Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976?Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Non-profit, educational or personal use tips the balance in favor of fair use. Unless you are in this field of investigative journalism, especially covering extremely sensitive subjects and potentially dangerous subjects as well, you simply cannot understand the complexities and difficulties involved with this work that I face every day.
House Republicans are now calling on the President to take the crisis head on by ending this program and enforcing current immigration laws.
There are 33 GOP lawmakers who have taken a stand against the DACA
program, and are hoping the pressure they put on the president will
force him to take action.
via Breitbart:
In response to the ongoing flood of unaccompanied
immigrant minors illegally crossing the nation’s southern border, 33
Republican congressmen, lead by Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA), are pressing
Obama to roll back policies and perceptions that they say have helped
spur the onslaught.
“As our country faces an unprecedented surge in the arrival of
unaccompanied alien children (UACs) at our southwestern border, we call
on you to immediately end the failed policies that encourage young
individuals to put themselves in peril, leave their home countries, and
make a long and dangerous journey to enter our country illegally,” they
wrote Wednesday in a letter to Obama.
Since October, more than 52,000 unaccompanied minors have been
detained illegally crossing the southern border — many telling Border
Patrol agents that they came because they believe they will be able to
stay.
According to the GOP congressmen, the president must take the crisis
on by first ending the DACA program — which shields certain illegal
immigrants from deportation and allows them to live and work in the U.S.
— “to send a clear signal to all individuals that our immigration laws
will be enforced.”
Further, they call on Obama to “make an explicit public commitment
that you will not support legislation that extends legal status to the
newly arriving illegal aliens no matter the age.”
They also requested Obama disclose the intent of the Department of Homeland Security’s review of deportation policies.
Signatures include: Rep. Darrell Issa, Rep. Pete Sessions, Rep. Sam
Graves, Rep. Lamar Smith, Rep. Blake Farenthold, Rep. Gus Bilirakis,
Rep. Marsha Blackburn, Rep. Tim McClintock, Rep. John Duncan, Rep. Tom
Cotton, Rep Jim Bridenstine, Rep. Alan Nunnelee, Rep. Gregg Harper, Rep.
Doug LaMalfa, Rep. Paul Gosar, Rep. Lynn Jenkins, Rep. Vicky Hartzler,
Rep. Tom Cole, Rep. Markwayne Mullin, Rep. Ken Calvert, Rep. Brad
Wenstrup, Rep. Virginia Foxx, Rep. Ander Crenshaw, Rep. Phil Gingrey,
Rep. Rob Wittman, Rep. Ralph Hall, Rep. Roger Williams, Rep John
Campbell, Rep. Steve Stockman, Rep. Dan Benishek, Rep. David Jolly, Rep.
Ted Yoho, Rep. Tim Griffin.
Awesome. It’s great to see House Republicans continuing to stand up against President Obama and attempt to hold him accountable for his actions.
This mess was made by Barack Obama, and it’s his duty to take the
lead in cleaning it up, and it all starts with ending the DACA program,
which is the source of the problem.
Obama is obviously attempting to use this crisis as justification for
passing immigration reform through executive order, once again superseding Congress. This must not be allowed to happen.
Please share this article on Facebook and Twitter if you
support House Republicans calling for Obama to step in and clean up his
mess at the border.
Teenagers’ Deaths Raise Fears of Shift From Political Struggle to Blood Feud
Photo
Israeli said it had launched 15 airstrikes against sites in Gaza that are associated with Hamas.Credit
Mohammed Abed/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
SDEROT,
Israel — In this resilient town about a mile from Israel’s volatile
border with the Gaza Strip, the streets were empty on Thursday but the
residents expressed defiance as Israeli troops massed around Gaza after a
barrage of rockets including three that hit homes here.
“We
need to finish them off before they finish us off,” said Avichai Jorno,
34, whose bedroom was littered with debris and bathroom was destroyed
by an unexploded rocket.
In
Shuafat, the East Jerusalem neighborhood where a Palestinian teenager
was kidnapped and killed the day before, streets strewn with remnants of
Wednesday’s violent protests were mostly quiet, too, but for a smallish
clash with Israeli soldiers. And the boy’s family was also defiant,
calling on the Israeli authorities to declare the attack an act of
revenge by Jews for last month’s abduction and murder of three Israeli
teenagers, not the result of a family dispute.
