Airport body scanners violate Islamic law, Muslims say

[blue902]

How unfortunate!

http://www.freep.com/article/2010021...aw-Muslims-say

"Saying that body scanners violate Islamic law, Muslim-American groups are supporting a “fatwa” – a religious ruling – that forbids Muslims from going through the scanners at airports.

he Fiqh Council of North America – a body of Islamic scholars that includes some from Michigan – issued a fatwa this week that says going through the airport scanners would violate Islamic rules on modesty.

“It is a violation of clear Islamic teachings that men or women be seen naked by other men and women,” reads the fatwa issued Tuesday. “Islam highly emphasizes haya (modesty) and considers it part of faith. The Quran has commanded the believers, both men and women, to cover their private parts.”

The decision could complicate efforts to intensify screening of potential terrorists who are Muslim. After the Christmas Day bombing attempt in Detroit by a Muslim suspect from Nigeria, some have called for the use of body scanners at airports to find explosives and other dangerous materials carried by terrorists. Some airports are now in the process of buying and using the body scanners, which show in graphic detail the outlines of a person’s body.

But Muslim groups say the scanners go against their religion. One option offered to passengers who don’t want to use the scanners would be a pat down by a security guard. The Muslim groups are urging members to undergo those instead.

Two members of the Fiqh Council are from Michigan, Imam Hassan Qazwini of the Islamic Center of America in Dearborn, and Imam Ali Suleiman Ali of the Canton Mosque. “Fiqh” means Islamic jurisprudence.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations, which has a chapter in Michigan, says it endorses the fatwa.

“We support the Fiqh Council’s statement on full-body scanners and believe that the religious and privacy rights of passengers can be respected while maintaining safety and security,” said Nihad Awad, national executive director of CAIR.

Currently, there are 40 full-body scanners at 19 airports in the U.S., including two of them in Detroit, said spokesman Jim Fotenos of the Transportation Security Administration (TSA). There are plans for 450 more body scanners in U.S. airports, he said.

In a statement, the TSA said it is committed to keeping passengers safe and also protecting their privacy.

"TSA's mission is to keep the traveling public safe. Advanced imaging technologies are an important tool in a multi-layered security system to detect evolving threats such as improvised explosive devices. TSA's use of these technologies includes strong protections in place to safeguard passenger privacy. Screening images are automatically deleted, and the officer viewing the image will never see the passenger.”

The TSA stressed that the body scanners are “optional to all passengers.” Those who turn them down, “will receive equivalent screening that may include a physical pat-down, hand-wanding, and other technologies. Physical pat-downs are performed by Transportation Security Officers of the same sex as the passenger in a private screening area, if the passenger requests.”

Body scanners “do not produce photos,” the agency said. Rather, the images “look like chalk outlines.”

Body scanner images are available at www.tsa.gov.

Fiqh Council advises Muslims on Islamic law
The Fiqh Council is based in Plainfield, Ind., where it is affiliated with the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) and advises Muslims on sharia, or Islamic law.

An earlier version of the group started in the 1960s with the Muslim Students Association of the United States and Canada. The chairman of the Fiqh Council is Muzammil Siddiqi, religious director of the Islamic Society of Orange County in California and former president of ISNA.

In its fatwa, the council said the use of body scanners “is against the teachings of Islam, natural law.”"

TFB, if they don't like the rules go move somewhere else.
Seems to me that IF this group is, as it keeps whining that it is "peaceful" they would applaud the use of anything that keeps them safe .

OTOH, sounds like a great way to sepereate the wheat from the chaf?

AM

[Ambush Master]

When are the "PEOPLE of THE FREE WORLD" going to wake the F*** UP and come to Grip(s) with the FACT that these (?!?!People?!?!), i.e islamists, are out to rid the face of the Earth of ALL of us that are not like THEM!!!????

WM, while you are "away" I WILL MAINTAIN, AND WE WILL PERSEVERE!!!!

Take care Brothers and Sisters, that are like minded!!!
Martin

[Ret10Echo]

Originally Posted by blue902

"Saying that body scanners violate Islamic law, Muslim-American groups are supporting a “fatwa” – a religious ruling – that forbids Muslims from going through the scanners at airports.

