Don Rumsfeld let Israeli Mossad agents "Torture" Iraqi prisoners?
k.hawley 11 May 2004 17:53 GMTDon Rumsfeld let Israeli Mossad agents "Torture" Iraqi prisoners?
Did U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld allow Israeli Mossad (Secret Police) agents to devise,orchestrate and oversee the Torture and Abuse of Iraqi prisoners in Fallujah and throughout Iraq?
Experts on the Middle East,especially on Islam conclude that the abuse and torture the Iraqi prisoners suffered in Fallujah were and are similiar and identical to the kinds of humiliation and torture the Israeli Govt's "Secret Police" the Mossad, routinely inflicts on Palestinain prisoners to break them down and to terrorize the Palestinain population.
The Bush White House has a close relationship with the Israeli Govt. of "War Criminal" Ariel Sharon who once headed the Israeli Mossad where he systematically tortured and murdered hundreds of Palestinians and Middle East Arabs. Its not such a stretch to believe that the Bush Admin. called on its friends in the Sharon Govt. to provide "skilled" Mossad "interrogators and torturers" to force information and confessions out of the Muslim Iraqi prisoners the US Military held in Fallujah and other Iraq prisons.
Maybe all this though,in a way, is an unmistakable "Showcase" for President Bush's reverent brand of Right Wing Christianity?
[article.email.prefix]: corporats@yahoo.ca
I was thinking the same thing yesterday...
David James Vickery (Canada) 11.May.2004 19:51
As someone who recently lived for more than two years in the West Bank of Palestine, I was having the same kinds of thoughts as yourself about what's going on in Iraq. I was not thinking specifically about Israeli Mossad influence on U.S. torture/interrogation techniques, but more about the similarities I see between how the Israeli Army operates in the occupied Palestinian territories and how American/British forces comport themselves in Iraq.
Their methods of conducting urban warfare have clearly been learned from their friends in Israel, and I know for a fact that there were training sessions. A poor substitute for what the Israeli Defense Forces (I.D.F.)really wanted, which was to attack Iraq themselves.
But who would know better than the Israeli military establishment about methods of humiliating and breaking the spirit of Arabs? 56 years after the creation of the state, the Israeli military knows arabs inside and out.
The Israeli Torture Template!
Wayne Madsen 12.May.2004 04:10
The Israeli Torture Template
Rape, Feces and Urine-Dipped Cloth Sacks
By WAYNE MADSEN (from www.Counterpunch.com)
With mounting evidence that a shadowy group of former Israeli Defense
Force and General Security Service (Shin Bet) Arabic-speaking
interrogators were hired by the Pentagon under a classified "carve out"
sub-contract to brutally interrogate Iraqi prisoners at Baghdad's Abu
Ghraib prison, one only needs to examine the record of abuse of
Palestinian and Lebanese prisoners in Israel to understand what Secretary
of Defense Donald Rumsfeld meant, when referring to new, yet to be
released photos and videos, he said, "if these images are released to the
public, obviously its going to make matters worse."
According to a political appointee within the Bush administration and U.S.
intelligence sources, the interrogators at Abu Ghraib included a number of
Arabic-speaking Israelis who also helped U.S. interrogators develop the
"R2I" (Resistance to Interrogation) techniques. Many of the torture
methods were developed by the Israelis over many years of interrogating
Arab prisoners on the occupied West Bank and in Israel itself.
Clues about worse photos and videos of abuse may be found in Israeli files
about similar abuse of Palestinian and other Arab prisoners. In March
2000, a lawyer for a Lebanese prisoner kidnapped in 1994 by the Israelis
in Lebanon claimed that his client had been subjected to torture,
including rape. The type of compensation offered by Rumsfeld in his
testimony has its roots in cases of Israeli torture of Arabs. In the case
of the Lebanese man, said to have been raped by his Israeli captors, his
lawyer demanded compensation of $1.47 million. The Public Committee
Against Torture in Israel documented the types of torture meted out on
Arab prisoners. Many of the tactics coincide with those contained in the
Taguba report: beatings and prolonged periods handcuffed to furniture. In
an article in the December 1998 issue of The Progressive, Rabbi Lynn
Gottlieb reported on the treatment given to a 23-year old Palestinian held
on "administrative detention." The prisoner was "cuffed behind a chair 17
hours a day for 120 days . . . [he] had his head covered with a sack,
which was often dipped in urine or feces. Guards played loud music right
next to his ears and frequently taunted him with threats of physical and
sexual violence." If additional photos and videos document such practices,
the Bush administration and the American people have, indeed, "seen
nothing yet."
