Panther Bonds Set at Three Million Each

Bail has been set for at least $3 million for each Panther ($5 million for some of them)! Can anyone--with the possible exception of some in the current administration--really be that dangerous? Clearly, the plan seems to be to ensure the defendants' inability to defend themselves, even within the severely limited scope of the Just-us system.

New Website to Support the Panther 8

The corporate media sensor seems to have eliminated all mention of the Black Panther re-arrests from the Tube. Thankfully, a new website has been set up to cover the case, by the producer of A Legacy of Torture:
http://cdhrsupport.org

Black Panthers Rearrested

Yesterday, at the protest against the Iraq War, a young Muslim-activist brutha was telling me about the recapture of eight members of the BPP, and their treatment during the their earlier prosecutions in the 60s/70s. Abu Ghraib, all over again. COINTELPRO is ostensibly defunct and discredited. (For those of you who live in the U.S., and are unfamiliar with COINTELPRO, please, please educate yourself on it. The U.S. fascination with torture did not begin at Abu Ghraib.) Yet, in the selective application of justice characteristic of the U.S., its perpetrators have gone unpunished/unprosecuted for the murders and torture committed under the program. Not a single leader--Black or Muslim--who claims to stand for justice and for the rights of the People, from Jesse Jackson to WD Muhammad, or even Farrakhan, has called for an inquiry into COINTELPRO. Today the system continues to victimize these innocents, as if they haven't suffered enough. Muslims and people of conscience must speak out against this injustice.

I'm not sure what's being done, if anything, to organize against this outrage. The Jericho Movement may be posting updates, as they become available:

http://thejerichomovement.com/

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http://bombsandshields.blogspot.com/

Eight veterans of the Black Panther Party (BPP,) seven of whom are accused of belonging to the Black Liberation Army (BLA,) were arrested today on charges stemming from the 1971 shooting death of San Fransisco Police Sgt. John V. Young.

The August 29, 1971 attack on the Ingleside Police Station came only eight days after San Quentin prison guards gunned down BPP Field Marshal "Soledad Brother" George Jackson. The murder of Jackson provoked threats of retaliation and even sparked the Attica Prison rebellion.

Seven of the men arrested, all suspected BLA members, were charged with murder and conspiracy. They are Ray Michael Boudreaux, 64, of Altadena; Richard Brown, 65, of San Francisco; Herman Bell, 59, and Jalil Abdul Muntaqim formerly known as Anthony Bottom, 55, both currently incarcerated in New York state; Henry Watson Jones, 71, of Altadena; Francisco Torres, 58, of Queens, New York; and Harold Taylor, 58, of Panama City, Florida.

Another suspect, Ronald Stanley Bridgeforth, 62, was still being sought on murder and conspiracy charges. Authorities believe he could be in France, Belize or Tanzania.

Taylor and two others faced murder charges in 1973, but the case was dismissed after a San Francisco judge that torture was used to extract confessions from the men. San Francisco Police Department Inspectors Frank McCoy and Ed Erdelatz were present for the interrogation and torture which consisted of stripping the men naked and beating them with a lead pipe, blindfolding them and throwing wool blankets soaked with boiling water over their bodies, placing electric probes on their genitals and other body parts, inserting an electric cattle prod in their anus, punching and kicking, and slamming them into walls while blindfolded.

McCoy and Erdelatz came out of retirement to lead investigation when the case was reopened sometime in 2002. The decision to re-investigate the incident followed the Department of Justice's expanding prosecution of political crimes in the wake of the September 11th terrorist attacks.

Bell's attorney Stuart Hanlon called the arrests a "prosecution based on vengeance and hate from the '60s." "There's a law enforcement attitude that they hate these people, the Panthers," Hanlon said. "Now they're going after old men."

All I Need to Know, I Learned from a Brutha in tha Pen

What will convey unto thee what the Ascent is!
(It is) to free a slave...
--Qur'an 90: 12-13

At the age of 14, I began writing to (primarily Muslim) inmates in federal penitentiaries. The correspondence brought me to the realization that imprisonment is one of the worst forms of man's inhumanity to man. My view is that imprisonment raises grave ethical concerns. One who imprisons another human being controls when or if that human eats, drinks, bathes, procreates, or gets vital medical treatment, in effect, "playing God." The extreme example of "playing God" is, off course, capital punishment, where the State's irreversible act places it in the role of the Creator (nauzo-billah)--potentially taking the life of an innocent person lacking adequate counsel. Alternatives to imprisonment were practiced by indigenous societies through the ages. Considering the dismal failure of the U.S. prison system today, these examples merit rigorous study for potential adaptation to modern times.

