From the International Herald Tribune:
The British government, moving against suspected Islamic extremists after the July bombings, said Thursday that 10 foreign nationals seen as a “threat to national security” had been seized for deportation.
The foreigners, thought to include Abu Qatada, once described as the spiritual ambassador of Al Qaeda in Europe, were detained in early-morning raids across Britain by police forces in London, Leicester, Luton and the West Midlands area around Birmingham. All are cities with strong Muslim minorities. Announcing the arrests, Charles Clarke, the home secretary, said he would not identify the detainees by name.
At the same time, news reports from Lebanon said that a British-based radical cleric, Omar Bakri Mohammed, was being held by the Lebanese authorities. Bakri Mohammed left Britain on Saturday saying he was Britain on Saturday saying he was going on vacation. There was no immediate confirmation in Britain that Bakri Mohammed, born in Syria, had been detained in Lebanon.
Bakri Mohammed left just one day after Prime Minister Tony Blair announced a broad range of new antiterrorism measures, including the deportation of clerics fomenting violence, the threatened closure of some mosques and actions to bar Islamic militants from entering Britain.
In a statement on Thursday, Clarke said: “In accordance with my powers to deport individuals whose presence in the U.K. is not conducive to the public good for reasons of national security, the immigration service has today detained 10 foreign nationals who I believe pose a threat to national security,” adding that they would be held “in secure prison service accommodation.”
In the past Britain has been forbidden by European human rights rules to deport foreign nationals to countries where they might face abuse, torture or the death sentence. In recent months, however, Britain has signed an agreement with Jordan guaranteeing that deportees will not be abused. Final agreement was reached in Amman on Wednesday.
Abu Qatada is a Jordanian citizen of Palestinian descent who faces a life sentence in Jordan on bombing charges imposed in his absence in 1999. Algeria and Lebanon are negotiating agreements similar to Jordan’s with Britain.
About time. Interestingly, this policy hasn’t been met with the kind of hysterical shrieking over potential civil rights abuses we’d expect to hear were such a program announced in the US (and make no mistake: much of that shrieking would be coming from EU elites themselves); and the reason is, the London bombings seem to have brought Western Europe to its tipping point, after which—though still quite tacitly—Western Europeans appear to have reached a quiet consensus that the multiculturalist and immigration policies of the last few decades have been a dangerous mistake, and that anything necessary to reverse the damage—quickly and forcefully—will be met with quiet assent from the overwhelming majority of the polity.
The Bush Administration should take note and begin drawing up aggressive plans of its own to clamp down on Wahhabi mosques and Islamic Centers preaching jihad and inciting violence against the West. There is simply no reason—including our near-religious commitment to the First Amendment, which allows for restrictions against incitement—to allow avowed enemies, who have formally declared war on the US, to abuse our freedoms as a way to operate without scrutiny in our midst.
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update: thoughts from noted libertarians against a noted Libertarian here and here:
The fact that the Court opined that we couldn’t punish a naturalized citizen for doing something that a native-born citizen can do with impunity does not, in any way, have any bearing on whether or not we can boot out resident aliens for saying things we don’t like. Indeed, as Knauer [Knauer v US, 328 U.S. 654 (1946)] proves, it doesn’t even have any bearing on whether or not we can strip you of your naturalized citizenship.
[…] The bottom line is that, if you are a foreigner, and if you intend to reside in this country, then those of us who are already here have a perfect right to boot you out the moment you displease us. Allowing you into the US is a privilege we graciously extend to you because we’re such hoopy froods.
And it’s a privilege we can retract at any time.
Take note, jihadists. Because you know strategic problems are in the offing when libertarians start talking like this…
RACISTS!
commitment “to” – last sentence.
There is an incitement exception to the First Amendment, but it’s extremely narrow. Unless and until the Supreme Court revists the subject, it will be hard to prosecute Wahhabi hatemongers.
Then again, many of these guys are aliens. I’m not sure what the FA standard is re: deportation for aliens who foment violence, or whether there’s any FA protection for them at all.
I almost stood up and cheered at that statement.
Jeff, you’re on frickin’ fire lately. Steven Green’s going to have to go for the three-peat.
This is kind of an aside, and I hate to be an alarmist but – does anyone else smell an all out world war III/Modern Crusade type thing here? I mean, Iran’s going nuclear, Britain is kicking out Muslims, we’re chasing terrorists through the DirkaDirkastan hinterlands, meanwhile oil is going through the roof. I woke up this morning and put my waders on, becase if the shit gets any deeper in here we’re gonna be swimming in it. How long do we stand around and watch everything stack up before we decide to move on it?
