July 14, 2003	Monday	Jumadi-ul-Awwal 13, 1424

WASHINGTON, July 13: Recent cases seem to confirm a glaring double standard applied to Arab Americans and Muslims that can be neither denied nor defended, the Los Angles Times said on Sunday.

The article also refers to an internal report of the US Justice Department, which confirms long-alleged abuses of Arab Americans in detention and questioned the basis for their arrests.

Attorney General John Ashcroft, however, has dismissed such reports as inaccurate, saying that government efforts to detain terrorism suspects were applied in the same way to all citizens regardless of their ethnicity.

The L.A. Times quotes several cases to point out, what it calls, “a glaring double standard.”

One such case is that of Earl Krugel and Robert Goldstein. Krugel is the former West Coast coordinator of the Jewish Defence League. He was recorded in meetings in October 2001 with alleged co-conspirators planning a reign of terror on Arab Americans to give them “a wake-up call” by destroying one of their “filthy mosques.”

This conspiracy allegedly included a plan to assassinate Congressman Darrell Issa who is of Lebanese descent.

Recently, Krugel confessed to a plot to blow up a mosque in Culver City.

Krugel was given immunity and is reportedly sharing information on other attacks, including the 1985 bombing death of Arab American civil rights leader Alex Odeh.

Though Mr Ashcroft has promised to prosecute accused terrorists to the fullest extent of the law and to reject any deals, Krugel was given a generous plea bargain and immunity and is likely to receive a mere 13-year sentence, the newspaper says.

In Florida, Robert Goldstein and his wife, Kristi Lea Persinger, plotted their own “terror” war. When the police were called to their house in a domestic dispute in 2002, they discovered an arsenal that included 30 bombs, mines, 30 to 40 guns, light-armour rockets, machine guns, sniper rifles and grenades. They also found plans to blow up 50 mosques and to “liquidate” Muslims. Goldstein vowed to “kill all ‘rags’ “at an Islamic education center.”

Like Krugel, Goldstein was charged not with terrorism but with civil rights violations. Goldstein was sentenced to a paltry 12 1/2 years for conspiracy to violate civil rights. Persinger (who had five bombs in her closet) was given a mere three years in prison.

Comparing these cases with those against Muslims, the L.A. Times refers to the arrest last month of 11 Muslims in Virginia. They face 42 criminal counts, including conspiracy “to participate in a violent jihad” and being part of a Kashmir terrorist group. “The government put great weight on the fact that the men participated in paintball games in Virginia. Though the government does have evidence that some of the men had contacts with a Kashmir terrorist group, it has no evidence of any terrorist plot. In the cases of at least four of the men, there is scant evidence of anything beyond anti-Indian sentiments and weekend Rambo fantasies,” the article says.

“The government may yet supply the evidence demanded by these judges, but the sweeping charges against these men stand in sharp contrast with the charges against non-Muslim defendants.”