Since the U.S. in-Justice system is unlikely to willingly capitulate to those whom it oppresses, an inquiry under the U.N. or other international fora on black males in the U.S. prison system is required. The question must be asked: Are black men inherently more criminal than all other segments of the population? If not, why do they constitute the preponderance of the prison population? Is the current prison system a continuation of the system of slavery and genocide of black people? If so, what remedy can be enacted by the international community--international sanctions, U.N. inspections of U.S. prison facilities, or peacekeepers to prevent U.S. mistreatment of its black population?

A few years after my first exchanges with Muslim inmates, I expropriated a copy of the Gulag Archipelago from my father's library. The work left an indelible impression. Imprisonment--dehumanizing by nature--is exacerbated when it is enacted as punishment for unpopular words, thought, and speech. Today, tens of thousands of primarily Muslim innocents suffer in the U.S. Gulag, spanning from Guantanamo to Afghanistan and beyond. And political imprisonment is the sword of Damocles which threatens any Muslim leader who advocates or exercises the internationally recognized (Geneva Convention affirmed) right of his people to self-defense against Zionist or imperialist aggression.

To me, the existence of such a Gulag--and the threat that any independent-minded Muslim is a candidate for it--is a major crisis, warranting the focus of Muslims and humanitarians alike. I believe the time for Picnics has passed, and Muslim leaders who insist on Picnicking--well, perhaps their leadership ought to be questioned according to the Islamic tradition of accountability of Muslim leaders to their constituents. Recall the famed example of Hazrat Umar's (RA) roughing up and questioning by a Bedouin, on the simple matter of the former's possession of a shawl. When will we finally seize our leaders by the shawl, and ask them why they silently allow the innocent Muslim imams, hafiz-e-Quran, Muslim fathers, husbands, and brothers to languish in U.S./U.S.-administered prisons, often under medieval conditions?

Clearly, a truly Islamic leadership must prioritize: 1) effective, legal organizing for the rights of the political prisoners; 2) a massive public awareness campaign, aimed at lifting the curtain of fear from the Muslim community, while also countering corporate media propaganda with objective information on political cases; and 3) providing necessary assistance to the families of political prisoners.

None of Us Are Free (If One of Us Is Chained)

Solomon Burke's excellent work:

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article8199.htm

Runoko Rashidi and Afterwards

During winter break, I attended a thoroughly fascinating lecture on the African Presence in Early Asia, by historian Runoko Rashidi at Howard University with a UMBC friend. After the lecture, we mulled over where to have dinner. Options were somewhat limited by the fact that it was late and a weeknight. I am partial to African cuisine, and thought immediately of Dukem, an Ethiopian establishment on U Street nearby. Ethiopian troops were in Somalia, and my politically conscious friend and I did some soul-searching before deciding it was okay to visit the Ethiopian restaurant given the late hour.

On my last visit, I'd thought Dukem rather mediocre (in comparison with other Ethiopian spots around town). This time, however, was different. The place was bursting with African rhythms. Our server, a young woman with beautiful dark skin, aquiline nose, and thick lips, in traditional Ethiopian garb, reminded me of Cheikh Anta Diop's writing on the incredible diversity of native African features prior to Asiatic and European invasions. I glanced at my friend. A musician himself, he appeared immersed in the music. Four stunningly beautiful Ethiopian women in traditional garb--flowing white dress, accented with colorful red, green, and black sash--swayed to the reverberations of a drum, in a graceful, perfectly choreographed classical Ethiopian dance. At times, they were accompanied by a male dancer. I marveled at their movements, as graceful and coordinated as the dance of swans I'd seen on the bay near my house.

The food arrived--my perfectly prepared spicy doro wat, one of my favorite Ethiopian dishes, and my friend's spicy spinach entreé, both with spongy ingera bread. We ate with our hands from one huge round plate, an African tradition common to Afghan, Arab, and other Third World cultures, which I believe leads to harambee in these communities.

The night was perfect--almost. Shortly after the dance started, a white woman in a tight sweater, mini-skirt, and boots rose to her feet at the next table. Making moronic sounds and gestures, she poorly mimicked the dancers' every move. After a while, she abandonned any semblance of accuracy, and simply started shaking her volumptuous body. Then she progressed to grabbing at her own mammary glands, while shaking her buttocks. Earlier, I'd noticed that nearly all the restaurant patrons were Ethiopian or African. Now they stared at her, some with contempt, some with anger or pity. They were either too polite or too shocked to tell her to shut up and sit down. The security personnel had evaporated into the woodwork.

