[Seattle-editorial] FEATURE PROPOSAL: Somali Victory

[jonathan lawson]

SUBTITLE: USDA OVERTURNS REPRESSIVE RULING
TITLE: Victory for Somali Grocers

On Tuesday, the USDA overturned a previous ruling which banned three stores 
in Seattle's Somali community from accepting food stamps. The ruling is 
good news for Somali Muslims who rely on the stores for halal meats and 
other dietary staples.
The ban, instituted in March, followed an incident <a 
href="http://seattle.indymedia.org/archive/features/2001/11/2001-11.html#2107">last 
November</a> in which federal agents raided the Maka Mini-Mart and 
confiscated its inventory, claimng that an adjoining money exchange 
business was funneling money to terrorist organizations (the market's owner 
later recovered damages in a court settlement).  Local Somalis and 
community activists charged that both the raid and the food stamp ban were 
fueled by post-9/11 prejudices against immigrant communities.
"We are not protecting the American way of life by suspending the civil 
rights of our own people," says <a href="http://www.hatefreezone.org">Hate 
Free Zone</a> organizer Pramila Jayapal. "This was never the way to go 
about fighting terrorists."

<a href="http://seattle.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=16093">Read the 
full story</a>.