<html>
<body>
<font size=3>
<a href="http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-laeight29jun29,0,5123690.story?page=2&coll=la-home-headlines">
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-laeight29jun29,0,5123690.story?page=2&coll=la-home-headlines<br>
<br>
</a></font><h4><b>COLUMN ONE<br><br>
<br>
</b></h4><h1><b>18 Years Waiting for a Gavel to Fall<br><br>
<br>
</b></h1><h2><b>A group of Palestinians have been in legal and personal
limbo for nearly two decades as the U.S. has sought to deport them. Their
case foreshadowed post-9/11 policy. First of two
parts</i></b></h2><font size=3>By Peter H. King<br>
Times Staff Writer<br><br>
June 29, 2005<br><br>
On a rain-soaked Saturday afternoon nearly two decades ago, a handful of
young Palestinians gathered at the Glendale Civic Auditorium to prepare
for an evening fundraiser. The event a night of ethnic food, folk
dances and political speeches delivered in Arabic would be attended by
an estimated 1,200 men, women and children, most of them immigrants from
the Middle East.<br><br>
It had been promoted as a festival to celebrate the 18th anniversary of
the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, a Marxist-oriented
faction of the Palestine Liberation Organization. The underlying purpose,
organizers said, was to generate donations for "the homeland,"
in particular to provide medical care and schooling in Palestinian
refugee camps.<br><br>
"People," the crowd would be reminded that night in the call
for contributions, "the revolution will not continue, and the march
to Palestine will not go on, with words alone."<br><br>
The preparations seemed fairly unremarkable. Posters were taped to walls.
Palestinian magazines, including copies of a PFLP publication, Al Hadaf,
were arranged on tables. A troupe of amateur dancers practiced a folk
dance known as the <i>dabka. <br><br>
</i>Before the rehearsal, one dancer removed the American flag from its
standard on the stage and leaned it against a back wall in the wings.
This did not pass unnoticed.<br><br>
Earlier that day, FBI Special Agent Frank H. Knight had hidden himself
inside an engineering booth outfitted with a window that overlooked the
auditorium. He would remain at his post deep into the night, snapping
rolls of pictures, recording snippets of the speeches and narrating what
he saw into a tape recorder.<br><br>
For three years Knight had been tracking a number of these Palestinians,
suspecting they were agents of the PFLP, an organization with a mixed
record of social good works, military operations and terrorist strikes.
Unable to convince FBI headquarters that he had evidence of illegal
activities, Knight had come to Glendale with a new plan.<br><br>
He brought with him an agent from the Immigration and Naturalization
Service: If he could not prosecute the Palestinians, perhaps he could
have them deported.<br><br>
Knight did not speak Arabic, and many of his conclusions about that
Saturday, Feb. 15, 1986, would be based on intuition. He reported, for
example, that the music, speeches and "general mood" all
"sounded militaristic." He thought it suspicious that some men
in an opening procession were dressed in khaki shirts and camouflage
trousers.<br><br>
"This would not be a normal attire for obtaining cash for
orphans," Knight surmised. "It is one to get cash for
guns."<br><br>
And although he could not read the posters, the agent noticed that some
depicted people holding AK-47 assault rifles. This led him to conclude,
three minutes into his narration, that "it is obvious that this
fundraiser has nothing to do with building hospitals or schools. It is
solely for raising money for terrorist activities."<br><br>
Finally, there was the business of the American flag. Not only had it
been removed before the program, Knight would report, the banner was
never returned to its standard. Years later, Knight was pressed in a
deposition to explain why he considered this relevant.<br><br>
Certainly moving a flag off the stage did not constitute a criminal act,
did it?<br><br>
"I've been to other events, and the American flag usually stays in
the standard. With this group the PFLP, they removed the American
flag…. And it makes a statement…. "<br><br>
"What kind of statement?"<br><br>
"An observation," Knight responded. "They treat the flag
the way they would treat the enemy. And, so, it wouldn't be a part of
their event."<br><br>
The<b> </b>revolutionary rhetoric and perceived slights to the flag, the
"martial" music and posters, the khaki clothing all of these
in time would be presented as evidence of seditious inclinations, part of
the government's brief in a pioneering attempt to deport seven
Palestinian men and the wife of one of them, a Kenyan.<br><br>
The "L.A. 8," they would be called.<br><br>
This is the story of their case. It is a case that has rattled around the
courts now, incredibly, for 18 years, and yet remains unresolved. It is
also a case that foreshadowed what was to come for many Arab and Muslim
immigrants in America years later, in the aftermath of terror.<br><br>
<br>
<br><br>
Long before Sept. 11, 2001, and President Bush's subsequent declaration
of a "war on terror," long before the Patriot Act and the
proactive tactics it licensed, back in a time when the difficult question
of how to root out potential terrorists without trampling on civil rights
seemed more academic than immediate, there was the case of the L.A.
