outrageous

Angry Desi points to this very strange and I think very, very troubling story:

For years, the father said, he watched as his daughter, now 16, became more and more drawn to the family's Muslim religion. At 14, she began wearing a full-length veil and teaching religion classes at mosques around the city. A year ago, she withdrew from her Manhattan high school because, a school official said, she felt uncomfortable with typical teenage banter. She told her family she wanted to go to an Islamic all-girls school, and when they could not afford to send her, she chose to study at home. The father, a Bangladeshi watch salesman who describes himself as far more devoted to American education than to prayer after 13 years as an immigrant illegally in the United States, said he pushed for his daughter to return to public school. Then last fall, the daughter he also describes as loving Bollywood soap operas and shopping with girlfriends startled him and her mother by seeking their approval to marry a young American Muslim man they had never met and whom she barely knew. The father refused the marriage overtures, which were made by the young man's father in a call from Michigan. A few months later, when the teenager stayed out overnight for the first time, the father, fearing an elopement, went to the police for help. It is a decision he regrets deeply. His daughter and another 16-year-old girl are now described by the government as would-be suicide bombers and are being held in a detention center for illegal immigrants in Pennsylvania. He is sure that his visit to the police set off the F.B.I. investigation that led to a chilling assertion, in a government document, that the girls are "an imminent threat to the security of the United States based on evidence that they plan to be suicide bombers." Family and friends call that absurd. The document, provided to The New York Times by a federal agent on Wednesday, did not describe the nature of the evidence. Yesterday, after repeated inquiries, officials from several agencies involved in the investigation, including Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the F.B.I. and the New York Police Department, would not comment on the case.

Where did this "suicide bomber" claim come from? Since none of the people involved have been allowed to see the evidence against them (um? Is this American?), no one can be sure. However, this editorial suggests where:

The police and federal immigration officials searched her belongings and are reported to have found an essay on suicide. According to the family, the essay says suicide is against Islamic law. But detectives went on to question the girl about her political beliefs before arresting her.

AngryDesi comments:

So maybe you're feeling a little depressed and write something in your journal about how you're feeling a little suicidal. Suicidal Muslims apparently cannot be anything other than suicidal Muslim bombers.

And the story doesn't even stop there because a second girl is caught up in this too. From the news report:

Little is known about the second 16-year-old. The mother of the Bangladeshi girl, conveying her daughter's account, said the two girls met for the first time at 26 Federal Plaza after her daughter's arrest. But when the other girl, a Guinean who was facing deportation with her family, noticed her daughter's veil, she gave her a traditional Muslim greeting, and federal agents seemed to think they were friends. The second girl ended up in the Pennsylvania detention center, too.

AngryDesi again:

I would have thought that the FBI would by now have figured out that when Muslims greet one another, even with ones whom are total strangers, they often say "As sala'amu alaikum" (peace be upon you) and the generally expected reply is "walaikum as sala'am" (and unto you also, peace). This is no different, from a familiarity perspective, than saying 'hello' to someone you see on the street.

What the hell is this? Just pick up some random Muslim who happened to be there and lock her away too? The girls, their families, and their lawyers need to be able to see the evidence against them. They need to be given a fair trial where they are allowed to exercise their rights according to the Constitution. Not this:

There are no firm time limits on immigration detention, so the burden is on the girls to prove that they are not potential suicide bombers, rather than on the government to prove they are. Indeed, the evidence is withheld from the girls and anyone who represents them under a "protective order" that F.B.I. investigators obtained from the immigration court, according to an April 1 motion to continue the secrecy, signed by Jeffrey T. Bubier, assistant chief counsel for the Department of Homeland Security in Philadelphia. "The F.B.I. has an important and substantial interest in safeguarding the information," Mr. Bubier's motion stated, "to protect national security law and enforcement interests." To release it, he said, "places investigative strategies and methods at substantial risk." The girls have no right to a court-appointed lawyer, and according to the government document that described the Guinean girl, her family had not retained one.

As the editorial concludes (rather mildly):

If the evidence isn't there, the arrests are very disturbing. The government will have taken 16-year-olds from their families, branded them as would-be terrorists and put them into a frightening legal limbo for no good reason.

Is that what America stands for these days? Update: Jeanne d'Arc has more and points to bookofdays and a blog set up about the case, Detain This. Update 2: The second girl has been released. The first has not been charged with anything but immigration violations and her family have agreed to leave the country. So now what exactly was the threat here? Update 3: The New York Times has an update on this case. And more from bookofdays and Pacific Views.