"It's a free country, and it's her right to demonstrate what a moron she really is," I thought to myself. The problem was that she was directly in my line of sight to the dancers, and instead of enjoying the performance, I was forced to watch her vulgar flailings. Elevated testosterone, the price of female athleticism, surged through my body, and I willed myself not to re-seat the b----. "Now you know understand where the term 'Ugly American comes from,'" I remarked loudly to my friend.

The woman looked over at me for a moment, then continued to gyrate at her table for a moment. Then she said something in what sounded like a Hebrew accent to her friends, and made her way onto the dance floor. There she partnered up with the male performer, who seemed to be trying to humor her random shaking, earning very dirty looks from the female performers. Her buds cheered her on. Deferred shame or alcoholic toxicity caught up with her, for shortly thereafter, she and her drunken friends staggered out of the restaurant.

Afterwards I wondered: Who exhibits utter ignorance of other cultures and customs? Who violates the social norms and protocols of other cultures and communities with impunity, here and on a global scale? Who proudly wears her ignorance and ignominy on her sleeve? Who else but Whitey.

African Presence in Early Asia:Runoko Rashidi Speaks

Having been the only practicing Muslim at my suburban, all-white high school, I developed an understanding of racism early on. Yet the recent Howard University lecture of renowned historian and scholar Runoko Rashidi on “The African Presence in Asia” opened my eyes to the fact that I, too, had unwittingly swallowed racist ideas. The standing-room only, primarily black audience exuded afrocentricity and political consciousness with their red, black, and green caps, locks, and politically astute questions. Regrettably absent—in light of the subject matter—was HU’s significant Asian student population.

Rashidi’s first act, upon taking the podium, brought to light the unconscious eurocentricity of most of us living in the West. Employing a long-neglected Africanism, Rashidi recognized the elders. He asked their permission to speak. Only then did he begin the lecture. How often do we, Muslims, Africans, and others—whose religions and cultures emphasize respect of the Elders—bother to do this? In one stroke, Baba Rashidi, as he is respectfully called, returned us to our roots.

A solidly built, dark-skinned brother with bald head and gold frame glasses, he spoke in a no-nonsense manner devoid of rhetoric. “I’m tired of hearing of a black history which begins with slavery,” he began. “A perfect example is the popular black history book, From Slavery to Freedom.”

“I differ in my view of history. I don’t view it as Africans waited around for some white man to come and take them captive,” he told the appreciative audience.

Nuclear DNA polymorphisms have been used to study the origins and relations between ethnic and racial groups, said Rashidi matter-of-factly. “Mitochondrial DNA, inherited from the mother, is more important [in demonstrating relatedness]. This indicates that Africa is the mother country.”

Rashidi’s research focuses on black people in Asia and the Middle East. To this end, he has traveled to Syria, Jordan, India, Vietnam, Cambodia, China, and a litany of other countries. “Israel,” explained Rashidi, “Is the only country I haven’t visited—for political reasons.”

Denial by Local Officials

At the start of each visit, Rashidi was invariably told: “There are no black people here.” Undaunted, he headed straight to the national museum. Almost without exception, he found artwork—often centuries old—depicting people with unmistakably black (Africoid, in archeological terms) features. Then, traveling the countryside, to remote and inaccessible areas seldom frequented by tourists—he found black people. The pattern repeated itself in nearly every country he visited.

Beyond his extensive travels throughout Asia, Rashidi has visited Africa 20 times. “Wherever I go, I meet Africans who are literally dying to leave Africa,” he said. Twenty-five hundred people line up at the [U.S.] embassy in Ethiopia each day. This is because things are so bad. They are the new boat people.”

The implication is that such was not always the case. As Ivan Van Sertima (with whom Rashidi co-authored African Presence in Early Asia) wrote in They Came Before Columbus, there was a time when Africans were leaving Africa because—as the ruling power—they had the wealth, resources, and naval capability to explore what was then uncharted territory.

Rashidi launched into his slide presentation. It is a small sampling of the thousands of slides of artwork from museums across Asia and the Middle East he has painstakingly collected through decades of research. There are black natives of the Andaman Islands, whose inner radar, said Rashidi, allowed them to flee just before the tsunami; an African nobleman from Laos; a 2,000 year-old bust of a Syrian African nobleman; and Antara the Lion. All have clearly Africoid features.

Then there is the tomb of Bilal (RA).

