Colgan: Caught in the chilly shadow of Detroit, is Dearborn, Michigan, population 97,000. An all American town on the industrial belt: Big Macs, big cars -- and home to that American icon, the Ford Motor Company.And yet...
This too is Dearborn – home to the largest Arab-American community in the country. Here, east meets west -- desert cultures, superimposed on an icy middle American landscape.

Brenda: Everybody feels like their house is wired, their phones are tapped, everybody feels like maybe someone is following them. So they’re not as able to express their opinions, not as able to discuss day to day politics with somebody without the fear of – it’s almost a joke nowadays ‘I wonder if they’re listening,’ because every family really feels as though the magnifying glass is looming over them as well. My sister and I were both born here in America. We’re very much proud to be Arab – at the same time proud to be American.

Colgan: 21 year old law student, Brenda Abdelall has watched her community grow more and more fearful. They do feel particularly vulnerable, especially with the war coming up. Our community has been targeted since September 11 and it will continue to be targeted if there is a war. Her Egyptian born parents came here more than 30 years ago – both work for the Ford Motor Company and call the U.S. home.

Mona: Lots of the time now I say, why are we here? Why don’t we sell everything and just go home? We’ve been here for 30 years we’ve worked very hard.

Husband: We’re citizens.

Mona: He works two jobs, I work two jobs. We raised such a beautiful family and to be put in a situation like this I think is very disappointing.

Brenda: The first hate e-mail I received was actually at 11:30 am on Sept 11 and that first e-mail said, may a bomb fall on your house. Well this was actually sent to me on Thursday. He addressed it to me and he referred to me as Princess. It says to think I was in the U.S. Service so that freedom of right of expression were allowed by your kind to build bombs and kill us because you are jealous of our prosperity. Go home and suck up to your dictator leaders. Pass this on to all your Arab, Muslim, Sikh, stupid associates. After a while you receive so many of them, it’s really sad that it’s almost numbing, it’s almost normal.

Colgan: It was Arabs, outsiders, who flew the planes on September 11. But the wide net cast by Federal authorities has dragged the entire Arab American community under suspicion. Thousands of their men have been forced to register, to be interviewed -some detained. Their religion has been ridiculed.

Roberston: If you consider that Mohammed is the prophet of Allah, you look at what he said. What he instructed his followers to do and then what they did for 1400 years of unrelenting warfare against Europe and Christian world then you begin to say, well this is the way they are.

Ali Elahi: Pat Robertson, others, they started accusing Islam and saying prophet Mohammed was a terrorist and insulting the Muslim community. At that time we expected our President to stop this situation, stronger.

Colgan: In response to the attacks of September 11, President George W. Bush gave law enforcement authorities wide-sweeping powers under the new Patriot Act. Greater powers of surveillance, wire-tapping, the use of secret evidence and closed court hearings have become part of the war on terror. FBI agents have been assigned to covertly monitor mosques.

Ali Elahi: To come and secretly collecting info and this type of thing, we thought to be very insulting and negative and we didn’t like the idea.

Colgan: Led by Attorney General John Ashcroft, a campaign is underway to rid the U.S., not only of those linked to terrorism - but those suspected of being so.

John Ashcroft: We will bring justice to the full network of terror.

Osama Siblani: Mr Ashcroft made a statement to me that was appalling. He said you should be thankful that nothing happened to you like what happened to the Japanese.

Colgan: Meaning?

Osama Siblani: That we should have been put in internment camps, you know, detention camps.

Colgan: The spectre of internment camps strikes a deep chord of fear among new Americans. After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, war hysteria gripped the U.S. and President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed orders to forcibly intern 120,000 people of Japanese descent - two-thirds were American citizens. They languished in camps for the duration of the war. Arab American leaders want to believe the U.S. would never commit such an act today – but they cannot predict how deep anti-Arab sentiment will eventually run.

Abdrabboh: When you’re focusing on a particular community and let’s say you’re not an Arab or a Muslim-American, many people think well, if our government is doing that, there must be something there. So there’s that cloud of suspicion that Ashcroft and the policies of our government help reinforce.

Colgan: At the mosque where the Abdelall family prays, the community has rallied around this woman, Salma Al-Rashaid. Her husband has been held in detention for 15 months – accused of links to terrorism.

Salma: My husband has no link whatsoever to terrorism and he is among the first people to stand up after September 11th and cry against that. He has not done anything wrong. If being a Muslim is wrong, then he’s done something wrong.