“We
want a written paper from the Israeli government saying the crime was
committed on a national background, and we want the Israeli government
to condemn this crime,” Ishak Abu Khdeir, the victim’s uncle, told
reporters.
Israelis and Palestinians are caught in another cycle of violence with little hope for a political solution.
Video Credit By Mona El-Naggar and Tamir Elterman on
Publish Date July 3, 2014.
Image CreditMohammed Ballas/Associated Press
A
familiar sense of foreboding engulfed Israelis and Palestinians, with
both preparing for the possibility of another of Israel’s periodic
military blitzes on Gaza, and with growing worry about a potential third
intifada, or uprising, in Jerusalem and the West Bank.
But
two months after the collapse of the latest round of peace
negotiations, there was also a new kind of fear bubbling, a sense that
these brutal crimes against young people — and the hate-laced social
media campaigns surrounding them — had revealed an alarming depth of
demonization and distrust on both sides.
“It
could be a shift in the nature of the conflict, from political struggle
to blood feud,” said Moshe Halbertal, a professor of philosophy at
Hebrew University. “It’s no more the Palestinian possible state
vis-à-vis the Israeli state; it’s kind of two peoples entangled in
cycles of vengeance.”
Photo
A spokesman for the armed
wing of Hamas at news conference in Gaza City on Thursday. There have
been conflicting accounts about the group's willingness to convince
militants to hold their fire.Credit
Mohammed Salem/Reuters
Diana
Buttu, a Palestinian lawyer and analyst, said Israel’s aggressive
crackdown on the West Bank — with hundreds of homes searched, mostly in
cities supposedly under Palestinian control — had left “an overwhelming
feeling of just this great vulnerability.”
“A
lot of the problem with this place is that compassion has become quite
selective,” said Ms. Buttu, who is a citizen of Israel but lives mainly
in Ramallah. “I hate to say this, but all of the ingredients are there
for things to get worse.”
The
Israel Defense Forces on Thursday sentenced four recent recruits to 10
days in military jail for joining a Facebook revenge campaign by posting
pictures of themselves with signs urging Israel’s prime minister to
“let us terminate the terrorists.”
Clashes between Israeli security forces
and Palestinian protesters continued in East Jerusalem as tensions
remained high over the deaths of four teenagers.
Publish Date July 3, 2014.
Image CreditRina Castelnuovo for The New York Times
After
nearly three weeks of intense activity in the West Bank, Israel’s
military on Thursday turned toward Gaza, where the daily exchange of
rockets answered by airstrikes threatened to explode into a full-scale
operation.
With
more than 40 rockets fired toward Israel in 24 hours, Lt. Col. Peter
Lerner, a military spokesman, said troops were mobilizing around Gaza
“to serve defensive positions and forward preparations.” But he
repeatedly said that “we have no interest in escalation,” and said
Gaza’s fate was in the hands of Hamas, the militant Islamic group that
dominates there and that Israel blames for the kidnap-murder of its
three teenagers.
“Our
activities on the ground are in direct relation to what Hamas has been
dealing out,” Colonel Lerner said. “We don’t want to take it further,
but we will be prepared for developments.”
Photo
In Sderot, Israel, a man looked at a home that was damaged by a rocket fired by Palestinian militants from Gaza.Credit
Abir Sultan/European Pressphoto Agency
Hamas
political leaders, too, have said they are not interested in
escalation, but that they are having trouble persuading other militias
to hold their fire, especially with Wednesday’s discovery of the burned
body of the 16-year-old from Shuafat, Muhammad Abu Khdeir.
After
a meeting of the Gaza factions on Thursday afternoon, masked men from
the Hamas military wing declared themselves “ready for all
possibilities.” Thirteen rockets hit Israel as night fell.
“We
monitor the barbaric and brutal aggression by the enemy’s army in the
West Bank and Jerusalem,” a Hamas fighter said through a kaffiyeh
covering all but his eyes. “We promise to turn your settlements, posts,
the targets that you expect and those you don’t expect into a burning
coal if your leadership makes any stupid step.”
