Even high-ranking Muslim American officials were surveilled without criminal cause

Evidence

Reda Shata learned firsthand why it doesn’t pay to associate with the law enforcement establishment. He worked with the FBI and the police, inviting officers to his mosque for breakfast and even dining with Mayor Bloomberg. He personified everything that American imperialism has defined as a “good Muslim.” Yet an undercover police officer and an informant were assigned to spy on him and to keep tabs on his mosque. — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 586 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

The interviews also revealed that South Asian and Arab men and women, regardless of their status as Americans, were surveilled by both the state and their fellow citizens because of their religious identity. South Asian and Arab Muslim Americans had similar experiences to one another because of the way their religious identity was interpreted. Their ethnicity as South Asian or Arab intersected with their Muslim identity and gender in salient ways that impacted social interactions in their everyday lives because it had made them a target for surveillance. — , Selod, Saher - Forever Suspect_…, 104 (#expands, via linked claim)

In 2003, another thousand people were arrested as part of a program to catch “absconders” from Middle Eastern nations who had overstayed their visas and who might have knowledge of “terrorist activity.” Many of these people were put “on planes to destinations where they knew no one. They left behind jobs, homes, and families, including American-born children.” Such actions are nothing if not the wholesale demonization of Muslims, who are now “guilty until proven innocent.” Their consequences reach far beyond the Arab and South Asian Muslim communities. Non-Muslim peace activists and antiwar organizers soon became targets of surveillance and interrogation as well. — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 448 (#expands, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Radicalization theory targets Muslims who have committed no crime — Khaled A. Beydoun, American Islamophobia_ Understanding…, 379; The prospect of mass internment occupies the center of the collective Muslim American psyche. — Khaled A. Beydoun, American Islamophobia_ Understanding…, 520; The US government surveils Muslim civil rights organizations meant to protect Muslim liberties — , Selod, Saher - Forever Suspect_…, 633 (+8 more)

Related

• Muslims are presumed guilty until proven innocent in US enforcement (similarity 0.90)
• Even Muslims who cooperated with the FBI were placed under surveillance (similarity 0.86)
• Muslims are presumed terrorists until interrogation proves otherwise (similarity 0.86)
• No US religious community endures such simultaneous embrace and surveillance (similarity 0.84)
• The USA PATRIOT Act produced the surveillance society that made Muslim bodies constantly monitored (similarity 0.84)
• American society uses religion to explain crimes committed by a tiny fraction of Muslims. (similarity 0.83)
• The US government surveils Muslim civil rights organizations meant to protect Muslim liberties (similarity 0.83)
• Even exemplary good Muslims are simultaneously surveilled as suspects (similarity 0.83)
• Muslim identity alone justifies state surveillance without any criminal record (similarity 0.82)
• Fear of black Muslims uniting with colonized peoples drove FBI surveillance. (similarity 0.82)
• Private citizens surveil Muslim religious practice as a threat to American values. (similarity 0.82)
• Even Muslim civil rights organizations are surveilled and discredited by the state (similarity 0.82)
• Surveillance targets Muslim Americans based on religious identity regardless of citizenship (similarity 0.82)
• FBI surveillance drives Muslim congregations to self-police and Americanize (similarity 0.82)
• Even model pro-state Muslim collaborators remain permanent police suspects (similarity 0.81)

Broader Connections

• Even Muslims who cooperated with the FBI were placed under surveillance #corroborates (0.90) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 586
• Surveillance targets Muslim Americans based on religious identity regardless of citizenship #expands (0.85) — , Selod, Saher - Forever Suspect_…, 104
• Muslims are presumed guilty until proven innocent in US enforcement #expands (0.80) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 448
• Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act enforcement targeted Muslims despite neutral wording. #corroborates (0.75) — Khaled A. Beydoun, American Islamophobia_ Understanding…, 259
• Muslim American men self-silence politically out of fear of surveillance #expands (0.65)
• Majorities of Americans approved of Muslim surveillance even while holding positive views of Islam. #expands (0.60) — Saher Selod, Forever Suspect_ Racialized…, 64
• Muslim Americans hold nominal but reduced substantive citizenship #expands (0.60) — Khaled A. Beydoun, The New Crusades_ Islamophobia and the…, 1344