That would be a blessing for the 99% of the American population that is not forbidden. Let's hurry up and get those suckers installed.

PLEASE outlaw being screened....PLEASE....

I hear the Greyhound stations are always in the best parts of town.

Of course all this is built on the premise that the Federal Government and DHS will not knuckle under to pressure due to "religious" reasons.

[greenberetTFS]

Both AM's,

I tend to agree,how long are we to put up with their BS????

Big Teddy

[Sigaba]

In a statement, the TSA said it is committed to keeping passengers safe and also protecting their privacy.

"TSA's mission is to keep the traveling public safe. Advanced imaging technologies are an important tool in a multi-layered security system to detect evolving threats such as improvised explosive devices. TSA's use of these technologies includes strong protections in place to safeguard passenger privacy. Screening images are automatically deleted, and the officer viewing the image will never see the passenger.”

The TSA stressed that the body scanners are “optional to all passengers.” Those who turn them down, “will receive equivalent screening that may include a physical pat-down, hand-wanding, and other technologies. Physical pat-downs are performed by Transportation Security Officers of the same sex as the passenger in a private screening area, if the passenger requests.”

Body scanners “do not produce photos,” the agency said. Rather, the images “look like chalk outlines.”

Body scanner images are available at www.tsa.gov.

Muslims are not the only ones with second thoughts about body scans. Source is here.

An invasion of the body scanners

Mary Schmich

January 6, 2010

At some point as a kid, you learn that no one is supposed to see your underwear unless you have issued an invitation.

"I see London, I see France, I can see your underpants," is a time-honored childhood taunt.

But now?

Fly to London, fly to France, you may have to show your underpants in a "full-body scanner," a term that the average American had surely never spoken until Christmas Day, when a Nigerian allegedly tried to detonate explosives on a flight from Amsterdam to Detroit.

Now the world's atwitter over the prospect of the airport security line as a peep show.

Full-body scanners -- coming soon to O'Hare -- capture images that go way beyond the naked feet we now flash in the airport, and this latest level of exposure perturbs a lot of people, especially women.

"Oh, yeah," said Kate Hanni when I called Tuesday.

Hanni runs flyersrights.org, a consumer advocacy group. Since the day after Christmas, she said, she has received 4,000 unsolicited e-mails about body scanners, mostly from women, most of whom said: No way.

Not all women oppose the scanners or find them sexually invasive. A friend who just flew to Chicago reports being frisked at London's Heathrow, " breasts, underwear and all."

"I would much rather have a scanner do a more thorough inspection than have my privates fondled," she notes.

Even Hanni, in a Washington Post interview, said, "I really don't care if anybody sees the outline of my body. I've got nothing to hide."

On Tuesday, though, she said she regretted that comment as glib. She said it undervalues the embarrassment or humiliation the scanners inflict on many people, male and female. She has heard from elderly people worried about having their adult diapers seen and mocked.[/COLOR]

The scanner images are far from digital photographs. They're X-rays, and they're not "anatomically detailed," as supporters point out. They're viewed in a remote location, not by guards at the security line. Facial details are obscured.

But in their ghostly way, along with exposing "anomalies" between the clothes and skin (a cell phone, a knife, a packet of explosives), the images convey a sense of nudity -- the contours and shadows of a body's lumps and protrusions.

The ones that typically run with news stories are of men. With their legs apart and their arms overhead, they evoke thugs being frisked or guys in bikini briefs doing jumping jacks. I've seen only one of a woman; her breasts were clearly defined.

The scanner images are explicit enough that in Britain they've provoked loud concerns about child pornography.

Most of us will relinquish some modesty if it saves our lives. We bare our bodies to medical personnel all the time.

But we've had no time to agree on giving up this next layer of privacy. And it's not yet clear that body scans are what it takes to save us.

The rush to scanners risks being no more than what's called "security theater," the big show that follows a scare without making us much safer. Scanners, for example, don't reveal what's in body cavities, where contraband is often smuggled.

"I'm not saying we're against body scanners," Hanni said. "But shouldn't we push the pause button?"

Yes. Still, if full-body scans become the next routine phase of air travel, we'll get used to it.

