‘Most oppressed Muslim woman in the world’ now denied religious solace

Why does the US Bureau of Prisons refuse to allow Dr Aafia Siddiqui visits from an imam?

We have recently – imam and lawyer – joined forces, along with so many unsung heroes, to demand respect for the humanity of Dr Aafia Siddiqui. She is often called the “Most Oppressed Muslim Woman in the World” – and with good cause. There is no other woman who went through the full US Rendition to Torture program. There is no other example of a case where a woman was abducted by the CIA and their Pakistani co-conspirators along with her three small children.

And is there a parent in the world who does not tremble at the fate that befell those kids? Suleman, aged 6 months, was apparently killed when he was dropped on his head during the abduction. The CIA has never let Aafia know, but this happened on March 30, 2003, in Karachi, so it seems unlikely that the child is still alive. Yet which fate would be worse for the mother – to know the infant who was so recently a part of your body is dead? Or to hold out a faint hope two decades later that he lives?

It might seem obvious that Suleman did die once you hear what our government – the US – did to the other two. Mariam, aged 3, was taken all the way to Afghanistan, a war zone, where her name was changed to Fatima and she was involuntarily put in a family of white Christian Americans for seven years. She would still be there but for former President Hamid Karzai, who later helped get her home.

Then there is Ahmed, who was taken to Kabul and put in prison, at the age of six! He was told his name henceforth was to be Ihsan Ali and that he would be killed if he said it was anything else. Ahmed and Mariam are both US citizens, and it is mind-boggling that the CIA, sworn to uphold the US Constitution, would do this to two children from anywhere, let alone kids carrying US passports.

Aafia was herself taken to Bagram Airbase in Afghanistan where she endured five years of torture. Eventually, through an agonizing path, she ended up in FMC Carswell, a federal women’s prison in Fort Worth, Texas, serving what is essentially a life sentence.

This article is not the forum in which to contest her guilt – whatever our well-founded doubts – so let us pretend she really did try to kill an American soldier, even though she was the only person to be shot. Regardless, it is a common thread in most faiths that we should remember those in distress, and that’s part of what brings the two of us together in this struggle for Aafia. In the Quran we are told, “And they give food from their sustenance, in spite of their love for it, to the needy, the orphan, and the captive…” (Insaan “The Human” 76:8). The Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) famously taught that “no one of you believes until he loves for his brother what he loves for himself” (Bukhari). In the Bible, a verse reads that we should “continue to remember those in prison as if you were together with them in prison, and those who are mistreated as if you yourselves were suffering”. (Hebrews 13:3)

Empathy is a pronounced value in our traditions, and if ever there was someone who needs religious solace right now, it is Aafia Siddiqui. So when she told her volunteer lawyer (Clive Stafford Smith) that she had not had an imam during her 16 years in prison, let alone the five years of torture before that, Clive reached out to Imam Omar, who immediately agreed to visit her every couple of weeks to give her spiritual assistance.

This was months ago, and each time we chased up the prison authorities, they came up with a new reason to do nothing. First, they wanted their form filled out. We did that. Then they said they needed a driver’s licence and proof of being an imam. Then they said they did not have the documents they needed, and we asked what else they needed. Months went by and they requested strange documentation that demonstrated they had no intention to facilitate Aafia’s request.

Last month Clive’s team demanded to know when this was going to get resolved. We were told nothing. Then this week we were told that they had denied Omar’s right to help Aafia: “This memorandum is to advise of the denial of visiting for Imam Suleiman.” The memorandum is dated September 26 – meaning it was written two months ago, but they had not bothered to tell us until now.

No reason is given. The Biden administration has laboured long and hard to alienate Muslim Americans in its blinkered support for Israel’s war crimes in Gaza, but it is difficult to understand why this request would be denied. Is it because of other human rights advocacy? Could it be precipitated by previous tweets and protests demanding that there should be justice for Aafia? Or could it be that demanding an end to the atrocities against the Palestinian people has once again alienated us from yet another basic space in which to function?

Today Clive and his colleagues have filed a suit in federal court to force the issue, yet it should not take a lawsuit for the Carswell authorities to respect fundamental religious rights – they could just read the Bible, the Quran or maybe even just the First Amendment to the US Constitution.

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Clive Stafford Smith is a human rights lawyer and director of the UK charity 3DC, 3dc.org.uk

Imam Omar Suleiman is an American Muslim scholar and theologically driven activist for human rights. He is the Founder and President of the Yaqeen Institute for Islamic Research, and a Professor of Islamic Studies at Southern Methodist University.