The Agence France Presse reports that the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel (PCATI) issues a report on "torture" of detainees by Israeli security forces, based on 547 cases of
arrests and dozens of interrogations conducted over the past year.
"Painful shackling is done for invalid and irrelevant reasons, which
include causing pain and suffering, punishment, intimidation and
illegally eliciting information and confessions," the group said.
It added that the victims were mostly Palestinians detained for
"security" reasons but that the practices had seeped into the
facilities where other categories of detainees are held.
The group added that its findings were supported by the testimony of
soldiers to Breaking the Silence, another Israeli organisation.
The group said detainees are often shackled in painful positions for
hours or days at a time, even when they are being held in highly secure
facilities and are not being interrogated.
Thanks to Rob Browne for headsup.
Torture is inhumane. This is an interesting contrast. http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1095905.html Hardline cleric says Iranian rioters should be executed By News Agencies Tags: israel news A hardline Iranian cleric on Friday called for the execution of "rioters" in the latest sign of the authorities' determination to stamp out opposition to the June 12 presidential election. "I want the judiciary to … punish leading rioters firmly and without showing any mercy to teach everyone a lesson," Ahmad Khatami told worshippers at Tehran University.
I guess execution is more humane.
Cue the excuse-making and rationalizing!
A good investigative reporter might look into whether (hah, document that) the torture movement in the US and Israel has common roots among a Neocon cabal. It occurs in both places. Dershowitz was certainly one of its leading advocates in the US – a "new client?" or just a new case for his "principal client?" As if on cue, 24 appears on our televisions feeding the American public a daily (or hourly) diet of torture, during which the truth is always, or often (I'm not sure because I didn't get into it), extracted just in the nick of time through infliction of pain and suffering. The All-American, experience-and-realism based, tried and true traditions among highly reputable interrogators – in which torture is both reviled as evil and understood not only not to work to extract the truth, but as corrupting and corrosive to the investigative forces when they first turn to and then grow to rely on it, instead of good investigative technique – is marginalized in our mainstream media. Do these parallel phenomena arise independently in our two countries? or are they part of a single Neocon agenda which, in both places, works to accomplish what Naomi Wolf, in the End of America, describes as a fascist shift. Consider her checklist of how such shifts always are engineered, and see if the parallels grab you and incline you to look for common roots of this noxious weed growing in the garden of democracy: 1. Identify a terrifying internal and external threat 2. Establish secret prisons where torture occurs 3. Create a thug caste or paramilitary not answerable to citizens 4. Set up an internal surveillance system 5. Harass citizens' groups 6. Engage in arbitrary detention and release 7. Target key individuals 8. Control the press 9. Treat all political dissenters as traitors 10. Suspend the rule of law As close as Israel and the United States have become, I see a good way forward as only achievable if these common roots are eradicated in both places simultaneously. A "good way forward" might even be defined as a concerted movement away from each of the items on the list.
…and the subject changing. Oh, but that's already begun.
Richard, you should to constantly look for something worse to find. It's boring.
Witty tosses bait. Unwary fish rise.
all this twaddle merely to distract us from what is really happening: Michael Jackson died!!
Your post would make sense, Richard, if Phil were defending the conduct of the Iranian government, or if the US supplied them with billions of dollars per year or if the mainstream press tended to downplay or whitewash their crimes. Since none of that is true, you look like someone trying to whitewash Israel's crimes.
but seriously– If the US is Israel's best friend & ally; And if the US and Israel 'share values,' And if, as Obama has insisted, "America does not torture," Then is it not incumbent upon the US administration and the Congress that they demand of Israel that Israel abjure torture? well…well…maybe after settlements cease, er, kinda don't get too much bigger….
Zionists Lie About Israeli Israeli Torture There is a world of difference from the standpoint of American complicity between
Jewish Conspiracies are real
You seem to simply be trying to change the subject to avoid the issue of Israel's indefensible behavior. Or perhaps you're trying to argue that we shouldn't criticize Israel until the rest of the world solves its own issues. Either way, I'm not convinced. Nothing that anyone else does justifies or excuses Israel's crimes. Can we stay on topic, please?
I'm a bit confused. Is RichardWitty I (the first) the same person as RichardWitty, only with kingly pretensions? (Their prose sounds the same to me.) Which Witty is it that lives/studies in Israel? Would that be Richard II? Wow, these Zionists really do belive their own nation of priestly kings PR. But if Richard I is taken, what is Richard Perele's self-anointed title? The first Dick?
should stop to
It's very transparent of you to avoid the subject matter of this blog entry by talking about IRANIANS (who aren't Arab but are Muslims and so, slippery slope = Palestinians!) doing something inhumane. You pass yourself off as some kind of moderate Zionist but then you do petty dishonest stuff like this. Do you think people don't pick up on this, Witty?
Iranian clerics may have been influenced by the political success of Meir Kahane.
Israelis think it is humane to fire US made missiles into apartment blocks and to shoot children for playing too close to security walls.
Odd, I had the exact same thought. After all his years of posting comments here, Witty still has no clue. He's like a Holocaust denier, same mentality.
Witty probably thinks he's a moderate accountant too-after all, look at what some accountants do for their clients!
Oh, no connection to Israel at all! Just a handful of hillbilly enlisted GIs are responsible for USA torture: http://eldib.wordpress.com/2009/05/30/iraelis-tor...
It is the same person, on a different computer. The article upset me, so I referred to it. I've heard so much apology for Iran here (not from Phil), that I thought the contrast was important to point out. I also read a post by Ali Abunimeh at Electronic Intifada condemning Hamas for being too accommodating to Jimmy Carter, and specifically agreeing in principle that the two-state solution is better than one.
Hmmm – how about a couple of links so I can get a sense of the support for Iran here.
I support Iran. I advocate learning as much as possible and disseminating in every way possible solid information about Iran's culture, politics, and history. I further advocate shining a very bright light on Israel's 40 years of treachery vis a vis Iran, and the cost to Americans of Israel's sick determination to prevent the US from having a positive relationship with Iran. Israel–specifically, the Israel lobby in the US, has been gunning for Iran since 1992, well before anybody knew anything about Ahmadinejad. And the issue is not nukes, its wealth and power — quelle suprise — Israel wants what Iran has, and believes it has a right to take it. Americans need to become aware that in 2002 Iran helped US in Afghanistan, and in 2003 Iran offered Bush a "grand bargain." Accepting that bargain was contrary to Israel's interests, so the Iran's 2003 offer received no response from the Bush administration. Reflect what it means that US tossed away Iran's offer, at Israel's behest: US is now bogged down in Afghanistan; 700 US soldiers have died there. The blood of American soldiers is being shed to accommodate Israel.
Yep. That's the truth. Always recall in context here that the US put in the Shah because Iranian democracy meant no control or especially favorable access to Iranian oil. The arab regimes can be as despotic as they are and does that get 1% of the demonization Iran gets from the US government and MSM?