Although it is still largely undocumented if any of the contractor named
in the report of General Antonio Taguba were associated with the Israeli
military or intelligence services, it is noteworthy that one, John Israel,
who was identified in the report as being employed by both CACI
International of Arlington, Virginia, and Titan, Inc., of San Diego, may
not have even been a U.S. citizen. The Taguba report states that Israel
did not have a security clearance, a requirement for employment as an
interrogator for CACI. According to CACI's web site, "a Top Secret
Clearance (TS) that is current and US citizenship" are required for CACI
interrogators working in Iraq. In addition, CACI requires that its
interrogators "have at least two years experience as a military policeman
or similar type of law enforcement/intelligence agency whereby the
individual utilized interviewing techniques."
Speculation that "John Israel" may be an intelligence cover name has
fueled speculation whether this individual could have been one of a number
of Israeli interrogators hired under a classified contract. Because U.S.
citizenship and documentation thereof are requirements for a U.S. security
clearance, Israeli citizens would not be permitted to hold a Top Secret
clearance. However, dual U.S.-Israeli citizens could have satisfied
Pentagon requirements that interrogators hold U.S. citizenship and a Top
Secret clearance. Although the Taguba report refers twice to Israel as an
employee of Titan, the company claims he is one of their sub-contractors.
CACI stated that one of the men listed in the report "is not and never has
been a CACI employee" without providing more detail. A U.S. intelligence
source revealed that in the world of intelligence "carve out" subcontracts
such confusion is often the case with "plausible deniability" being a
foremost concern.
In fact, the Taguba report does reference the presence of non-U.S. and
non-Iraqi interrogators at Abu Ghraib. The report states, "In general, US
civilian contract personnel (Titan Corporation, CACI, etc), third country
nationals, and local contractors do not appear to be properly supervised
within the detention facility at Abu Ghraib."
The Pentagon is clearly concerned about the outing of the Taguba report
and its references to CACI, Titan, and third country nationals, which
could permanently damage U.S. relations with Arab and Islamic nations. The
Pentagon's angst may explain why the Taguba report is classified Secret No
Foreign Dissemination.
The leak of the Taguba report was so radioactive, Daniel R. Dunn, the
Information Assurance Officer for Douglas Feith's Office of the Under
Secretary of Defense, Policy (Policy Automation Services Security Team),
sent a May 6, 2004, For Official Use Only Urgent E-mail to Pentagon
staffers stating, "THE INFORMATION CONTAINED IN THIS REPORT IS CLASSIFIED;
DO NOT GO TO FOX NEWS TO READ OR OBTAIN A COPY." Considering Feith's close
ties to the Israelis, such a reaction by his top computer security
officer, a Certified Information System Security Professional (CISSP), is
understandable, although considering the fact that CISSPs are to act on
behalf of the public good, it is also regrettable..
The reference to "third country nationals" in a report that restricts its
dissemination to U.S. coalition partners (Great Britain, Poland, Italy,
etc.) is another indication of the possible involvement of Israelis in the
interrogation of Iraqi prisoners. Knowledge that the U.S. may have been
using Israeli interrogators could have severely fractured the Bush
administration's tenuous "coalition of the willing' in Iraq. General
Taguba's findings were transmitted to the Coalition Forces Land Component
Command on March 9, 2004, just six days before the Spanish general
election, one that the opposition anti-Iraq war Socialists won. The
Spanish ultimately withdrew their forces from Iraq.
During his testimony before the Senate Armed Service Committee, Rumsfeld
was pressed upon by Senator John McCain about the role of the private
contractors in the interrogations and abuse. McCain asked Rumsfeld four
pertinent questions, ". . . who was in charge? What agency or private
contractor was in charge of the interrogations? Did they have authority
over the guards? And what were the instructions that they gave to the
guards?"
