Hard-Working Pakistani Immigrant and Victim of Wave of American Islamophobia Sentenced to 86 Years

A shameful black eye on our image abroad.

A Pakistani woman trained as a scientist in the U.S. was sentenced to 86 years in prison Thursday after she was convicted of trying to kill U.S. Army soldiers and FBI agents in Afghanistan two years ago.

Aafia Siddiqui, 38 years old, was convicted in February of grabbing a soldier's M-4 assault rifle and trying to shoot an assembled group of Federal Bureau of Investigation agents and soldiers at an Afghan police compound in July 2008.

The U.S. team had traveled to the compound in Ghazni, Afghanistan, to interview her after she taken into custody by Afghan authorities, prosecutors said. Ms. Siddiqui was found at the time with materials that included handwritten notes referring to a "mass casualty attack" in the U.S. and listed several landmark locations in New York City, prosecutors said.

Prior to her sentencing, Ms. Siddiqui again proclaimed her innocence and disputed claims by her lawyers that she has a mental illness.

The word Muslim, naturally, is omitted from the story.