by Therese Saliba

For the last twenty years, Michel Shehadeh was accused by the US government of being a terrorist. In 1987, he was arrested in an early morning raid by armed federal agents in Los Angeles along with 6 other Palestinian men and a Kenyan woman. They were jailed for 23 days in a maximum security cell, then released while the government tried to deport them. Through numerous court rulings and appeals, their case made it to the Supreme Court . On October 30, 2007, after what Shehadeh describes as “20 grueling years,” the federal government dropped all charges against the LA-8.

Michel Shehadeh and Joan Mandell in Olympia (Photo by Therese Saliba)