"I'll never be over Macho Grande."
Posted on 08/30/2007 8:28:09 AM PDT by Froufrou
A woman who complained that some fellow passengers spoke Arabic and "had odd behavior" prevented a Chicago-bound American Airlines flight from departing San Diego, police said Wednesday.
Flight 590, scheduled to depart at 11 p.m. Tuesday, left its gate about 11:15 but returned to the boarding area after the woman, who was traveling with at least one child, indicated she wanted to get off the airplane. The flight then was unable to make Lindbergh Field's 11:30 p.m. curfew for departures, said Irene McCormack, a spokeswoman for the San Diego Harbor Police.
The flight, carrying 126 passengers, was rescheduled for midmorning Wednesday and arrived in Chicago in the afternoon, an American Airlines spokesman said.
McCormack said it is unusual for planes to return to the gate. She said it's usually for medical and mechanical problems or a disturbance.
The woman first complained to the flight crew that four to seven men were possibly speaking Arabic in the boarding area. The woman added that they "had odd behavior." The crew decided to return to the boarding area because the woman indicated she wanted off the plane.
The American Airlines spokesman indicated the plane returned to its gates because of a dispute between passengers. The spokesman didn't provide details on the dispute.
A Transportation Security Administration spokeswoman said it returned because of "suspicious activity on board the plane."
Ahmed Rehab, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations in Chicago, was upset about the airline's actions. He said television reporters told him that six Iraqi Americans were detained after a passenger became uncomfortable with the men speaking Arabic.
"It is one thing to flag suspicious behavior, but to flag a global language? We are deplaning people for who they are, not what they do," Rehab said.
The Associated Press reported Defense Training Systems had hired the men to train U.S. Marines at Camp Pendleton in California.
McCormack said no one was detained in the incident.
Drew, thanks for the DTS info. The rest of you, please don’t shoot the messenger, ‘kay? I am guilty only of posting what is apparently an interesting thread!
None of us can say what we’d have done, nor do we know what ‘odd behavior’ she saw. Maybe it was knee-jerk, maybe not.
I will remind y’all of the New Jersey incident...
If these Arabs hadn't said a word to each other during the flight, that probably would have been considered "suspicious" behavior as well.
Dialects of Arabic are spoken as a first language by an estimated 246 million people, placing it fifth (behind Mandarin, Hindi, English, and Spanish); hardly “minor”. This woman is paranoid.
Makes sense to me. FofF, thanks for that oldie-but-goodie!
Tough love man...
Life sucks and then you die.
I love that. Bookmarking.
Ah! The voice of reason! I’m all for multi-lingual people practicing their tongues [use it or lose it and all that.]
But if they do so to cloak what they’re saying, then what they’re saying becomes a hot button.
People overseas assume that I do not speak their native languages when I travel. You should visit Miami...most people speak their native language when in a group because usually, not everyone speaks at the same level. Not everyone is talking about you behind your back.
“We have become a bunch of bedwetters who see the boogeyman everywhere. What happened to the “Land of the Brave”.”
Would you want your wife and child to be brave? What would your wife think of you if you told her to be brave and board with your child?
What happened is sad. It’s discrimination. And I would do the same thing.
"Huh?"
True, ya just can’t make everyone happy, that’s for sure.
What if you made a mistake, and tried to take out the air marshall?
God has given each one of us the desire for self-preservation. Part of that gift involves distrusting people who are different. People who are different are assumed to be a threat until some other action resolves the issue. The ability to profile is something we are born with. It is liberals and an environment of political correctness that wants us to ignore what god has told us to beware of.
The actions of the woman to provide the safest environment for her child were perfectly correct.
but what's the answer? search these guys more thoroughly?
were they sitting together? if they were sitting apart that might raise my suspicion a bit more. and if they were hired by the american gov't, some US representative should have been escorting these guys! DUH! don't they realize the current situation in this country?
I thought the kids who took over the embassy spoke farsi ‘cause it was in Tehran? Yes?
“Speaking something no one else understands can be interpreted as suspicious. What could they possibly be saying that they don’t want me to know?”
The girls they picked up the night before? Problems back at home? A lousy boss? The excessive paranoia of some Americans? Strategy they plan to play out in the training, which might sound threatening if they talked about it in English? ED problems? How to deal with rampant diarrhea from eating unfamiliar food? Their no-good children?
However, the most likely explanation is that these guys have different levels of proficiency in English, so the easiest and best understood way to communicate is in their native language. Americans do it all the time in other countries, even Americans who are proficient in the other language.
Why you should learn Arabic?
-You can speak in the native language of good people from the Middle East (see jveritas)
-If you are a Christian, how will you spread the Word of God to muslims (Arab or not) if they can’t understand you?
-Because it is heavily influenced by Aramaic (one of the languages of the Bible). I could understand quite a bit in Passion of the Christ without subtitles.
-So you can read the Koran in the native language and see exactly what we are facing.
-New markets for business.
-So you don’t have to depend on the lazy liberal media to tell you what Arab publications are saying about the West, Jews, etc.
-So you don’t look like an idiot (and get sued) simply because some guys are speaking their native language (people who are risking their families in Iraq if they are discovered).
Gratuitous, irrelevant, non-sequitur statement. How many muslims have been "hired" both in the U.S. and in foreign battle zones who have turned out to be, without question, enemy agents?
I would have been much more satisfied with statement as to what their religion is and what is their country of allegiance (other than the umma, of course, which the normal ignorant American knows nothing about).
Survival is ultimately a personal obligation. It recognizes neither "political correctness" nor State Department double talk nor "racism".
If for example, these people were escorted the entire tme that they are in the US or, better yet, not allowed into the US under any circumstances (the American "students" can travel out), then we wouldn't be having this conversation.
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