The FBI Thinks I'm Pretty

Alia Malek, author of A Country Called Amreeka: Arab Roots, American Stories, recounts a peculiar encounter during a book signing in “On Book Tour With…” a column in the Panorama Book Review.

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With the recent release of my book on Arab America, friends have been teasing me that I was or would soon find myself on some sort of government watch list. Not because my book is polemical but because Arab and Muslim Americans have come to be regarded as a potential fifth column, and a book about them might catch the government’s eye. Call it black humor if you will.

Then, at a recent signing at an Arab-American cultural space, the FBI did in fact show up. They didn’t wear nametags or badges or any kind of disguise. They drank sodas, they ate baklawa, they looked at posters of nineteenth-century Arab women’s clothing. They even bought my book.

How did I know they were FBI? They didn’t exactly blend in, so before the reading I went up to them; they were sitting in the back corner of the room. After exchanging a few pleasantries, I asked with a smile: “What agency do you all work for?”

They were surprised, but recovered quickly from the brash- ness of my remark. “DOJ,” they said. Department of Justice.

“Wow,” I said, “I used to work for DOJ too!” That seemed to surprise them, too. “Uh, it’s in the bio,” I said, nodding to the copy of my book sitting in one fella’s lap.

He flipped it open. “You’re pretty,” he said, looking at the picture, suggesting that either I was less pretty in person or too pretty to be an Arab.

“I was in the Civil Rights Division,” I continued. “What division do you guys work for?”

They said all kinds of names that I did not recognize, so finally I asked if they were FBI. A jumble of words came out, including “Yes” and “Community Outreach.”

I asked if I should direct my comments into the pens in their lapel pockets. The one without my book told me he had been in the Peace Corps. I think he figured this would show he was down.

“Ah, so you’re also CIA,” I joked.

“You should do stand-up,” he said, adding it was too bad I had ever left DOJ. They asked me why I did.

I had, in fact, resigned for several reasons, including every thing other DOJ divisions were doing post- 9/11 to eviscerate civil liberties and the Constitution, and everything the Civil Rights Division wasn’t doing to protect our rights and that Constitution. “Not enough attorney development,” I demurred.

Before the reading started, I asked folks from the cultural center if the FBI often showed up. They told me that the same agents had come to an Iftar dinner during Ramadan. WTF, I thought, but calmed myself by chanting quietly “teaching moment.” I introduced the book, read, and fielded questions. The agents took particular interest in the 1985 murder of Arab American activist Alex Odeh, which is described in my book; the FBI has yet to find his killers and their website says they are seeking information.

The agents lingered afterward as I signed books, indulged in more baklawa and stared at more traditional-clothing drawings. The one with the book asked me to sign his copy.

“You’ll have my fingerprints now,” I winked at him.

He then slipped me his business card. It looked official enough, with FBI insignia, though there was no mention of community outreach. He was identified only as a “special agent.” Under that card, his colleague slipped another. His had nothing on it, just what appeared to be a name, email address, and telephone number typed onto a blank field.

“I guess you roll Deep Throat-style?” I asked. He reminded me with pride that Deep Throat had been one of the top officials at the agency. I guess he wanted me to know that not only was he Peace Corps-down, he was whistleblower-down.

“Here’s a souvenir,” they said as they prepared to leave, handing me a silver-dollar-sized token. On one side was the FBI seal and on the other, a relief of a 49er in the middle of a stream, a chunk of gold in his pan. I asked if it would get me out of a random search at airports. Chuckling, they repeated, “Stand-up.” The down agent started to say several words in Arabic—turns out he’s been studying.

As soon as they left, my non-Arab American friends let their jaws drop. They couldn’t believe how unruffled I and the center’s patrons were. Were their watch-list jokes funnier now, or just surreal?

With the silver token in front of us, we started speaking into it jokingly, until someone decided to drown it in a cup of hot coffee. Just in case.