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Hundreds Protest FBI, Justice Department In Washington
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| ANSWER's rally saw hundreds of people march past the "Silk Road" festivities in an attempt to get their message across
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By
Ayesha Ahmad, IOL Washington Correspondent
WASHINGTON, June 30 (IslamOnline) – Hundreds of demonstrators
marched through summer-crowded downtown Washington on Saturday, June
29, 2002, demanding an end to what they called a “war on the Bill of
Rights,” in a rally and march against the U.S. Federal Bureau of
Investigation and the Department of Justice.
On this sunny weekend, the national mall was packed with tourists
visiting the annual Smithsonian Folk Life Festival “The Silk
Road”; the demonstration, organized by the International ANSWER (Act
Now to Stop War and End Racism) coalition, took the chanting
protestors right past the mall, where volunteers handed out fliers and
organizers on megaphones urged bystanders to lend their support to the
causes.
As with many of ANSWER’s rallies, this one espoused several issues,
apparent in the variety of rally slogans being chanted – everything
from, “Free Free Palestine!” to “Money for jobs, not war!” and
from “Our civil rights are under attack! What are you gonna do? Act
up, fight back!” to the essential, “The people united will never
be defeated!”
“This Bush, Rumsfeld, Ashcroft war on terrorism is actually a war on
us… a war on the people of the world,” said speaker Reverend
Graylan Hagler, of Washington’s Plymouth Congregational Church,
referring to U.S. President George W. Bush, Defense Secretary Donald
Rumsfeld and Attorney General John Ashcroft.
“We are not exempt, none of us, from what is going on,” Hagler
told the demonstrators. “Those of us who believe in dignity for all
of God’s creatures are under attack… If you go after them, I
invite you to come after me.”
Hagler
was speaking at the start of the rally across the street from the FBI
building on Pennsylvania Ave.; a fiery activist and a frequent feature
at ANSWER’s and other anti-war rallies, he roused the crowd easily,
demanding them to “let the people’s voices be raised… let the
people call for justice!”
Speaker Mara Verheyden-Hilliard, an attorney with the Washington-based
Partnership for Civil Justice, also emphasized to the crowd that it
was the power of the people that governed the outcome in the end.
“They need to know – and they are learning because of this
movement – what we all know… that they won’t be able to do this
if we don’ let them,” she said. “The power remains in the hands
of the people… They can’t do this, we can make them stop!”
The
speakers’ encouragement stemmed from their outrage at what some
critics of the administration have called the erosion of civil rights
after the September 11 attacks.
Ashcroft
pushed through the U.S.A. Patriot Act in late October 2001, which
allowed for, among other things, enhanced surveillance authorities and
the right to detain a non-citizen without charge for up to seven days.
Stories that emerged soon after the arrests began of detainees being
unable to contact lawyers, of mistreatment in jail, of racial
profiling of Arabs, Muslims and South Asians, all aroused immediate
concern among civil liberties advocates.
ANSWER
was formed in the weeks following the attacks to counter the
injustices of both the foreign and domestic war efforts.
“The Bush administration has announced a policy to the whole world
of pre-emptive strikes,” said speaker Sara Flounders, of the New
York-based International Action Center. She said that such strikes
included detentions “if you look guilty to the racist profilers…
if you have any… sympathy for any of the countries under attack.”
“It’s
a war on the Bill of Rights,” she said, adding “war and oppression
will breed resistance.”
Speaker Amer Jubran, with the Al-Awda Palestine Right to Return group,
insisted that “We cannot allow them to run their policies that every
Arab is accused of terrorism until proven innocent.”
Another speaker, 12-year-old Kamal Taha, came to the rally from New
York to read a message to the Administration.
“Mr. President, we are all Americans, and we were born here and this
is our country,” he said. “And we choose you to be our leader,
hoping that you could bring peace and justice to the world, not making
wars and killing innocent civilians.”
After the initial speeches, the marchers, carrying hundreds of
ready-made signs and some homemade ones as well, took to the streets,
escorted by police, and marched up 15th St. past the White House and
then up to a nearby park for another round of speeches.
The demonstration was completely peaceful and orderly, although ANSWER
organizer Brian Becker notified the crowd at one point that the police
were threatening to arrest them for passing out fliers.
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