The case of Muslim follow-up goes to the U.S. Supreme Court. What’s at stake? | News

The U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments in a case in which the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) can decide whether to apply for a “state secrets” privilege to avoid its lawsuit. monitoring of Muslim communities and places of worship in the wake of the September 11, 2001 attacks.

Prosecutors arising from the lawsuit initially filed in 2011 say the U.S. government has used national security for years to prevent the accounts. This has deprived them of the opportunity to appear in court to show evidence that the FBI conducted a surveillance campaign against the Muslim community in Southern California, including secret audio and video recordings, and only their religion was encouraged. monitored.

This oversight occurred among many U.S. governments in the early 2000s tactics aimed at Muslims in the name of national security who continue to cast a long shadow, even though they are secretly surrounded.

“We’ve been torn apart for 15 years now, at least since I found out what the FBI was doing,” said Sheikh Yassir Fazaga, an imam at the Orange County Islamic Foundation in Mission Viejo, California. , when the agency sent a paid informant Starting in 2006 he appeared as a convert to control his mosque and others.

On Monday, November 8, 3 Muslim plaintiffs will give oral arguments #SCOTUS challenging #FBIit is spying illegally on them and their communities. Join us to hear their arguments and rally on their behalf. Read the press release and thread for event details.https://t.co/BntRjAACBL

– CAIR National (@CAIRNational) November 4, 2021

The religious leader is the plaintiff in the lawsuit, along with Fazaga v FBI, Ali Uddin Malik and Yasser Abdelrahim, both congregated at the Irvine Islamic Center in Irvine, California.

In 2012, a lower court dismissed the trio’s initial lawsuit and argued in favor of the FBI’s position, arguing in part that it would pose a risk to national security. A federal appellate court later ruled in favor of Fazaga, Malik and Abdelrahim, saying the case should go ahead. anticipating the case To the U.S. Supreme Court.

“Sorry, but you have to trust us”

During the three presidential administrations, the government has continued its line of defense of the issue, said Ahilan Arulanantham, director of the UCLA Center for Immigration Law and Policy, on behalf of Fazaga, who will argue with Mali. and Abdelrahim on Monday in the Supreme Court.

“The government’s position has been,‘ We don’t (control) people just because of their religion, ’” he said. “Anything else we tell you would jeopardize national security and therefore cannot be shared with anyone, not even secretly with the court.

“The government’s stance is,‘ Sorry, but you have to trust us, ’” he said.

The FBI has so far not been protected from providing full coverage of surveillance activities in Southern California, but has confirmed in unrelated court proceedings that Craig Monteilh was working as an agency informant for several Orange County mosques in 2006 and 2007. .

The agency, according to court documents, “did not engage in any unconstitutional and illegal practices” and “conducted reasonably investigated actions to respond to credible evidence of potential terrorist activity.”

Other details have come from the accounts of congregants and community members who contacted Monteilh, as well as Monteilh. long accounts about his work as an informant.

The 2011 lawsuit alleges that Monteilh, on the orders of his FBI managers, recorded hours of video and audio in mosques, religious gatherings, people’s homes, establishing an extensive and often non-discriminatory network by infiltrating various groups in various Islamic organizations.

The infiltration was particularly exciting for Fazaga, who as a prominent leader moderated a community meeting a few months earlier with Stephen Tidwell, head of the FBI’s Los Angeles office. Officials assured those gathered that the agency would not send secret monitors to the community.

“The potential for abuse is enormous,” Fazaga said of the FBI’s broad claims to national security.

“Imagine putting devices to record in the confession of a Catholic church? Imagine being able to do that in a place where they want to be safe … people have confidence in their religious leaders, people come and share their most intimate details with us, ”Al Jazeera said.

“The government has no access to these types of settings for no good reason,” he added, “which is very dangerous and very harmful.”

The 2011 lawsuit says no verdict came from Monteilh’s follow-up.

However, several congregants took responsibility for denouncing Monteilh – and his continued fixation on violence.

As more details about the FBI’s surveillance came to light, particularly when Monteilh was made public in 2009, distrust of law enforcement and spread within the Muslim community in Orange County spread, Fazaga said.

Without government responsibility, that environment is unchanged, he said.

“The most important element in healthy human relationships is trust. And when you erode that trust, you literally can’t have a healthy community, ”he said.

“People start questioning it. They start to suspect and then they go away. ”

He added that non-Muslim converters have had a special account since then.

“Historically speaking, this has always been a moment celebrated by the Muslim community,” he said. “Now … I would be lying if I told you that people don’t ask: is this real? is this for the show? Is this the next informant in our community? ”

‘Symbolically and Doctrinally’

Attorney Arulanantham said the Supreme Court’s proceedings could have an impact “both symbolically and doctrinally.”

“Since September 11, there have been very few accounts of the long history of discrimination against Muslim Americans, and this case offers them a rare opportunity to do so,” Al Jazeera said.

“In terms of doctrine,” he added, “it would be very important for the courts to say that there is a mechanism by which the government can be held accountable for religious discrimination, even in national security contexts.”

Monday’s arguments will be based on the government’s state secret privileges, a doctrine dating back to the early 1800s, refined in subsequent court rulings, to regulate when national security may be referred to for information storage.

The arguments are likely to focus on the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Protection Act, which regulates home surveillance. The law was passed as a result of revelations by the government of civil rights leaders and anti-war protesters.

Fazaga, now an imam at the Memphis Islamic Center in Mississippi, said the ruling in favor of the FBI’s national security claims “will establish the belief that Muslims in the U.S. are second-class citizens.”

He said he has been reaching out to other Muslims across the country for the past two decades since sharing his experiences with FBI surveillance practices.

However, he acknowledged that the case goes beyond a faith group and called for attention to be paid to the broad U.S. population.

“The Muslim community immediately took on the burden of that,” he said.

“But ultimately, the good that comes out of that is not just for the Muslim community. It’s for all citizens. ‘

Fazaga, Malik and Abdelrahim are also representing the United States Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the American Council on Islamic Relations (CAIR) and the law firms of Hadsell Stormer Renick and Dai.

The decision on the lawsuit is expected shortly before the end of the current term of the Supreme Court, which ends in June 2022.