A file photo of Dallas Muslims in an anti-terrorism demonstration

CAIRO, July 17 (IslamOnline.net) – The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has launched a nationwide campaign to question Muslim and Arab Americans after intelligence warnings of possible terrorist attacks, an American daily said on Saturday, July 17.

The series of interviews so far covered a broad spectrum, including students, high-tech professionals and even prominent Muslim figures, reported the Washington Post.

"This is not a general population. They are identified by intelligence or investigative information," an FBI official to the mass-circulation daily, on condition of anonymity.

The questioning is being carried bout in collaboration with the regional Joint Terrorism Task Forces, which includes law enforcement officers from other agencies, said the Post.

The move came after Attorney General John D. Ashcroft warned earlier in the month that Al-Qaeda was planning a large-scale attack in the near future in the United States.

"While we currently lack precise knowledge about when, where and how they are planning to attack, we are actively working to gain that knowledge," he said in a press release July 9.

"As part of that effort, we are again reaching out to partners in the Muslim and Arab American communities for any information they may have."

Ridiculous Questions

Several people interviewed have criticized the FBI’s approach and kind of questions that would lead them nowhere.

In California and Arizona, for instance, Arabs and Muslims have been asked whether they knew anyone who had recently been in the Pakistani border region of Waziristan, regarded as a possible safe haven for Al-Qaeda figures.

Others were asked about Iranian groups based in the Middle East and in the United States and whether they knew people who had been in contact with the Iranian mission to the United Nations.

Interviewees were also asked broader questions, such as their opinion with respect to the US-led invasion of Iraq or of the Syrian government, the Post said.

Other questions focused on recent converts to Islam.

"We were told by the FBI agents that they're concerned there could be a coming threat from people who are recent converts to Islam," said Stacy Tolchin, a San Francisco lawyer who accompanied a Turkish Kurdish immigrant to an interview this week.

Yasser Alamoodi, a student at Arizona State University, was surprised to get a visit at home recently from a campus police officer with the local Joint Terrorism Task Force.

He said the questions included whether he knew anyone who had recently returned from Pakistan, anyone who had shown interest in a government building or agency or anyone who had shown extreme hostility toward Americans.

"The questions were just ridiculous," he said. "I said, 'You guys really think you're going to get anywhere with these kind of questions?' "

Alamoodi was puzzled about why he was selected for an interview.

"I don't go to the mosque that often," he said, "unless they have free food."

Panicked

"It creates fear in the community and accomplishes absolutely nothing," said Zogby

Rights activists told the Post that Muslims and Arabs were nervous about responding to the FBI, in part because thousands of immigrants end up being deported after being contacted in earlier phases of the government's anti-terrorism campaign.

They were even panicked when they get FBE phone calls, they added.

"Within two days, I received 10 calls from people freaking out because the FBI was contacting them," said Deedra Abboud, executive director of the Arizona chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR).

Asim Ghafoor, a Muslim attorney in Washington who was visited by two FBI agents about a week ago, is concerned that FBI agents are going to people’s workplaces.

"I said, 'Hey, some people lose their jobs when the FBI shows up at their offices,'" Ghafoor recalled.

"It creates fear in the community and accomplishes absolutely nothing," stressed James Zogby, president of the Arab American Institute.

The new FBI move is part of recent clampdown on Muslims in the states.

On July 1, agents raided an Islamic institute in Northern Virginia, with no reasons cited, a move seen by an American Muslim civil rights group as a "new fishing expedition".

A May report released by the US Senate Office Of Research concluded that the Muslim community in the United States has taken the brunt of the Patriot Act and other federal powers applied in the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

In its ninth annual Muslim civil rights report, CAIR documented an unprecedented increase of 70 percent of anti-Muslim violence over the previous year.