Allah—
Yeah. My understanding (and I’m going off the top of my head here) is that the incitement has to be particular (eg., “Go Kill President Bush with a hand grenade on Monday on his Crawford ranch” as opposed to “The Great Satan’s Greatest Satan must die!”); and the libertarian part of me wants desperately to retain that narrow tailoring to protect speech. At the same time, though, the pragmatist in me believes we need to risk charges of “racism” and “religious persecution” and begin tailoring laws that will narrowly target the Islamist threat. Britain has the right idea—though I’m uncomfortable with the government being in charge of general “threat to national security”-based speech restrictions; I’d want the restrictions to be written in such a way that they apply to very specific threats that are, say, imminent or “actively latent.”
I don’t know how to do it exactly; how to strike that proper balance. But I think it needs to be done. Of course, enforcing our own visa policies and immigration laws would be a great help, too.
The key phrase is ‘tipping point’. Western Europe’s was relatively low, likely because of long-term experience with the disasterous multiculturalist and immigration policies on a smallish region.
Because those problem aren’t as prevalent in a large country, the US as a nation is still trying to figure out where the tipping point is. I think Gerard Van der Leun is right in that it will take the loss of a second major city before the tipping point is established and reached simultaneously.
Jeff—It’s even narrower than that. According to the leading case, the three elements are (1) express advocacy (2) of imminent lawless action (3) that’s likely to result in such action. Aside from a speaker inciting a crowd to riot, it’s hard to imagine a situation that fits the bill on all three.
I’d hang the argument on the “likely to result in violence” part, in this case. Anybody think Wahhabi muslims of a jihadist persuasion are more likely to accept such incitement as valid and act on it than, say, the Amish?
Their own barbaric predilictions should be used against them whenever possible. God likes irony.
Allah –
the thirds pillar there, likely to result in such action, isn’t that pretty flexible? I mean, 9/11 pretty much changed what anyone thought was likely, and now a lot of people use 9/11 as proof that anything is likely. Yes no?
Eloquently stated. Bingo!
mojo and shank—I agree, the third element probably could be expanded to encompass ideological predilections. When the Court said “likely to result in such action,” I think they were thinking of audiences who were situationally disposed towards violence, e.g., a crowd of angry protesters. But it shouldn’t be too hard for a judge to reason that there are lots of variables that affect one’s willingness to engage in illegality. The counterargument is that we don’t necessarily want the government deciding which groups are “likelier” to engage in lawbreaking than others. On that point, it’s worth noting that the case this doctrine came from involved a Klan rally. So evidently we’d have to show that Wahhabists are more likely to break the law than the Klan is.
Anyway, the third element isn’t the problem. The second element is. I haven’t studied the case law to find out how the “imminence” requirement has developed, but my sense is that it’s pretty strict. If a cleric stands up at a mosque in Dearborn and tells the congregation to bomb New York, and six months later a group of people who were there does just that, I suspect we’d have a tough time convicting him. Although, given the realities of the age, perhaps judges would be willing to extend the time frame for “imminence” and thus expand the second element of the doctrine too. It’d be an interesting question to put to Judge Roberts, in any case.
Expect plenty of shrieking and pants-shitting from the left if any of this comes to pass, of course.
How about we just enforce the existing immigration and terrorism laws and forget about carefully tailoring some new legislation–a highly problematic proposition, given the current Patriot Act sunset provisions experience?
I’m highly sympathetic to Jeff’s expressions, herein, but actions like deportations, rather than words in a piece of legislation, would comfort me that government is actually doing its job, rather than just blathering about it.
“Western Europeans appear to have reached a quiet consensus that the multiculturalist and immigration policies of the last few decades have been a dangerous mistake”
Not remotely so.
Look for Govts wallowing tragi-comically into the morass of legislation they have created without thought of the consequences.
Meanwhile for everyone else life goes on as usual. What does “multi-culturalism” mean to anyone? Is it real? is there a manual?
Is that last a rhetorical question, Michael? Because if not, I’ve written several posts recently on multiculturalism as a social policy in the UK.
And I think you’re wrong. I think the majority of Brits, French, Spanish, Dutch, et al., realize what the policies they’ve created from such a social philosophy has wrought—as do their governments—and we’re going to see a determined movement to circle the wagons, prevent further damage, and roll back some previous damage.
I had better read your posts before going higgnerantly on…
But I don’t understand (for all the MSM rantings, touchy-feely declarations of politicians, applications of muddled laws that apply to all UK/EU citizens etc etc) that there ever was such a social policy/philosophy operating explicitly in the UK. Nor that there is any public interest in introducing some new strain of social philosophy: no more than there was during decades of IRA bombing threats.
I don’t see any wagons being circled, or any signs of a sea-change in attitudes to immigration, integration, and so forth.
But I had better read y’r posts.
Follow the links in this post for a good baseline for discussion.