What Is Free Speech, and What Is Terrorism?

The New York Times:

August 14, 2005

By RICHARD BERNSTEIN

BERLIN — Radical Muslim preachers have hated the West for decades - at least since the Egyptian writer Sayyid Qutb famously visited the United States in the late 1940's and loathed what he saw. And yet the West is facing something rather new these days as it collectively asks, What should be done with the imams living in London, Paris, Rome and other Western cities who preach the murder of nonbelievers?

Indeed, the late Qutb himself, who remains highly influential in the world of Muslim radicalism, may have hated what he called the "primitiveness" of the West and seen it as a menace to civilization, but he never called for terrorism.

The same cannot be said about many latter-day Qutbs who have come to Western democracies to revile them. There is, for example, the case of Abu Qatada, otherwise known as Omar Mahmoud Abu Omar, who, according to Spanish investigators, is Osama bin Laden's "ambassador to Europe."

Mr. Qatada and at least a few dozen others represent something new and, certainly since the London bombings last month, something extremely scary: Islamic sojourners in the West who have imported the radicalized, self-immolating rage of the Middle East to their adopted countries, preaching violence and hatred, and, according to a number of European governments, at times recruiting soldiers for holy war.

What to do about them? Throughout Europe, governments have become conspicuously tougher with radicals in their midst, far readier than before to deport them.

In France, Nicolas Sarkozy, the interior minister, announced a "zero tolerance" policy for Muslims who preach violence or recruit fighters for battles elsewhere, as in Iraq. The French last week deported two imams to Algeria, one of whom, Reda Ameuroud, had been arrested earlier in what was called "a preventive antiterror operation" in a Paris neighborhood with a mosque known for attracting radicals.

Germany, though not so far a terror target, had well before the London bombings been waging a campaign against Islamists believed to be violating the country's strict laws against inciting racial hatred. A couple of months ago, for example, Germany banned the Islamic group Hizb ut-Tahrir and has quietly deported a few of its members.

The group's spokesmen deny that they preach hatred or advocate violence, but the Germans are embarrassed that they had unwittingly harbored three of the Sept. 11 hijackers in a secret Qaeda cell in Hamburg. In Bavaria alone, according to published reports, 14 "extremists and hate preachers" have been removed since November 2004.

Some defense lawyers and human rights activists argue that the European Convention on Human Rights prohibits sending anybody to countries where they might face abuse, torture or the death penalty.

And while Britain is in the midst of negotiating deals with 10 Muslim countries, including Jordan, Algeria and Morocco, to assure that deportees will get humane treatment, civil rights advocates and moderate Muslim spokesmen have criticized the absence of safeguards to assure abuses don't take place.

Beyond that, these groups ask: in clamping down on radicals, are democracies violating their own values and, in this sense, handing a kind of unintended victory to the terrorists?

One aim of terrorism is to provoke responses that will intensify anger in the Muslim world. The retort to this argument is that the hatred already exists, and those who foment it cannot be left to encourage violence against the very countries that have given them refuge.

Preaching Jihad Abu Hamza al-Masri preaching on a London street in April 2004. Even though his mosque was a recruiting center for jihadists, like the shoe bomber Richard C. Reid, the British government did not detain him until last year.

Here, a look at how countries are handling their radicals.

Britain: Taunts Follow Crackdown

The July 7 bombers who killed themselves, along with 52 victims, aboard three subway trains and a double-decker bus might not have dreamed that their action would cause a transformation in British attitudes toward counterterrorism and civil liberties.

The rules have changed. And so has the nation.

Among the slew of counterterrorism laws announced by Prime Minister Tony Blair earlier this month were measures aimed at uprooting extremists, including the threatened closure of mosques, the deportation of foreign fundamentalist clerics and the possible extension of the permissible period for detention without trial from 14 days to three months.

Some Islamic organizations would be banned. Lists would be compiled of unwelcome Islamic teachers from outside the country and, within the country, of militant Web sites, centers and bookstores, Mr. Blair said.

