for an organization, whatever the government might
choose to call it, is an activity protected by the first amendment for US.
citizens.  They contend that the government is wrongly pursuing this case
since the first amendment's guarantee against government arbitrariness
extends to foreign nationals as well under present immigration law.  The
validity of guilt by association was negated when Congress repealed the
Maccaran-Walter Act in 1990 which allowed the government to deport
foreign nationals on the grounds that they advocated "world communism"
and replaced it with this new law. While these are the grounds on which the
defense wishes to argue its case it also contests subsidiary claims of the
prosecution. The two defendants deny membership in the PFLP.
The Thistle can be reached at W20-413, 84 Massachusetts Ave., Cambridge
MA 02139; [phone]; [e-mail]

--- 30 ---