8.<br><br>
Since January 1987, when the eight were arrested, the case has bounced
from immigration court, through federal district courts, up to the U.S.
Supreme Court and back again, with side visits to individual immigration
status hearings. Along the way, it tested legal questions that would loom
large after Sept. 11.<br><br>
Do foreign nationals enjoy the same free-speech protections as citizens?
Can particular immigrant groups be singled out for removal to advance
U.S. policy objectives? When does advocacy for a political cause
Palestinian statehood, say lapse into material support for terrorists
with similar goals but more sinister methods?<br><br>
The government architects of the case point to it as providing a
framework, years ahead of its time, for the strategy of seeking to
identify and remove possible terrorists and their supporters in America
before they can strike.<br><br>
"Our job is to protect the American people against things that may
happen in the future," said William B. Odencrantz, who came to the
L.A. 8 case early on as a supervising lawyer for what was then called the
Immigration and Naturalization Service. "We're not concerned with
convicting people after they blow up buildings. What we want to do is
keep them from being in a situation where they can blow up a building in
the first place.<br><br>
"And so that's the kind of story we've been trying to sell for 18
years with respect to this particular incident."<br><br>
Critics of the case view it, conversely, as an early model of an
anti-terrorism strategy they regard as a campaign of stereotype and
overreach. They argue that to place fundraising for Palestinian refugee
camps and, for that matter, dancing the <i>dabka</i> on par with the
dark works of international terrorists not only diverts government
resources from the hunt for "real terrorists," but undercuts
basic constitutional protections.<br><br>
For the accused, the case has kept them ensnared for nearly two decades.
Released from detention while the litigation played out, they have built
seemingly innocuous lives in Southern California, raising children,
buying homes, starting businesses. Yet they have done so with a gnawing,
daily awareness that their purchase on the landscape remains precarious,
with the government unwavering in its determination to see them
removed.<br><br>
"At first," recalled Maria Obeid, wife of one of the eight,
"it was: 'Can we have kids? Let's not have kids because we don't
know what is going to happen. Let's not buy a house, because something
might happen. Let's not get this job, because something might
happen.'<br><br>
"I mean, everything that you want to do is stopped. And it's not
just us, it's everybody, and it's psychological torture."<br><br>
The eight were never accused of plotting or committing any act of
terrorism or any crime, for that matter. As William H. Webster, FBI
director at the time, testified before Congress not long after the case
broke: "If these individuals had been United States citizens"
rather than green card holders and foreign students "there would
not have been a basis for an arrest."<br><br>
Rather, they were targeted for removal, technically a civil proceeding,
on grounds that they allegedly had raised money for the PFLP. More
specifically, the initial charges involved the eight's efforts to
distribute Al Hadaf, the PFLP magazine a publication available in
public libraries, on college campuses and even at the U.S. Library of
Congress.<br><br>
The government contended that the magazine linked the defendants to an
organization advocating the "doctrines of world communism," a
deportable offense under a provision of the McCarran-Walter Act, which
was conceived during the McCarthy era as a means to remove immigrants
with Marxist leanings.<br><br>
The charges against the L.A. 8 have been reworked at least three times
since, reflecting changes in immigration and anti-terrorism laws, some of
which were tailored to be applied retroactively to this case. For all of
that, however, the matter is far from finished.<br><br>
Two of the eight, Khader Musa Hamide and Michel Ibrahim Shehadeh, are
scheduled for trial in immigration court next month, with the government
seeking to deport them under a provision of the Patriot Act that forbids
giving material support to terrorist organizations. The outcome of their
trial could influence the fate of the others. Should the government
prevail, it could in theory take the same tack against the rest of the
L.A. 8.<br><br>
The respondents, as defendants are called in immigration court, hope the
trial will bring an end to the case a hope tempered by
experience.<br><br>
"I think we are going to win, but now what is the price of
winning?" asked Hamide, alleged leader of the eight and a father of
three who now makes his living as a wholesaler of coffee beans.