African Presence in Early Islam

“Bilal [RA],” Rashidi told the predominantly black, non-Muslim audience, “had an Ethiopian mother. He was one of Muhammad’s [PBUH] closest companions. His tomb was found in Syria.”

“There was an African presence throughout early Islam,” said Rashidi. “Ishmael [AS] was a black man, as was the grandfather of Prophet Muhammad [PBUH]. A well known saying of the Prophet is: ‘He who brings an Ethiopian man or woman into Islam, brings his house blessings.’”

Rashidi described a mural he’d observed at the Pantheon (burial site of Rousseau, Voltaire, Marat, Victor Hugo, and other notables) in Paris: “It is a painting of a very handsome black man. This is an African crusader.”

Other slides depict not artwork, but photographs of indigenous black people across Asia and the Middle East, which Rashidi has collected in the course of exhaustive field work: photographs of a black Saudi cabinet member, who held the position in 1954; black men of Kuwait’s Sabah family; and a black Iraqi.

Black Iraq

This last is perhaps the most astonishing. The black Iraqi is holding a submachine gun. This is not a U.S. soldier, Rashidi emphasized, but an African Iraqi.

“There was a population of Black captives in Southern Iraq, called the Zanji,” Rashidi explained. “They engaged in three major insurrections, with some success. Iraq has a 10 - 15 % African population in the South, but you don’t see them on TV,” he told the mesmerized audience.

At this point, Rashidi could have seized the occasion to bash Arabs/Muslims. But, he uttered barely a word on the Arab identity of the slavers. I wondered if this was due to a consciousness of a common oppressor, who today subjugated Arabs and Africans alike. Or was it perhaps in recognition of the efforts of the young Muslim graduate student, Sharron Muhammad, who’d worked hard to organize the Howard lecture?

Whatever the case, I was struck by the stark contrast between the attitude of this strong afrocentric brutha, actively engaged in uplifting his people, and that of the “Free Darfur” movement—Zionists who contributed nothing to black liberation, but were quick to spoon-feed black people news of their Arab “enemy,” feigning common ground with black people, while both blacks and Arabs continued to suffer and die disproportionately under the Zionist/capitalist/imperialist agenda.

Rashidi’s next few slides depicted women: “An Israeli sister” wearing hijab (“She looks very African”); an African-Palestinian woman, who attended Howard University (“The Black Panther Party was established among Palestinians”); and a group of African Turkish women. [All quotes describing Rashidi’s slides are his—editor]

Rashidi, who displays few pictures of himself, appears with the latter group. “These are African women of Southwest Turkey,” he explained. “Their husbands are dead, and they are discriminated against.”

There are so few blacks in Turkey, he continued, that these women had never seen a black man other than one from the Sudan or Chad. “I knew it was time to leave when one of the ladies started stroking my arm, and telling me I reminded her of her late husband,” he quipped.

There is a painting of black slaves standing in a line behind their Ottomon regent (“The Ottoman Empire had many blacks, but this is not acknowledged”); and a bust of an African-Afghan (“probably destroyed by the Taliban”). I longed to ask the scholar the reason for his latter supposition.

Indus Valley—A Great Black Civilization

Then there is the figurine of a black woman from the Indus Valley (“We know she is a sista--from the hand on the hip” joked Rashidi); and a painting of a black woman with long braided hair pinned up in a bun.

Amazingly, museum officials tried to convince Rashidi that the beaded appearance of the woman’s hair in the latter painting was not African hair in a braid, but “snails” which crawled on to the woman’s head!

“I am a very patient person,” said Rashidi, “So I spent the next 48 hours reclining under the same type of tree she was under, in the very same area, and no snails crawled on to my head.”

Rashidi’s main research interest is India. “In Greater India, more than a thousand years before the foundations of Greece and Rome, proud and industrious Black men and women known as Dravidians erected a powerful civilization....the Indus Valley civilization--India's earliest high-culture, with major cities spread out along the course of the Indus River,” says a handout accompanying the lecture. “The Indus Valley civilization was at its height from about 2200 B.C.E. to 1700 B.C.E.”

I thought back to discussions of the Indus Valley civilization in my high school world history classes. As in the treatment of Ancient Egypt, “they schools” somehow managed to overlook the minor detail that the Indus Valley civilization was a black civilization. But, they did not mind discussing blacks and slavery, slavery and blacks, I mused.

“The decline and fall of the Indus Valley civilization has been linked to several factors, the most important of which were the increasingly frequent incursions of the White people known in history as Aryans—violent Indo-European tribes initially from central Eurasia and later Iran,” Rashidi’s handout continued.

