FBI denies internet raid was anti-Arab

Police in the United States have denied that a raid they carried out on an internet company serving a host of Arab websites was prompted by anti-Muslim bias.

A spokeswoman for the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Lori Bailey, said they were executing a search warrant as part of a criminal investigation and the action had nothing to do with Middle East issues.

About 80 agents of an anti-terrorism task force raided the premises of InfoCom in Dallas, Texas, on Wednesday and copied information from the company's internet servers.

The action shut down about 500 websites temporarily, including that of a leading television news channel in the Arab world, al-Jazeera.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations, based in Washington, denounced the search as an anti-Muslim witchhunt promoted by the pro-Israel lobby in the United States.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service