home

Mueller Defends Use of Informants to Spy on Mosques

The FBI is understandably disinclined to reveal the details of ongoing criminal investigations, and the information it chooses to make public isn't always true. We therefore have no way to evaluate the legitimacy of the FBI's efforts to recruit Muslim informants to spy upon clerics and worshipers in mosques. Credible evidence that terrorists are using a mosque to shield their activities could justify the Bureau's infiltration effort, but how do we know that Muslims aren't targeted for undercover investigation simply because of their religion?

Robert Mueller's vague defense yesterday of the FBI's reliance on informants to gather information inside mosques when "there may be evidence or other information of criminal wrongdoings" did little to assure concerned Muslims that the FBI has a good reason when it decides to spy on them.

"It doesn't alleviate anything. It only continues to show the sheer arrogance demonstrated by the bureau in holding Muslim community members, clerics, mosques, as suspects," [executive of the Islamic Shura Council of Southern California Shakeel] Syed said.

[more ...]

The FBI believes "spying on mosques is one of the best weapons to uncover lurking terrorists or threats to national security." That may be true when the agency has good reason to believe that terrorists are actually lurking within a specific mosque. Mueller's willingness to send informants into a place of worship on the basis of "evidence or other information of criminal wrongdoings" gives rise to the legitimate fear that mosques might be targeted for infiltration on the basis of rumor or speculation that isn't supported by credible intelligence.

Mueller's comments came just days after a Michigan Muslim organization asked the Justice Department to investigate complaints that the FBI is asking the faithful to spy on Islamic leaders and worshipers. Similar alarm followed the disclosure earlier this year that the FBI planted a spy in Southern California mosques. ...

The Council of Islamic Organizations of Michigan sent a letter to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder after mosques and other groups reported members of the community have been asked to monitor people coming to mosques and donations they make. The FBI's Detroit office has denied the allegations.

The FBI's reliance on informants who instigate terrorist plots that would never have been devised without the informant's prodding allows the Bureau to take undeserved credit for protecting the homeland when it makes well publicized arrests. It may also serve a larger political agenda.

It would appear that FBI Director Mueller's strategy -- a holdover from the Ashcroft Dept. of Justice -- is to use these headlines to stoke fears of Muslims, justify intensive domestic surveillance, and reinforce the notion that domestic terrorism by lone wolves is a real threat to national security. In response to this week's arrests, comments to news blogs call Muslims animals, savages, and worse. This strategy only serves the interests of American conservatism, which is at root, a politics of fear and negation that cannot function without an enemy.

Ultimately, Mueller's hollow assurance that the Bureau can be trusted to spy on mosques will satisfy those members of the public who think the civil liberties of Muslims are worth sacrificing to secure the homeland. Those of us who think the homeland should be secured from the FBI's love affair with informants can find little comfort in Mueller's statement.

< California Considering Sale of San Quentin | Obama Abandons Transparency, Again >
  • The Online Magazine with Liberal coverage of crime-related political and injustice news

  • Contribute To TalkLeft


  • Display: Sort:
    where is your balance point? (none / 0) (#1)
    by Ryan at TrulySkewed on Tue Jun 09, 2009 at 07:21:06 AM EST
    Everybody has a balance point, between liberty and safety, where they are ok with certain actions.  

    For some of my friends that point is at holding people without charge and torturing them.  I think that is a ridiculous balance point.  Others feel its ok to monitor people's phone calls without probable cause.  I also feel that's ridiculous.

    But having some informants poking around in mosques might be somewhere near my balance point.  I'm not sure about it.  Thoughts?

    - Ryan at TrulySkewed

    The FBI (none / 0) (#2)
    by AlkalineDave on Tue Jun 09, 2009 at 08:41:53 AM EST
    shouldn't use the word spying.  An Executive order on Intelligence Oversight prevents spying on U.S. citizens.  I know in light of the PATRIOT Act that sounds laughable, and it seems just semantics. But the FBI has to choose their words more wisely.

    That said, spying on mosques for the sole reason they house Muslim worshipers is wrong.  I will say that the first world trade center bombings were planned heavily throughout some New York City mosques with support from mosques in other states.  I'm not claiming to know the FBI's motivation in these particular incidents, but that there is a past history of terrorist activity being planned in U.S. mosques.

    Come to my church too (none / 0) (#3)
    by diogenes on Tue Jun 09, 2009 at 11:00:08 AM EST
    There are many efforts by Saudi and others to preach/indoctrinate as well as recruit in mosques.
    In any case, those who have nothing to hide should not really care if people watch them.  They are welcome to come to my church and maybe learn something.

    They ain't welcome... (none / 0) (#4)
    by kdog on Tue Jun 09, 2009 at 11:42:49 AM EST
    hmmmm (none / 0) (#5)
    by Capt Howdy on Tue Jun 09, 2009 at 02:57:12 PM EST
    maybe spying on mosques will stop puds like Frank Gaffney from writing stuff like this:

    GAFFNEY: America's first Muslim president?
    Obama aligns with the policies of Shariah-adherents

    By Frank J. Gaffney Jr. | Tuesday, June 9, 2009

    When all the thugs (5.00 / 0) (#7)
    by jondee on Tue Jun 09, 2009 at 04:13:24 PM EST
    have left is the hope that their intelligensia (such as it is), can somehow stir up the "Ah thank he's a Arab" base, you know they're reaching new depths of intellectual bankruptcy.

    You have to wonder if Gaffney comes up with that swill himself, or does that come directly from the divinely-inspired Rev Moon.

    Parent

    It has been decades (none / 0) (#6)
    by sarcastic unnamed one on Tue Jun 09, 2009 at 03:54:25 PM EST
    since I've heard the word "pud." Gives me a chuckle...

    Parent