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go to originalby The Associated Press
WASHINGTON October 23, 2010, 07:28 am ET
As listeners and angry citizens complained to NPR and public radio stations across the country over the firing of Juan Williams, the news analyst kept up his own criticism of his former employer as he began a bigger role with Fox News Channel.
As the guest host Friday night of "The O'Reilly Factor," Williams, who was axed for saying he gets nervous on a plane when he sees Muslims, mentioned several remarks made by other NPR commentators that didn't result in firings.
"My comments about my feelings supposedly crossed this line, some line, somewhere. That crossed the line?" Williams said. "Let me tell you what you can say on National Public Radio without losing your job."
Williams went on to note that commentator Nina Totenberg said 15 years ago that if there is "retributive justice," former Republican North Carolina Sen. Jesse Helms or one of his grandchildren will get AIDS from a transfusion.
An NPR spokeswoman said Totenberg has repeatedly apologized for her comments.
Meanwhile, a number of major stations said they were meeting or surpassing their fundraising goals in the wake of the furor over Williams' dismissal, despite it being pledge season.
"We find ourselves kind of caught between NPR and the audience," said Craig Curtis, program director at KPCC in Pasadena, Calif., which won't hold its pledge drive until next month. He said the station had received about 150 comments on the firing, mostly disapproving, and three people asked to cancel their memberships.
Conservative leaders including Sarah Palin called on Congress to cut off NPR's federal funding — an idea that was also raised in the 1990s and didn't get very far.
Williams was fired Wednesday over comments he made on "The O'Reilly Factor."
"When I get on a plane," he said, "I got to tell you, if I see people who are in Muslim garb and I think, you know, they are identifying themselves first and foremost as Muslims, I get worried. I get nervous."
After his remarks, Fox announced it had re-signed Williams, who has been with the network since 1997, to a multiyear deal that will give him an expanded role.
NPR chief executive Vivian Schiller held a staff meeting Friday and said management was standing by its decision, spokeswoman Dana Davis Rehm said. Schiller acknowledged that NPR didn't handle the firing perfectly and executives would review their process, Rehm said.
Veronica Richardson, 38, a paralegal from Raleigh, N.C., said the firing revealed that NPR had a "political agenda." She said she would stop listening and donating to her local station, WUNC-FM in Chapel Hill.
"I think it's unfair to fire someone for a comment that was innocuous to begin with. It's how many people feel," said Richardson, who describes herself as a libertarian.
Teresa Kopec, 42, of Spartanburg, S.C., backed the firing, saying, "I thought what he said was kind of offensive. I think it was probably the last straw. He had a pattern of saying things that were not appropriate." But she said his association with conservative Fox News may have been more troubling, because it damaged NPR's reputation for objectivity.
At KUNC, an NPR affiliate in Colorado, general manager Neil Best said that Thursday, the start of a pledge drive, was one of the station's best fundraising days ever. Best said some callers who criticized the firing seemed to be reading from a script since they used some of the same words, such as "totalitarian."
Rehm said several other stations also reported callers may be reading from a script. In other cases, it was clear the callers weren't listeners or supporters, she said.
"When people say, `I'm never going to watch you again,' that's an indicator," she said, because NPR isn't on TV.
Stations in some big cities such as New York, Washington and Philadelphia, all three of which have been holding pledge drives, said fundraising remained strong even as complaints rolled in. In Denver, Colorado Public Radio President Max Wycisk said the episode could boost fundraising. "It might actually help, because it reinforces how seriously public radio takes its integrity," Wycisk said.
At least one station wants to distance itself from the firing. In Miami, WLRN general manager John Labonia said he was hearing dozens of complaints from angry citizens and loyal donors. He said one called to cancel a $1,000 pledge. The station's fundraising drive had already ended when the furor erupted.
"We don't want that negative halo of NPR's decision to affect us, so we are making it perfectly clear that we were not part of this decision and we do not agree with it," Labonia said. "It was a short-sighted and irresponsible decision by NPR."
Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., said he will introduce legislation to end federal funding for public radio and television.
"Once again, we find the only free speech liberals support is the speech with which they agree," he said in a statement. "With record debt and unemployment, there's simply no reason to force taxpayers to subsidize a liberal programming they disagree with."