The government announced plans for "special courts" sitting in secrecy to decide whether extended detention without charge could be applied, using evidence inadmissible in a normal court. And Charles Clarke, the home secretary, announced after a series of dawn raids that 10 people had been detained as a prelude to deportation, a process that could take months if the detainees appeal the deportation orders. The government would not formally identify them or describe their suspected transgressions.

Most of those ordered deported had been held in Belmarsh prison since shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the United States, when Britain enacted a law permitting indefinite detention without charge of foreign nationals suspected of involvement in terrorism.

Among those detained, according to lawyers, was Abu Qatada, a Jordanian of Palestinian descent who had been described as the spiritual guide of the Sept. 11 attackers.

Some other prominent clerics have fallen afoul of different laws. Abu Hamza al-Masri, born in Egypt, is wanted in the United States on charges related to terrorism and faces extradition. And Sheik Omar Bakri Mohammed, born in Syria and founder of the supposedly disbanded Al Muhajiroun group, was detained last week during a visit to Lebanon. Mr. Bakri has joint Syrian and Lebanese citizenship. Once he was out of Britain, the authorities used existing laws to revoke his residency rights in Britain and bar him from returning.

Mr. Blair is also seeking broader powers to prevent terrorism. He has made it clear that British authorities will make greater use of "control orders" - akin to house arrest - and will introduce new catchall offenses of glorifying, preparing for or inciting acts of terrorism, regardless of the offender's nationality.

Mr. Blair has also said he will ban several militant groups, including Hizb ut-Tahrir, which calls for the establishment of an Islamic caliphate, though it says its methods are nonviolent, and "successor groups" to Al Muhajiroun.

Moves against British Muslims could provide the real test of how tough Mr. Blair is prepared to be. Already, three British allies of Mr. Bakri have made statements that might violate the new laws.

Abu Uzair, leader of the Savior Sect - a successor to Al Muhajiroun - has declared on television that "the banner has been risen for jihad inside the U.K."

Anjem Choudary, a friend of Mr. Bakri and a former Al Muhajiroun spokesman, called the Sept. 11 attackers "magnificent martyrs."

And Abu Izzadeen, who converted to Islam at 17 and heads another successor group to Al Muhajiroun, called Al Ghurabaa, called suicide bombing "martyrdom operations."

ALAN COWELL

Australia: Muslims Rein in a Cleric

With its largely homogeneous population - 92 percent Caucasian; 65 percent Christian; fewer Muslims than Buddhists - Australia would seem an unlikely place for Islamic extremists. But after the London bombings, Australia's prime minister, John Howard, has joined Britain in suggesting that new laws might be needed to deal with Islamic extremists, including deportation of clerics who preach violence.

But so far he has not followed the lead of Tony Blair, the British prime minister, with a crackdown on extremist groups. In fact, Australia's attorney general said the country saw no legal justification at the moment for banning one radical group, Hizb ut-Tahrir, which has called for attacks on coalition forces in Iraq. The group was banned in Britain, but Australian officials saw no evidence that the group was linked to the recent bombings in London or other violence. The pressure in Australia to crack down is mitigated somewhat by efforts of moderate Muslims, who are the vast majority, to police the radical fundamentalists.

Melbourne's board of imams told one high-profile radical cleric, Sheik Mohammed Omran, not to speak to the news media. Mr. Omran claims that the Americans themselves were behind the Sept. 11 attacks, and denies that Muslims were responsible for the London bombings.

"You should shut up a little bit," the imams told Mr. Omran, according to the chairman of the board, Imam Rexhep. Reflecting an attitude of many non-Muslims in Australia, they added, according to Mr. Rexhep, "If you don't like it here, no one forces you to stay."

