LI imam stopped from boarding flight

A Wyandanch imam was among several religious leaders either kept from boarding flights or removed from airplanes as they headed to a conference in North Carolina.

The incidents have grabbed national headlines as Muslim groups denounce them as examples of the harassment they say Muslims are subjected to due to fear of terrorism.

Al-Amin Abdul Latif, who heads the Islamic Leadership Council of Metropolitan New York, said Tuesday that he was first stopped from boarding an American Airlines flight Friday because of discrepancies between his ticket and driver's license. But he said he was later told he still couldn't fly after he had a new ticket issued and returned the following morning.

"I want to know what it is that I did, other than being an imam," he said. "All of us feel that we could be singled out because of the climate of anti-Islam and the heightened sense of security, but this took me by surprise."

Ed Martelle, a spokesman for American Airlines, said Tuesday the company did not intend to offend. He said he couldn't elaborate on security matters.

"There was no ill intent on the part of any of our employees," he said. "It was a situation that just got very complicated very quickly."

A Transportation Security Administration spokeswoman said Latif was screened and cleared for travel.

Latif's son, Abu Bakar Latif, an imam in Brooklyn, boarded the Friday evening flight, but the airplane was sent back to the gate so he could get off for questioning, his father said.

Ibrahim Hooper, a spokesman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations in Washington, D.C., said the case and similar incidents Friday with two Muslim clerics from Tennessee are worrisome.

All men were wearing Muslim garb that Hooper believed attracted the negative attention. "That should not be tolerated in America," he said.