In June, Rep. Doug Lamborn, R-Colo., introduced similar legislation in the House. He said the Williams firing will help his bill.
NPR radio stations are independently owned and operated and, like the nation's public TV stations, receive government funding through the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which got about $420 million this year from Washington.
As for NPR's headquarters operation, federal grants account for less than 2 percent — or $3.3 million — of its $166 million annual budget. It is funded primarily by its affiliates, corporate sponsors and major donors.
This isn't the first time public broadcasting has been in the crosshairs of conservative politicians. In 1994, then-House Speaker Newt Gingrich called for an end to all federal funding for public broadcasters.
NPR's Rehm warned that if Congress cut off funding, "stations across the country would be hurt by that and would have to make up that balance elsewhere. In many places that would be difficult to do."
———
Associated Press Writers Dan Elliott in Denver, Jeff Wilson in Los Angeles, Ben Nuckols in Baltimore, Suzette Laboy in Miami, Kendal Weaver in Birmingham, Ala., Ula Ilnytzky in New York City and JoAnn Loviglio in Philadelphia contributed to this report.
go to originalA small US church's plan to burn copies of the Koran has caused global outrage. Although Pastor Terry Jones has put his plan on hold, the anger has not yet subsided.
Afghan President HAMID KARZAI
By burning the Koran, they cannot harm it. The Koran is in the hearts and minds of 1.5 billion people. Humiliation of the holy book represents the humiliation of people. I hope that this decision will be stopped... so that the world can live in peace and stability and respect of each other.
US President BARACK OBAMA
This is a recruitment bonanza for al-Qaeda. You could have serious violence in places like Pakistan or Afghanistan. This could increase the recruitment of individuals who would be willing to blow themselves up in American cities or European cities.
Nato Secretary General ANDERS FOGH RASMUSSEN
I am happy to see that he has put this terrible act on hold at least. It is a very disrespectful act. I urge all people to demonstrate clear respect for other people's faith.
UK Foreign Secretary WILLIAM HAGUE
The burning of the Koran would be offensive not just to Muslims but to all supporters of religious freedom and tolerance worldwide. Eid is a time of celebration, charitable giving and family gathering. To seek to mar it in this calculated way would be selfish and provocative in the extreme. We hope that the individuals involved will reconsider and refrain from carrying out this act.
Indonesian President SUSILO BAMBANG YUDHOYONO
We stand here collectively as the world is facing a great threat and danger. What is being planned by Reverend Terry Jones and his followers... not only wounds the feelings of the Islamic Ummah [community], but I am also certain the feeling of the followers of other faiths; and indeed can threaten international peace and security.
Indian Home Minister PALANIAPPAN CHIDAMBARAM
We hope that the US authorities will take strong action to prevent such an outrage being committed. While we await the action of the US authorities, we would appeal to the media in India - both print and visual media - to refrain from telecasting visuals or publishing photographs of the deplorable act.
Nigerian President GOODLUCK JONATHAN
This action cannot be justified at anytime and certainly is doubly unjustified coming at the holy month of Ramadan. To my Muslim brothers and sisters, I urge you to show restraint while we deal with this issue as we continue to build and strengthen our fortress for religious tolerance and continuing peaceful coexistence.
US commander in Afghanistan GENERAL DAVID PETRAEUS
It could endanger troops and it could endanger the overall effort. It is precisely the kind of action the Taliban uses and could cause significant problems. Not just here, but everywhere in the world, we are engaged with the Islamic community.
German Chancellor ANGELA MERKEL
If a fundamentalist, evangelical pastor in America wants to burn the Koran on 11 September, then I find this simply disrespectful, even abhorrent and simply wrong. Europe... is a place where freedom of belief, of religion, where respect for beliefs and religions, are valuable commodities.
Danish cartoonist KURT WESTERGAARD
Satire is provocation. Provocation should lead to reflection, to enlightenment, to knowledge. In this case, this is really not the case.
Iranian President MAHMOUD AHMADINEJAD
[The proposed burning is a] Zionist plot that is against the teachings of all divine prophets. Zionists and their supporters are on their way to collapse and dissolution and such last-ditch actions will not save them, but multiply the pace of their fall and annihilation.