Oppression of Dalits

As the lecture reached its peak, Rashidi hit upon the major focus of his research: Dalits, or “untouchables” in India. Dalits—who are black—“are victims of Hinduism,” he explained. They are literally treated as untouchable—in other words, unclean. Even the shadow of a Dalit is believed to be polluted, and Dalits must announce themselves by beating drums or making loud noises, to allow others to avoid them. They live under apartheid-like conditions.

Then, Rashidi offered a startling statistic: Three hundred million people are Dalits in India. The significance of this? “This means there may be more black people in India than there are in Africa.”

Rashidi is a powerhouse of knowledge, dropping facts at lightening speed.

As the lecture wrapped up, he showed slides of a black Brahmin (“Very unusual”), and an early depiction of a black Krishna (“Initial depictions of Krishna were always black”), before moving on to speak briefly of his travels to the far east.

The Far East

Rashidi had no desire to visit China, and said he traveled there only for the completeness of his research. Predictably, he was informed by Chinese officials: “There have never been black people in China.” Rashidi had difficulty traveling around China, and, for once, did not encounter black people. However, in the course of his research, he found that one of China’s earliest dynasties, the Shang, were said to have “black and oily skin.”

In Japan, he found proverbs with references to African roots (“For a samurai to be brave, he must have a bit of black blood”); in Angkor Tom, Cambodia, he found bas reliefs depicting black people (shown on the cover of his book, Africans in Early Asia); in Central Vietnam, he discovered an entire living population of black people; and everywhere in the far east, he found black Buddhas (“All early depictions of Buddhas were black, and this did not change until much later”).

“Wherever there is humanity, you find black people,” said Rashidi, concluding the lecture. “I want all black people to embrace their African-ness. Why is this important for us? Because we are trying to become whole again. What you do for yourself, depends on what you think of yourself. And what you think of yourself depends on what you’ve been told.”

During Q&A, the question of Dalits came up again, as many audience members seemed shocked by what they’d heard. Elaborating, Rashidi told of a Dalit woman being paraded through the village naked, because she stole some vegetables to feed her family, and of a Dalit boy forced to drink urine in punishment for some very minor infraction.

“There is an affirmative action policy in India,” said Rashidi. A Dalit headed India’s Supreme Court for a time; another was President of India. The appointment of these token black people, like the appointment of Clarence Thomas and Condoleezza Rice to high positions in the U.S., evidently had little impact on the condition of the majority of their people. Clearly U.S. foreign policy makers—in their embrace of the Hindu-dominated Indian government as a foremost U.S. ally—were unfazed by the apartheid-like conditions experienced by 300 million black people.

Reflections

The lecture was the most thought-provoking I’d attended in recent memory. Afterwards, I greeted Baba Rashidi with “As-salaam alaikom” and extended him my solidarity as a Pakistani and a Muslim. I told him that were it not for his book, I, like most Pakistanis, would be woefully ignorant of the African contribution to our subcontinent, and that the incredible history he’d presented was completely absent from schools across Pakistan and India. His lecture, coupled with my reading of New Trend coverage of the Dalit struggle greatly added to my awareness of the specter of racism and classism plaguing the Indian Subcontinent. The lecture brought me to the realization, that Bollywood’s (Indian cinema’s) acute racism closely paralleled that of Hollywood. Both popularized negative and de-humanizing stereotypes of black people, targeting them for genocide. Remarkably, Indian cinema is hugely popular in West Africa.

Like many Indo-Pak households, my childhood home featured Indian movies blaring in the background every evening. Although the sexism of Indian cinema sickened me even then, its racial intonations initially escaped me. Most of the movies featured Milky White Indian Hero and Milky White Indian Heroine, frolicking through gardens and fields in their glorious courtship dance--paragons of goodness and morality. Adivasis—a major black Indian ethnic group—were, almost without exception, depicted as savages, drumming and dancing around an open fire in remote areas far from “civilization,” encountered by Milky White Indian Hero only when he came to rescue Milky White Indian Heroine from their evil clutches. Dark-skinned actors were frequently cast as villains of various sorts, usually bent on raping the Milky White Indian Heroine. In addition to his work with Dalits, Rashidi worked closely with Adivasis, and he listened with interest as I mentioned this to him.

As I left the program, I started thinking how I would explain the relevance of the African presence in early Asia to Muslims. I knew a good many brothers and sisters would try to convince me that racism is an American problem; that Muslims don’t think along racial lines; that in Islam, the sole relevance of skin color is “so that ye may know one another;” and that one is judged solely on taqwa (level of Allah-consciousness). They would try to convince me that it is a waste of time to ponder the question of who settled where and when, and that these things were in the past.

