Republican presidential candidate, Ron Paul, is calling Al-Awlaki's assassination "an impeachable offense," and says that the administration "flouted the law" and is moving towards "tyranny." These are strong words and not unexpected in campaign season, but they do have a disturbing ring of truth.
This may be the first time the United States government has targeted one of its own citizens after placing him on the enemy combatant kill or capture list, without satisfactorily explaining why he was not entitled to arrest, a fair trial or constitutional "due process of law" like other U.S. citizens.
The Justice Department on October 2, 2011 gave the CIA approval to kill Al-Awlaki on grounds of "self-defense" because he was "targeting U.S. citizens." But so far we have been offered no visible proof that he was anything more than a crazy militant ideologue, instigating others to violence, without firing a shot himself.
Political assassinations were banned by President Gerald Ford in 1976, so people on the CIA list are assumed to be military enemies of the U.S. and therefore legitimate targets. The underlying unease about Al-Awlaki's assassination is that there is considerable argument about whether he had become "operational" and was actively plotting or whether he was merely inspiring terrorism. It is unfortunate that more information, if indeed it exists, is not made public to help clarify the situation.
On July 16, 2010 the U.S. Treasury added his name to their list of Specially Designated Global Terrorists and he was banned from travelling to the U.S.. The United Nations Security Council Resolution 1267 then placed Al-Awlaki on its list of al Qaeda associates, saying that he was the al Qaeda leader in the Arabian Peninsula and was actively involved in recruiting and training camps. In September 2010, the United Kingdom's MI 5 said that Al-Awlaki was the West's public enemy number one.
Al-Awlaki may have been on everyone's list by then but he was still an American citizen and the legality of making him a terrorist target for assassination was challenged, unsuccessfully, by the American Civil Liberties Union. At the request of Al-Awlaki's father, they sought an injunction in August 2010 to prevent the targeted killing and asked the government to reveal the standards by which an American citizen may be "targeted for death." The lawsuit was thrown out by the judge and the information sought was not provided.
Perhaps the issue would not have the same pertinence if the U.S. State Department had indeed stripped Al-Awlaki of his citizenship as was proposed by Rep Charlie Dent (R.PA) in April 2010. Dent introduced a resolution urging the U.S. State Department to issue a "certificate of loss of nationality" to Al-Awlaki. He said Al-Awlaki "preaches a culture of hate" and had been a functioning member of al Qaeda "since before 9/11," and had effectively renounced his citizenship by engaging in treasonous acts. But the proposal never made it out of subcommittee.
It was once possible to lose one's U.S. citizenship by fighting in another country's army against the United States but the Supreme Court has found that unconstitutional under the 14th amendment. Ironically, the virulently anti-semitic cleric's citizenship was protected by a case that involved a dual U.S.-Israeli citizen fighting to keep his U.S. citizenship after voting in an Israeli election.
There is no doubt that Al-Awlaki was a radical advocate for terrorism and has probably been responsible for inciting the deaths of many innocents. But the summary execution of a citizen, based on evidence that is being withheld from the public because of security implications, has been described by a commentator in the UK Guardian as "abandoning our own values" in the pursuit of the war against terror. Obama has repeatedly said that we do not have to make a false choice between security and values, but his subsequent actions seem to raise uneasy questions about accountability and due process.
Since January 2010, the White House has been considering the legalities of attempting to kill Al-Awlaki and finally ruled that it was permissible "under international law" although conceding it was a rare "if not unprecedented" move because of his citizenship.
It seems somewhat disingenuous for the administration to quote international law considering that the U.S. is not a signatory to the UN International Court, having withdrawn in 2002 on the grounds that "the United States will regard as illegitimate any attempt by the court or state parties to the treaty to assert the ICC's jurisdiction over American citizens." Trying to bring the U.S. counterterrorism practices in line with either international or domestic law is obviously a gray area as capabilities, techniques and technological innovations are outpacing the creation of laws to cover them.
It is timely that the circumstances surrounding Al-Awlaki's death should be reviewed and that the international debate be continued about drone strikes. Clarity is needed about their "legality" and definitions are also needed of imminent threat, hot battlefield and the right to take military action in countries where governments are unwilling or unable to take that action themselves.
The justifications for killing Al-Awlaki will continue, but in the meantime, little has been said about the death of his companion, also a U.S. citizen. Samir Khan was an editor of the al Qaeda publication Inspire and has never been accused of plotting attacks against Americans. He was collateral damage in an increasingly murky world where citizens' civil rights are being overlooked in the pursuit of security, and hopes of peace being destroyed in the process.
