Washington, June 18: Across the United States Muslim charities are being shut down, raided or questioned under terrorism finance laws that give the government unchecked power and creates a climate of fear that is stopping American Muslims from carrying out one of their fundamental religious duties, an advocacy group said Wednesday.
“Broad and vague” terrorism finance laws, expanded by George W. Bush’s administration, allow officials to target Muslim charities based on “secret evidence and without notice,” the author of an American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) report published on Tuesday told.
The report described how the laws also target donors, who are being unfairly prevented from giving Zakat, obligatory charity donations that are one of the five pillars of Islam, due a climate of fear created by law enforcement intimidation.
An ACLU map where charities have been shut down (red), raided (orange) and questioned (yellow)
Freedom of religion is being “trampled on,” said Jennifer Turner, author of the report.
The terrorism laws in question were first expanded following the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks and gave the Treasury Department a free hand to label organizations as sponsors of terrorism and lacked the legal framework to protect such charities from abuse.
Counterproductive laws
” Even if a donor has no intention to support terrorism they could still be potentially criminally prosecuted ”
Jennifer Turner
For the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), ACLU’s report was nothing new.
“We have been aware of this situation for a number of years and I think the atmosphere is definitely chilled in the post 9/11 era and people feel reluctant to give that they may be targeted or unjustly accused,” Communications Director Ibrahim Hooper told Al Arabiya.
When asked why people would be fearful if they were sure there were no links to terrorism, Hooper replied that “merely being innocent has not always been the test” by which the government judged people.
The ACLU’s Turner explained that under the laws donors are exposed to criminal liability for donations made in good faith, meaning “even if a donor has no intention to support terrorism they could still be potentially criminally prosecuted.”
She said that the FBI had interrogated many of the 120 Muslims — community leaders and donors in states across the country — she interviewed for the report, even those that had given donations to charities that were legally operating or not known to be under suspicion.
The FBI has come under fire recently for using informants to spy in mosques.
” In the U.S. rules on charitable giving have made it harder on Muslims to fulfill their religious obligation. I am committed to working with American Muslims to ensure they can fulfill Zakat ”
Obama acknowledges problem
Such laws are counterproductive as they are meant to make Americans safer but create an image of a “war on Islam” and undermine President Barack Obama’s efforts to reach out to Muslims, Turner, who is a researcher with the ACLU Human Rights Program, argued.
Obama even acknowledged the problem in his landmark speech from Cairo where he said: “In the U.S. rules on charitable giving have made it harder on Muslims to fulfill their religious obligation. I am committed to working with American Muslims to ensure they can fulfill Zakat.”
The report “Blocking Faith, Freezing Charity” aims to document the serious effects Muslims face and called on Obama’s administration to review with congress what is wrong with these laws.
So far nine U.S.-based Muslim charities have been shut down because of the laws, including some of the country’s largest, like the Holy Land Foundation, which was shut down and its founders jailed after they were found guilty of funneling money to the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, labeled a terrorist organization by the United States.
Courtesy: Al Arabiya