The
people of Sderot, where the first crude Qassam rockets made in Gaza
fell 13 years ago, were preparing for another round, but were skeptical
that Israel would take strong action. “It’s a waste of fuel,” Itzik
Biton, who owns a falafel store, said of the mobilization. “They won’t
do anything.”
“We
were born here and we will die here,” Mr. Biton, 43, added. “The
question is whether we will die of old age or from a Qassam.”
Ministers
and Parliament members, insurance assessors and reporters visited
Sderot, but local residents were scarce. In the midafternoon heat, a
half-dozen children had the public pool — reopened this week after
years’ closed for security reasons and then renovations — to themselves.
Photo
An Israeli woman inspected
the damage to a home in the border town of Sderot on Thursday after
Palestinian militants fired rockets there.Credit
Jack Guez/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Mr.
Jorno’s wife, Tami, said that when the rocket alert sounded at 8 a.m.
Thursday, she and a friend rushed their three small children into the
safe room off the kitchen and almost immediately heard two booms. She
went out to her garden with its ornamental gnomes and toadstools,
sensing that one had landed close by. Neighbors pointed out the hole in
her stucco wall.
Later, bomb disposal experts carried the unexploded rocket away. Debris littered the Jornos’ flowery summer bedcovers.
Shuafat
was also riddled with detritus from Wednesday’s clashes. Smashed
traffic lights. Overturned garbage bins. A vegetable stand in an
unfinished two-story building blackened by firebombs protesters had
hurled at soldiers using it as a staging area.
“Resistance
lives on,” read a splash of fresh red graffiti. Next to Muhammad’s
name, another said, “Palestine is free and Arab.” Most were in Arabic,
but one, in Hebrew, said, “Death to Jews.”
Around
5 p.m., some 300 Palestinians threw stones at soldiers, who responded
with stun grenades. But most of the day was quiet, as mourners
congregated at a canopy in front of Muhammad’s house and adorned with
his picture, waiting for word on when the autopsy would be complete. The
funeral was expected after Friday’s noon prayer.
“It
will not be a normal funeral,” said a cousin, Said Abu Khdeir, who owns
a restaurant in the neighborhood. “It will be a wedding for a martyr.”
A
police spokesman said the investigation was continuing and had not yet
determined whether the killing was revenge or a nonpolitical crime.
Wasem Abu Khdeir, 17, a cousin of Muhammad’s, said the police had
questioned four of his other teenage cousins for hours on Thursday about
whether they had anything to do with the crime.
Tamir
Lion, an anthropologist who focuses on youth and combat soldiers, said
on Israel Radio, “The state of Israel in recent years is looking for its
ethos — that is to say, ‘Where are we going.’
“When
there is no ethos, and it does not matter why, you always withdraw to
the most primitive ethos — us and them,” he added. “It becomes a group
that defines itself not as what it is, but what it hates.”
Isabel Kershner reported
from Sderot, and Jodi Rudoren from Jerusalem. Said Ghazali contributed
reporting from Jerusalem, and Fares Akram from Gaza.
Suha Abu Khdeir, center, whose son Muhammad was found dead, with relatives on Wednesday. “We don’t feel safe,” she said.Credit
Rina Castelnuovo for The New York Times
JERUSALEM
— The abduction and killing of a Palestinian teenager whose burned body
was found in a Jerusalem forest on Wednesday further poisoned relations
between Israelis and Palestinians and prompted international outrage as
the police investigated the death as a possible Israeli revenge
killing.
The
death of Muhammad Abu Khdeir, 16, came a day after the burial of three
Israeli teenagers who were kidnapped and killed in the occupied West
Bank last month. The killing of the teenager set off fierce riots in the
ordinarily quiet and relatively well-to-do East Jerusalem neighborhood
where he lived, threatening to ignite broader unrest and underlining
deep fissures in Israeli society.
The
abductions and killings of the Israeli and Palestinian teenagers raised
the specter of individual vendettas within the broader conflict, making
it all the more personal. Both sides, while angry and grieving, seemed
stunned by the turn of events, in which each side sees itself as both
victim and perpetrator.