"It's already been 18 years of hell and misery for all of us. Is it
going to take another 18 years? I mean, we want to go on with our
lives."<br><br>
<br>
<br><br>
Los Angeles in the early 1980s, the Los Angeles in which this case took
root, was in the midst of transformation, on its way to becoming what
boosters at the time liked to call a "world city."<br><br>
The agents of change, by and large, were immigrants.<br><br>
Refugees were pouring in from seemingly every corner of the planet, from
Soviet Armenia, Mexico and El Salvador, Cambodia and South Korea, from
the Philippines, Thailand and Pakistan.<br><br>
Many did not leave their political passions and causes behind in the old
country. Palestinians were no exception. They followed closely the
fighting then underway with Israeli troops in Lebanon. They kept
themselves informed on the dismal conditions of the refugee
camps.<br><br>
"Back then," Shehadeh recalled, "we were getting reports
that people in the refugee camps were eating dogs and rats. They were so
besieged. And the whole Palestinian community worldwide was energized to
rebuild hospitals, start clinics, to help alleviate human
suffering."<br><br>
One response, he said, was to raise money at events like the one held in
Glendale. Various Palestinian organizations would sponsor them. Ayman
Obeid, one of the eight and a performer at the event, said the gatherings
served another purpose: giving displaced and homesick immigrants an
opportunity to take comfort in like company.<br><br>
When he looked out from the stage, Obeid said, "I did not see any
terrorists. I saw families. They brought their kids. For them it was to
see live music, dance. Their eyes were lit. They thought we were kind of
the Boyz II Men group. Because we liked what we did, and they liked what
they saw, and that was the extent of it."<br><br>
After the performances, he said, would come a pitch for donations, which
he characterized this way: " 'And can we get some money to send to
the needy?' And that was it."<br><br>
As they look back now, some of the eight recall the early 1980s as a time
for hope. They were young, outspoken advocates of the Palestinian cause,
and sensed momentum in their drive to push American public opinion their
way. They were engaged not only in fundraisers, but also in campus
rallies, protests, leafleting, voter drives.<br><br>
"We wanted to influence the U.S.," Hamide said. "We wanted
to be like the Jews of the United States. Do you know what I am saying?
To work from within the system. That is why we demonstrated in the
streets. We engaged every group that was willing to listen to us, whether
it was on campuses, churches, community groups and political
people.<br><br>
"Anybody who was willing to listen to us, we went to them, with
literature, with dialogue, with whatever it took. Books, you name it
with dance, with food, with anything we could. We wanted to bring out the
truth."<br><br>
Those with opposing views about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict took
notice of a heightened Palestinian profile across America. In 1983, a
booklet published by the Anti-Defamation League of B'Nai B'rith reported,
"Beginning in June with Israel's military action against the PLO in
Lebanon, a pro-Arab propaganda network, which had been growing steadily
in the United States for many years, erupted in full
force."<br><br>
At the same time, there were suspicions in Southern California that the
Palestinian activists might be up to more than political propaganda. An
investigative article in the now-defunct New West magazine asserted that
Palestinians in Los Angeles had created "an operational base for
international terrorism" and that the government was "doing
little."<br><br>
In the article, an FBI supervisor complained about a lack of legal
"tools" and said: "We can't even start to investigate a
terrorist group until we have solid information that they are planning,
say, to bomb a building … not that they are talking about it. But that
they have already bought the fuses and the wires and the electric
clock."<br><br>
<br>
<br><br>
Enter Frank H. Knight, a tall, silver-haired agent who was to become an
almost mythic, monster-like figure in the memories of the L.A.