RAYMOND BONNER

Italy: Deport, Then Deport More

The imam was married to an Italian woman named Barbara, claimed he had met Osama bin Laden and warned that Italian troops in Afghanistan and Iraq would come under justifiable attack. And in November 2003, the imam, Abdel Kader Fadlallah Mamour, was deported to his native Senegal from his home near Turin - the first time Italy used a law allowing the expulsion of radical imams. An additional seven Muslims termed as extremists were also expelled then, following a crackdown in Italy after an attack in Iraq killed 19 Italian soldiers.

The law in Italy, a nation with a history of domestic terrorism, has allowed for the expulsion of radical imams since 1998, and since 2003 the nation has used the law to send suspects home to Senegal, Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia, according to Ministry of Interior documents. But new antiterror legislation passed on July 31, in the wake of the London bombings, anticipates a more aggressive expulsion policy: It expands the right to expel to regional prefects, who are the Ministry of Interior's chief officials in Italy's provinces. Last week, the news media reported that the ministry was preparing the expulsion of another six radicals. The laws specifically address the issue of spreading hate, as opposed to the larger crime of involvement in acts of terror. They allow for expulsion for "proselytism or spreading messages of extremist fundamentalism," the ministry documents say. Since the London bombings, and amid heightened surveillance of mosques, Italy appears to be moving quicker, too, against people without legal permission to stay in the country. On Aug. 2, eight Palestinians whom the authorities labeled as fundamentalist preachers were expelled from near the town of Perugia for not having proper documents to live or work in Italy.

Italy has not been squeamish in the past about expelling foreigners: To strong opposition from human rights groups, the nation last year began immediately sending home most of the thousands of foreigners who risk the treacherous sea crossing each summer in small boats from northern Africa. The new terror law passed in July also allows for more aggressive phone tapping and conservation of phone records - measures that had been allowed in the past only against those suspected of belonging to the mafia or domestic terror groups.

In a nation with vast experience prosecuting mobsters, there has been talk of fighting terror along much the same lines. There are discussions about expanding the crimes of conspiracy, useful in prosecuting mobsters here and in other countries, to international terror investigations.

IAN FISHER

Canada: An Iman in Legal Limbo

Canada is the land of multiculturalism - so much so that Ontario is considering whether to accept Shariah law for the resolution of some family matters between consulting adults.

That's not to say that Canada shrugs off the decrees of radical imams. Canada has strong laws against hate speech, and the country's commission governing television and radio allowed Al Jazeera on the air only if cable and satellite distributors monitored its programs 24 hours a day. The agency also allowed cable companies to alter or delete "abusive comments" from Al Jazeera programs.

But when it comes to imams, Canada has not been that forceful, at least not yet. Sheik Younus Kathrada, a South African-born Muslim teacher who lectures at a mosque in Vancouver, shocked the country late last year with comments referring to Jews as "the brothers of monkeys and the swine." In lectures posted on his mosque's Web site, he said all Muslims, if given the chance, should want to become martyrs, and that Islam supports a holy war to convert nonbelievers "so that the word of Allah will be the superior word."

Sheik Kathrada said his comments had been taken out of context. But his words were considered particularly dangerous after it was disclosed that one man who attended his lectures was reportedly killed while fighting with rebels in Chechnya. But were his words a crime? The police in Vancouver began to investigate the comments as a possible hate crime, and the inquiry has since been transferred to a special national antiterrorism investigative squad. How far the investigation will go remains to be seen. Investigators say he could be deported from Canada if he is found to be a security threat, since he is a resident and not a Canadian citizen. But Mr. Kathrada was quoted in The Toronto Star recently as saying that police had not interrogated or even spoken to him.

Yet since the London bombings senior Canadian officials have made increasingly stronger comments about security dangers, and a poll last week showed that Canadians favor tough security measures over civil liberties. The Globe and Mail and CTV found that 72 percent of Canadians support placing video cameras in public places, and 81 percent favor "deporting or jailing anyone who publicly supports terrorist bombers."

CLIFFORD KRAUSS