Dr Azeem Ibrahim is a Fellow and Member of the Board of Directors at the Institute of Social Policy and Understanding and a former Research Scholar at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard and World Fellow at Yale.
More writings here: www.azeemibrahim.com
Follow Azeem Ibrahim on Twitter: www.twitter.com/@AzeemIbrahim
Feisal G. Mohamed: A Farewell to Due Process: The Assassination of Anwar Al-Awlaki
Peter Van Buren: U.S. Executes American Citizen Al-Awlaki Without Trial
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Terror Propagandist Anwar al-Awlaki Killed in Yemen | Blogs ...
Al Qaeda's Anwar al-Awlaki killed in Yemen - CBS News
Anwar al-Awlaki killed in Yemen - Middle East - Al Jazeera English
Al-Awlaki strike did not kill bombmaker - ABC News
Anwar al-Awlaki killed in Yemen - as it happened | World news ...
US officials warn of possible retaliation after al Qaeda cleric is killed
It is ironic that I am now more afraid of my government under Obama than I was under Dubya/Cheney (and I loathe Dubya/Cheney). That is a truly disturbing thought to me ....
actions. He abrogated his contract with the human race.
This is a quote from the artiicle above. I am sorry but when we declared war on terrorism and Bin Laden declared a fatwa on the United States, everyone who was a member of Al Queda became an enemy combatent. There is a reason he did not call his local embassy and plead his case.
This war you speak of is a never ending war, so it is NOT a war at all. It is something else,
Whatever you call it, it is not remotely a war, it is a place where the most powerful nation believes it is entitled to invade, occupy, bomb, assasinate, etc. etc. any place and anyone it likes.
Now I ask you, how long do you think that will stand? There are other bullies on the block, and there are others who are very strong as well.
Within the space of 24 hours, the story was completely reversed and
inflated into a massive terror plot involving dozens of suspect
packages supposedly bound for synagogues in Chicago. How could packages
that after being tested for explosives were labeled duds suddenly
become ‘massive and powerful explosive devices’? This proves that the
story was manipulated at an early stage so that it could be feverishly
overblown and exploited for political purposes, just as a number of
contrived terror alerts were issued for political gain by the Bush
administration, as former Homeland Security chief Tom Ridge admitted."
and Osama's top generals (like Awlaki), O Mama!!
8 yrs -Bush tried, but couldn't, O Damn-A!!
His US citizenship doesn't make him any less an enemy combatant.
He was the kind of person for whom predator drones were designed.
Kudos to whoever pulled the trigger on this one.
Nice target acquisition and shooting.
I wonder who's next.
---Tapper interviewing Carney---
Tapper: Do you plan on bringing before the public any proof of these charges?
Carney: The question makes us, you know—has embedded within it assumptions about the circumstances of his death that I’m just not going to address.
Tapper: He’s dead. You are asserting that he had operational control of the cargo plot, and the Abdul Multallah plot. He’s now dead. Can you show us, or the American people—Has a judge been shown?
Carney: I’m not going to go any further than what I’ve said about the circumstances of his death and—
Tapper: Is there going to be any evidence presented?
Carney: I don’t have anything for you on that.
Tapper: Does the administration not see at all how a president asserting that he has the right to kill an American citizen without due process, and that he’s not even going to explain why he thinks he has that right, is troublesome to some people?
Carney: I wasn’t aware of any of those things that you said actually happening, and again I’m not going to address the circumstances of al-Awlaki’s death. Again, it’s an important fact that this terrorist who was actively plotting-- had plotted in the past, and was actively plotting to attack Americans and American interests is dead. But I’m not going to, from any angle, discuss the circumstances of his death.
Even with these assurances Obama knew that the possibility of acquittal was present in the criminal justice system. Hence we see displayed the logical consequence: assassination of all future key terrorist leaders -- to avoid the risk that the criminal system might fail to convict. One consequence is the loss of valuable information that might come from intense interrogations. All of this is given up to preserve the sham of treating terrorists as criminals. What is the ultimate injustice? Treating terrorists as terrorists, or assassinating the leaders of terrorism out of fear that they might escape justice?
Summary execution of someone, however heinous and evil they may be, undercuts the foundation of the rule of law. This is not an abstract problem. If we do not have rule of law, then we have rule of individuals, and we do not want to open that can of worms.
I suppose with bin Laden, we can take solace in the fact the man was not an American citizen and was killed on Pakistani soil. So maybe (maybe) one could argue the Constitution does not apply. But in al-Awlaki's case, I have a great deal of trouble understanding why there is no due process. A great deal of trouble indeed.