Posted on 08/30/2006 3:45:02 PM PDT by Sub-Driver
JFK Passenger Not Allowed To Fly Wearing Arabic Script T-Shirt
POSTED: 6:25 pm EDT August 30, 2006 UPDATED: 6:27 pm EDT August 30, 2006 NEW YORK -- An Arab human rights activist says he was prevented from boarding a plane at Kennedy International Airport while wearing a T-shirt that said "We will not be silent" in English and Arabic.
The incident happened Aug. 12 when Raed Jarrar was preparing to board a JetBlue flight from Kennedy to Oakland, Calif.
Four officials from JetBlue or from a government agency stopped him at the gate and told him he couldn't get on the plane wearing his shirt, Jarrar said in a telephone interview Wednesday.
One of the officials told him, "Going to an airport with a T-shirt in Arabic script is like going to a bank and wearing a T-shirt that says 'I'm a robber."' he said.
Jenny Dervin, a spokeswoman for JetBlue, acknowledged that the dispute occurred and said the airline was investigating it.
She noted that the incident occurred two days after British authorities announced that they had foiled a plot to blow up jetliners over the Atlantic.
New restrictions banning liquids and gels in carryon baggage went into effect at U.S. airports following the Aug. 10 announcement, but Dervin said there are no specific rules governing apparel. "Each situation is different," she said.
Jarrar, who directs the Iraq project for Global Exchange, a San Francisco-based human rights organization, said he asked what law he was breaking by wearing the shirt. The officials didn't answer, he said, but suggested that he turn the shirt inside out.
"I refused to take off my T-shirt and put it on inside out because it looks like a punishment for something I have not done," he said.
(Excerpt) Read more at wnbc.com ...
Reasonable. Quite reasonable. That is, if it was indeed the airline that refused to let the ticketed passenger board.
But then it would be reasonable also for the airline to compensate the denied passenger for any acutal economic loss as well as hardship and inconvenience for the airline's unilateral abrogation of a contract.
good.
Fine by me, though in this case, I suspect the business of this "Arab human rights activist" is soliciting "unfair" reactions that he can be outraged by. In that sense, his business was not interrupted in any way by the airlines actions.
They should have just singled him out for extensive orafice searching, see how silent he is after that.
SO you don't plan on staying here long, right?
Don't you think he did it on purpose? To bring about an ACLU suit that would allow Arab men to wear snarky t-shirts and carry boxcutters onto the aircraft!
Probably :)
Lot of new sign-ups today. The left is getting nervous.
Yes, and posting on old threads, too. I saw one on a 2003 thread, lol.
No doubt.
Sniff sniff, is that ozone??
one very small step in the right direction.
Amnesty International is, like the ACLU, CAIR and the UN, run and funded by anti-Americans, and driven by their hatred for America.
They are so blatantly anti-American that they have no credibility except with like minded left leaning socialists.
To quote "The Siege": You're just dumb enough to think that that is an insult.
Welcome to FreeRepulic, comrade.
Hey FRiend, I'm busy cleaning. Want some fresh troll?
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