And the bad guys will keep looking for ways to outwit our effort to outwit them.

MOO, dimwits at the TSA will find some way to scandalize this security issue. The TSA will remain the weakest link in GWOT as long as Janet Napolitano heads DHS.

It is only a matter of time before TMZ has scans of this celebrity or that movie star. Or someone will be forced to take a body scan even though the rules allow for a personal search instead.

[SF-TX]

Originally Posted by Sigaba

It is only a matter of time before TMZ has scans of this celebrity or that movie star. Or someone will be forced to take a body scan even though the rules allow for a personal search instead.

It has apparently already happened.

The scan of Khan

Published Thursday, February 11, 2010

That didn't take long, did it? But it was bound to happen.

Airline screeners at a London airport printed and copied the full-body scan of Bollywood star Shah Rukh Khan even though the authorities had promised that the scans would be instantly deleted and that the staff would be unaware of whom they were screening.

Khan was good-natured about it. He said on British TV that as he was leaving the scanner, "I saw these girls — they had printouts. I looked at them. I thought they were forms you had to fill. I said, 'Give them to me' — and you could see everything inside. So I autographed them for them."

He was, after all, in England on a publicity tour for his new film, My Name Is Khan, about the tribulations of an Indian Muslim couple who must cross the United States to reunite in the aftermath of 9/11.

The Transportation Security Administration stepped up its program of installing full-body scanners at U.S. airports following the failed attempt Christmas Day to set off a bomb on a Detroit-bound airliner. TSA's privacy safeguards are similar to those that failed in London.

The combination of curiosity and prurience can be overwhelming. There were the passport clerks who made unauthorized searches of the applications of film stars and prominent politicians. Following Joe the Plumber's sudden fame, Ohio government agencies made eight searches of his records that had no legitimate purpose. And a nominee to head the TSA, since withdrawn, used a police agency to run a background check on his estranged wife's boyfriend.

Given human nature, these lapses are almost bound to happen. Most of us lack Khan's intoxicating draw of sex and celebrity, but all that stands between us and appearing nude on the Internet is the TSA's good intentions.

http://www.tampabay.com/opinion/colu...f-khan/1072582

[The Reaper]

Fine.

Don't get on the plane with the rest of us.

If there weren't plenty of reasons to use body scans before, that should confirm it.

Let them try ocean travel. Till they hijack one of the liners, then they will be body scanned there as well.

TR

[Defender968]

Originally Posted by The Reaper

Fine.

Don't get on the plane with the rest of us.

If there wasn't plenty of reasons to use body scans before, that should confirm it.

Let them try ocean travel. Till they hijack one of the liners, then they will be body scanned there as well.

TR

Completely agree TR, but I'm sure the left will be along shortly yelling about how flying is a right.

[Ryanr]

The claims of body scanners showing "nude" pictures are grossly exaggerated, it's barely more exciting than an x-ray. I don't understand why anyone is all riled up about these things, Muslim or otherwise. Surely this is better than having your junk fondled by some random TSA agent?

[Requiem]

Does the scan work like this?

[Ryanr]

Originally Posted by Requiem

Does the scan work like this?

Heh, the images I've seen floated around from mainstream media sources were these ones: http://wikiprotest.com/blog/wp-conte...y-scanner1.jpg but there's another set floating around that's much more revealing -- and also looks a little fake to me, but I'm obviously no expert.

I guess I think we're a bit prudish in this country, but that's just me.

[Dozer523]

Originally Posted by Ryanr

The claims of body scanners showing "nude" pictures are grossly exaggerated, it's barely more exciting than an x-ray. I don't understand why anyone is all riled up about these things, Muslim or otherwise. Surely this is better than having your junk fondled by some random TSA agent?

Tell that to Lois Lane.

Originally Posted by Ryanr

I guess I think we're a bit prudish in this country, but that's just me.

Prudisih? Hardly, however I was reared to believe that who sees my unclothed body should be my decision. It could be your mom who's scan ends up on the internet. How would you feel then?

If Allah wanted Muslims to not have to be scanned, then he should have written specifically into the Quran.

[Go Devil]

suicide uncle sam islam.jpg