------------------------- Via Workers World News Service Reprinted from the Dec. 6, 2001 issue of Workers World newspaper -------------------------
AFTER VIGOROUS DEFENSE CAMPAIGN: PALESTINIAN DEFEATS POLICE FRAME-UP By Steven Gillis Boston Supporters of Palestinian activist Amer Jubran are celebrating. An attempted frame-up of Jubran by Brookline, Mass., police and the Boston Israeli consulate has collapsed in the face of a determined, vocal defense of Palestinian free speech rights. On June 10, months before the new repressive initiatives of the Bush administration, Jubran was arrested, shackled hand to foot, held for 36 hours incommunicado, interrogated and falsely charged with felony assault and battery with a dangerous weapon--his shod foot. He faced 10 years in Massachusetts' maximum-security prison and deportation to Israel, which practices assassination and torture of activist Palestinians. Jubran's real crime was that he dared to lead a spirited but peaceful protest June 10 at a street festival celebrating the founding of the Israeli state. To police authorities-- who spent two hours filming the 100 or so Palestinians and their supporters--the chants of "Long live the Intifada" and "Shame, shame, USA, funding Israel this way" were an intolerable threat to the Israeli Festival Committee's attempt to present a monolithic, pro-Israel view. Utilizing known pro-Zionist provocateurs to finger Jubran, police moved in under orders to break up the Palestinians' picket. Even as the police wagon was pulling away, the Palestine Right of Return Coalition (Al-Awda) of Massachusetts, organizer of the protest, was joined by the International Action Center, the Portuguese American Relief for Palestine, SUSTAIN, and the Boston Committee for Palestinian Rights in launching the Committee to Defend Amer Jubran and Palestinian Free Speech Rights. The committee started an international email and fax campaign to flood the office of the Norfolk County District Attorney with demands to drop the racist frame-up charges. Messages came in from Australia, Austria, Canada, Egypt, France, Greece, India, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Palestine, Poland, Portugal, Saudi Arabia, Switzerland, Tunisia, the United Arab Emirates, Britain and 33 U.S. states. The Massachusetts Civil Liberties Union and the American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee worked to expose this overt attack on Palestinian free speech rights, which was a precursor to the thousands of detentions, interrogations and false arrests of Arab and Muslim immigrants under the jurisdiction of the "USA Patriot Act" passed after Sept. 11. Well-known figures--Boston City Councilor Chuck Turner, former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark, author Howard Zinn and Greek Maj. Gen. Kostas Konstantinidis--called on the DA to dismiss the charges. Arthur Buonamia, district chairperson of the Democratic Party election committee in Miami, wrote: "Having witnessed firsthand a fascist rent-a- mob deny us the right to count the votes in Miami on Nov. 22, 2000, I have since become concerned with the denial of basic democratic rights throughout this country. Amer Jubran has the right to peacefully demonstrate and I will defend that right." CAMPAIGN IN THE STREETS For months, the Amer Jubran Defense Committee met weekly, producing a mass campaign in the streets from Brookline and Boston to Washington, D.C. After a Brookline cop threatened a shackled Jubran with "I'll teach you a lesson," supporters picketed in front of the courthouse for each of nine court appearances, chanting "Free, free Palestine!" Supporters distributed hundreds of thousands of leaflets, ran a defense committee web page (www.iacboston.org/amerjubran), and forced the issue into the local media spotlight. Amer Jubran's outspoken leadership of Al-Awda, especially in the burgeoning anti-war movement following Sept. 11, became an inspiration to young student activists. While facing felony charges, Jubran addressed 20,000 anti-war marchers in Washington, D.C.'s Freedom Plaza on Sept. 29, and led 500 demonstrators in Boston on Oct. 27 in a militant three-mile "March against the Warmakers" targeting the Boston FBI office, the Israeli consulate, and the Northeastern University ROTC. He has spoken at dozens of campus and community rallies in recent months about how to strengthen the Palestinian solidarity struggle for freedom and self- determination. Meanwhile, the government's case against him was falling apart. Through the pro-bono efforts of attorney Barry Wilson and the Massachusetts Civil Liberties Union, many elements of the government's conspiracy against Jubran were fatally exposed. The Brookline police were shown to be in the pay of the Israeli Festival Committee on the day of Jubran's arrest, receiving more than $10,000. Evidence also showed that local Brookline cops had been in illegal and unconstitutional consultation with representatives of the Israeli government in Boston about how to handle the Palestinian protest. The district attorney withheld eyewitness exculpatory evidence from Jubran's defense team. Clumsy editing of police video evidence left a Watergate-style gap in the tape. And after undercover police agents illegally filmed Jubran and his witnesses in open court on July 16, Boston Phoenix investigative journalists helped spotlight the real motives behind Jubran's arrest: a taped dispatch from police headquarters had ordered cops on the scene to break up the peaceful Palestinian protest that day. Amid the complete collapse of this conspiracy to silence Palestinian voices, Brookline authorities on Nov. 21 offered Jubran a complete dismissal of the charges against him, with no admission by Jubran whatsoever. Afterwards, Jubran told supporters filling the courthouse steps that, "My case is only one among thousands of Palestinian, Arab, Muslim, South Asian and African immigrants who are being wrongly arrested, detained and interrogated in what the U.S. government now calls its 'war on terrorism.' We must use all our energy and experience gained from this case to stop this extreme racial profiling and violations of civil and human rights, made possible by the U.S.'s continued support of the Israeli war against the Palestinian people, and the indiscriminate bombing of the people of Afghanistan." He urged those present to spread the word about an upcoming Dec. 1 rally and march in Boston to defend civil rights and civil liberties. The Boston chapter of ANSWER (Act Now to Stop War & End Racism) is calling on people to rally at 1:00 p.m. in Copley Square to demand freedom for the 1,200 federal detainees locked up for months by the U.S. Office of Homeland Security. The rally will also highlight the defense of two Somali brothers arrested in Boston for sending money to relatives back home, and support the Hartford 18 peace activists brutalized and arrested by Connecticut police in October. Protesters will march to Boston Police Headquarters, where they will demand that police obey local laws prohibiting racial profiling and refuse to cooperate with the Bush administration's new roundup and interrogation of 5,000 young Arab immigrants. For further information, see www.iacboston.org/ANSWER on the Web. - END - (Copyright Workers World Service: Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies of this document, but changing it is not allowed. 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