St. Petersburg Times
June 19, 2003
By Mary Jo Melone
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Leena is a sophomore at USF. You would probably not notice her around the Tampa campus except as another of those Muslim girls in a hijab, the traditional headcovering that manages to not just cover her hair but also disguise her looks.

At home, in her family’s apartment, you see the rest of her, the unveiled Leena. The only thing that gives away her age is the mouthful of braces. She has an oval face, dark brown hair pulled sternly back, brown eyes and an almost scholarly look. Here she is, the girl with the infamous name.

Al-Arian.

As in the alleged supporter of Palestinian terrorism, Al-Arian. The under massive federal indictment Al-Arian.

Around USF, where he taught, the mere mention of Sami Al-Arian’s name supposedly all but sets off grenades. If that was the case, you’d expect his daughter would have suffered some.

But she hasn’t, she says. She has friends, Arabic and non-Arabic. She belongs to student groups. The Model United Nations. The Alliance of Concerned Students. The Religious Studies Club. She was recently elected the club’s treasurer. She’s taking summer courses in religion, politics, economics. She wants to graduate in three years.

This is the world she hangs on to, the normal world that exists alongside the world, in her heart, that has her imprisoned father at its center.

The two worlds collide in her dreams. The dreams take place in her mother’s room, because ever since authorities raided the apartment and carted off her father, Leena Al-Arian and her little brother and two sisters have slept cuddled on the floor of their mother’s room for safety.

In Leena’s dreams, she stands before the judge who hears her father’s case. In a dream she remembers, she has been indicted and arrested. Her cell phone has fallen from her purse. The judge reaches for it. She begins to scream at him. “What more do you want? Haven’t you done enough to my dad?”

In her waking hours, Leena can’t get away from the guilt. She is filled with the sense that she must do something, anything, everything, to win her father’s freedom. “There is so much to do,” she says. “If I don’t help, then who will help?”

That may explain her impulse to become a lawyer. She also wants to finish school as fast as she can. She doesn’t want to be sitting in some boring class when she could be at her father’s trial, set for 2005, tracking every word. And given all that’s happened, she doesn’t have the allegiance to the university that other students do.

“I don’t even plan on going to my own graduation. I can’t see shaking hands with Judy Genshaft after all she’s done.”

At moments, Leena feels distracted by the constant swirl of thoughts about her father. They never quite leave. Sometimes she has to make herself go numb to stop obsessing. She feels deep cynicism well up inside her. Other times, she finds great faith that all will go well.

No matter what you think of Al-Arian or the charges against him, remember that a child should never be held responsible for a father’s sins. Remember that to a daughter, a father is not a criminal, a Palestinian mastermind, but only and always her father.

Sami Al-Arian is at the Coleman Correctional Facility about 70 miles north of Tampa. Leena visits a couple of times a month with her mother. The prison doesn’t have much in the way of niceties, but it does apparently have a card shop. Sami Al-Arian sent one in April when Leena’s birthday arrived. He wrote what any father might write, ignoring the bitter circumstances.

Happy 18!

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