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| Mazen Al-Najjar deported... |
| 2002-08-24 |
| A Palestinian professor was finally deported Thursday after a seven-year legal fight to remain in the United States. Mazen Al-Najjar left the United States at 9 a.m. Thursday for an undisclosed Middle Eastern country. Al-Najjar's final destination was unclear early Friday, but an official with the Embassy of Bahrain in Washington said he had been granted a two-week tourist visa. Jamal Rowaie, a spokesman for the embassy, told the St. Petersburg Times that immigration officials would reject Al-Najjar because his visa was only for ordinary tourists. "His case is not an ordinary case," Rowaie said. "Because of that, Bahrain will not allow him to come." They don't need him, either. I imagine he'll eventually end up in Damascus... Al-Najjar, who has a doctorate in engineering and once taught Arabic language classes at the university, spent more than 3 years in jail on secret evidence that prosecutors said linked him to terrorists. He was released in 2000 but arrested again in November and held until his deportation. Seems they had something on him, if only the quality of people he associates with... Al-Najjar, 45, is the brother-in-law of Sami Al-Arian, a computer science professor. The University of South Florida filed a lawsuit Wednesday seeking to fire Al-Arian if it would not violate his constitutional rights. At a news conference Thursday, Al-Arian said the university wanted to fire him because of bias spawned by the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. "I'm an Arab, I'm a Palestinian, I'm a Muslim. That's not a popular thing to be these days," he said. "Do I have rights or don't I have rights?" "You have the right to remain silent..." Both Al-Najjar and Al-Arian have denied any connection to terrorists, and neither has been charged with a crime. The deportation order naming Al-Najjar says he overstayed his visa, which was issued 20 years ago. Al-Arian, born in Kuwait, came to the U.S. from Egypt more than a quarter-century ago. Al-Arian and Al-Najjar founded the World and Islam Studies Enterprises, a now-defunct Islamic think tank at the university that was raided by the FBI in 1995. It was a fund-raising front for Islamic Jihad... |
| Posted by:Fred Pruitt |