May 2, 2010

Broadcast Date: 
May 2 2010

Syed Fahad Hashmi pled guilty to providing material support to Al Qaeda, but many questions raised by his case remain; some Jewish organizations charge that the federal government treats campus anti-Semitism solely as religious bias, which isn't proscribed under the Civil Rights Act; plus blogger Max Ajl speaks with us from Gaza.

Episode segments
  • Syed Fahad Hashmi
    National Politics, Civil Rights, Police/Criminal Justice, Torture
    Petra Bartosiewicz is a freelance writer.  Her forthcoming book, The Best Terrorists We Could Find, an investigation of terrorism trials in the U.S. since 9/11, will be published by Nation Books in 2011. She has written for numerous publications including A Thousand Little Gitmos in Mother Jones.
    Marilyn Kleinberg Neimark

    For over three years, since he was extradited from Great Britain to the U.S., Syed Fahad Hashmi was kept in solitary confinement in New York City's Metropolitan Correctional Center.  This past week, on the eve of his trial,Hashmi  accepted a plea bargain from prosecutors and pled guilty to one count of providing material support to Al Qaeda. 

    We talk with journalist Petra Bartosiewicz about Hashmi's case, the civil rights and human rights issues it raises, and whether it is possible for terrorism suspects to receive due process and fair trials in this post-9/11 era.

    To read an open letter from Syed Fahad Hashmi's family, click here.

     

  • Anti-Semitism and Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964
    National Politics, American, Civil Rights, Anti-Semitism
    Josh Nathan-Kazis, is a regular contributor to Beyond The Pale and a full-time Forward Fellow at The Forward newspaper. Previously, he worked as the editor of New Voices, an independent national magazine for Jewish college students. His work has also appeared in Tablet and Haaretz. 
    Marilyn Kleinberg Neimark

    Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits federal funding to institutions that discriminate on the basis of race, color or national origin. In a recent letter to Department of Education Secretary Arne Duncan, thirteen Jewish organizations called on the Department's Office of Civil Rights to interpret Title VI to protect Jewish students from anti-Semitic harassment, intimidation and discrimination.  At issue here is not just the old question of what constitutes Jewish identity, but the more recent one of what constitutes anti-Semitism and how closely it overlaps (if at all) to criticism of Israel and/or Zionism.

  • Update from Gaza
    Israel/Palestine, Palestinian Politics, Occupation
    Max Ajl is a freelance journalist who blogs at Jewbonics.  He was the Coordinator for Communications and Media for the Gaza Freedom March.
    Marilyn Kleinberg Neimark

    Beyond the Pale talks with journalist Max Ajl, currently living in Gaza about local conditions.