News Right Now: Renewed Surveillance

Last week, minutes after the expiration, The US Senate voted in favour to reauthorize Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA for another 2 years. This law enables US intelligence agencies to conduct electronic surveillance, in order words – SPYING to collect foreign intelligence- without seeking a judicial warrant.

US national security officials claimed that the surveillance tool since its creation in 2008, has been crucial in disrupting terrorist attacks, cyber intrusions, foreign espionage and has also produced intelligence that the U.S. has relied on for specific operations, such as the 2022 killing of al-Qaida leader Ayman al-Zawahri in Afghanistan. However, what has been made very clear, is this law has ONLY given agencies the green light to pry on its citizens, invade their privacy and in fact give them no space to- in their own terms- “exercise their rights and freedoms.” According to a ruling from a Fisa court judge - The FBI abused its authority under the law no fewer than 300,000 times in 2020 and 2021. A declassified report from 2023, for example, revealed that the FBI had used Section 702 to investigate Black Lives Matter protesters. Section 702 has also been used to spy on American journalists and undermining their ability to speak with foreign sources confidentially – something reporters must do frequently. It was also conjectured that the law would give way to spy on Americans protesting against the war in Gaza.

With such a law in place, intelligence agencies have used and abused their power and positions to create an environment of fear and intimidation within the societies whereby citizens cannot voice and express their views and opinions without the thought lingering that they could be flagged up. This is a clear  injustice.

Regardless of the reasonable opposition against such a bill, the reauthorization has shown the US could care less about their proclaimed values and democratic rights they boast to the whole world about! Their hypocrisy has been exposed and world witnesses that they are ready to go to any extent in infringing, demeaning and sacrificing everything and everyone along the way, in order to keep quash any form of expression against them or their insubstantial failure of a system.

We pray that Allah SWT further exposes them and allow for them to be replaced by the beautiful and just system of Islam ameen.

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