Photo
Clashes between Palestinians
and Israeli border police broke out in Jerusalem on Wednesday after the
kidnapping and killing of a Palestinian teenager.Credit
Mahmoud Illean/Associated Press
While
Israeli officials said they were still investigating the death of the
teenage Palestinian, including possible criminal motives, the killing
followed passionate calls for retribution on a Facebook page named “The
People of Israel Demand Revenge” that quickly gathered 35,000 “likes”
and included pictures of soldiers posing with their weapons. The page
was taken down after two days.
The
latest killing seemed to set off introspection among many Israelis who
only a day earlier nursed their grievances over the killings of the
three Israeli teenagers. The justice minister, Tzipi Livni, reacted
harshly to the public calls for revenge and said if Muhammad was the
victim of a reprisal killing it amounted to “an act of terrorism.”
Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed on Tuesday to hold accountable those
who killed the three young men in the West Bank, pointing a finger at
the Palestinian militant group Hamas. On Wednesday, after the body of
the Palestinian teenager was found in the woods, the prime minister
called on Israelis to obey the law, and asked investigators to quickly
look into what he called “the abominable murder.”
Given
the explosive atmosphere after Muhammad’s death, Israel found that its
options for punitive measures had been narrowed for fear of inflaming
the situation. Many Israelis engaged in soul-searching, recognizing that
both sides in this blood feud had suffered at each other’s hands. About
a thousand Israelis gathered for a demonstration in Jerusalem against
violence and racism.
Secretary
of State John Kerry, in a statement, strongly condemned what he called
“the despicable and senseless abduction and murder” of Muhammad. He
added, “Those who undertake acts of vengeance only destabilize an
already explosive and emotional situation.”
Photo
Muhammad Hussein Abu Khdeir was killed a day after the burial of three Israelis.Credit
Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
The
Israeli teenagers, Eyal Yifrach, 19; Naftali Fraenkel, 16, who also
held United States citizenship; and Gilad Shaar, 16, were abducted on
June 12 as they tried to hitch a ride home from their West Bank
yeshivas. Muhammad was forced into a car near his neighborhood mosque, a
few yards from his home in the Shuafat neighborhood before 4 a.m. as he
waited for his friends to go and pray, witnesses told his parents.
“We
don’t feel safe,” Suha Abu Khdeir, Muhammad’s mother, said as she sat
in an upper floor of the family’s stone house, quiet and tearful,
surrounded by women who had come to comfort her. “They took him from in
front of our home,” she added.
Outside
in the small yard, masked youths with slingshots were hurling rocks and
rolling burning tires toward Israeli security forces. The forces, a
short distance away on the main road, responded with tear gas, stun
grenades and other means, according to a police spokesman, who said
protesters had also thrown several pipe bombs.
A
half-mile section of the main thoroughfare, in an area that Israel
seized in the 1967 war and annexed in opposition to international
opinion, was carpeted with rocks and remained closed as clashes
continued throughout the day. Shelters at stops along Jerusalem’s
light-rail line, which runs through Arab and Jewish neighborhoods, were
smashed.
Tensions
had already been running high. During the recent Israeli crackdown in
the West Bank, six Palestinians were killed in confrontations with
Israeli forces and about 400 Palestinians, many of them affiliated with
Hamas, were arrested. Militants in Gaza fired more than
20 rockets and mortar rounds into southern Israel on Wednesday. They
fell without causing injury.
Palestinian and Israeli officials and a
relative of the slain teenager, whose body was found in a Jerusalem
forest early Wednesday, discussed the kidnapping and killing.
Video Credit By Quynhanh Do on
Publish Date July 2, 2014.
Image CreditMenahem Kahana/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Sitting
in an enclosed porch surrounded by male mourners, Hussein Abu Khdeir,
Muhammad’s father, who owns an electrical appliance store, said he had
spent eight hours with police investigators. Tired and unshaven, he said
that he had not been allowed to see his son’s body, which was at the
Abu Kabir Forensic Institute in Tel Aviv, but that investigators had
identified it by matching DNA samples taken from the saliva of both
parents.
