You Don't Always Get To Hear Both Sides

A couple of days ago, six Imams (Muslim clerics) were rather brusquely removed from a US Airways flight leaving Minneapolis for Phoenix. The Imams claim it was because they had been doing Muslim prayers at the gate before the flight. This, according to the imams, spooked the passengers, and "a passenger rebellion" of sorts ensued, causing the imams to be arrested, held, and in a couple of cases, even banned from catching another flight (due to having caused a disturbance).

Quite disturbing that an airline would treat Muslim passengers like that, eh?

Well, it seems that sometimes a story is too good to be true. If the reporters filing the original story had bothered to talk with the flight attendants, the pilots, or any of the passengers on that plane, they might have gotten the other side of the story.

Muslim religious leaders removed from a Minneapolis flight last week exhibited behavior associated with a security probe by terrorists [Jil: They mean terrosists riding a plane for the purpose of discovering security details... a "dry run" if you will.] and were not merely engaged in prayers, according to witnesses, police reports and aviation security officials.

Witnesses said three of the imams were praying loudly in the concourse and repeatedly shouted "Allah" when passengers were called for boarding US Airways Flight 300 to Phoenix.

"I was suspicious by the way they were praying very loud," the gate agent told the Minneapolis Police Department.

Passengers and flight attendants told law-enforcement officials the imams switched from their assigned seats to a pattern associated with the September 11 terrorist attacks and also found in probes of U.S. security since the attacks -- two in the front row first-class, two in the middle of the plane on the exit aisle and two in the rear of the cabin.

"That would alarm me," said a federal air marshal who asked to remain anonymous. "They now control all of the entry and exit routes to the plane."

A pilot from another airline said: "That behavior has been identified as a terrorist probe in the airline induindustry."

Now, I'm always a person who never takes either side completely at its word, and am skeptical of everything that anybody says.

But when you have six people of a close-knit group — of a like mind — accusing several dozen heterogeneous people bearing little or no relation to one another of having acted irrationally... and then those several dozen people together but separately divulge rather important information regarding the original six people; reasons that justify what we originally thought to be a rather extreme reaction; reasons that the first six people didn't even mention in their first statement to the press... well, that gets my "doubt everyone equally" policy all askance.

I'll go out on a limb here and make an accusation: The Imams were tired of getting that "terrorist lookout" vibe from everyone in the airport and decided (either right then, or prior to the fact) to perform some (could-be-construed-as-terrorist-activity-if-you-are-biased-towards-that-kind-of-thing) actions that would raise suspcisions. Then they would get in trouble for that suspicious activity, the press would come and shove microphones in their faces, and they would be able to say, "This is racial profiling! All we were doing was praying. These people just hate Muslims."

That's my take.