UN Secretary General BAN KI-MOON
Such actions cannot be condoned by any religion. They contradict efforts of the United Nations and many people around the world to promote tolerance, inter-cultural understanding and mutual respect between cultures and religions.
THE VATICAN PONTIFICAL COUNCIL FOR INTERRELIGIOUS DIALOGUE
Each religion, with its respective sacred books, places of worship and symbols, has the right to respect and protection.
go to original
WASHINGTON -- The security company Blackwater Worldwide formed a network of 30 shell companies and subsidiaries to try to get millions of dollars in government business after the company faced strong criticism for reckless conduct in Iraq, The New York Times reported Friday.
The newspaper said that it was unclear how many of the created companies got American contracts but that at least three of them obtained work with the U.S. military and the CIA.
Sen. Carl Levin, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, has asked the Justice Department to see whether Blackwater misled the government when using the subsidiaries to gain government contracts, according to the Times.
It said Levin's committee found that North Carolina-based Blackwater, which now is known as Xe Services, went to great lengths to find ways to get lucrative government work despite criminal charges and criticism stemming from a 2007 incident in which Blackwater guards killed 17 Iraqi civilians. A committee chart outlines the web of Blackwater subsidiaries.
Messages left late Friday with spokespeople for the Michigan Democrat and Xe were not immediately answered.
The 2007 incident and other reports of abuses by Blackwater employees in Iraq led to criminal investigations and congressional hearings, and resulted in the company losing a lucrative contract with the State Department to provide security in Iraq.
But recently the company was awarded a $100 million contract to provide security for the agency in Afghanistan, prompting criticism from some in Congress. CIA Director Leon Panetta said that the CIA had no choice but to hire the company because it underbid others by $26 million and that a CIA review concluded that the contractor had cleaned up its act.
Last year, Panetta canceled a contract with Xe that allowed the company's operatives to load missiles on Predator drones in Pakistan, and shifted the work to government personnel.
However, the Times quoted former Blackwater officials as saying that at least two Blackwater-affiliated companies, XPG and Greystone, obtained secret contracts from the CIA to provide security to agency operatives.
The newspaper said the network of subsidiaries, including several located in offshore tax havens, were uncovered as part of the Armed Services Committee's examination of government contracting and not an investigation solely into Blackwater. But Levin questioned why Blackwater would need to create so many companies with various names to seek out government business, according to the Times.
The report quoted unidentified government officials and former Blackwater employees as saying that the network of companies allowed Blackwater to obscure its involvement in government work from contracting officials and the public, and to ensure a low profile for its classified activities.
go to originalIs the Fox News host's event a bold attempt to restore honor to America, a Tea Party-inspired anti-tax event, or merely an orgy of self-promotion?
posted on August 26, 2010, at 6:30 AM
Beck will speak at the rally, as will Sarah Palin.
Beck will speak at the rally, as will Sarah Palin.
Fox News' reliably provocative Glenn Beck is mounting what many consider his boldest move yet: This Saturday's "Restoring Honor" rally in Washington, D.C., which is expected to draw up to 300,000 conservatives. Not only has Beck courted controversy by scheduling this ostensibly "non-political" rally on the anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.'s 1963 "I Have A Dream" speech, he's booked the same location: The Lincoln Memorial. Here's a concise guide to the goings-on:
Why is Beck holding a rally?
According to Beck's website, Restoring Honor is a "non-political event" conceived to pay tribute to our nation's "heroes, our heritage and our future." Attendees will be invited to "pledge to restore honor" to America at the steps of the memorial. Critics have labeled the event "Beckapalooza" and accused the Fox host of trying to pass off a mere self-promotional stunt as a headier endeavor.
Who is speaking?
Sarah Palin is the keynote speaker. Other orators include Beck himself and executives from the Special Operations Warrior Foundation, a charity that provides funds for the surviving children of Special Ops personnel killed in battle. Also featured: Choir performances and "literature distribution."
Wait, Sarah Palin is speaking? I thought this was non-political.
