Taking Liberties: 22 Years Behind Bars For a “Crime of Compassion”
(this article appears in the Taking Liberties column of rabble.ca)
By Matthew Behrens
When former U.S. President George W. Bush descended on the
Regional Economic
was, understandably, no shortage of protesters, pleas for
indictments, and cries of “war criminal.” Left out of most news
coverage as well as activist communiqués, however, was any focus on
another former U.S. President who was tagging along, someone equally
deserving of such protest but who seems, remarkably, to get off
fairly lightly these days: Bill Clinton.
While
human misery were many – think the cruise missile attack on a vital
pharmaceutical plant in
Yugoslavia and daily bombings of Iraq, cruise missiles lobbed into
Afghanistan and Pakistan, tightening the sanctions against the Cuban
people, failure to act to prevent the Rwandan genocide, and
legislation that doomed millions of Americans to ever deeper levels
of poverty – perhaps most infamous was his aw-shucks enforcement of
the devastating sanctions that resulted in the deaths of over one
million Iraqis.
That
anyone in the George W. Bush administration is largely forgotten.
Yet report after report produced through the
the hundreds of thousands of premature deaths in
close of the decade, the word " genocide " began creeping into their
vocabulary. Enforced in part with $1 billion in Canadian military
muscle, sanctions that led to the monthly deaths of 5,000 Iraqi
children under the age of five provoked the high-profile resignations
of UN humanitarian coordinators Denis Halliday and Hans Von Sponeck.
When Halliday resigned in 1998, he stated: "I've been using the word
'genocide' because this is a deliberate policy to destroy the people
of
What was one to make of a policy that deliberately targeted
the importation of civilian goods that allegedly had “dual use,” from
pencils and baby dolls to eyeglasses and shampoo? The equipment
needed to fix electrical generating stations and water purification
systems destroyed during the 1991
Desert Storm was not permitted entry, so water-borne diseases ran
rampant. The medicines needed to treat the spike in cancer (a result
of tons of depleted uranium munitions dust that wound up in the Iraqi
soil, air and water) didn't get through either.
Clinton's Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright, asked on
the CBS program 60 Minutes if the sanctions-related deaths of a half
million Iraqi children were worth it, famously replied, "We think the
price is worth it."
The people of
siege, and while the general responsible for that siege was charged
as a war criminal at
stage as a self-styled “elder statesman” who runs a foundation where
he paints himself as the second coming of Mother Theresa. "In my
life now, I am obsessed with only two things: I don't want anybody to
die before their time, and I don't want to see good people spend
their energies without making a difference,"
website.
As
trotting out such tripe,
also believed no one should die before their time, especially in
Iraq, remains behind bars in one of the most brutal of U.S. prisons,
the Communication Management Unit in
“Little
arrested as part of post-9/11 racial profiling paranoia.
Dhafir was sentenced to 22 years for consciously violating
the sanctions against the people of
who were not Muslim also violated the sanctions – fines were the
worst punishment directed at a number of groups – yet Dhafir, as the
driving force behind the Help the Needy Foundation, which provided
millions in aid, was the only one to suffer such a fate. Needless to
say, corporations that quietly went around the sanctions not for
humanitarian goals, but to profit from their relationship with the
Hussein dictatorship, did not face charges either.
Dhafir’s imprisonment began on the morning of February 26,
2003, when hundreds of federal agents swooped down on the community
of
his wife’s head, and ransacked his house, taking away any books
related to Islam while leaving behind the Bible and tomes on American
history.
Agents proceeded to terrorize patients at Dhafir’s clinic,
and interrogated almost 150 primarily Muslim Help the Needy donors
about how often they prayed, whether they had family in the Middle
East, and whether they celebrated Christmas.
Cynically framed as a terrorism-related arrest as the
prepared its invasion of
contained 14 charges of violating sanctions. But when he refused a
plea bargain, the government ratcheted up its already hyperbolic
case, alleging an additional 45 alleged breaches of various financial
laws related to the running of a charity as well as alleged Medicare
fraud. The non-sanctions charges were speciously vague, and related
to things like incorrectly filling out the complicated Medicare forms
(many doctors refuse to treat Medicare patients as a result of their
burdensome regulations, and even Medicare officials themselves
appeared confused about them during the trial). Charges also arose
from using another organization to issue Help the Needy’s tax
receipts, a not uncommon practice. In any event, most such “white
collar” cases, should they actually result in a trial, do not produce
such serious consequences.
As community members could testify, Dhafir was a hugely
generous person, and opened his office not in
could have made more money, but an hour away in
underserved community. His reputation for providing interest-free
loans, treating low-income patients, donating large chunks of money
for schools and mosques, and assisting newcomers to the
legendary.
But Dhafir’s refusal to be silent in the face of genocide
resulted in seven government agencies investigating Help the Needy
and intercepting his mail, email, faxes and telephone calls, bugging
his office and hotel rooms, combing through his trash, and also
conducting physical surveillance. They were unable to find any
evidence of terrorism links, yet the stench of such alleged
associations infused the trial as a result of headline grabbing
outbursts from New York Governor George Pataki and Attorney General
John Ashcroft.
After a six-week trial, Dhafir was convicted in February,
2005, though as the
was forbidden during the trial to tell the jury that the government's
investigation of Dhafir had apparently begun as a terrorism hunt, nor
was the defense allowed to argue that Dhafir had been selectively
prosecuted for alleged crimes that are relatively common and do not
usually result in criminal charges."
While further details of this railroad are available on
the website http://www.dhafirtrial.net/, Dhafir is now preparing to
head to court in early February seeking a resentencing that would see
him released for time served. During his time behind bars, Dhafir has
developed a range of debilitating conditions, from an untreated
hernia and diabetes to chronic gout, significant back pain, and
incipient cataracts. Even though he was originally sentenced to a
medium security prison within driving distance of his community, he
was transferred to the notorious CMU, where he could not have contact
visits, his freedom to worship was severely limited, phone calls were
rare, and he was harshly treated along with his fellow, isolated
inmates.
His lawyers will argue that median sentences for far more
serious offences, such as material aid to terrorists, money
laundering, and “national defence” cases, are all far lower than what
Dhafir has already served.
Over 60 letters of support from the
Germany, and Ireland have been sent to the judge, including one from
Nobel Peace Prize winner Mairead Maguire. Among those is one from
Linda Taffs, a 63-year-old grandmother in
was one of those who took humanitarian supplies to
2003. She says she and fellow delegates “visited hospitals and
schools in
fact dying before my eyes,” she wrote, noting she could understand
what motivated Dhafir to undertake his Help the Needy commitment.
Taffs is proud to be associated with Dr. Dhafir and that
all-too-small honour roll of those who openly, proudly did what they
could to end the silent genocide taking place in
before Abu Ghraib and WMDs became the new backdrop for another
generation of suffering.
While supporters await the outcome of the resentencing for
what they call a “crime of compassion,” they ask that letters of
support be written to Rafil A. Dhafir, 11921-052,
Haute, IN 47808,
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