“I don’t expect any results,” he said of the investigation.
Muhammad,
who was studying at a vocational school to be an electrician, was the
fifth of seven children, three sons and four daughters.
“I
am against kidnapping and killing,” his father said. “Whether Jew or
Arab, who can accept the kidnapping and killing of his son or daughter? I
call on both sides to stop the bloodshed.”
Muhammad’s
mother said he had been playing a computer game on a laptop with one of
his brothers, then left the house about 3:30 a.m. to meet his friends
for the dawn prayer that starts the daily fast during the Muslim holy
month of Ramadan.
Photo
Palestinian protesters threw stones at Israeli police during clashes on Wednesday in Shuafat, a neighborhood in Jerusalem.Credit
Thomas Coex/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Mahmoud
Abu Khdeir, the imam of the mosque and a cousin, said the other youths
left to get food for the predawn meal when a gray Hyundai pulled up and
its occupants forced Muhammad into the car.
The
police said they were reviewing images from security cameras along the
street; Muhammad’s father showed visitors photographs, on his cellphone,
that he said were from the security camera of a store near the mosque,
showing two young men walking on the pavement, who he said were the
kidnappers. Witnesses told him a third man was in the driver’s seat of
the car.
Youths
came to the house to tell Muhammad’s parents that he had been abducted.
They called the police and tried to call Muhammad’s cellphone. It rang,
but nobody answered.
On
Wednesday, the Ynet news site posted the full two-minute recording of
an emergency call one of the Israeli youths placed to the police from
the car in which they were apparently shot to death. After what sound
like gunshots and cries of pain, the kidnappers can be heard
congratulating themselves and singing.
As
funerals for the three were underway on Tuesday, hundreds of
extreme-right protesters gathered in Jerusalem demanding vengeance.
Chanting “Death to Arabs,” they tried to attack passers-by, who had to
be extricated by the police. More than 40 protesters were arrested.
The
two events exposed the extent to which parts of each side have
dehumanized the other. After the kidnapping of the three Israeli
teenagers last month, messages posted on social networks by Palestinians
celebrated the capture of “three Shalits,” in reference to Gilad
Shalit, the Israeli soldier held captive by Hamas militants in Gaza, who
was eventually released in exchange for 1,027 prisoners.
A
17-year-old created the Facebook group calling for revenge for the
kidnapping of the three Israelis, and an Israeli blogger, Ami Kaufman,
pointed to a photograph submitted to the Facebook group by two smiling girls who held a sign reading, “Hating Arabs is not racism, it’s values!”
President
Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority strongly condemned the
killing of the Israelis. And Yoaz Hendel, a former director of
communications for Mr. Netanyahu, expressed dismay after the death of
Muhammad.
“It
is unbelievable how a few hundred racist Jews can cause so much damage
to an entire country,” Mr. Hendel wrote on his Facebook page in Hebrew.
“The results of the investigation into the death of the boy are already
unimportant. After pictures of the mob shouting ‘Death to Arabs,’ the
damage is done.”
Jodi Rudoren and Said Ghazali contributed reporting from Jerusalem, and Robert Mackey from New York.
A version of this article appears in print on July 3, 2014, on page A1 of the New York edition with the headline: Arab Boy’s Death Escalates Clash Over Abductions. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe
Obama is Suing an American Company; The Reason will Blow Your Mind
July 3, 2014
Submitted by: Veronica Coffin By Jennifer Burke
Barack Obama and Eric Holder are fighting hard for rights that they
believe are important. No, they are not fighting for the right to life.
They are also not fighting for religious liberty. Goodness knows they
are not fighting for the right to free speech. No, the President of the
United States and the Attorney General are fighting tooth and nail for
the right for people to not have to speak or even know English in order
to work at a company in America.
In fact, not only are Obama and Holder demanding the ‘right for people
to not have to be able to communicate in English’ in order to hold a job
in America, they are suing an American company for firing a group of
Hmong and Hispanic workers because they could not speak English. The
company, a Green Bay Wisconsin metal and plastics manufacturer, is being
accused of discrimination. Abusing
Using Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Obama regime is
claiming that it is not necessary for workers to know English in order
to perform their jobs and forcing them to speak English is in violation
of the Civil Rights Act.