The Pakistani sister who secures her coach bag walking through the garage because “a black man may be lurking there;” the Arab/Indian/Pakistani man looking for an arranged marriage whose stated criteria is “anyone but a black woman;” the Nigerian parents who teach their son or daughter not to hang with African-Americans, because “they no good”—all these, as well as others afflicted by more subtle and subconscious racial notions, reveal that racism has penetrated our oh-so-pious Muslim consciousness, whether we acknowledge it or not.

Racism is cemented by a myth which refuses to acknowledge the immense and positive contributions of powerful African civilizations throughout history, insisting that black people be viewed only in the context of slavery and its aftermath. As Baba Rashidi stated in his closing remarks, “The people of Sumer lost their history, so they died.” For Muslims to maintain the myth is to assist in the oppression and cultural genocide of black people. A Muslim, by definition, bears witness to the truth, even that truth which is discomfiting.

For more information on the Dalit struggle, Africans in early Asia, and related topics, visit Runoko Rashidi’s website:
http://cwo.com/~lucumi/runoko.html

Saddam: Demon or Demonized?

The psychologists in my extended family tell me that black and white thinking--the idea that something or someone is all good or all bad--is characteristic of (a) children; (b) people with certain psychiatric disorders (Borderline Personality Disorder, for example). It seems to me that demonizing a person is a classic example of black and white thinking. With the Ayatollah long dead, and Bin Laden out of reach, Saddam Hussein was the most recent to be demonized. Clearly, the picture painted was necessary to fuel the illegal U.S. war. Now that he is dead, it may be a good time to examine the extent of the reality behind the Saddam-Demon. Here is one website--evidently censored by Google and Google-News and restored only after massive reader protest--which challenges the conventional wisdom:

http://uruknet.info

Free Imam Jamil—An Evening at Masjid Al-Islam

He is one of America’s best and brightest orators. He is a nationally known and respected religious leader. He rid entire inner city neighborhoods of drugs, encouraged the establishment of small businesses, and established mentoring programs for black youth. For his efforts, he is currently serving a life term in Georgia State Prison. His name is Jamil Al-Amin.

Jamil Al-Amin was convicted for the murder of a sheriff’s deputy after a trial in which very significant exculpatory evidence was never presented. The reason for this, given by some Al-Amin supporters, is that his attorneys were not paid, and hence plea bargained with the prosecution. The neglected exculpatory evidence includes: 1) the absence of wounds on Al-Amin’s body when he was taken into custody (although the deputy involved in the incident which led to Al-Amin’s imprisonment clearly stated that the suspect was shot and bleeding); 2) a confession for the shooting of the deputy by another man, Otis Jackson; 3) ballistic evidence showing that the deadly shots were not fired by any weapon which could be associated with Al-Amin.

A habeas corpus hearing determines whether a person is serving a lawful sentence and/or whether he or she should be released from custody (Blackstone). It is viewed as an opportunity for the defense to convince the court that previously suppressed or unknown evidence warrants a prisoner’s release. In Al-Amin’s case, the prosecution has repeatedly requested postponements of this hearing, perhaps indicating the strength of the unpresented evidence. The hearing is currently scheduled for February 27, 2007.

For an excellent background article on the case, see:
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20020318/thelwell

On December 30, I attended a fundraiser for Imam Jamil Al-Amin at Masjid Al-Islam. The masjid stands proudly at the corner of Benning Road and C Street in Southeast DC, two blocks from the subway, in a poor black residential area, a far cry from the exclusive suburban mosques hidden away in the countryside, away from bus lines and poor people. I could imagine El-Hajj Malik Shabazz preaching at Masjid Al-Islam. The AmeriKKKan flag, found at the entrance of many U.S. masajid today, was nowhere to be found.

Inside, Imam Abdul Alim Musa was scheduled to lecture—but not before he personally served dinner to the men who were there to hear about the Jamil Al-Amin case. Imam Musa, for some reason, had determined that he—and only he—would serve food to the men. The result was a long line of hungry bruthas—perhaps an exercise in sabr? Just yards away, across the prayer hall, two sisters served food to the women. I found Imam Musa’s wife, and introduced myself. She greeted me with a warm hug and welcomed me. I was seated with three young women--Amatullah, Tazkiya, and Hajure. As we talked, I realized how politically astute they were. Tazkiya, a college student, had spoken in public forums on Imam Jamil’s case. Two of the sisters were either readers or contributors to New Trend (Muslim e-journal). Masjid Al-Islam clearly did not limit its women to the baking committee.

