A Bay Area American-Islamic group called Wednesday for a federal investigation of Southwest Airlines for “racial and religious profiling of a Muslim passenger” after a UC Berkeley student said he was removed from a flight in April for speaking Arabic.
The San Francisco Bay Area chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Office of Aviation Enforcement and Proceedings, asking it to investigate the airline.
“Nobody deserves to be discriminated against for their perceived religious and racial identity,” said Saba Maher, the civil rights coordinator for the CAIR chapter. “People speak hundreds of different languages and it shouldn’t be seen as a threat.”
Khairuldeen Makhzoomi, a 26-year-old Iraqi refugee and son of a slain Iraqi diplomat, was supposed to fly into Oakland from Los Angeles on April 6. He was asked to leave the flight by a Southwest employee after a passenger raised concerns over him speaking Arabic on his cell phone.
The passenger claimed she heard Makhzoomi use words in Arabic connected to martyrdom, but Makhzoomi said he was using the word “inshallah,” an Arabic term meaning “god willing,” or “hopefully.”
Southwest said in a statement that it removed Makhzoomi from the plane because of “potentially threatening comments made aboard our aircraft” and “further discussion.”
Makhzoomi was speaking to his uncle in Iraq on the phone about a dinner he had attended in Los Angeles the evening before with U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon.
“I had an emotional breakdown and cried a little bit,” Makhzoomi told The Chronicle in an interview shortly after the Southwest incident. “I was so afraid. I was so scared.”
Makhzoomi eventually made it home on a different flight, but Maher said the trauma he has since dealt with was one of the main reasons for filing the complaint with the Department of Transportation. Makhzoomi is not seeking damages from the airline, but is hoping that Southwest will be held accountable and will, at the very least, issue an apology to him, Maher said.
Makhzoomi’s experience with discrimination on an airline or at an airport isn’t uncommon among Muslims and Muslim Americans, especially in this political climate, Maher added. She said that extra diversity training would be crucial for airline employees.
“He was exposed to the most egregious of things that could happen,” Maher said of Makhzoomi. “My hope is that our complaint wouldn’t fall on deaf ears - especially with something as severe and pervasive as this.”
Representatives of Southwest did not respond to request for comment.