Flight on 9/11 anniversary ends in handcuffs for housewife

[babsbunny]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/44501310/ns/us_news-security/?GT1=43001\

By Elizabeth Chuck
msnbc.com
updated 1 hour 48 minutes ago

Shoshana Hebshi will never forget where she was on the 10th anniversary of Sept. 11.

She and two other airline passengers were handcuffed and strip-searched after flying into Detroit on Sunday.

No charges were filed against Hebshi, a self-described "half-Arab, half-Jewish housewife living in suburban Ohio," or the two men sitting next to her, who were flying in from Denver when the crew of Frontier Airlines Flight 623 alerted authorities that they were reportedly behaving suspiciously.

[Claudia Jones]

1. all too common

According to the story this was one of 50 similar incidents that day.

Human beings are being persecuted by this. Let's remember that.



From her blog:

Silly me. I thought flying on 9/11 would be easy. I figured most people would choose not to fly that day so lines would be short, planes would be lightly filled and though security might be ratcheted up, we’d all feel safer knowing we had come a long way since that dreadful Tuesday morning 10 years ago.

But then armed officers stormed my plane, threw me in handcuffs and locked me up.

...

When the Patriot Act was passed after 9/11 and Arabs and Arab-looking people were being harassed all over the country, my Saudi Arabian dad became nervous. A bit of a conspiracy theorist at heart, he knew the government was watching him and at any time could come and take him away. It was happening all over. Men were being taken on suspicion of terrorist activities and held and questioned–sometimes abused–for long periods of time. Our country had a civil rights issue on its hands. And, in the name of patriotism we lost a lot of our liberty, especially those who look like me.

...

I believe in national security, but I also believe in peace and justice. I believe in tolerance, acceptance and trying–as hard as it sometimes may be–not to judge a person by the color of their skin or the way they dress. I admit to have fallen to the traps of convention and have made judgments about people that are unfounded. We live in a complicated world that, to me, seems to have reached a breaking point. The real test will be if we decide to break free from our fears and hatred and truly try to be good people who practice compassion–even toward those who hate.

I feel fortunate to have friends and family members who are sick over what happened to me. I share their disgust. But there was someone on that plane who felt threatened enough to alert the authorities. This country has operated for the last 10 years through fear. We’ve been a country at war and going bankrupt for much of this time. What is the next step?

http://shebshi.wordpress.com/2011/09/12/some-real-shock-and-awe-racially-profiled-and-cuffed-in-detroit/

[gateley]

2. Aren't the Israelis (and maybe other countries') security

people trained in gauging peoples actions? Their behavior?

We just look at a person and make the judgment on that, and that is so wrong. PLUS, if we'd been properly trained, think of all the $$$ we'd have saved by not scrambling a pair of fighters FIFTY TIMES.

We are so stupid it's embarrassing.

[Claudia Jones]

3. kick

Important story.