Palin's attendance, and the involvement of Tea Party groups, has prompted suspicions that the event is a conservative anti-tax rally in disguise. Beck insists, however, that the former vice presidential candidate will not be addressing political issues: "Sarah's Palin's role is introducing the heroes of the military, as a mother, not as a candidate." Attendees have been asked not to bring political signs or slogans.
How many people will be there?
Authorities in the capital say they're prepared for up to 300,000 people. Fellow Fox News host Bill O'Reilly has scoffed at such estimates, promising Beck he'll give up his own show if more than 100,000 people attend. (Some Tea Party groups have distributed a conservative-friendly guide to Washington D.C, warning people to avoid the Green and Yellow subway lines, which cover what the guide's authors suggest are sketchy parts of the city. Alas, says Mike Madden at the Washington City Paper, activists who follow this tip would miss the chance to visit the National Archives, where their "beloved Constitution now resides.")
Are people angry about Beck's choice of date and place?
Civil rights groups have expressed outrage. Marc Moria, president of the National Urban League, told CBS News it was "insulting" to King's legacy. Rev. Al Sharpton has also organized a Saturday march through Washington, D.C., to commemorate King's speech, an event supported by the NAACP, the National Urban League, and Martin Luther King III. Sharpton says he began planning his event in April, and that it is "not a countermarch to Beck."
How does Beck explain the choice of date?
He's shrugged it off as a coincidence, telling Bill O'Reilly that civil-rights critics have nothing to complain about: "Do white people own the legacy of Abraham Lincoln? I don't think they do, and I don't think black people own the legacy of Martin Luther King." Beck has said "divine providence" led him to select the date.
What do pundits make of it?
If this is "divine providence," says Alexander Zaitchik at AlterNet, then clearly God has a "very dark sense of humor." Beck is "the media's boldest manipulator of white racial anxieties, fears and prejudice." Were King alive today, Beck would likely excoriate him for being a "progressive cockroach." But the Fox News firebrand is right that black people don't own MLK's legacy, says Cynthia Tucker at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Dr. King "belongs to America" — and the Bill of Rights he so passionately believed in guarantees Beck the right to his rally, no matter how "odious" civil rights groups think it is.
Sources: GlennBeck.com, Fox News, Media Matters, Huffington Post, AlterNet, CBS News, Washington City Paper, Atlanta Journal-Constitution
go to originalBy Suzanne Bohan
Contra Costa Times
Posted: 08/08/2010 12:00:00 AM PDT
When Stanford climate scientist Christopher Field looks at visual feeds from a satellite monitoring deforestation in the Amazon basin, he sees images streaked with white lines devoid of data.
The satellite, Lansat 7, is broken. And it's emblematic of the nation's battered satellite environmental monitoring program. The bad news: It's only going to get worse, unless the federal agencies criticized for their poor management of the satellite systems over the past decade stage a fast turnaround. Many, however, view that prospect as a long shot.
"I would say our ability to observe the Earth from space is at grave risk of dying from neglect," said Field, director of the Department of Global Ecology at the Carnegie Institution for Science at Stanford University.
Inez Fung, a noted climatologist at UC Berkeley, was shocked as she scanned a recent federal report warning of impending gaps in the country's ability to monitor Earth from space.
The federal document, released in May, listed cuts in climate-monitoring sensors from the next generation of Earth-observing satellites. The current satellites beam down many types of indispensable data about the planet, such as ocean currents, ozone levels and snow cover, as well as the pictures we see every day on TV weathercasts.
But key instruments on the new satellites have been eliminated: Gone is a sensor that would relay new data about the atmosphere and environmental conditions in the ocean
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and along coastal areas, including those in California. The movement of pollutants and greenhouse gases would have been under the instrument's mechanical gaze, as well.
Also absent is a critical sensor that monitors temperature changes over time on Earth.
"That's like if you have a sick patient, and then say, 'I have no more thermometers,'" Fung said.
In all, nine new climate instruments on the next generation of satellites were canceled or their capabilities scaled back in 2006, according to the Government Accountability Office report. The office is the investigative arm of the U.S. Congress, assessing the performance of federal agencies.