Finally Imam Musa began his presentation. A tall, built brother with dark skin, graying beard, and just the hint of a stoop that betrayed his position as a veteran in the Islamic movement, he looked distinguished in all black as he took the podium. He spoke comfortably without notes, his speech articulate and sprinkled with wicked humor.

“What makes Imam Jamil so special?” he asked the audience.

“He is the only one on the COINTELPRO list who’s still alive,” he said, referring to the U.S. government’s counterintelligence program, which used highly questionable means to target Black, Native American, and other activists during the 1960s and 1970s. “And he was the only non-immigrant imam on the Majlis-e-Shura [of North America.] The immigrant imams on the Shura Council, they couldn’t forecast things like Imam Jamil.”

“The big crews have not helped,” Imam Musa continued. He’d asked Muzammil Siddiqui and others for support for Imam Jamil—to no avail. Then he’d suggested if they didn’t want to help directly, they could just give him a letter of support for Imam Jamil—again to no avail.

I was aghast. The very Shura Council of which Imam Jamil was a member up until his arrest, refused to support him! What happened to the “Muslims are part of one body; if one part hurts, the rest feels the pain” popularly spouted at ISNA conventions and elsewhere?

“All the big fundraisers, they done sold out” said Imam Musa, shaking his head. “We Americans, they say, we going to stand up for America.”

“Remember when they kicked in the doors in Virginia, tore through their homes, with the wives sitting there with no hijab on?” said Imam Musa, referring to the March 20, 2002 FBI raids on the homes and offices of officials connected to IIIT, SAAR, WAMY, Safa Trust and other pro-government Muslim organizations. “Well, they [the Muslim leaders] stayed mad for two days. After that, it was business as usual.”

Imam Musa started fundraising. The atmosphere was solemn, quite unlike other fundraisers I’d experienced in the past, perhaps in the realization that the collective efforts of the community could determine whether a beloved imam-political prisoner would continue to suffer in jail.

Imam Musa teased and cajoled the congregation into emptying their pockets. During a lull in the fundraising, he told the audience, “Yeah I know, if you or I donate $50, we may not eat for a week. Them that got it, ain’t givin’ it. So, we gotta do this for our brutha.”

The resident Muslim women’s organization, An-Nisa of Masjid Al-Islam, donated $250, which they’d worked hard to raise, encouraging others in the audience to follow suit. Masjid Al-Islam’s working class Muslims, slowly but surely donated their hard earned dollars to Imam Jamil’s case. The imam himself donated a large bundle of bills, all one dollar bills, he jokingly assured the congregation.

The fundraising came to an end, and Imam Musa talked in a somber tone about Al-Amin’s condition. The Atlanta imam had already been imprisoned for six-and-a-half years; serious psychological changes occurred in a prisoner after his sixth or seventh year, said Imam Musa. The prisoner’s mind gets used to the concrete and the bars.

“Meaning he may be broken, disoriented, his spirit destroyed” I thought to myself. No wonder Islam talked extensively about freeing the slave, the modern day versions of whom, off course, fill America’s jails.

“That is why it is so important we get him out. We need him out here,” said Imam Musa.

During Q&A, a non-Muslim progressive, one of the few whites in the audience, brought up the important point that the very Habeas Corpus rights, which Imam Jamil had invoked as a legal defense, were under attack by the Bush regime.

Had any lawyers expressed an interest in representing the imam pro-bono, I asked. Imam Musa said they had not, running scared after the Lynne Stewart witchhunt.

The shooting in which Imam Jamil was railroaded and the Saddam execution both occurred on the eves of Eid, the former in 2000, the latter in 2006, pointed out a sagacious Caucasian brother. Subjecting the Muslim community to such acts on a major Muslim holiday exhibited the arrogant character of Dajjal.

I left the event inspired that this independent mosque, with its fiery leader, not only refused to celebrate the Eid on the incorrect date, despite the Saudi dictate, but used the eve of the holiday to bring to light the victimization of an innocent Muslim imam. And the next morning, the congregation would again come together for an Eid prayer, held according to sunnah. This, it seemed to me, was the true spirit of the Eid!

Further donations for Imam Jamil’s defense are badly needed. Checks may be made out to the Masjid (with "Imam Jamil fund" noted on the memo line) and mailed to:

Masjid Al-Islam
4603 Benning Road, SE
Washington, DC 20019

For updates on the case, and what you can do to help:
http://myspace.com/freetheimam

Saddam--U.S. Stooge?

