Sunday, November 21, 1999
Airline profiles called biased
Arabs decry Friday episode
BY LIZ SIDOTI
The Associated Press
COLUMBUS — The airline industry's profile of “suspicious” passengers is more at fault than America West for two Saudi Arabian men being handcuffed and hauled off a plane, Arab-Americans said Saturday.
“When someone asks a funny question, if he happens to be of color it's a security risk,” said Khalil Jahshan, the president of the National Association of Arab-Americans. “If he happens to be a WASP, that's OK, there's no problem; he's left alone.”
Airport officials said the pilot of Flight 90 ordered passengers to evacuate after landing at Port Columbus International Airport on Friday.
The pilot, whose name was not released, said that the two
asked suspicious questions during the flight and that one had jiggled the cockpit door.
But after three hours of FBI questioning, no charges were filed against Hamdan Alshalawr, 37, or Muhammad Al Qudhaieer, 34, both doctoral students studying linguistics at Arizona universities.
They said they asked questions because they were curious about their itinerary. Mr. Al Qudhaieer said he was looking for a lavatory, not trying to get into the cockpit.
Both accepted a local apology, but not an upgrade to first class on the last leg of their flight to Washington, D.C. They are considering legal action against the airline, which they believe acted prematurely and without evidence.
Paul Barton, a spokesman for America West, declined to comment Saturday about the allegations.
“We're not going to comment until we have an opportunity to interview all of our crew involved and we're doing that now,” Mr. Barton said. The investigation is likely to last through the weekend, he said.
Tony Molinaro, spokesman for the Federal Aviation Administration, said he could not comment about whether the pilot acted improperly. But he stressed that a pilot's primary concern is safety.
“If the captain of the flight decides for any reason that a plane should be met by local authorities, then they are met by those authorities,” he said.
The Council of American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) held a news conference Saturday to encourage American Muslims and Arab-Americans not to use the airline until the issue is resolved.
“We don't want them to be subject to the same humiliation that these people have been subject to,” said Nihad Awad, executive director of the Washington, D.C.-based civil rights organization.
CAIR has hired an attorney, Martin McMahon, to represent the two passengers in possible legal action against America West, local police and the FBI. Mr. McMahon said he was considering a federal lawsuit alleging the two men were victims of “illegal detention.”
Mr. McMahon said he also was recommending that CAIR file a complaint with the Department of Transportation asking the government to investigate allegations of discrimination against Muslims on an “airline-industry-wide basis.”
Several Arab groups said in interviews Saturday that the crash of an EgyptAir flight on Oct. 31 might have heightened tensions of the America West crew. A co-pilot is suspected of causing the crash, which killed all 217 people on board.
The White House Commission on Aviation Security, formed after the ValuJet and TWA Flight 800 crashes, urged airports to implement a process by the end of 1997 to spot potential terrorists and smugglers.
Federal officials have said passenger profiling doesn't target any specific racial or ethnic group, but they have declined to provide details of the profile.
Hussein Ibish, a spokesman for the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee in Washington, D.C., said the government implemented a skewed security procedure.
“But there also have clearly been instances in which the airline security have gone overboard and exceeded what guidelines called for, so the airline has to take part of the blame,” he said.
Andy Amid, former president of the Arab-Americans of Central Ohio, said an Arab passenger's slightest deviation from appropriate behavior is a signal of a threat.
“It's just a hysteria that's going on in our country called Islamaphobia or the unjustified fear of Arabs,” he said. “And it's being promoted by the government to get American people to believe that Muslims are the bad guys.”
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