*DIGG post by clicking here*
It's going to be tough to beat this diary by JeffLieber, but I thought a Muslim POV on the situation would be appropriate.
Please recommend this diary if you agree with its implications. How can US citizens be treated like this in the 21st century??
LET AirTran know what you think about this incident by clicking here.
Nine passengers were removed yesterday from an AirTran flight. Apparently two made some "suspicious" comments, which in retrospect were completely benign, yet not only these two, but a few other passengers were removed! All the passengers don't even seem to be related. In fact, one person is African-American, while the others are of Indo-Pak descent! You can see a picture of a few of the passengers by clicking here.
These passengers need to SUE AirTran! Not for financial rewards, but to provide a deterrent effect, so that airlines in the future will think ten times before stripping passenger of their civil-rights.
Muslims cannot be treated like second-class citizens. This is no different than Rosa Parks, who refused to give her seat up for a white passenger. The issue about "suspicious" comments is pure nonsense and an excuse for stripping Muslims off their civil rights. Everyone knows that making a joke about security will land a person in jail, so if indeed these passengers had said something which was akin to a verbal threat (even jokingly), then they would be in jail. And the fact that they are not, implies that other passengers either misunderstood or lied. Regardless, once the FBI had questioned and cleared them, they should have been allowed to fly. More importantly, why were other passengers removed? Just because they were Muslims??
Even after being cleared by the FBI, who were kind enough to arrange these people a flight on US Airways, AirTran refused to reseat them. This is PURE Islamophobia, and a clear case of illegal profiling. And this is not the first time AirTran's flight crew did this (I wonder if there are common flight crew personnel between the two cases). See this post from Ahmed Bedier, which includes audio PROOF of how PURE profiling got two passengers kicked off another AirTran flight in September 2006. I have added the youtube version of the audio all the way at the bottom.
CAIR's News Article below the video:
The Council on American-Islamic Relations said that nine American Muslims, most of them headed to Florida for a vacation with family members, were removed from an AirTran Airways flight Thursday afternoon at Reagan National Airport.
The group said the incident began when another passenger complained about something that was said while boarding.
"We were talking about seat placement," one of the detained passengers said. "We were in the back ... started talking about safest place to sit. Maybe someone gleaned into that that we were planning to do something to the plane."
AirTran acknowledged that nine people were detained for questioning after boarding Flight 175 headed to Orlando International Airport.
AirTran released the following statement:
"At departure time, the captain informed the airline that there were two federal air marshals on board who contacted local Washington law enforcement officials for a security related issue on board the aircraft involving verbal comments made by a passenger and overheard by other passengers. The airline then advised the Transportation Security Administration."
Upon arriving at the gate and interrogating several passengers, the TSA determined that the 104 passengers on board must deplane and all passengers, crew and bags should be re-screened.
After the re-screening of the passengers, crew, bags and the aircraft, 95 passengers were allowed to re-board the aircraft and nine were detained for interrogation by the local law enforcement officials and the TSA.
Flight 175 departed nearly two hours late and arrived safely at its destination. AirTran Airways complied with all TSA, law enforcement and Homeland Security directives and had no discretion in the matter."
CAIR said the passengers who were detained were refused re-booking by the airline despite being cleared by federal authorities. (MORE)
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Police Audio: AirTran Removes Muslim Passengers Because "Iranian" Look
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