Newsweek Flap
Written by Jack O'Reilly on May 20th, 2005While I was in the airport I read (without buying, naturally) the Newsweek article explaining their reporting of unsubstantiated allegations that the Qur’an was flushed down a toilet and the fallout. It was pretty disgusting how they brushed aside the murder of almost 20 innocents by attributing it to unwanted American presence and a poor Afghan economy.
It was sad how little responsibility they took, but it was even sadder (more sad?) that they failed to blame the most guilty cause of this violence: militant Islam. For a good analysis, see here, here and here.
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It seems that the right wishes to put the blame for this violence squarely on Newsweek and not look at one of the more glaringly legitimate reasons - a dislike of American presence.
Plus, there have been many substantiated reports that what Newsweek reported was 100% accurate. Instead of addressing them the right and this administration that is hell-bent on controlling the media and supressing dissent are looking for someone else to blame for their own failures. Harry Truman said “The buck stops here.” Too bad this administration spent that buck….
(from that known radical leftist Andrew Sullivan….)
We now know that the International Red Cross compiled records of allegations of mistreatment of the Koran at Gitmo:
Simon Schorno, a spokesman for the Red Cross committee, declined yesterday to discuss the details in the reports of how Koran was handled and would not say whether any reports involved a Koran’s being flushed down a toilet.
He said the committee received “multiple allegations” of abuse of the Koran from the detainees. He said workers for the committee, which monitors the treatment of prisoners of war and works in tandem with the military to ensure that the Geneva Conventions are followed, did not witness any of the reported incidents.
Mr. Schorno said the committee began receiving the accusations in 2002, when the detainees first arrived in Guantánamo, and they continued until mid-2003. The reports were “substantial enough for us to bring to the attention of authorities,” he said, and included information not only from detainees but also from military personnel.
After the Red Cross submitted its reports, he said, complaints from detainees stopped.
Two weeks ago, in our issue dated May 9, Michael Isikoff and John Barry reported in a brief item in our Periscope section that U.S. military investigators had found evidence that American guards at the detention center in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, had committed infractions in trying to get terror suspects to talk, including in one case flushing a Qur’an down a toilet. Their information came from a knowledgeable U.S. government source, and before deciding whether to publish it we approached two separate Defense Department officials for comment. One declined to give us a response; the other challenged another aspect of the story but did not dispute the Qur’an charge.
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“our issue”? Mojo, do you work for Newsweek? If so, then you know you’re pretty screwed when you feel you have to respond to some College students blog.
You proved my point: You blamed the US “presence” for the riots and murder of almost 20 innocent people. The blame should rest with militant Islam. Or rather, I should say, “selectively militant Islam”. Where was their jihad against Saddam Hussein when he was having Muslim women raped and their skin burned off with acid? This doesn’t incite riot and holy war, but the unsubstantiated reports that a Qur’an was flushed down the toilet does?
You would rather blame Bush than bin Laden. That shows how twisted your mind is. You spend your entire time arguing that the Qur’an may have been flushed. First of all, this would have been the wrongful actions of an individual interrogator. Here is the US policy on handling the Qur’an:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/05/16/AR2005051601320.html
Moreover, desecration would (probably) cause more PR harm than the good that would come from information.
And as Jonah Goldberg noted, where do you find a toilet that can flush a book?
But this is missing the main point that Islamofascism is the real cause of this. Do American mobs intentionally slaughter innocents when the Bible is desecrated? Or the American flag burned?
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“(from that known radical leftist Andrew Sullivan….)”
Your point? Andrew Sullivan is the biggest joke on the ‘net and no one on the right respects him anymore. Just another schill for liberals.
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