That’s right. It is not necessary for a worker to be able to
communicate with their supervisor. It is not necessary for a worker to
understand instructions given to them on the job. Forcing them to learn
how to communicate effectively in order to create a productive,
efficient, and safe work environment, in this case at a manufacturing
plant, is discrimination. Judicial Watch provides the twisted interpretation of the Civil Rights Act as provided by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC).
…the Civil Rights Act protects employees from
discrimination based on national origin, which includes the linguistic
characteristics of a national origin group. Therefore, according to this
reasoning, foreigners have the right to speak their native language
even during work hours at an American company that requires English.
Requirements of English fluency and so-called English only rules are
often implemented to make what is really discrimination appear
acceptable, says the government attorney handling this case. “But
superficial appearances are not fooling anyone,” he assures. “When
speaking English fluently is not, in fact, required for the safe and
effective performance of a job, nor for the successful operation of the
employer’s business, requiring employees to be fluent in English usually
constitutes employment discrimination on the basis of national origin —
and thus violates federal law.”
Judicial Watch also reveals that the EEOC, under Obama, have taken
‘unprecedented actions’ to protect foreigners, going so far as to give a
directive in 2009 that made a “workplace English rule illegal.” Obama
has also taken legal action against businesses that conduct criminal
background and credit checks accusing them of discrimination against
minorities. Company rules regarding the wearing of headgear has gotten
companies accused of discrimination against Muslims.
Some might wonder whether Obama is continuing his community agitation organizing to a new level using the power and weapons that he has as president.
Before Boston Attack, Alleged Bomber Posed With Black Flag of Jihad at Local Mosque
BOSTON — Jul 3, 2014, 10:07 AM ET
By MICHELE McPHEE
Months before the 2013 terror attack on the Boston Marathon, accused
bomber Tamerlan Tsarnaev posed in front of a black flag often associated
with jihad with a fellow worshiper at a Boston-area mosque, according
to an FBI report obtained by ABC News.
The FBI report, which did not include the photo, describes Tsarnaev and
his friend Khairullozhon Matanov as “seated in front of a black flag
with a sword and a shadada phrase,” referring to the Muslim statement of
faith, and adds that the photo was taken “at the mosque.” Similar flags have become symbols of jihad, used by al Qaeda and al Qaeda-linked extremist groups.
The FBI had been warned by Russian intelligence in 2011 that Tsarnaev
may have become radicalized, but the bureau dropped its inquiry months
before the photo was taken because it said it “did not find any terrorism activity.”
The black flag picture is part of the evidence prosecutors said Matanov
deleted from his computer to obstruct the investigation into the
bombings, which in turn led to the arrest of the Kyrgyzstani national
last month on federal charges. He has pleaded not guilty and is
currently being held without bail.
The FBI report says the alarming photograph was taken on Eid-Al-Adha,
also known as the Festival of Sacrifice, the highest of Muslim holidays,
but does not say exactly when. A source familiar with the investigation
told ABC News it was taken during the August 2012 celebration. The FBI
report does not identify the mosque where the photograph was taken.
Tsarnaev and Matanov prayed at a mosque in Cambridge, Mass., the FBI
report says, but Yusufi Vali, the Executive Director of the Islamic
Society of Boston that opened the mosque told ABC News there were no
reports of the black flag of jihad being at the 2012 Eid holiday, or at
any other time. Tsarnaev had been asked to leave the Cambridge mosque
after he disrupted services later that same year.
“Without doubt there is no symbol of violence or terrorism at the
[Cambridge] center," said Vali. “I can confidently say that we preach
moderation in line with more American values."
The Islamic Society of Boston opened its first mosque in 1994 on
Prospect Street in Cambridge in a former Knights of Columbus building. A
larger $15.6 million Roxbury mosque opened in 2009. Because of its
size, high holidays, like Eid, are celebrated there, Vali said.