8.<br><br>
Knight, a Midwesterner, had joined the FBI in the late 1970s. He was well
into his 30s, having served as an Army officer in Vietnam and a junior
high school science teacher.<br><br>
He was assigned to the Los Angeles office's counter-terrorism detail in
1980 and picked up the trail of Hamide and the PFLP in 1983. Over the
next four years, he would prove himself to be not only determined but
also creative, developing theories about domestic terrorism and how to
combat it that appear to have been years ahead of their time.<br><br>
Now 61, retired from the FBI and living in San Diego, Knight declined to
answer questions about the case because it remains open. With one
exception, other prosecutors and investigators, through public affairs
officers, took the same stance, as they have from the start.<br><br>
The years of litigation, however, have churned up dozens of memos,
teletypes and internal reports. Also, Knight was deposed for four days in
1996 by an L.A. 8 lawyer, and his testimony provides significant insights
into his conception of the case.<br><br>
For three years, Knight and fellow investigators tailed Hamide, a Burbank
busboy who had immigrated to the United States from Bethlehem, in the
West Bank, on a Jordanian passport<b> </b>in 1971.<br><br>
They followed him to the Go-Between Express Bar-Cafe in Silver Lake,
where he was overheard saying something about "presentation of the
cause" and "problems" as he pored over documents with two
companions.<br><br>
They followed him to a Carl's Jr. in Glendale and caught more snippets of
conversation "rent a building," "progressive
Republican" and "May Day."<br><br>
They staked out his Glendale apartment and watched him lug boxes of
publications, including copies of Al Hadaf, from his car. An L.A.
sheriff's deputy happened to live in the same building and happened to
notice the regular visits of several Arab males to Hamide's
apartment.<br><br>
What prompted Knight's initial interest in Hamide and the PFLP remains
less than clear. There were mentions in early reports of tips from other
FBI field offices, as well as a widespread effort before the 1984 Los
Angeles Olympics to check out anyone who might conceivably be connected
to any terrorist plot against the Games.<br><br>
After the arrests in 1987, Anti-Defamation League officials claimed that
the investigation had been triggered by information developed by their
organization. They would back away from this boast a few years later,
however, in the wake of embarrassing disclosures that ADL operatives in
several cities, including Los Angeles, had kept thousands of covert files
on people they deemed worthy of extra vigilance. Indeed, ADL files on
Hamide and Shehadeh did turn up.<br><br>
As his investigation proceeded, Knight began to read up on Palestinian
politics and, in particular, the PFLP. Founded in 1967, it had claimed
responsibility for a number of terrorist acts, including political
assassinations and the hijacking of jetliners. As it evolved and became
part of the social fabric of the Palestinian territories, it also opened
medical clinics and schools.<br><br>
These good works did not impress Knight. Asked in his deposition about
the day-care centers and kindergartens, he replied: "You engage in
these activities for many reasons. One being humanitarian reasons. The
other is as a recruitment vehicle. Gain the hearts and minds of the
mother, and she'll send her son to war."<br><br>
Knight believed it was impossible to be dedicated to the PFLP, with its
Marxist dogma, and still be a law-abiding American resident. "The
PFLP," he declared in one report, "is interested in no less
than the subjugation of the entire world under a communist regime, and
not the mere establishment of a Palestinian state. PFLP people, by virtue
of their creed, hate the United States and all the U.S. Constitution
stands for."<br><br>
The members of the L.A. 8, not surprisingly, disagree with this stark
view. Without admitting they were agents of the PFLP, those interviewed
for this article did say there were aspects of the organization they
found attractive.<br><br>
The PFLP was secular, they said, and it promoted feminism. Its social
programs were effective. It was staunch in its insistence on Palestinian
statehood, and by the early 1980s its fighting wing seemed to be moving
away from attacks on civilians and toward operations against military
targets.<br><br>
That they could hold these views and still claim not to support
PFLP-sponsored terrorism, was something Knight could not accept: "To
the committed PFLP member," he asserted in one document,
"pulling a trigger is no different than selling a subscription to Al
Hadaf, and soliciting money for the cause is the same as killing
Zionists. Every act has a political message. Every utterance carries a
terrorist purpose."<br><br>
<br>
<br><br>
By 1984 the object of Knight's investigation had become clear: to
"neutralize" the PFLP in Southern California by removing
Hamide. He described Hamide, who had studied marketing at the University
of Oregon and had gained permanent-resident status, as "intelligent,
aggressive, dedicated," with "great leadership ability."