Combined with a five-year delay in launching these next-generation satellites, with the first scheduled to blast off in 2011, these canceled or "degraded" instruments leave the nation facing critical gaps in satellite monitoring of the planet beginning in 2015, the report stated. And a National Academy of Sciences analysis of the disarray in the satellite program stressed that because of Earth's growing population, it's more crucial than ever to monitor pollution, water quality, land use and other environmental conditions.
Casting blame
Many blame the cuts on Bush administration policies that favored manned moon and Mars missions over shoring up aging Earth-observing satellite systems. Critics cite a 30 percent decline between 2000 and 2006 in NASA's Earth science budget -- which funds environmental satellites -- as evidence of the administration's lukewarm support of keeping an eye on the planet's condition. The National Academy of Sciences report, along with a chorus of experts in the field, also warns that the country is at risk of losing its worldwide technological leadership in Earth-observing satellites.
Other casualties of the 2006 cuts include an instrument for tracking airborne particles such as sea spray, smog, volcanic ash and smoke -- all factors contributing to the warming or cooling of the planet. The inclusion of a new instrument for monitoring soil moisture was canceled, which would have yielded information valuable to, among others, farmers and those monitoring the spread of deserts worldwide.
These cuts spell a 46 percent decline in data about the Earth's conditions that these new satellites were designed to provide, and the Government Accountability Office report concluded that because of the trouble-plagued satellite program, "our nation's ability to understand climate change may be limited."
Those in the field use harsher language.
Many Earth-monitoring satellites "are really in desperate shape," said Field, with Stanford's Carnegie Institution.
He copes with the neglect daily. Field and his staff rely on data from Landsat 7, a satellite that malfunctioned in 2003 and is limping along at two-thirds its capacity. For example, when it flies over the Amazon basin, where it's used to monitor rain forest deforestation, it sends images marred by white lines showing where the satellite failed to gather data. To back up that defective machine, they use data sent by a 28-year-old satellite, Landsat 5, which was designed to last three years.
"Landsat 7 is just basically broken," Field said. He considers it a "miracle" that Landsat 5 still functions.
Help from above
In the 1960s, the United States began using satellites to observe its lands, oceans, atmosphere and the space environment near Earth. The satellites continuously monitor the planet's dynamic environment, and allow humans to peer into inaccessible places. Information beamed by these spacecraft is now essential for forecasting weather, tracking conditions on Earth and in its atmosphere, and projecting long-term climate trends. With satellite data, rising sea levels can be monitored, helping communities on islands and along coastal areas plan. Satellites help farmers assess soil conditions before planting, allow foresters to examine logging activities, let water managers monitor the mountain snowpack that provides water to cities, and track the migration of wildlife such as buffalo and elephants.
Satellite data is also essential for crafting international agreements for reducing global warming, said Molly Macauley, an economist with Resources for the Future, a research institute in Washington, D.C.
Delay now, pay later
Field, the Carnegie Institution scientist, echoed many of his colleagues' views in saying the cuts also reflect a lack of support for climate monitoring in particular during the Bush administration. Former President George W. Bush held that there was insufficient information to conclude global warming was caused by human activity, but that the economic harm of regulating heat-trapping gases was certain.
A May 2 article in Defense Industry Daily noted that "one of the most controversial decisions" after the 2006 reduction in satellite sensors was the fact that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the Department of Defense "apparently chose not to seek additional funding" to retain the climate instruments. The agencies, along with NASA, jointly managed one of the programs, NPOESS. The other, GOES-R, is managed solely by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Had the agencies received more funding at that earlier stage, subsequent cost increases and launch delays could have been avoided, the prime contractor on the satellite program testified before Congress, according to the article. The NPOESS program, at nearly $14 billion in cost, is now more than $7 billion over its original estimate.
Jumping into the fray, the National Academy of Sciences in 2007 released a 455-page report on the nation's environmental satellite program, offering the most comprehensive recommendations to date for getting it back on track. Chief among them was an infusion of money for Earth-observing satellites. And the funding decline in the years before the report's release put the country's ability to monitor the climate and severe weather "at great risk," the academy report warned.
"There was a decreased emphasis on Earth observations" during the Bush administration, Field said. "That was because NASA was so strongly focused on the moon and Mars."
