Delta Airlines has denied the claims of a Muslim American YouTube star who said he was removed from a flight because he was speaking Arabic.
In a statement on Wednesday, the airline said Brooklyn-born Adam Saleh was kicked off the flight from London to New York because he was shouting and trying to disrupt the cabin.
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Youtube star kicked off flight 'for speaking Arabic'
Muslim American youtube star Adam Saleh says he was kicked off a Delta Airline flight because he was speaking Arabic.
Saleh, 23, a filmmaker from Manhattan, and his friend Slim Albaher, 22, made international headlines when they claimed the captain of their flight at Heathrow Airport asked them to leave after Saleh spoke in Arabic to his mother, setting off alarm among British passengers on the flight.
Delta Airlines refuted the claim after speaking to crew and passengers on the flight.
![YouTube star Adam Saleh who claims he was kicked off a Delta Airlines flight for speaking Arabic.](/web/20161222095829im_/http://www.smh.com.au/content/dam/images/g/t/g/7/4/r/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gtg6zt.png/1482371268421.jpg)
"Upon landing the crew was debriefed and multiple passenger statements collected. Based on the information collected to date, it appears the customers who were removed sought to disrupt the cabin with provocative behavior, including shouting."
Saleh had been returning to New York from Australia via London, where he had a string of appearances in Melbourne and Sydney.
After arriving in Melbourne on December 10, Saleh made a final appearance at Bankstown Central Shopping Centre in Sydney on Monday.
The Delta news was met on social media with anger against the airline industry, but also skepticism. Saleh, who has more than two million subscribers on YouTube, has a history of perpetuating video hoaxes and pranks, some of them aimed at exposing stereotypes about Muslims.
![YouTube star Adam Saleh who claims he was kicked off a Delta Airlines flight for speaking Arabic.](/web/20161222095829im_/http://www.smh.com.au/content/dam/images/g/t/g/7/4/q/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gtg6zt.png/1482371268421.jpg)
We got kicked out of a @Delta airplane because I spoke Arabic to my mom on the phone and with my friend slim... WTFFFFFFFF please spread pic.twitter.com/P5dQCE0qos
— Adam Saleh (@omgAdamSaleh) December 21, 2016
In his latest YouTube video, posted this month, he pretended to smuggle himself onto a plane in a suitcase on a Tigerair flight from Melbourne to Sydney.
![Tigerair released this image of Saleh (right) boarding his flight after his latest video was a hoax.](/web/20161222095829im_/http://www.smh.com.au/content/dam/images/g/t/g/7/j/t/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gtg6zt.png/1482371268421.jpg)
Tigerair disputed the video was a hoax, telling Saleh on Twitter they had video of him boarding the flight. They later released Melbourne Airport security footage of him boarding the flight at the gate with two travel companions.
In a phone interview on Wednesday from Heathrow before he and Albaher boarded a new flight, Saleh insisted this was not a stunt: "The only thing I can say is, I would never film a phone video. That's when it's really serious, and I must film." His video camera was in his luggage.
Delta is reviewing the incident. Morgan Durrant, a spokesman for the airline, said in a statement that two passengers had been removed from the flight after "a disturbance in the cabin resulted in more than 20 customers expressing their discomfort."
He did not identify the passengers nor would the airline elaborate on the statement.
"We are taking allegations of discrimination very seriously," it said. "Our culture requires treating others with respect."
Camilla Goodman, a spokeswoman for London's Metropolitan Police confirmed that two passengers had been removed from the flight and that they "didn't do anything lawfully wrong." They were not arrested, she said. Saleh and Albaher later boarded a Virgin flight to New York.
@omgAdamSaleh Nice try Adam, but definitely a few inconsistencies with this vid, namely the fact we have footage of you boarding the plane!
— Tigerair Australia (@TigerairAU) December 14, 2016
In Periscope videos and the interview with The Times, Saleh and Albaher gave their version of events.
Saleh said he had just spoken to his mother on the phone, in Arabic, to tell her when his flight would land. After the call, he and Albaher continued to speak briefly in Arabic, when they were interrupted by a woman in front of them who asked them to speak English because they were making her uncomfortable.
They did not respond aggressively, Saleh said, but told her that they were speaking Arabic and asked whether she had ever heard another language. Then, Saleh said, a man with a British accent who appeared to be travelling with her swore at them and said that they be "chucked" off the plane.
"At this point, me and Slim looked at each other," Saleh said in the interview. "We didn't know what to do. We felt like we were terrorists."
The situation escalated, Saleh said, and other passengers joined in asking that Saleh and Albaher be kicked off the plane. Some of them mentioned Monday's terrorist attack in Berlin, he said.
After the disturbance continued for what Saleh said was about seven minutes, the captain was summoned, and he asked that the two men leave the plane with their baggage.
At that point, Saleh started filming with his phone. He later shared the video and others from the airport on Twitter, where he has more than 250,000 followers.
In the footage, Saleh was being escorted from the plane as he pointed out passengers who were heckling him, yelling goodbye and waving at the camera.
"You guys are racist," Saleh shouts in the video, as he retells the story of the confrontation. "Six white people against us bearded men."
With Saleh's large following, the story quickly took off, and many people were immediately critical of Delta.
Reports of Muslims being asked to leave planes have risen in recent months, according to advocacy groups. Zainab Chaudry, a spokeswoman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations, the United State's largest Muslim civil rights group, said in a phone interview that "more and more reports have been made of Muslims or Arabs, or people who were perceived to be Muslim or Arabs who were removed from planes by airline personnel.
"There isn't one particular airline I can point to and say we've been hearing more reports on this airline than others," she said. "Delta has not been one of the more common offenders."
In April, a college student was removed from a Southwest Airlines flight in California when he was heard speaking Arabic, a week after a Muslim woman was asked to leave another Southwest flight when she asked to switch seats. In May, an Italian professor was removed from an American Airlines flight when a passenger reported becoming alarmed by his handwritten notes, which were in fact math equations.
Saleh and Albaher, who are best friends and frequently work together, had recently travelled to Kuala Lumpur and Sydney to perform their stage show, which mixes comedy with inspirational speaking. Their audience largely consists of English-speaking Muslim youth from around the world, Albaher said, though he added that "a bunch of other people watch us, too."
Saleh was born and raised in New York City. After the September 11, 2001, attacks, he was afraid to tell people he was Muslim, but he later embraced his culture and religion. "I wanted to show people we can have fun, we can be normal just like everyone else," he said.
New York Times