Taking him out of action, he wrote to his superiors, would "severely
hinder the PFLP in L.A."<br><br>
Knight began to stake out fundraisers organized by Hamide, noting that he
did little of the physical work but gave plenty of orders. The speeches
at the events, Knight would later report after obtaining translations,
were "all anti-peace, anti-United States peace settlement,
anti-Jordanian peace settlement and anti-Israel." One summary also
mentioned "anti-Reagan" overtones. Still, it was a difficult
criminal case to build.<br><br>
Various Palestinian charity organizations were listed as the official
sponsors of the fundraisers, and donation checks were made out to them.
Knight, relying on what he said was a single confidential source,
regarded this as a sham. In any event, the money raised at the Southern
California events he staked out was never traced to find out exactly
where it was spent.<br><br>
Knight believed it made little difference if the funds were earmarked for
benign works donations to a PFLP kindergarten simply would free up
money for PFLP AK-47s. "We know that the United States is a
moneymaking apparatus for the PFLP from their captured documents,"
Knight testified in his deposition. The group committed "lots of
attacks on people, a lot of military attacks, as well. And it's not free.
It costs money. And money is fungible."<br><br>
In his view, even the dancers who performed at fundraisers were
supporting PFLP terrorism.<br><br>
"They put on a show for you," Knight said of the <i>dabka</i>
performers. "And it's the whole ambience that's generated in the
thing that causes people to reach into their pockets and give
money."<br><br>
There was, however, a problem with Knight's theory.<br><br>
His superiors in Washington were not buying it.<br><br>
Three times he laid out the evidence he'd gathered and asked headquarters
for permission to open an official investigation, a bureaucratic step
paving the way for criminal prosecution. The responses were
blunt.<br><br>
"FBIHQ has again reviewed LA's request," one communique read,
" … and determined that Hamide is associated with Popular Front for
the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) principals and activities.<br><br>
"The circumstances presented concerning his PFLP activities do not
demonstrate preparation for terrorism, but rather, the exercise of his
rights as guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution and its Amendments.
Therefore, LA's request is again denied."<br><br>
An FBI agent in New York who shared Knight's interest in the PFLP
suggested he team up with immigration authorities. There was, the agent
wrote Knight, a significant upside to this then-novel approach: "INS
deportation hearings are not criminal trials, and the rules of evidence
are less stringent, such as hearsay, disclosure of sources,
etc."<br><br>
Knight met with an attorney of the Immigration and Naturalization Service
in Los Angeles. He was briefed on the McCarran-Walter Act and the
provision dealing with the deportation of communists. He revisited the
Marxist ideologies expressed in the PFLP magazines that Hamide and his
associates distributed.<br><br>
He also requested that an INS agent be loaned to his investigation. This
was done, although the INS supervisor who authorized the assignment later
would say he had been left somewhat in the dark about what kind of case
Knight was attempting to build.<br><br>
"I don't think we knew what the full deck of cards was," former
INS District Director Ernest Gustafson recalled. "I'm not so sure we
were completely in the loop." Nonetheless, the INS would authorize
the arrests.<br><br>
Knight informed the FBI of his plans: "This novel approach," he
wrote, "would utilize information developed from FBI investigations
with the INS deportation laws." He met in Washington with superiors
and came away believing that the U.S. attorney general supported the
effort.<br><br>
After the INS agent joined his investigation, Knight learned that Hamide
was about to be sent a letter of invitation to become a full-fledged U.S.
