Nahla Al-Arian, Sami Al-Arian’s wife, said the trial “showed there was no case and my husband was innocent,” the Miami Herald reported.

Al-Arian, a former University of South Florida professor in Tampa, is a supporter of the struggle for the rights of the Palestinian people. University officials fired him shortly after he was indicted in 2003. Two others, Sameeh Hammoudeh and Ghassan Zayed Ballut, were found not guilty of all charges and released. Hatem Naji Fariz was acquitted on 24 charges, with the jury unable to decide on eight others.

After 33 months in jail, Al-Arian and Fariz were returned to prison while prosecutors decide whether to retry them on the deadlocked charges.

The four had been accused of “racketeering, conspiracy to maim and murder,” and of providing material support to Palestinian Islamic Jihad, which the U.S. government has labeled a “terrorist organization.”

After more than five months of testimony by nearly 80 witnesses and the presentation of 1,800 faxes, wiretap transcripts, e-mail, and other exhibits, prosecutors conceded that none of the evidence linked the defendants to “terrorist” acts.

The U.S. Constitution “protects Dr. Al-Arian for his speech,” William Moffitt, one of Al-Arian’s lawyers, told reporters. “The fact that Dr. Al-Arian is a Palestinian deprives him of no civil rights.”

In an interview, Melva Underbakke, an activist in Tampa-based Friends for Human Rights, which has defended Sami Al-Arian, said that her group “organized people to attend the trial, and we had someone in the courtroom almost every day. Every Monday we had people outside the courthouse with signs saying, ‘Everyone deserves a fair trial’ and ‘Charity to women and children is not terrorism.’ On the two-year anniversary of his arrest, before the trial began, we held a candlelight vigil outside the jail where Dr. Al-Arian was being held. I feel we may have had an impact on the jury by showing them that if they returned a ‘not guilty’ verdict, they weren’t alone, that many people in the community were for justice and weren’t afraid to speak up against the government. There was a lot of media-driven pressure in the community to convict.”

After the verdict, an editorial in the St. Petersburg Times said the trial showed “the fairness of the American justice system.” It then declared, “As a legal resident, Al-Arian has abused this nation’s hospitality and engaged in conduct that may warrant his deportation.”

Federal authorities are now considering deporting Sami Al-Arian, a U.S. permanent resident since 1989.

The burden of proof for deportation on “terrorism” charges is lower than in criminal courts.

A rally was held in front of the courthouse December 13 to demand that Al-Arian be released now and not be deported.  
 
 
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