“Was Newsweek Really Wrong?”

The entire Muslim world rebelled after Newsweek published an article affirming that interrogators at Guantanamo, the most famous of American gulags, had flushed a copy of the Koran down a toilet. There were violent demonstrations in Afghanistan in which Muslims leaders demanded the culprits be tried. Condoleezza Rice promised to seriously investigate the matter just before the Newsweek editor suggested that his magazine could have been mistaken. Apparently, a Pentagon spokesman relayed to the publication that the military did not have the slightest proof of such an act. What was the consequence? Everybody could go home and forget the story.
However, before completely forgetting the matter, it is necessary to remember that this is not first time that events of this type have been reported, even when they have not been allowed coverage by the mainstream media. Beginning with the testimonies of former Guantanamo detainees and of other sources, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, Associated Press and the Daily Mirror, facts have been reported which corroborate the initial thesis of Newsweek. The retraction by the magazine is therefore an insult to our intelligence.
This story reflects above all that the Bush administration is not making its armed forces or its mercenaries (sorry, its “subcontractors”) responsible for the abuses they commit. The British, so it seems, are not doing any better. This is not the way one can win the war against terrorism, since under these conditions it appears as if it is a war against Islam - and this can only augur future crisis.