When Rumsfeld had problems answering McCain's question, Lt. Gen. Lance
Smith, the Deputy Commander of the U.S. Central Command, said there were
37 contract interrogators used in Abu Ghraib. The two named contractors,
CACI and Titan, have close ties to the Israeli military and technology
communities. Last January 14, after Provost Marshal General of the Army,
Major General Donald Ryder, had already uncovered abuse at Abu Ghraib,
CACI's President and CEO, Dr. J.P. (Jack) London was receiving the
Jerusalem Fund of Aish HaTorah's Albert Einstein Technology award at the
Jerusalem City Hall, with right-wing Likud politician Israeli Defense
Minister Shaul Mofaz and ultra-Orthodox United Torah Judaism party
Jerusalem Mayor Uri Lupolianski in attendance. Oddly, CACI waited until
February 2 to publicly announce the award in a press release. CACI has
also received grants from U.S.-Israeli bi-national foundations.
Titan also has had close connections to Israeli interests. After his stint
as CIA Director, James Woolsey served as a Titan director. Woolsey is an
architect of America's Iraq policy and the chief proponent of and lobbyist
for Ahmad Chalabi of the Iraqi National Congress. An adviser to the
neo-conservative Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, Jewish
Institute of National Security Affairs, Project for the New American
Century, Center for Security Policy, Freedom House, and Committee for the
Liberation of Iraq, Woolsey is close to Stephen Cambone, the
Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence, a key person in the chain of
command who would have not only known about the torture tactics used by
U.S. and Israeli interrogators in Iraq but who would have also approved
them. Cambone was associated with the Project for the New American Century
and is viewed as a member of Rumsfeld's neo-conservative "cabal" within
the Pentagon.
Another person considered by Pentagon insiders to have been knowledgeable
about the treatment of Iraqi prisoners is U.S. Army Col. Steven Bucci, a
Green Beret and Rumsfeld's military assistant and chief traffic cop for
the information flow to the Defense Secretary. According to Pentagon
insiders, Bucci was involved in the direction of a special covert
operations unit composed of former U.S. special operations personnel who
answered to the Pentagon rather than the CIA's Special Activities
Division, the agency's own paramilitary group. The Pentagon group included
Arabic linguists and former members of the Green Berets and Delta Force
who operated covertly in Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran, Pakistan, and
Uzbekistan. Titan also uses linguists trained in the languages (Arabic,
Dari, Farsi, Pashto, Urdu, and Tajik) of those same countries. It is not
known if a link exists between Rumsfeld's covert operations unit and
Titan's covert operations linguists.
Another Titan employee named in the Taguba report is Adel L. Nakhla.
Nakhla is a name common among Egypt's Coptic Christian community, however,
it is not known if Adel Nakhla is either an Egyptian-American or a
national of Egypt. A CACI employee identified in the report, Steven
Stephanowicz, is referred to as "Stefanowicz" in a number of articles on
the prison abuse. Stefanowicz is the spelling used by Joe Ryan, another
CACI employee assigned with Stefanowicz to Abu Ghraib. Ryan is a radio
personality on KSTP, a conservative radio station in Minneapolis, who
maintained a daily log of his activities in Iraq on the radio's web site
before it was taken down. Ryan indicated that Stefanowicz (or
Stephanowicz) continued to hold his interrogation job in Iraq even though
General Taguba recommended he lose his security clearance and be
terminated for the abuses at Abu Ghraib.
In an even more bizarre twist, the Philadelphia Daily News identified a
former expatriate public relations specialist for the government of South
Australia in Adelaide named Steve Stefanowicz as possibly being the same
person identified in the Taguba report. In 2000, Stefanowicz, who grew up
in the Philadelphia and Allentown areas, left for Australia. On September
16, 2001, he was quoted by the Sunday Mail of Adelaide on the 911 attacks.
He said of the attacks, "It was one of the most incredible and most
devastating things I have ever seen. I have been in constant contact with
my family and friends in the US and the mood was very solemn and quiet.
But this is progressing into anger." Stefanowicz returned to the United
States and volunteered for the Navy in a reserve status. His mother told
the Allentown Morning Call in April 2002 that Stefanowicz was stationed
somewhere in the Middle East but did not know where because of what
Stefanowicz said was "security concerns." His mother told the Philadelphia
Daily News that her son was in Iraq but she knew nothing about his current
status.
Wayne Madsen is a Washington, DC-based investigative journalist and
columnist. He served in the National Security Agency (NSA) during the
Reagan administration and wrote the introduction to Forbidden Truth. He is
the co-author, with John Stanton, of "America's Nightmare: The Presidency
of George Bush II." His forthcoming book is titled: "Jaded Tasks: Big Oil,
Black Ops, and Brass Plates."