BERKELEY, California, 27 May 2004 — Millions of witnesses were shocked and appalled by graphic photographs of American soldiers reveling the vicious inhumane torture and sexual abuse of Iraqi prisoners in Abu Ghraib, a US-run prison outside Baghdad, notorious for torture and massive executions under Saddam Hussein. But for the heroic resolve of Specialist Joseph M. Darby to put an end to the torture, the world would not have known the nature of the “liberation” we are imposing on Iraq. ‘There are some things going on here that I can’t live with, “ reported M.P. Darby, presenting photographs depicting images of a prisoner, his head covered in a Ku Klux Klan-style hood with wires fixed to his fingers, toes and genitals (told that he would be electrocuted if he stepped down the from the block on which he was held standing), nude inmates piled in a human pyramid, a triumphant Chip Frederick sitting on top of a naked prisoner, Pte. Lynndie England showing a “thumbs-up” sign while pointing to the genitals of a detainee forced to masturbate, a dog attacking a prisoner, stripped inmates being forced to simulate sex and also beating one another.
In a Muslim society where modesty is a matter of principle, to force men and women into public nudity is humiliating enough, let alone torturing them into committing overt sexual acts. “Simulated sex” and rape have a deadly effect on modest Muslim women who are known to set themselves on fire if they have been “defiled,” their dignity and integrity violated. Also, Muslim men have a traditional distaste against any form of homosexual behavior. To rape young male teenagers, to insert foreign objects into an adult male’s orifices or to attach electrical wires to his genitals are the worse possible assault to the core of their being.
Yet, the “Muslim factor”, did not deter American soldiers from knowing violation of not only the Geneva conventions and the US Army rules, but of any basic human value. In Abu Ghraib, the M.P. were required to “break down” the inmates to “make them talk” to their interrogators by subjecting them to denial of food and water, sleep deprivation; taking away their clothes, mattresses and sheets; handcuffing and shackling, repeated beatings, forcing Iraqi men to sexual intercourse with young teenagers, putting dog collars on their necks and solitary confinement in dog houses.
Adding insult to injury of Muslims who have a long history of enmity with Israeli authorities, is that some “private contractors” who ordered the “softening up” were reportedly trained by Mossad, the Israeli secret police, well familiar with the Muslims’ “soft spots.” Under duress, many prisoners are forced to “cooperate” by lying and telling what their torturers want to hear, just to stop the endless degradation. Systematic illegal abuse of detainees was routinely perpetrated at all levels against nearly 4000 detainees crammed into small cells, most of them innocent women and children.
Disciplinary measures are pending against seven low-ranking soldiers charged with abusing and sexually humiliating detainees. Others are also “being investigated” for torture and homicide. These, however, are merely used as scapegoats to blow smoke over a horrendous institutionalized system of torture in the army prison system. The way the high— ranking military “intelligence” personnel and Pentagon’s hired guns methodically train our “liberation forces” to dehumanize, demonize, torture, and violate the very integrity of POWs is truly horrifying. What is more appalling is when we condone the torture and killings by closing our eyes and ears, looking the other way, remaining silent for fear of retribution and keeping the real perpetrators in power. The main culprits are higher up.
On Sept. 11, 2001, nineteen men crashed four hijacked planes into the WTC and the Pentagon, both symbols of US imperialism. Nearly three thousand innocent people from across the globe were brutally set ablaze. The US government emphasized ad nauseum, that all nineteen men were Muslims. Hence, all Muslims were portrayed as terrorists, denigrated to enemy status and became the object of hundreds of untold hate crimes, many of which go unpunished. When President Bush himself uses nineteen men to represent over one billion Muslims in the world, against whom to wage his “holy war for freedom,” what can we expect from his subordinates?
When 9/11 occurred, the whole world cried out against the perpetrators of the WTC disaster. In less than one year, we managed to arouse the outrage of people worldwide by supporting a president who is on a crusade to create an empire through pre-emptive strikes. It didn’t take long before we fueled the anger of Muslims around the world, and average Iraqi people, not foreigners and “insurgents,” but “revolutionaries” who are not afraid to fight to the last breath to reclaim their country from foreign occupation.
If Bush thinks that saying “I didn’t like it one bit” or talking on US-run televisions broadcasted in Arab countries will squelch the international public outrage, he is sadly mistaken. Only idiots will buy into their lies about “investigating and bringing the perpetrators to justice” even as they refuse to disclose the names of all individuals being investigated and the investigation details. Without independent scrutiny by organizations such as Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and the Red Cross, the president is wasting his breath.
When are we going to wake up and bring the real offenders to justice? The blame needs to roll uphill. No one is above the law. We should bring to account not only the ill-trained soldiers and armed mercenaries who are paid out of our tax dollars to commend the “Chip Federicks” for their “great job,” but also bring to justice the president and his notorious attorney general who have torn to shreds our Constitution and hard-won Bill of Rights. Each time we go to the polls, we need to remember our roles as free citizens and elect individuals who truly care about our rights and interests, not the value of their stocks or the balance of their bank accounts. We must empower those who let their actions speak for their values, those who prove patriotic by honoring human integrity, those who respect the right to dissent against losing our basic freedoms in the guise of “national security”, those who refuse to use our youth as human shields in legally and morally wrong wars which lead to lamentable bloodshed. We need to remember that freedom, love, active compassion and justice for ALL are the only true American values. Not hatred, vengeance, torture and destruction. We must lift our voices and let our leaders know that we will not forget or forgive what they have done in our name.
And we must let the world know that what our unelected government officials do in our name does not represent the true values and ideals of the people of the United States. If not now, then when?
— Ramona Shashaani is an Iranian-American human rights activist based in Berkeley, California.
E-mail: [email protected]