In 2004, Bush announced that NASA would turn its focus to more manned space missions. The first goal was returning humans to the moon by 2020, and establishing a lunar launchpad for staffed missions to Mars. He proposed a $12 billion budget for the first five years, with $11 billion diverted from existing NASA programs.
The Obama administration remains committed to manned space flights, but it canceled the projected $108 billion return-to-moon plan, called Constellation, a move that's roiling some in Congress. Instead, the administration is seeking international and commercial partnerships for developing manned missions to asteroids and to Mars. The administration also proposed increased funding of $2.4 billion for Earth observation research at NASA.
The White House stated that it's committed to "minimizing -- if not eliminating -- potential gaps in data" in Earth-monitoring satellite activities in the coming decades.
"The urgency to maintain the continuity ... that's out in front of everybody," said Mark Mulholland, a senior official with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. "Certainly in the last couple of years there's been an increasing emphasis at the administration level on climate monitoring," he added.
But the Government Accountability Office's Powner said it's clear that stronger leadership is needed for the nation's environmental satellite program, and he said that job belongs to the Office of Science and Technology Policy in the White House.
"We pinned it on OSTP," he said. "They have the responsibility to coordinate these interagency-type, long-term issues."
Without that kind of oversight, Powner said, agencies commonly focus on their own priorities, and fail to commit to long-term plans -- an approach essential for the complex job of designing and launching Earth-observing satellites.
A senior analyst with the technology policy office "did not agree or disagree with our recommendations," the report stated.
Field concurred with Powner's position. He described the dearth of leadership as another serious gap in the nation's Earth-observing satellite program.
"There's nobody in the federal system that's really responsible for ensuring the kind of long-term observations that you want on a planet that's changing," he said.
Suzanne Bohan covers science. Contact her at 510-262-2789. Follow her at Twitter.com/suzbohan.
# The 1994 Clinton administration decision to save costs by merging into NPOESS previously separate military and civilian Earth-observing satellite systems backfired, ultimately creating a dysfunctional program plagued by bureaucratic wrangling, delays and cost overruns. In contrast, GOES-R is run by a single civilian agency.
# Due to escalating costs, in 2006 numerous climate sensors on NPOESS were cut or "degraded" and the number of satellites were reduced from six to four, in addition to a "preparatory" test satellite. Despite the cuts, the NPOESS program is five years behind schedule, with the preparatory satellite now scheduled to launch in 2011. At nearly $14 billion in cost, it's more than double its original $6.2 billion estimate.
# Facing $5 billion in projected overruns, the number of GOES-R launches was also reduced, from four to two. The first is scheduled in 2015, one year behind schedule. Also canceled was a state-of-the-art sensor designed to yield valuable new information about oceans and coastlines, winds, humidity and severe weather events, among other environmental conditions.
# A government agency in the spring released two reports warning that the launch delays and sensor cuts threatened to create serious gaps, beginning in 2015, in the nation's ability to monitor key aspects of climate change.
# Sensors for forecasting weather were largely spared, but took hits. For example, in the coming years some U.S. military sites could experience up to 70-minute delays in getting weather data. That time lag would particularly affect military operations in the air and on the ocean. An instrument that would have advanced severe weather monitoring was also cut.
# President Barack Obama's 2011 budget disbands the tri-agency management of NPOESS to loosen the bureaucratic logjam, putting NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in charge of two of the satellites, in addition to the "preparatory" satellite. The program will be renamed the Joint Polar Satellite System, or JPSS. The Department of Defense will be put in charge of the other two, under a still-unnamed program. GOES-R remains under NOAA management.
# In a setback to closing the gaps, in late June the Obama administration canceled a crucial sensor for monitoring how the Earth's temperature changes as the sun's energy fluctuates. The satellite planned under the newly split program is too small to include the instrument.
Sources: Government Accountability Office: April report, "Environmental Satellites: Strategy Needed to Sustain Critical Climate and Space Weather Instruments" and May report, "Polar-Orbiting Environmental Satellites: Agencies Must Act Quickly to Address Risks that Jeopardize the Continuity of Weather and Climate Data"
go to originalBy TIMOTHY WILLIAMS and OMAR AL-JAWOSHY
Published: July 23, 2010
BAGHDAD — An outsize ceremonial skeleton key traded hands last week in the official transfer of Camp Cropper, the last jail in Iraq that had been under American control. The Iraqi government was, one American general said, “equipped, prepared and poised to take over.”
