2 years after July War, racist gets imprisoned for saying "The only good Lebanese is a dead Lebanese"
Source: Agencies, compiled, 12-07-2008
A retired U.S. diplomat was sentenced on Friday to one year in prison and fined $10,000 for sending racist, threatening messages to an Arab-American group, the Justice Department said.
The diplomat, Patrick Syring of Arlington, Virginia, sent abusive and intimidating e-mails and voice mails to employees of the Arab American Institute, a Washington group.
He was sentenced in federal court in the U.S. capital after pleading guilty to federal civil rights
charges, the Justice Department said in a statement.
He was alleged to have made such comments during the war waged by ‘Israel' on Lebanon in the summer of 2006. Among his comments in a series of e-mails, Syring wrote that "the only good Arab is a dead Arab."
Federal prosecutors charged in an indictment that Syring had left multiple expletive-laced messages with the Arab American Institute whose founder, James Zogby, had criticized the government for not doing enough to protect U.S. citizens visiting family members in Lebanon.
"The only good Lebanese is a dead Lebanese. The only good Arab is a dead Arab," Syring is alleged to have said, accusing Zogby of being anti-Semitic, prosecutors said.
"You wicked evil Hizbullah-supporting Arabs should burn in the fires of hell for eternity and beyond," Syring wrote in one e-mail, according to the prosecutors. "The United States would be safer without you."
Syring, also praised ‘Israeli' forces for "bombing Lebanon back to the Stone Age where it belongs" and said "Arabs are dogs," according to an e-mail cited in the indictment.
He identified himself in one phone message and sent e-mails from his personal account, prosecutors said. He did not return a message seeking comment left at his home in Arlington, Va.
"They will burn in hellfire on this earth and in the hereafter," said Syring, 50, in an e-mail that was included in the indictment last year.
Syring was a U.S. diplomat in the Middle East and had worked more recently in the Human Resources division at the State Department.
"Threats of violent hate crimes have an impact far greater than the impact on the individual victim," said Grace Chung Becker, Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division.
"These are crimes against the fundamental ideals on which America was founded," she added.
Syring, who retired from the State Department last year, was ordered to serve 100 hours of community service and have three years of post-release supervision, the Justice Department said.
"There is no room in our society for the intolerance of other races or national origins, particularly by those who hold positions within the government," said Jeffrey Taylor, U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia.
The State Department had no immediate comment, but when Syring retired last year, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said utterances such as those made by the ex-diplomat were unacceptable to U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
A retired U.S. diplomat was sentenced on Friday to one year in prison and fined $10,000 for sending racist, threatening messages to an Arab-American group, the Justice Department said.
The diplomat, Patrick Syring of Arlington, Virginia, sent abusive and intimidating e-mails and voice mails to employees of the Arab American Institute, a Washington group.
He was sentenced in federal court in the U.S. capital after pleading guilty to federal civil rights
charges, the Justice Department said in a statement.
He was alleged to have made such comments during the war waged by ‘Israel' on Lebanon in the summer of 2006. Among his comments in a series of e-mails, Syring wrote that "the only good Arab is a dead Arab."
Federal prosecutors charged in an indictment that Syring had left multiple expletive-laced messages with the Arab American Institute whose founder, James Zogby, had criticized the government for not doing enough to protect U.S. citizens visiting family members in Lebanon.
"The only good Lebanese is a dead Lebanese. The only good Arab is a dead Arab," Syring is alleged to have said, accusing Zogby of being anti-Semitic, prosecutors said.
"You wicked evil Hizbullah-supporting Arabs should burn in the fires of hell for eternity and beyond," Syring wrote in one e-mail, according to the prosecutors. "The United States would be safer without you."
Syring, also praised ‘Israeli' forces for "bombing Lebanon back to the Stone Age where it belongs" and said "Arabs are dogs," according to an e-mail cited in the indictment.
He identified himself in one phone message and sent e-mails from his personal account, prosecutors said. He did not return a message seeking comment left at his home in Arlington, Va.
"They will burn in hellfire on this earth and in the hereafter," said Syring, 50, in an e-mail that was included in the indictment last year.
Syring was a U.S. diplomat in the Middle East and had worked more recently in the Human Resources division at the State Department.
"Threats of violent hate crimes have an impact far greater than the impact on the individual victim," said Grace Chung Becker, Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division.
"These are crimes against the fundamental ideals on which America was founded," she added.
Syring, who retired from the State Department last year, was ordered to serve 100 hours of community service and have three years of post-release supervision, the Justice Department said.
"There is no room in our society for the intolerance of other races or national origins, particularly by those who hold positions within the government," said Jeffrey Taylor, U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia.
The State Department had no immediate comment, but when Syring retired last year, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said utterances such as those made by the ex-diplomat were unacceptable to U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
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