Before Tamerlan Tsarnaev began to pray at the Cambridge mosque, which he
did more frequently than his younger brother and alleged Boston bombing
co-conspirator Dzhokhar, the Islamic Society of Boston over the years
had had a small number of run-ins with alleged would-be violent
extremists.
The Islamic Society of Boston was founded by Abdulrahman Alamoudi, who pleaded guilty in 2004
to charges related to his “activities... with nations and organizations
that have ties to terrorism” -- including a link to an assassination
plot targeting Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Abdullah ibn Abdilaziz,
according to the Department of Justice. He was sentenced to 23 years in
prison. To this day the FBI lists Alamoudi’s prosecution as a “Major
Terrorism Case” on its website.
Tarek Mehanna, 31, was a pharmaceutical student at a Massachusetts
college where his father worked as a professor, and lived with his
parents in upscale Sudbury where his mother ran a state-licensed day
care center out of her home. He was convicted in 2012
of supporting al Qaeda and conspiring to kill Americans. Before that,
Mehanna had visited the Cambridge center for prayers and lectures, in
addition to visiting mosques in other parts of the state, Vali said.
After the Boston bombing, investigators found a Tarek Mehanna prayer
card tucked into a Russian dictionary in Tamerlan Tsarnaev’s Cambridge
apartment, according to court documents.
Mehanna’s alleged accomplice, Ahmad Abousamra, also occasionally prayed
at the Cambridge mosque. He had graduated from the prestigious Catholic
high school Xavier with honors and his father, Dr. Abdul Abousamra, was a
respected endocrinologist at Massachusetts General Hospital before
moving to Detroit and was the President of The Islamic Center of New
England, according to The Boston Globe.
After being interviewed by agents from the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task
Force, Abousamra was able to slip out of the country in 2006, according
to the bureau. He was indicted in 2009 and last December he was added to
the FBI’s Most Wanted Terrorists List with a $50,000 reward for information leading to his capture.
Perhaps most controversial of the group, Dr. Aafia Siddiqui also prayed
at the Prospect Street mosque while she earned a scientific doctorate
degree at MIT. She eventually moved overseas with her husband and two
children. She was detained in 2008
after Afghan officials found her in possession of handwritten notes
that referred to a “mass casualty attack” along with a specific list of
targets like the Statue of Liberty and the Brooklyn Bridge.
As military intelligence officials and FBI agents questioned her at a
police compound in Afghanistan, prosecutors said, she grabbed an assault
rifle from a U.S. serviceman and opened fire on her interrogators while
saying “Death to America,” according to the reported testimony of witnesses.
No one was killed in the sudden attack. Siddiqui was convicted in 2010
on federal terrorism charges and sentenced to 86 years in prison.
Director Vali insisted that all were “infrequent” worshippers at the
Cambridge center, as were the Tsarnaev brothers, and they also
worshipped at other mosques. Their affiliation with the Islamic Society
of Boston should not cast aspersions on either the Cambridge center or
the larger Roxbury mosque, where some 1,200 worship every week, Vali
said.
“When the [Boston] bombings happened initially, like most Bostonians, we
were all traumatized and scared. We were devastated that these people
were part of city and part of our mosque,” he said.
The mosque was also where Matanov met Ibragim Todashev, a suspect in a
mysterious triple murder elsewhere in Massachusetts, the FBI report
says.
On Sept. 11, 2011, the ten-year anniversary of the 9/11 terror attacks,
the bodies of three young men were discovered with their throats slit
and covered in marijuana in a home in Waltham, Mass.
Todashev, a suspect in the case, lived with Matanov at the time of the
murders, according to FBI reports, and later moved to Florida.
This May Todashev was killed in his Orlando home
by an FBI agent after he allegedly attacked the officer. The FBI says
Todashev was on the verge of signing a statement that implicated himself
and Tamerlan Tsarnaev in the triple murder. The same month, ABC News
reported investigators had developed “mounting evidence,”
bolstered by “forensic hits,” that pointed to the possible involvement
of the Tsarnaev brothers in the grisly unsolved murders.
Matanov's immigration attorney, Paul Glickman, said that his client was
cooperative with the FBI during multiple interrogations over the past
year and answered all of the bureau's questions about the night of the
Waltham murders.