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Maya Alleruzzo/Associated Press
Iraq’s justice minister, Dara Nurredin Dara, and Maj. Gen. Jerry Cannon on July 15.
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Notes from Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq and other areas of conflict in the post-9/11 era. Go to the Blog »
But it did not end the dark history of prisons in Iraq over the last seven years: Just five days later, four prisoners, at least three of them said to be high-ranking members in the nation’s most violent insurgent group, escaped. The warden and several guards are nowhere to be found.
“Leaders from the Islamic State of Iraq were able to escape from Cropper Prison,” read a statement that appeared Friday on a Web site that carries messages from the group, which is affiliated with Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia. “And no one from the apostates has been able to find them, 36 hours after their escape.”
Sunni extremists sometimes use the term “apostates” to describe the majority Shiites, who control Iraq’s government.
The July 15 transfer of Camp Cropper, which had held many of what the United States military considered “high value” inmates, was considered yet another milestone toward full Iraqi sovereignty, just over a month before America is scheduled to withdraw the last of its combat troops.
But institutions are being handed over to a political system in disarray. There is no new government nearly five months after parliamentary elections.
And while overall violence is relatively low, a deadly campaign of assassinations is under way against political figures, members of Awakening groups and people who had cooperated with Americans. The group to which the escaped prisoners belonged, the Islamic State of Iraq, claimed responsibility for one of the worst of these recent attacks: On Sunday, bombings killed at least 47 members of Awakening Councils, made up of former Sunni insurgents who switched sides.
The men escaped from the Camp Cropper prison complex, near Baghdad International Airport, on Tuesday, though Iraqi officials did not make the news public for 48 hours. The missing men include the group’s finance minister, its interior minister and its justice minister, the security officials said, without identifying them. The standing of a fourth escapee was unclear.
The men had been captured by American forces and had been held for about 15 months, the Iraqi police said Friday. On Friday, the United States military in Iraq declined to answer questions on the escape from the prison, where 1,500 inmates are held. In Washington, Bryan Whitman, a Pentagon spokesman, said: “U.S. forces are not involved in any aspect of running or securing the facility. The government of Iraq is investigating the circumstances surrounding the escape.” It is not known how the four men escaped the highly secured prison, but Iraq’s minister of justice, Dara Nurredin Dara, said Friday that the jail’s American-assigned warden, Omar Hamis Hamadi, was missing as well.
“We were told that he was trustworthy and had a good reputation,” Mr. Dara said.
Other security officials said that several guards had failed to report to work since the escape.
The prison system in Iraq has been consistently troubled since the United States military invaded Iraq in 2003. Seeking to tame an increasingly effective insurgency, American soldiers arrested thousands of suspects, many of them without proof, and held them for a year or longer.
The system began to change after the scandal at the Abu Ghraib prison, in which American jailers tortured and abused detainees. Experts say that many men became radicalized against Americans inside the prisons.
Experts also say that, as prisoners have been released and transferred to Iraqi authority, the system remains abusive. In April, Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki ordered the closing of a secret prison that held hundreds of detainees from northern Iraq. Dozens of prisoners had been tortured before the country’s human rights minister and the United States intervened.
High-level suspects have disappeared from Iraqi detention with maddening frequency. On Friday, the British Embassy in Baghdad said the British foreign secretary had raised concerns with Iraq’s foreign minister, Hoshyar Zebari, about the recent disappearance of the man convicted in the 2004 kidnapping and murder of a British-Iraqi aid worker, Margaret Hassan. The man, Ali Lutfi Jassar al-Rawi, was in custody and appealing his conviction when he disappeared.
At Camp Cropper, the American military continues to operate one of the prison’s blocks at the request of the Iraqi government, overseeing about 200 inmates, including members of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, a homegrown Sunni group, and officials who had been part of Saddam Hussein’s government. The Iraqi government asked the Americans to hold on to some of the prisoners while Iraqi law enforcement officials determine their legal status. The men escaped from the Iraqi-controlled part of the prison.
