Movie used to show “emerging and disturbing truth”

Life imitates art.

At least, that’s what members of the American Civil Liberties Union fear…. Life imitates art.

At least, that’s what members of the American Civil Liberties Union fear. Thursday night, members of the ACLU and the Islamic Center of Pittsburgh used fiction to illustrate what one called “an emerging and disturbing truth.”

The ACLU hosted a screening of the 1998 film “The Siege,” starring Denzel Washington and Bruce Willis. The movie is set in New York City during a string of terrorist attacks by Muslim extremists. The result is martial law and a “witch hunt” by armed forces for Arabs who might be involved in planning other attacks.

After the film, Omar Shafer, an ACLU board member, spoke about the consequences of the Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act. Shafer is also president of the Islamic Center of Pittsburgh, an organization whose mission includes spreading “clear and accurate information about Muslims.” Nusrath Ainapore, outreach director of the Islamic Center, spoke briefly before Shafer.

“I saw ‘The Siege’ when I was at Pitt, and I did not believe anything like it was possible when I first saw the film,” Ainapore said.

She quoted a survey conducted last month by the Boston Globe, which reported that 44 percent of U.S. citizens believe Muslims should have their civil liberties curbed to protect the United States.

“Fortunately, a majority of Americans disagree,” Ainapore said. Quoting the Quran, the holy text of Islam, she urged people to “be just, for this is the closest to being conscious to God.”

Shafer began by saying the “paralysis by fear” illustrated in the film is “not unique in American history,” reminding the audience about the round-up of suspected socialists and anarchists by Attorney General Mitchell Palmer 90 years ago and the internment of Asian Americans during World War II.

According to Shafer, several Muslim Americans have had their lives disrupted since Congress passed the USA PATRIOT Act six weeks after Sept. 11, 2001. The act was written in part “to enhance law enforcement investigatory tools” to protect the United States from terrorism.

Shafer referred to a number of incidents, including the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s questioning of several Pittsburgh Muslims after a single tip in May 2004 that a terrorist attack would disrupt November’s presidential election.

“There were no charges, and no real reasons for [the questioning],” Shafer said. “It was a fishing expedition aimed at profiling Muslims in this city. The time and tenor of the [USA PATRIOT Act] allows this.”

He also outlined some of the new tools law enforcement officials now possesses because of the USA PATRIOT Act, which also modifies the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978.

“A FISA court can give the FBI a blank warrant to arrest anyone, and no court but the Supreme Court can review it,” Shafer said. “The FBI can also ‘sneak and peek’: search someone’s place before a warrant is issued so they know what to seize.”

Shafer and the ACLU believe that this is against the Constitution’s Fourth Amendment, which protects citizens against unreasonable search and seizure.

“Does this violate civil rights? You tell me,” Shafer said.

Shafer also said the government has frozen the assets of Muslim charities and seized financial and library records of individuals, and that none of these cases “have really gone to trial.”

Many individuals suspected of terrorist activities are being detained under FISA warrants, “not awaiting trial but awaiting findings,” Shafer said, adding that “as a matter of record, most of these cases have been forgotten.”

“We are all at risk, as Americans and as foreign visitors living in this country,” he said.

Shafer said the USA PATRIOT Act is a conglomerate of “a series of laws that have never been used,” including FISA and the McClaren Act of 1951, which allows the president to establish martial law in any city — a law designed to protect the United States from communist agents. This law is the basis for the situation illustrated in “The Siege.”

In order to protect themselves and their civil rights, students were urged by Shafer to join the ACLU. He said the organization has offered legal help, mostly free of charge, to many detainees held under FISA warrants.

“As Americans, we’ve come to expect protected civil liberties,” Shafer said. “It’s important to support those in the front lines.”