Brooklyn Man Arrested For Providing 'HezbollahTV'

[kpete]

FBI: Brooklyn HDTV company provided users with 'Hezbollah TV'

RAW STORY
Published: Thursday August 24, 2006

Javed Iqbal, a.k.a. "John Iqbal," 42, of Staten Island, N.Y., has been arrested and charged with conspiring to violate the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), RAW STORY has learned.

A complaint announced today by the FBI alleges that through a company called HDTV Ltd. located in Brooklyn, Iqbal and others provided customers in the New York area with satellite broadcasts of al Manar, which is a television station owned and/or operated by Hezbollah.

The Department of Treasury named al Manar as a "Specially Designated Global Terrorist entity" in March 2006, thereby making it a crime to, among other things, engage in business transactions with al Manar. In conjunction with the arrest, agents executed search warrants at both HDTV's Brooklyn office and Iqbal's Staten Island residence where, it is alleged, Iqbal maintained several satellite dishes.

Iqbal was arrested Wednesday.

http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/FBI_Brooklyn_HDTV_company_provided_users_0824.html

[Freedom_from_Chains]

1. Yeah, we certainly wouldn't want America to hear the other side of

the story.

[winter999]

5. Does that mean you'd be OK with a KKK channel?

[Warren DeMontague]

8. More okay than I would be with one being censored.

Yes. They have a right to free speech, as much as anyone else. If they're breaking the law, then prosecute them for that. But expressing an opinion- even a noxious one- is protected by the First Amendment.

[Freedom_from_Chains]

12. Thanks for saving me the trouble of having to respond.

Some people just can't have their rights taken away fast enough it seems.

[Roy]

20. No, they want their rights. Every single one....

They just don't think that you, I, or others should have any.

[ryanus]

13. Yeah that's right

Just a couple of weeks ago I learned that there even was a Hezbollah TV. I didn't even know we had banned TV stations in the US.

Broadcasting news and\or opinion isn't illegal. But of course if they lie or slander or something, take them to court.

So weird. I swear I'm gonna wake up in a few minutes...

[Eric J in MN]

11. It should be legal to have a KKK channel,

though of course I wouldn't want a cable provider to offer one.

[Beelzebud]

17. Free Speech is also for views you don't agree with...

Thats the messy part of living in a free country.

Hezbollah TV, KKK TV?

You bet. I don't have to watch the shit. But why, in a free country, should they be banned, or censored?

[shadowknows69]

18. I think such channels even when spewing hate

would serve more to expose the horror of their beliefs to the masses than be a danger to the masses. Information is power. How it is used is up to the individual. I suspect more people exposed to such hate speech would serve to educate more people on the absurdity of it.

[Roy]

22. They do have KKK TV and Radio

They just operate under assumed names.
Listen to Rush, Savage, or any other right wing hate channel or radio station.

Oh, you already do?

[Mr_Jefferson_24]

24. Are you OK with CNN? How 'bout MSNBC? And Fox?

[Nikki Stone 1]

7. It's not the "side" but the visuals they want to surpress

90% of our learning is visual and TV images have incredible power.

[Freedom_from_Chains]

10. So then you think that censorship is ok in this instance? n/t

[Nikki Stone 1]

15. Me? No! Good Lord!

But I'm pointing out their rationale. They have been so careful to hide images of flag covered coffins and disabled vets. Basically, the MSM has a narrative to tell and it doesn't involve showing the real results of war, except in very sanitized circumstances. The Vietnam protests were fueled by televisions images, especially on color TVs which had just come out.

[Freedom_from_Chains]

21. Yeah, you are on point with that.

The thing that concerns me about this story is it makes it hard to continue to claim that we really do have a free press in this country. And I would like to think that we do but instances like this an the items you point out make it next to impossible to continue to make that claim.

[Nikki Stone 1]

23. Reminds me of Putin accusing Bush of firing Dan Rather

In an indirect way, Junior actually did.

[Donnachaidh]

2. shutting down a broadcast?

guess freedom of speech is on the *to do* list for the feds.

[gatorboy]

3. They hate our FREEDOMS!

Say it wih me!

[springhill]

4. This is darn scary.

[ovidsen]

6. The thought police strike again

The guys who wrote the Bill of Rights knew that all political ideas should be allowed to stand or fall on their own merits. That's why freedom of the press works.

The fascist core of BushCo shows it's colors again...

[Eric J in MN]

9. This is despicable. The US govt has no right to call a TV

station a terrorist organization.

[Selatius]

14. Well, if it's true that Al Manar is a Hezbollah-owned group, then

the law should apply. It would be no different than prosecuting businessmen who did business with the Nazi 3rd Reich.

However, if this guy got busted for broadcasting Al Jazeera or Al Arabiya, then the feds trampled on 1st Amendment rights.

[Subdivisions]

16. They are immune from wiretapping judgements but this

guy has to go down for practicing his 1st Amendment right to freedom of speech.

Go figure.

[Lerkfish]

19. fascists fear ideas

they always fight them with book burnings, control of the press, propaganda.
that's why freedom of speech is a cornerstone of democracy.

and that's why freedom of speech was one of the first things taken from us, by project mockingbird and FauxNews.