In recent months, American and Iraqi security forces have captured and killed dozens of members of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, including its top leaders. American generals, however, caution that while the organization has been significantly weakened, it continues to be capable of launching attacks that lead to mass casualties.
Duraid Adnan and Zaid Thaker contributed reporting from Baghdad, and Elisabeth Bumiller from Washington.
go to originalAmid a barrage of criticism of Israel, fair-minded observers should consider these seven facts before judging the flotilla raid.
By Nadav Tamir / June 3, 2010
Boston
In the torrent of rage and confusion generated by the loss of life when the Israeli Navy enforced the embargo on the Gaza Strip this week, there has been a regrettable overlooking of certain fundamental facts. As is so frequently the case, these facts have gotten buried in the rubble of political rhetoric. In order to prevent this incident from having a deleterious effect on the peace process going forward, the following must be understood:
Fact 1: The Gaza Strip is an armed camp, ruled with an iron fist by a repressive Hamas regime that has not only repeatedly pledged itself to the annihilation of Israel and the torpedoing of any prospects for Middle East peace, but has made good on its pledges by firing approximately 10,000 missiles, rockets, and mortar bombs at Israeli civilians over the past several years for the express purpose of killing or wounding those civilians or, at a minimum, terrifying them.
Fact 2: The United States, the European Union, and the international community have recognized that Hamas is a terrorist enterprise, which surely is beyond dispute.
Fact 3: When faced with an armed enemy committed to its destruction, which has done its very best to make war against Israeli civilians, Israel has two choices: to try to protect its civilians from those attacks, or to simply shrug its shoulders and hope that the attacks stop. There is, quite simply, no nation on earth that would choose the latter course, and no reasonable and fair-minded person who would expect it to.
Fact 4: In an effort to stop the missiles from being manufactured and used against it, and only for that reason, Israel has been forced to try to keep the materials used for that purpose out of the Gaza Strip. This is an obvious step needed to prevent the kind of war that caused so much destruction in 2008, when the increase in attacks by Hamas and its allies against Israeli civilians eventually triggered an Israeli response to stop them. There can be no real doubt that Israel is entitled to keep weapons of war from being used against it.
Fact 5: Israel repeatedly, and expressly, made clear to those who organized the effort to break the embargo that it would willingly take all of the humanitarian aid that was on their boats and transfer it to Gaza, without delay. All that Israel wanted was to be able to ensure that materials were, in fact, humanitarian aid, rather than the sorts of materials used for launching attacks that are supplied to Hamas by the Iranians and others. The organizers of the flotilla refused – because, of course, getting humanitarian aid to Gaza was not what their gambit was really about.
Fact 6: Israel regularly provides humanitarian aid to Gaza, and volunteering to get the humanitarian aid from the ships to Gaza was consistent with Israeli policy all along.
And Fact 7, which is now coming to light several days after the initial and predictable barrage of criticism of Israel: Those on at least one of the ships planned all along to attack Israelis when they sought to enforce the embargo, and indeed, their attack on the Israelis was brutal.
This fact has been starkly captured in video widely circulating around the Internet, showing the vicious beatings initiated by those on board one of the ships against Israelis, who for their part had been instructed to refrain from using any force if at all possible. Indeed, in Israel the military is being criticized for failing to adequately prepare its naval personnel to anticipate the attacks on them from the boats, and for being too passive, and too trusting, in its approach to the flotilla.
As for the evidence that certain individuals of those responsible for orchestrating this tragedy are linked to Al Qaeda and other representatives of the worst forces on the planet, the next days will likely yield more information.
But the larger issue is this: Has the desire to blame Israel in certain quarters reached such an irrational frenzy that the fundamental facts of any issue relating to the Middle East conflict will reliably be overlooked? Are those who are committed to a fair-minded and reasonable analysis of that conflict prepared to insist that others who like nothing more than jumping to conclusions stop, pause, think, and consider the actual evidence?
There will always be those who don’t let facts to get in the way of their biases. But fair-minded people examine the evidence before forming conclusions, especially when emotions run high. Israel – and the cause of peace in the Middle East – is counting on them to do just that.
Nadav Tamir is the consul general at the consulate general of Israel to New England.
