Posted on 09/22/2002 11:12:42 AM PDT by John W
DAVIE, Fla. (AP) - Three medical students who were detained as terror suspects on a Florida highway are now being welcomed by the Miami hospital that turned them away after the incident, an American-Islamic relations activist said. Altaf Ali, executive director for Florida's chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, said Saturday that an agreement was reached last week to let the men study at Larkin Community Hospital, where they had been headed when they were pulled over by police Sept. 13 and detained for 18 hours while robots and bomb-sniffing dogs searched their cars.
The search, sparked by complaints from a woman who said she heard the men making alarming comments in a Georgia restaurant, was broadcast live on national television.
All three men denied any wrongdoing and were released by police without charges, but afterward, Larkin officials said the hospital had arranged to have them study elsewhere. Larkin officials said they had received hundreds of threatening email messages.
Larkin CEO and president Dr. Jack Michel, who attended the Islamic conference in Fort Lauderdale where Ali spoke Saturday, wouldn't confirm the agreement to welcome the men, but did offer his support.
"Their education is not going to be impeded," Michel said, adding that he would "personally ensure" it. "These kids are not going to be average doctors, but good doctors, great doctors."
A hospital supervisor said Sunday that Michel and other Larkin representatives would not be available for further comment.
Ali had arranged for attorneys to help the men - Ayman Gheith, 27, Kambiz Butt, 25, and Omar Choudhary, 23 - in their negotiations with the hospital.
Meanwhile, a physician who was to coordinate the three men's education said he was removed from his position at Larkin because he tried to find another Miami-area hospital for them to train in.
Dr. Enrique Fernandez said he was told Friday by Ross University, which runs the students' training program, that he was dismissed from Larkin. He said he didn't receive an explanation for the move.
Michel called the situation with Fernandez "an internal matter" and wouldn't comment on it.
The PC press declared the woman a racist (she's anglo and southern you know).
Warning:
Stay alert and report suspiscious activity as requested by the government and you will incur the wrath of the America is at Fault propagandists. The only middle eastern murderers the press opposes are the ones who killed one of their own, Daniel Pearl. The 9-11, USS Cole, and even the Africans killed by being in the proximity of a US Embassy victims brought on themselves in their little minds.
One of the best cardiologists I know is a devout Muslim and a fine man. I'd let him take care of me or any of my family. I hate radical Islamism and would like to see it crushed as much as you probably do, but you would be doing yourself a disservice if you refused care from a brilliant doctor like my friend.
-ccm
Actually, if their situation is typical, they will work their @$$es off in residency for more than a hundred hours a week. They'll take call every second or third night, and get an average of four hours sleep a night for three or four years.
Their salary will be from the mid-twenties to the mid-thirties per year, and their hourly income will be less than they could make flipping burgers.
They will work in county hospitals and VA centers, taking care of some of the sickest and poorest patients.
And when they finish, there is at least an 80% chance they will stay here rather than return home, and most likely they will take an unglamorous job in a rural or inner-city location at which American-born doctors turn up their noses.
That said, I hope the investigation was thorough and that they would be sent packing if it showed the slightest degree of criminal intent.
-ccm
DAVIE -- Less than a week after Larkin Community Hospital president enraged Muslim community leaders by turning away three medical students cleared of planning terror attacks, Dr. Jack Michel received a hero’s welcome at a Saturday afternoon Islamic conference.
(snip)
The approximately 200 people who came to hear more than a dozen Islamic leaders speak, hooted and cheered the doctor.
Michel would not confirm that the students would return to Larkin once the publicity died down, but Altaf Ali, the executive director for the Florida chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations that sponsored the event, said the agreement was negotiated last week.
“The message I’m hearing is the hospital administrators, regardless of how many ugly, anonymous threats, have decided they’re not going to turn their backs on the students,” said Howard Simon, American Civil Liberties Union of Florida executive director, calling Michel a “hero.” “It’s my understanding that the students will be welcomed back to the hospital in a few weeks.”
Somehow, I don’t think these Muslims are “scared”….in fact, when I looked at the large picture -- of a Muslim women laughing behind her hand -- accompanying the article in today’s paper, they seem downright amused – and perhaps that was the point of this little “joke,” from its beginning in Calhoun to its apparent end in Miami.
They are probably not terrorists, only sympathizers. The opinion I have from what I've been able to gather from various reports and posts last week and news clips of the bozos, what happened was:
1. they were laughing and joking in a diner on 9-12 about 9-11.
2. they made jokes about the grief we would feel on 9-13 for the new terror as it would be much greater than 9-11.
3. They may have felt they being "profiled" by the good citizens of Georgia as they were all of middle eastern appearance and one had some stupid embrioderied piece of laundry on his head, so
4. They embelished their story with talk which they knew would overheard such as "do you have enough to bring it down?" and " I have contacts who can supply us" and "they thought they were grieving on 9-11, wait untoil 9-13.
5. the lady Eunice who reported them has offered to take lie detector tests to back up that she is not a racist trying to go after the first A-Rabs she has ever seen passing through her town and was honestly concerned over what she heard.
6. The A-Rabs have refused to take a lie detector test.
Browse through the threads from last week, you will be able see all I have with more detail than I can provide with this reply and much more depending on how much time you have.
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