citizen the final step in the immigration process. Acting on Knight's
information, the INS withheld the invitation.<br><br>
Shehadeh, too, was close to becoming a naturalized citizen when, on Jan.
26, 1987, two men and a woman, all dressed in gray, came to his Long
Beach house. They announced they were from the INS. As he opened the
door, Shehadeh's first, vaguely formed thought was that these immigration
officers had come to welcome America's newest citizen.<br><br>
That they would do this at dawn, he recalls thinking, did seem
strange.<br><br>
<br>
<br><br>
As they remember it now, all these years later, the morning of the
arrests unfolds in a series of surreal, dream-like scenes. "I
remember every detail," said Hamide. He remembers how the officers
and agents burst into his Glendale apartment with guns drawn. They showed
him a subpoena. He did not understand. It seemed to indicate that they
had come to seize magazines.<br><br>
"So I gave them my magazines. That's funny," he recalled,
without a trace of mirth. "That is really very indicative of this
case. They came in with a subpoena for a magazine. No baseball bats, no
guns, no whatever. Because they knew: I ain't got none."<br><br>
Aiad Khaled Barakat recalls the knock on his door. He looked down from an
upstairs window and saw a lone Glendale police officer on his porch.
There was a problem, the officer explained. They needed to talk.<br><br>
"The minute I turned the key to unlock the door," Barakat said,
"the door went like a bulldozer. They pushed it like 10 feet back
and people came in, about 15 or 18. A lot of them."<br><br>
Shehadeh remembers the sweat that rolled down the chin of the agent who
held him in a headlock. His 3-year-old son had burst into the front room,
wailing, and another agent placed him on the couch. Shehadeh tried to
wriggle free, wanting to comfort the boy. The agent tightened his
grip.<br><br>
"Don't be stupid," Shehadeh remembers him warning. "You
don't want your son to watch you get hurt."<br><br>
Shehadeh was told that he belonged to a terrorist organization and was
under arrest. They handcuffed him and led him outside. A police
helicopter wheeled low over the house, and that is when the thought
clicked: He had witnessed this scene before.<br><br>
"The raid on my house in Long Beach," he said, "looked
exactly like the raids in the West Bank: early-morning raids, with
helicopters and guns and police and uniforms. Taken away in a hazy dawn,
you know. Except this was happening in America."<br><br>
Looking back now, what perplexes him the most was how calm he remained.
He did not lose his temper. He did not lash out and demand to know what
was going on. It took him some time to sort out his emotional
response.<br><br>
"In the back of a Palestinian mind," he explained,
"somebody is always going to come and take you away at any time. A
Palestinian expects this nonsense. We live with it."<br><br>
Amjad Obeid, Ayman's brother, had just returned from Las Vegas, where he
had eloped with his girlfriend, Maria Garcia. He was a Palestinian
Muslim. She was a Mexican American Catholic. They had agreed to keep the
marriage secret for a few months, to give them time to break the news
gently to their parents.<br><br>
Now Maria's mother was on the telephone. She'd seen a Spanish-language
newscast about Palestinian terrorists being arrested that morning. One of
them looked like Maria's friend Amjad. She would not be comforted to
learn from her daughter that he was no longer just a friend. He was her
new son-in-law, the suspected terrorist.<br><br>
Placed in a patrol car, Amjad Obeid was puzzled. "I remember when I
got in the car there was one individual that sat with me in the back, and
he was just showing me photos of me dancing at events. But I still didn't
make anything out of it why would they? What's going on, you know? And
here is just a thick book of nothing but pictures of me
dancing."<br><br>
Ayman Obeid, who was studying at Cal State Long Beach with his brother,
was asleep in his underwear. He opened his eyes to the barrel of a gun.
