Torture at Gitmo (Yawn)

We should all probably be used to this by now, but once again, the American media and the foreign media seem, shall we say, divorced from what makes news.

A former U.S. Army sergeant who served as an Arabic translator is publishing a book about his experiences and observations at Guantanamo prison in Cuba. Most American media ignored the story — just the way they ignored the disclosure of the secret memo that proves George Bush planned to conquer Iraq as early as the spring of 2002. But some media minions did cover it. Here’s the lead of the piece by Charlie Savage of the Boston Globe, published on May 3:

A former commander of the Guantanamo Bay prison exaggerated the value of information gleaned from detainees and knew that aggressive intelligence teams were staging friendly interrogations for visiting lawmakers and senior military officers, according to a former Army interpreter stationed there two years ago.

Huh? Whazzat?

Let’s compare Savage’s lead to that of Paul Harris, who led his story in the London Observer like this:

An American soldier has revealed shocking new details of abuse and sexual torture of prisoners at Guantánamo Bay in the first high-profile whistleblowing account to emerge from inside the top-secret base.

Oh.

Harris goes on:

In an exclusive interview, Saar told The Observer that prisoners were physically assaulted by 'snatch squads' and subjected to sexual interrogation techniques and that the Geneva Conventions were deliberately ignored by the US military.

He also said that soldiers staged fake interrogations to impress visiting administration and military officials. Saar believes that the great majority of prisoners at Guantánamo have no terrorist links and little worthwhile intelligence information has emerged from the base despite its prominent role in America's war on terror.

Saar paints a picture of a base where interrogations of often innocent prisoners have spiralled out of control, doing massive damage to America's image in the Muslim world.

The story broke on CBS’ 60 Minutes, which apparently is no longer taken seriously by American media. But the allegations from Saar are devastating, including bizarre attempts to break down the will of Muslim prisoners by sexually taunting them and preventing them from praying.

It all paints a picture of a United States out of control in its zeal to hunt down supposed terrorists. Which is why the American media won’t touch it.