"Mr. Matanov was cooperative multiple times," Glickman told ABC News. "I have no idea why he has been arrested now."
Glickman refused to comment on the specifics of his client's interviews
with the FBI, including at least one that took place at his Boston
office, according to the reports.
Matanov and Todashev have not been implicated in the Boston bombing, but
Matanov did have dinner with the Tsarnaev brothers the day of the
Boston bombing and texted Tamerlan roughly 40 minutes after the deadly
blasts, prosecutors said. He was also in touch with Todashev in Florida
after the attack, the report states.
Edward Hayden, who represents Matanov on the current obstruction charges
said his client is a hardworking immigrant with dreams of bringing his
family to the United States, not a radical.
"Being friends with someone is not an indication of terrorist
activities," he said. The FBI report obtained by ABC News notes that
Matanov told investigators he consciously avoided discussing extremism
with the Tsarnaevs.
The Islamic Society of Boston said too that terrorism is are not in line
with the mosque’s values. Vali pointed out that mosque leaders
volunteered to try and negotiate with Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, the accused
bomber who survived the police shootout that took his older brother’s
life and who was on the run for hours before being captured.
“Since the bombing what we are intentionally trying to do at that
Cambridge center is to push the right vision of Islam, in a stronger
way… contributing positively to our community,’’ Vali said. “That’s what
we are about.”
Michele McPhee is a freelance journalist and frequent ABC News contributor based in Boston.
The fierce disagreements dividing the Supreme Court over this
week’s Hobby Lobby decision were laid bare Thursday in a searing dissent
from Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who said
the Justices’ decision in a separate contraceptive case “undermines
confidence in this institution.” The dissent was signed by all three
female Justices.
“Those who are bound by our decisions usually believe they can take us at our word,” wrote Sotomayor. “Not so today.”
“Those who are bound by our decisions usually believe they can take us at our word. Not so today.”
The dissent was in an order to grant an emergency request from
Wheaton College, an evangelical college in Illinois. At issue is the
“accommodation” the Obama administration worked out for
religiously-identified non-profits: Sign a form certifying your
objection, and the insurer will provide the coverage directly, without
the objecting organization having to pay. As of now, 122 non-profits
have sued,
claiming that signing the opt-out form for someone to get contraception
violates their religious liberty. (An attorney for the plaintiffs has
repeatedly referred to it as a “permission slip for abortion,” even
though it does not actually cover abortion.)
In fact, that accommodation was one of the reasons Justice Samuel
Alito cited to justify his Hobby Lobby decision – words Sotomayor threw
back at him in the dissent. Under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act,
the government has to show it has pursued the least restrictive means
to accomplish its goal. Alito claimed that because the nonprofit
accommodation exists, that means the government has other ways to get
women access to contraception that respects religious liberty. Yet only a
few days later, he ruled that the nonprofit accommodation – again,
signing a form – is also a violation of religious liberty.
“Let me be absolutely clear: I do not doubt that Wheaton genuinely
believes that signing the self-certification form is contrary to its
religious beliefs,” Sotomayor wrote. “But thinking one’s religious beliefs are substantially burdened … does not make it so.” She added, “Not every sincerely felt ‘burden’ is a ‘substantial’ one, and it is for courts, not litigants, to identify which are.”
What the plaintiffs in the nonprofit cases are seeking is to be
treated like churches – no contraception for anyone. But the majority
claims that “nothing in this interim order affects the ability of the applicant’s employees and students to obtain, without cost, the
full range of FDA approved contraceptives,” because the government
already knows about their objection from the lawsuit and can tell the
insurer itself. But without the form, Sotomayor argues, how could the administration “ever
identify the organizations eligible for the accommodation and perform
the administrative tasks necessary to make the accommodation work?”
She added, “The Court’s actions in this case create unnecessary
costs and layers of bureaucracy, and they ignore a simple truth: The
Government must be allowed to handle the basic tasks of public
administration in a manner that comports with common sense.” The dissent was co-signed by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and
Justice Elena Kagan, but not Justice Stephen Breyer, who also dissented
with them in Hobby Lobby.