They allowed him to dress and then put him in a police car. Seated next
to him was agent Knight, "a big, big, tall guy," he said.
"A tough guy. He was very tough. Intimidation was part of the plan:
'We are the government, and you are nobody.' "<br><br>
He said the agent warned him that if he didn't cooperate, he'd be hauled
off to a Middle East country known for its hostile treatment of
Palestinian troublemakers, a country where they'd "love to have you
for lunch."<br><br>
Knight scolded him: "You guys here on the visa. You say you came to
study in our country, and you're doing this to us? How dare you do this?
You know, we can just flick you, and nobody will care about
you."<br><br>
Flick you?<br><br>
"Yes," Obeid said, those were the agent's "exact
words."<br><br>
He raised a flattened hand, as if to swat at the table where he
sat.<br><br>
"Flick you, like a fly."<br><br>
<br>
<br><br>
They initially were kept in isolation cells and described ominously as
national security threats. Trips to the federal courthouse in downtown
L.A. were made in convoys of unmarked vans, driven at a pace that was, to
these shackled terrorism suspects, truly terrifying.<br><br>
"One hundred miles an hour," Hamide recalled, "like they
are transporting the biggest Mafia head in Italy to court: 'You are going
to kill us, man!' And there was no reason for it. They knew that…. The
whole thing was a put-on."<br><br>
That they were transported in shackles and not permitted to shave made
them look more plausibly like international terrorists, even though the
government eventually would acknowledge that they were not accused of any
acts of terrorism.<br><br>
Rather, they were to be deported for their ties to an "organization
that causes to be written, circulated, distributed, published or
displayed, written or printed matter advocating or teaching economic,
international and governmental doctrines of world
communism."<br><br>
Arab American leaders condemned the arrests as a "witch hunt"
and "old-fashioned Arab bashing." There were suggestions that
the roundup represented a "crude response" by the Reagan
administration to the taking of U.S. hostages in Beirut.<br><br>
Another theory was that the government wanted a test case in the event
war broke out in the increasingly volatile Middle East to establish a
precedent for detaining large numbers of foreign nationals. Shortly after
the arrests, a secret government document discussing just such a plan was
leaked to the media.<br><br>
The document, "Alien Terrorists and Undesirables: A Contingency
Plan," appeared to plot a legal course not unlike that being
followed in the L.A. 8 case: In the instance of war, immigrants from the
Middle East, not liable for criminal prosecution but considered
undesirable, would be arrested for immigration violations and detained at
a camp in Oakdale, La.<br><br>
Government officials sought to downplay the document's importance, saying
it was merely a draft of a possible approach. Its airing, nonetheless,
rallied support for the arrested Palestinians. The American Civil
Liberties Union and the National Lawyers Guild, along with high-profile
lawyers such as Leonard Weinglass, of Chicago Seven fame, came riding
over the hill.<br><br>
After 18 days in detention, the eight were led in chains into the
courtroom of Immigration Judge Roy Daniel for a bond hearing. Outside,
Irv Rubin, national leader of the militant Jewish Defense League, marched
about with a placard: "Commie Dogs Beware."<br><br>
The government came into court with generic treatises on the PFLP,
pictures of Palestinian men dancing and promises of more-persuasive
secret evidence that, under orders from the U.S. attorney general, could
be produced only in chambers, away from the respondents, their lawyers
and the public.<br><br>
The judge wondered aloud what the various PFLP atrocities described in
the government literature had to do with these particular Palestinians.
