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Saturday, September 09, 2006
Khatami served with papers at the CAIR gala- by families of kidnapped Persian Jews
Ahh, I loved this.
I haven't covered the Khatami visit to the US much, as it's been covered in great depth elsewhere. Suffice to say that it's a national disgrace that this murdering despot set foot on the soil of my beloved nation in anything by handcuffs on the way to the scaffold, let alone in the National Cathedral and at Harvard.
Apparently,Khatami's visit wasn't all halal buffet lines, smiles and sunshine.
At Khatami's honorary dinner hosted by CAIR last friday (who else?) he was served with legal papers by the lawyers representing seven Jewish-Iranian families who have filed suit in an American federal court against former President Mohammad Khatami over charges that he's responsible for the kidnapping and torture of their missing family members.
The suit alleges that Khatami imprisoned and tortured their relatives without trials and refused to provide any information concerning their whereabouts when they tried to flee from dhimmi status and leave Iran across its border with Pakistan during the years 1994 through 1997.
The plaintiffs brought the suit under special laws - the Alien Torts Act and the Torture Victims Protection Act - which allow foreigners to sue their tormentors for torture and kidnapping in American courts. The plaintiffs are seeking hundreds of millions of dollars in damages against Khatami for his role in the disappearance of their family members.
Anytime Jews are arrested in Iran they are subject to harsh penalties because they have few rights as dhimmis. The suit alleges that Khatami has singled out the Jewish community and authorized the policy of secretly imprisoning Jews caught trying to leave Iran indefinitely.
Over the years, the Jewish families have received reports from other former prisoners and guards that the missing Jews are alive and being held in different prisons. In the case of the Tehrani family of Los Angeles, a former Muslim neighbor has sworn out an affidavit testifying that he has seen their missing son, Babak Tehrani, in a Tehran prison two years after his disappearance.
"These Persian Jewish families are seeking to bring Khatami before an American court for his involvement in the torture and imprisonment of their loved ones in Iran," stated the families' attorney Nitsana-Darshan-Leitner, "It is shocking that the State Department would grant this anti-Semitic criminal a travel visa instead of joining with the families in the struggle to bring him to justice. The court case will establish that these missing Jews are indeed still alive in Iranian prisons and that the former President violated international law with his policy of arrests and torture which targeted the Jewish community."
Unfortunately, Khatami has twenty days to file an answer denying the allegations or default the case. He will probably simply go back to Iran, but Iranian assets here in the US can still be attached..and the plaintiffs can also pursue redress through other foreign courts... like Vicki and Leonard Eisenfeld
They're suing under international human rights law. This is normally the kind of thing that conservatives would decry.
ReplyDeleteActually, JPE, they are suing under US law, as I cited in the article. THose laws allow victims of terrorism to sue in US courts, rather than in ridiculously
ReplyDeleteill-named forums like the International Court of Justice.
I'm afraid you're incorrect.
My mistake.
ReplyDeleteNot a problem.
ReplyDeleteSometimes the line can be fuzzy...