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   Vol.64/No.43            November 13, 2000 
 
 
INS uses secret ‘evidence’ to hold Palestinian
(feature article)
 
BY LYNN HILL  
TAMPA, Florida--Mazen Al-Najjar, a resident of this city, has been detained by the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) since May 1997. He has not been charged with any crime, and is being held solely on the basis of secret "evidence" that has not been made available either to him or to his lawyers. Despite a judge’s ruling that he poses no threat, Al-Najjar has not been released from prison.

Al-Najjar is appealing the attempt by U.S. authorities to deport him for overstaying a student visa. In a hearing in June 1997, he was denied bail by an immigration judge on the basis of so-called secret evidence that was not made available even in summary form to Al-Najjar or his lawyers, except to assert that he is "associated with the Palestinian Islamic Jihad." A U.S. district court later ruled that this violated Al-Najjar’s rights, and a new bail hearing was ordered. This hearing was completed in October.

Al-Najjar, a 43-year-old Palestinian, came to the United States from the Gaza Strip almost 20 years ago, where he finished his doctorate and stayed to teach at the University of South Florida (USF) in Tampa. During this time, he co-founded the World and Islam Studies Enterprise (WISE), devoted to Middle Eastern affairs at the university.

Government lawyers used the visa case to target Al-Najjar, claiming WISE, since closed by USF, was a front for terrorism.

At the October hearing, government lawyers said their case for denying Al-Najjar bail was based on searches of WISE offices over a five-year period. INS witnesses, however, conceded they could not point to a single act of violence attributed to him, nor could any funds associated with him be traced to groups labeled by the federal government as "terrorist."

INS district counsel Daniel Vara stated that Al-Najjar’s activities in the United States included teaching at the university, helping to found a mosque, publishing academic journals, and expanding a school, which he conceded were "the regular things people do in this country." But in Al-Najjar’s case, he argued, they were only an effort to create "a veil of legitimacy" for sinister doings.

The St. Petersburg Times reports that around two dozen people have been jailed on the basis of secret evidence. The overwhelming majority of these cases have involved Muslim and Arab immigrants. According to the National Coalition to Protect Political Freedom, six of them remain in prison.

Government lawyers questioned Al-Najjar and his colleagues about who attended WISE conferences and what had been stated at the gatherings.

Government lawyers also called onto the witness stand Sami Al-Arian, Al-Najjar’s brother-in-law and also a professor at USF and co-founder of WISE. They asked Al-Arian 102 questions such as, "Isn’t it true that you support freedom for Islam through violence?" "Have you ever engaged in fund-raising for the Palestinian Islamic Jihad?" "Isn’t it true that...you made the statement, ‘Death to Israel’?"

Al-Arian limited his responses to constitutionally required information.

At the end of the hearing, the immigration judge said he will release Al-Najjar if the government failed to file a motion within 14 days that it would introduce more secret "evidence." Federal lawyers have already stated that they will seek to present the judge with further arguments to prevent Al-Najjar’s release.  
 
 
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