Had they hijacked airplanes? Had they plotted bus bombings? He refused to
hear the secret evidence.<br><br>
The government lawyer described the fundraisers and demonstrations. She
also offered to share in chambers Knight's classified FBI report on the
PFLP.<br><br>
"I'm going to ask you to do that in public," Daniel
said.<br><br>
The government lawyer responded that, because of "national
security" interests, she could not. Maybe she could approach the
bench and whisper her secrets in the judge's ear? He refused and ordered
the eight released, some on their own recognizance, the rest after they
posted nominal bail amounts.<br><br>
They smiled, hugged one another, and were put back in chains for the
drive to Terminal Island, where they would be freed. Outside the
courthouse, their supporters danced the <i>dabka.<br><br>
</i>Later, as he and the others were led out of the detention facility,
Hamide glanced backward over his shoulder and spotted Knight, peering
down from an overhead stairway.<br><br>
Their eyes locked, he said, and in that moment Knight shot Hamide a look
he has never forgotten. "It was like," he said, " 'You
bastards.' Just a cold-blooded look of hatred."<br><br>
*<br><br>
(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)<br><br>
Looking back<br><br>
Here are major points in the L.A. 8 case, along with key events related
to U.S. policy:<br><br>
1983: FBI Special Agent Frank H. Knight begins tracking L.A.
Palestinians.<br><br>
1984: FBI refuses Knight's official investigation request.<br><br>
Summer Olympics come to Los Angeles, culminating months of scrutiny of
potential terrorism suspects.<br><br>
1986: Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine fundraiser takes
place in Glendale.<br><br>
1987: Khader Musa Hamide, his wife, Julie Mungai, and Michel Ibrahim
Shehadeh and six others are arrested. Group later consists of eight
people.<br><br>
Immigration Judge Roy Daniel releases all eight pending
proceedings.<br><br>
1990: Immigration Act of 1990 replaces McCarthy-era provisions allowing
deportation of noncitizen communists.<br><br>
1992: Hamide and Shehadeh begin their first deportation trial, which
stalls because of developments in a civil case.<br><br>
1995: Oklahoma City bombing kills 168 and injures more than 800;
anti-terrorism laws are toughened.<br><br>
1996: U.S. District Judge Stephen V. Wilson cites free-speech rights in
blocking deportation of the eight.<br><br>
1999: U.S. Supreme Court ruling favors government; case returns to
immigration court.<br><br>
2001: Sept. 11 attacks kill nearly 3,000 and lead to passage of the
Patriot Act with language that allows the L.A. 8 case to
continue.<br><br>
2004: Mungai, a Kenyan native, is granted permanent residency; Aiad
Khaled Barakat is denied citizenship.<br><br>
2005: July 13: Tentative date for Hamide and Shehadeh's second
deportation trial.<br><br>
*<br><br>
Amjad Obeid: A dancer at fundraiser, this Cal State Long Beach student
had just returned from eloping to Las Vegas when he was
arrested.<br><br>
Basher Amer: He was pulled out of college chemistry finals and arrested;
only L.A. 8 member who has left Southern California.<br><br>
Julie Mungai: Khader Musa Hamide's Kenyan wife now has permanent-resident
status.<br><br>
Ayman Obeid: Manager at a bank branch in Monrovia is seeking permanent
residency.<br><br>
Aiad Khaled Barakat: Helped distribute Palestinian magazines. He has been
refused citizenship.<br><br>
Michel Ibrahim Shehadeh, with his wife, Maxine: Arrested in front of son,
3, in a raid that reminded him of the West Bank.<br><br>
Khader Musa Hamide: Alleged leader of the L.A. 8, the father of three is
a wholesaler of coffee beans.<br><br>
Naim Sharif: Became a permanent resident after successfully challenging
the government's use of secret evidence.<br><br>
Sources: Times research, Infoplease.com <br><br>
</font><x-sigsep><p></x-sigsep>
<font size=3 color="#FF0000">The Freedom Archives<br>
522 Valencia Street<br>
San Francisco, CA 94110<br>
(415) 863-9977<br>
</font><font size=3>
<a href="http://www.freedomarchives.org/" eudora="autourl">
www.freedomarchives.org</a></font></body>
</html>