These are dangers that cannot be fully understood without the words of the people who face them directly, who live an existence where dodging persecution is a daily ritual that accompanies their five prayers or their fasts. I met these Muslims wherever I could, and they were keen on meeting me and sharing stories that few others care to hear. We spoke near their schools and in their living rooms, in neighborhoods that they have never left and cities where they live as exiles. When the pandemic arrived and everybody was quarantined and confined, I spoke to even more Muslims around the globe, conducting virtual interviews and meetings, communicating on social media platforms and phone apps, connecting on digital terrain where our virtual footprint likely summoned the scrutiny of agents from Washington and other new War on Terror capitals.

SEED: The method of giving voice to those facing persecution — and the surveillance risk of interviewing them digitally — could seed an essay on ethical journalism and source protection in the surveillance era. XREF: Connects to the author's broader methodology across books of witnessing and testimony from marginalized communities.

Khaled A. Beydoun, The New Crusades_ Islamopho…, loc. 157