Colgan: Rabih Haddad, co-founded the Global Relief Fund, one of the biggest Arab-American charity organizations in the U.S. Its mission was to provide money, supplies and medicine to the needy - the United States Government claims it was linked to Al Qaeda and Palestinian terrorist networks. The fund is alleged to have accepted money from a former assistant to Osama bin Laden. Rabih Haddad is now fighting deportation to Lebanon on a visa violation – he has not been charged with any crime nor has the government proven he personally knew of ties to terrorist organisations.

Salma: All those who were arrested after September 11, that had any charge, any link to September 11, were charged, had their day in court and it’s done. Rabih Haddad is still behind bars, a year and three months, no charges – what is this? What is this? How long does it take? For heaven’s sake, how long?

Abdrabboh: West, which is what you’re in now, is primarily very few Arab-American people that live here, and when I grew up here, here’s the home I grew up in to your right , myself and my cousin we were the only two in our graduating class that were Arab-American. So the east and west are actually divided as far as racial neighbourhoods.

Colgan: Young Dearborn lawyer Mo Abdrabboh, has been swamped with civil rights cases.

Abbdrabboh: Good morning your honour, Attorney Mo Abbdrabboh appearing on behalf on Khalil Khalil.

Colgan: The law, he says, is zeroing in on Arab Americans.

Abbdrabboh: There’s absolutely no doubt about it. Every area of law, I’ve noticed more stringent application of it and more selective enforcement of it.

Colgan: To Arab Americans?

Abbdrabboh: Yes. These particular drawers here are post-September 11 cases that I’ve dealt with. Discrimination cases, employment discrimination cases, all the way to civil suits that we’ve filed based on violation of civil rights.
The Patriot Act now legalises many things that in my opinion and in the opinion of many legal scholars, are in direct contravention of our constitution. I think the political climate has not enabled right minded people in the legal community to take that to the Supreme Court and overturn it.

Colgan: If the cost of securing this nation is to make one minority feel uncomfortable for the time being, isn’t it worth it, if it makes the rest of the nation safe and secure?

Osama Siblani: No. It’s not. I don’t believe a single individual liberty, a single individual liberty should be disposed. We have to make an effort in this country to balance security with civil liberties

Colgan: Political campaigner, Osama Siblani is also publisher of the Arab American News, the voice of the community. The irony of their situation, he says, is that Arab Americans helped put the Bush Administration where it is today.

Osama Siblani: We supported, overwhelmingly, George W. Bush and he assured the Arab-American community that he would never forget their support.

Colgan: Around Michigan, Democrat Al Gore beat Republican George W. Bush. But not here in Dearborn – where Mr Bush won by 5000 votes – on a promise of fair treatment for Arab-Americans.

Osama Siblani: 2004 is very close and closing on us. We will vote again and this time we will not vote for Mr Bush – if I have anything to say about this.

Colgan: Dearborn residents have raised their fears with federal authorities. Agents from the FBI, secret service, Border Security, Immigration and others came to town to listen.

Resident: I mean you see the anger in the community, you see what’s going on. We need your help.

Official: We have a broad range of people that we talk to – we do not target, we do not profile – it’s a wide range of individuals that we talk to.

Resident: Will you go on the record tonight in front of all these people, in front of the Arab-American community that if you get the order to round up Arab Americans and put them in concentration camps, you’ll refuse to follow that order, you’ll protest it, you’ll resign?

Official: That is not my personal view, to support camps - as we said at the outset this has been a model district and there’s no reason why, I don’t think, we cannot handle these situations in a way that is fair, that treats people with respect decency and courtesy.

Colgan: But as the night wore on, the promises of action were met with doubts. Did you get the answers you were looking for tonight?

Resident: No, not really. I feel they avoided most of our questions and I feel they don’t have the authority to answer most of our questions. Most of us want peace, most of us want justice, we want to see the happiness, the pursuit of life, liberty and happiness – that is core to the American mantra and what America stands for and we want to see that applied fairly.

Colgan: Fairness, however, is likely to be a casualty of America’s war on terror. In trying to save itself, the United States risks losing what it values most - freedom for all.

Osama Siblani: This is collective punishment. Today it’s the Arab-American community, tomorrow it’s going to be another community. No one is immune. When they take my right, they took the right of every individual living in the United States.