All best for Id-ul-ADHA, report was blocked by Googlegroups, censorship?

[brutto or netto]

TOPICS: _CHARITY_ (http://www.salon.com/topic/charity) , _HAMAS_
(http://www.salon.com/topic/hamas) , _HOLY LAND FIVE_
(http://www.salon.com/topic/holy_land_five) , _HOLY LAND FOUNDATION_
(http://www.salon.com/topic/holy_land_foundation) ,_ISLAM_ (http://
www.salon.com/topic/islam) , _ISRAEL_
(http://www.salon.com/topic/israel) , _MUSLIMS_ (http://www.salon.com/
topic/muslims)
, _PALESTINE_ (http://www.salon.com/topic/palestine) , _SUPREME COURT_
(http://www.salon.com/topic/supreme_court) , _TERRORISM_
(http://www.salon.com/topic/terrorism) , _NEWS_ (http://www.salon.com/
category/news/)
(http://www.salon.com/2012/10/25/
scotus_to_consider_fate_of_jailed_muslim_charity_leaders/
) Ghassan Elashi with daughter Noor. Ghassan is serving a 65-year
sentence
in federal prison (courtesy of Elashi family via Sparrow Media)

On Friday the U.S. Supreme Court will decide whether to hear the case
of
_the Holy Land Five_ (http://freedomtogive.com/) — a group of Muslim
charity leaders who face jail sentences of up to 65 years. On Thursday
afternoon,
activists, attorneys and family members of the prisoners have planned
to
rally in New York in advance of the SCOTUS conference.
The Holy Land Foundation (HLF) was the largest Muslim charity in the
United States until three months after 9/11, when the Bush
administration shut
it down following reports that the group had donated a portion of
their
foundation funds to schools and hospitals in Gaza through a “Zakat”
(charity-giving) Committee that allegedly had connections to Hamas.
After subsequent
raids on the charity leaders’ homes and offices, arrests, and two
trials
(the first in 2007 ending in a hung jury), the Holy Land Five were
convicted
of conspiracy under the Material Support to Terrorists statute and
received sentences ranging from 15 to 65 years in federal prison.
A release announcing Thursday’s rally from _the Sparrow Media Project_
(http://www.sparrowmedia.net/) noted that when the case was heard in
2007,
Edward Abington, a diplomat who served as U.S. consul-general in
Jerusalem
during the 1990s, testified on behalf of HLF. He testified that the
U.S.
Agency for International Development (USAID) had given $47,000 to the
same
charitable committee alleged in the HLF indictment to have ties to
Hamas. “
Moreover, USAID has periodically contributed to the same Zakat
Committee named
in the indictments, from before the time of the HLF indictment until
today,
” the release noted, adding, “This double standard is circuitous
because
it implies that either USAID is using taxpayer money to ‘finance
Hamas’ or
that the allegations made against the HLF were baseless from the
beginning.
”
The ACLU in 2009 spoke out against the treatment of the Holy Land
Five,
noting that their treatment by the U.S. government “violated the
fundamental
rights of American Muslim Charities.” On October 26, the Supreme Court
is
expected to review the case against HLF, which defense attorneys say
was
problematically based on anonymous witness testimony. In a petition to
the
court, the defense challenges the prosecution’s reliance on hearsay
and the
testimony of an Israeli intelligence official who gave evidence under
the
fake pseudonym “Avi” — the first time in U.S. history that an expert
witness
was allowed to testify using a fake name.

Noor Elashi, the daughter of HLF co-founder Ghassan Elashi who is
serving
a 65-year-sentence in an isolated federal prison unit, will speak at
Thursday’s rally. “I am heartened by the solidarity of those who are
standing
by my father during this critical time. I hope to see this momentum
keep
building until the Holy Land Five are exonerated,” she said in a
statement. In
_a recent article _
(http://electronicintifada.net/content/let-us-not-be-brought-down-last-
legal-recourse-holy-land-five/11805) for Electronic
Intifada, Elashi wrote at greater length about her father’s case. “I
am still in
shock that the case has gone as far as it has because in its essence,
the
HLF case is about a bold humanitarian endeavor that was put to an
end,” she
wrote.
Representatives from the Center for Constitutional Rights and the
National
Lawyers Guild will also join Elashi at Thursday’s rally in advance of
Friday’s Supreme Court conference, which will determine the fate of
the Holy
Land Five. “This will be the last legal remedy for the defendants
outside of
a Presidential pardon,” the Sparrow Media Project noted.
_Close_
(http://www.salon.com/2012/10/25/
scotus_to_consider_fate_of_jailed_muslim_charity_leaders/)

Natasha Lennard is an assistant news editor at Salon, covering
non-electoral politics, general news and rabble-rousing. Follow her on
Twitter
@natashalennard, email_n...@salon.com_
(mailto:nlen...@salon.com) .


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and still call yourself 'pro-life.'"
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