Muslim, progressive, and Zionist agreement on an issue should be an occasion for raised eyebrows. The recent execution of President Saddam Hussein and the celebrations of a “dictator meeting his just deserts” were such an occasion. And the Zionist media’s characterization of the Iraqi President as American stooge was quickly adapted and parroted by Muslims and progressives. Cozy.

The question is: How does one become an American stooge?

• By defying U.S./U.N. sanctions for a decade, ensuring decent healthcare, education, electricity, and clean water for the Iraqi people against overwhelming odds for that hellish period which we all seem to have forgotten?
  
  
• By providing free housing to the burgeoning population of Palestinian refugees then in Iraq?
  
  
• By honoring Palestinian freedom fighters with streets named in their remembrance?
  
  
• By helping widows and orphans living in the squalor of Palestinian refugee camps more than any other Arab ruler?
  
  
• By refusing to accept offers of political asylum, and remaining in Iraq after the invasion, to fight the imperialists to the death?
  

There is no shortage of stooges in the Muslim world, but I dare say Saddam, who died saying kalima, was not one of them. I am amazed and saddened that Muslims/progressives have adapted the corporate media refrain on Saddam: “He was America’s man.” Even after the destruction of Iraq, Muslims are regurgitating the official line of the party complicit in its destruction. We have, once again, failed to recognize wartime propaganda. Goebbels—no Wolfowitz—would be proud.

I do not doubt that Saddam made a grievous error in allowing himself to be used by the imperialists, during the Iraq-Iran war—an error for which, he will no doubt answer to Allah (AWJ). And yet, which national leader—Muslim or non—has not erred in their political life? The current discourse almost makes one believe that Saddam's reign ended with the Iran-Iraq war, and that he was somehow incapacitated from participation on the world stage thereafter. Accordingly, the man is tried in the realm of our imaginations only for actions he took decades ago. And the entire sanctions period has vanished from our minds.

The claim that Saddam was a U.S. stooge brings to mind similar Western claims of "blowback." The idea seems to be that any actions taken by Muslims, for good or for ill, cannot occur without the stewardship of the West—an arrogant premise to say the least. Such views, when embraced by Muslims, are symptomatic of a self-hatred, perhaps the residual effect of our colonial heritage, which has convinced us that we are incapable of any endeavor without the help of Gora Sahib (the Great White Master).

Eid al-Adha

I visited the Islamic Center in Washington, DC on Dec 30, Saudi-mandated Eid. The Center, located on Massachusetts Avenue in the Embassy District, is unusual in that its constituency includes a great many diplomats, and others affiliated with NGOs and government agencies. The police presence was much more muted than previously, with only an officer or two circulating about the courtyard and joking with administration members and other friends. Yet the iron bars surrounding the Center invoke a gated community. Symbolically, outside the iron gates of the Center where Washington’s most affluent pray, three beggars, toting small brown paper bags, waited to collect money.

After the prayer, I stood alongside the beggars, distributing fliers entitled "Boycott Major Supporters of Zionism.” Unlike New York, where I've conducted similar actions and encountered many more bleeding hearts trying to help out a begga woman (they assume that's what I'm doing--why else would a sista in her right mind be standing in front of a mosque distributing pieces of paper), only one person--an Arab woman who did not understand English--came to offer me charity. I thanked her anyway, and indicated that I was not in need. The overall mood of the worshippers seemed somewhat subdued, with less bantering and laughter than observed at many Eid gatherings. Oddly, although there appeared to be no prohibition on leafleting, no one else distributed anything--not even the usual "Eid bazaar" or “Eid picnic” literature, and certainly nothing on the Eid-day execution of the President of an independent sovereign Arab nation, under the auspices of the U.S. occupying power. Most of the worshippers accepted the fliers, but rejection came primarily at the hands of Arab men in expensive-looking djalabias and Pakistani men in voguish suits.

An Afrikan brother requested extra copies of the flier. An Iranian brother donated $20 towards its distribution. The flier displays the logos of various businesses (e.g., McDonalds, Disney, Coca-Cola, and Starbucks) with strong ties to Israel. A Pakistani brother asked if the businesses were Israeli. I told him, "No, but they might as well be. For example, the CEO of McDonald's is an honorary director of the American-Israel Chamber of Commerce, and the Chairman of Starbucks has received awards for his services to Israel." In all, I handed out 240 "Boycott Israel" fliers to the Eid gathering.