Oct 15, 2004 7:17 am US/Eastern
(1010 WINS) PATERSON, N.J.
This is the time of the year when Abdulrahman Odeh counts his blessings, takes out his
checkbook and pen, and makes a donation to an Islamic charity.
During the holy month of Ramadan, many Muslims meet their religious obligation to give
to the needy. But Odeh is agonizing over who should get his money this year _ with good
reason.
For 10 years, the bagel shop owner helped run an Islamic charity that collected and
distributed money in the Middle East. The Holy Land Foundation, he said, was helping
orphans and needy children.
But federal prosecutors say the group was funneling money to the Hamas terrorist group.
In 2001, its offices across the country were raided and stripped of equipment, its assets
frozen.
Now Odeh, who is awaiting a trial that could send him to prison for the rest of his life,
echoes many Muslims who say a 3-year-old federal crackdown has them worrying that
writing a check to charity today could bring FBI agents to their doors in the future.
``Everyone is scared,'' said Odeh, who bakes bagels and prepares sandwiches to support
his wife and three children. ``They say, 'Today this or that group is legal; two or three
years from now, who knows?'''
The Holy Land Foundation was one of several well-known Islamic charities raided by the
federal government, which claims the groups were aiding terrorism. On Wednesday,
authorities froze the assets of a Sudan-based charity with an office in Columbia, Mo., and
accused five of its officials of helping finance Osama bin Laden and other terrorists.
Islam has a two-pronged requirement on giving to charity. The first, the ``zakat,'' requires
believers to give 2.5 percent of their savings each year to the poor. The second, called
``sadaqah,'' is voluntary and depends on a person's ability to give.
Amaney Jamal, a Princeton University professor who recently completed a survey of the
Dearborn, Mich., Arab-American community, said the uncertainty is one of the most
distressing problems Muslims feel these days.
``If someone says to me, 'Do you want to support an orphan for $30 a month?' I say,
'Sure, that's a noble cause.' And then later someone comes and knocks on my door and
says, 'Her father was a suicide bomber,''' Jamal said. ``Charity giving to the Arab world
has become a big no-no.''
One result has been an increase in non-traceable cash donations to local mosques or
religious institutions.
``They don't want to write checks or use credit cards,'' Jamal said.
John Conway, a special agent in the Newark FBI office, said law-abiding Muslims who
donate to legitimate charities have nothing to fear. But he acknowledged that an
organization in good standing today might not be several years hence.
``It's perfectly understandable that people would have concerns about that,'' he said. ``If
it's a group that gives money to suicide bombers or to Hamas, then you run into a
situation where there's a possibility their name may come up at some point in time.''
It could not immediately be determined if anyone had been arrested or detained as a
result of having given to a charity that was later raided, Conway said.
So why not just give to an unaffiliated charity, like the Red Cross or the United Way?
Islamic scholars say there are differing schools of thought on whether the primary
recipients of the charity must be Muslims in order to fulfill the religious obligation.
Yaser El-Menshawy, chairman of the Majlis Ash-Shura of New Jersey, the state's council
of mosques, said the recipients of ``zakat'' have to be Muslims, while ``sadaqah''
recipients can be of any faith.
Ingrid Mattson of West Hartford, Conn., vice president of the Islamic Society of North
America, said there is a lot of money waiting to be donated, but much fewer obvious
places for it to go.
``The Muslim community is feeling frustrated because even if an organization is legal and
legitimate now, if in the future the government closes it down, they will all be in for extra
scrutiny. How do we know that if we give money to a group, next year the government isn't
going to come back to you and say, 'You gave money to a terrorist organization,'?''
Mattson said.
Odeh, one of seven Holy Land officials charged with providing material assistance to
terrorists, and conspiracy to commit money laundering, has pleaded not guilty in U.S.
District Court in Dallas. No trial date has been set.
His lawyer, Hamdi Rifai, said Odeh was just an employee at the foundation, and _ like its
donors _ was not responsible for knowing where the money was going. Many of the acts
alleged by the government occurred before Odeh was hired by the charity in 1994, he
added.
Two other suburban Chicago-area Muslim charities _ Global Relief Foundation and
Benevolence International _ also were raided by federal agents and had their assets
seized, effectively putting them out of business. But neither raid has led to
terrorism-related criminal convictions, and the Sept. 11 commission said the seizures raise
possible civil liberties concerns.
While he waits to find out when he must go back to Dallas for his trial, Odeh worries about
how to meet his own religious obligations to charity.
``I'm not sure what I'm going to do,'' he said. ``I'm afraid this is something people will be
dealing with for a long time to come.''
