I got a death threat the other day.
It's hardly the first time.
In fact, back in 2001 alone, I received 11 very specific e-mailed death threats. All of them were directed at me because I am an Arab-American who had the chutzpah to defend Israel from attacks by radical Islamic terrorists and their apologists.
Some of those e-mails, amazingly enough, even included the names of those making the threats. There didn't seem to be much of an effort at obscuring the origin. And I had reason to believe some of them may have represented more than idle threats.
So I filed those reports with the FBI office in Portland, Ore. I was told they would at least check the names against their terrorist database, but no one from the FBI ever got back to me.
A few months later, two highly suspicious Middle Eastern men moved to my very secluded rural neighborhood in the middle of the Redwood forest. They were observed on their deck celebrating wildly on Sept. 11 when their heroes killed 3,000 Americans.
What would two people like that be doing living in a remote part of southern Oregon – a mere stone's throw from WND headquarters and my home?
I thought maybe my friends at the FBI should be alerted. Since this call came shortly after Sept. 11, I noticed the agents were much more interested than they had been previously – when it was only my life being threatened. However, much to my surprise and chagrin, no one from the FBI ever followed up on this very specific concern.
A few months later, Elizabeth and I decided to move to the Washington, D.C., area. Frankly, one of our reasons was because we thought there would be safety in the light.
Well, I survived these last seven years – but I can't credit the FBI with being any help whatsoever.
My experience suggests to me the FBI is not the FBI of Efrem Zimbalist Jr. It's not the FBI of J. Edgar Hoover. Who knows, maybe the FBI mystique was never any more than the creation of some big-government myth machine.
This week, to be cautious, I decided to file a report with the FBI about the latest death threat. I called the Washington field office and briefly introduced myself. I was immediately transferred by someone I would estimate was no more than 22 years old to "Internet Crime Complaint Center," which was closed, but whose answering machine directed me to the website. It didn't take me long to determine this was a government operation that supposedly investigated consumer fraud complaints.
Assuming the young unnamed man I had reached at the FBI had made a mistake, I called back. This time I got an older lady who couldn't quite grasp what I was talking about. After I explained that I was the recipient of a death threat by e-mail and that there was some history of this kind of thing with the FBI field office in Portland, she asked me if I was the victim of Internet fraud.
Astonished at the inability of a grown woman manning the phones of the FBI's Washington field office, I explained once again that this was a death threat and that I had previous death threats filed with the FBI.
She put me on hold.
A few minutes later, I learned I had been transferred to a local police department – but not my local police department, just one nearby Washington, D.C.
The officer I spoke with couldn't quite understand why the call was transferred to her. She said it was her understanding that Internet death threats were definitely an FBI matter – and that was even before she understood I lived and worked outside her jurisdiction!
I decided I would give the FBI another try.
This time I got the original young man. Now he was pretty perturbed that an ordinary taxpaying American would be bothering him during his work shift with something so trivial as a death threat.
"I transferred you to the Internet Crime Complaint Center, why are you calling back?" he asked indignantly.
"Because the Internet Crime Complaint Center is for consumer fraud issues," I explained. "If you work for the FBI, you must know that is not an agency that investigates death threats."
He hung up on me.
I tried to call back, but it seemed clear the Washington field office of the FBI has blocked my calls as some kind of crank.
Now, I'm not overly concerned about the latest threat on my life. My fate is in God's hands. But I do believe in prudence with regard to such matters. I really thought the FBI would want to know.
Maybe someone at the FBI really does care.
If that's the case, that someone will surely want to clean house of the incompetent bumblers taking calls at the field office of the nation's capital.
Maybe someone should remind the phone handlers over there what the FBI's mission is – or is supposed to be. Here's the mission claimed by the FBI on its website: "Our mission is to help protect you, your communities, and your businesses from the most dangerous threats facing our nation – from international and domestic terrorists to spies on U.S. soil … from cyber villains to corrupt government officials … from mobsters to violent gangs … from child predators to serial killers. Learn more here about our work with law enforcement and intelligence partners across the country and around the globe."
Boy, do I feel safer now.