On May 9, 2005, Michael Isikoff and John Barry, two seasoned reporters for Newsweek, published a story about the interrogations and imprisonment of suspected terrorists in the aftermath of the Al Qaeda attacks on September 11, 2001 that left Americans in shock and mourning for the many lives that were lost. The suspected terrorists were detained in what became a controversial military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Isikoff and Barry described the culturally insensitive interrogation methods that were conducted at Guantanamo Bay by the American military. They described the soldiers desecrating the Koran, the Moslem holy book, which they placed on toilets and even one time flushed down the toilet. The information for this story was provided by a confidential informant, who in the past had been a very reliable source; however, this fact alone does not guarantee the story’s truth.
As a result of the story, Newsweek faced a lot of criticism. The American Joint Chiefs of Staff issued a statement on May 16, 2005, saying, “We can’t find anything to substantiate the allegations that appeared in Newsweek” (Jacquette, 2007, p. 15). On May 23, 2005, two weeks after publishing the Koran abuse story, Newsweek retracted the story. Mark Whitaker, the editor, commented, “Based on what we know ow, we are retracting our original story that an internal military investigation had uncovered Koran abuse at Guantanamo Bay” (Jacquette, 2007, p. 15). Though the story was retracted voluntarily, it came after a great deal of criticism from the American military and other governmental officials demanding that the story be withdrawn.
Investigators had reviewed 25,000 documents from the prison and only found one incident involving a copy of the K...
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...cy of the story. I would make sure that that I did not assume that my reporters did not take any short-cuts simply because they were experienced. As the editor, it would be my job to make sure that the story was done right before allowing it to be released to the public.
If the Koran abuse story had been true, I believe that it should be published. There may be bad reactions from the Muslim world, but as Jacquette wrote, “Commitment to truth and accuracy in news reporting is recognized as a fundamental obligation of journalistic ethics” (2007, p. 12). Publishing the story could cause riots, accusations, ruined reputation and lots of anger; but a journalist has a moral and professional obligation to report the abuses taking place in our society as well. They must inform the public because in a sense, journalists are a watchdog over the well-being of society.
Szegedy-Maszak, Marianne. "The Abu Ghraib Prison Scandal: Sources of Sadism." Writing and Reading for ACP Composition. Upper Saddle River: Pearson Custom, 2009. 210-12. Print.
In the article “Modern-Day Witch Hunts”, Jamie Dailey focuses the attention on problems that Muslim Americans commonly face on a day-to-day basis. He first paints a picture by comparing the violent acts performed on Muslims to the Salem Witch trial in 1692. The Salem Witch trials resulted in 19 deaths of innocent individuals, because they were accused of witchcraft. Dailey goes on to explain in America, the type of persecution Muslims endure has many forms. A more recent controversy towards this religion involves the building of the Ground Zero Mosque in central New York. The name of this building is very misleading, especially to the eyes of an American. Even though this structure is actually built a few blocks away from where the former World Trade Center stood, problems have still risen from the public. Americans often mistake Muslims as the group of people who had performed acts of terrorism on American soil, when it was actually an Islamic group known as Al Qaeda. Mosques all across the United States started being vandalized by people protesting against their religion. This article shows how irrational fear can corrupt the thoughts of people.
Marianne Szegedy-Maszak, a senior writer at U.S. News and World, published her article, "The Abu Ghraib Prison Scandal: Sources of Sadism," in 2004. She uses the article to briefly overview the scandal as a whole before diving into what can trigger sadistic behavior. The Abu Ghraib Prison Scandal took place in 2004, wherein American troops humiliated and tortured Iraqi detainees (Szegedy-Maszak 75). The main objective of Szegedy-Maszak’s article is to investigate the causation behind sadistic behavior, exclusively in the Abu Ghraib Prison scandal. She effectively does so by gathering information and research from professional psychologists and professors of psychology, specifically Herbert Kelman and Robert Okin (Szegedy-Maszak 76). She finds
Farber, David R. Taken Hostage: The Iran Hostage Crisis and America's First Encounter with Radical Islam. Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP, 2005. Print.
The most obvious and completely overlooked piece of evidence in this article is a seemingly simple sentence that changes the whole argument included within the article. “The guards at Abu Ghraib were told that they were merely “softening up” the prisoners for interrogation”(Szegedy-Maszak 77). This sentence is the one piece of evidence that clearly shows how it is not the soldiers fault, but authority figures. The only ones who can order the soldiers to act this way is their commanding
America’s Use of Torture in Interrogations of Suspected Terrorists Violates Human Rights by Lisa Hajjar
The US military base in Guantanamo Bay, which was used as detention facility and interrogation activities of suspected terrorists apprehended by US sequel to 9/11 attack in 2001, during the period, terrorist suspects witnessed a wide range of coercive interrogations and inhuman acts ratified by US government and termed “Enhanced Interrogation Techniques”. The joint armed forces and both intelligence agencies of US (CIA ad FBI) where deployed to Guanatanmo with the mandate of coercive interrogation techniques in other to ensure captured terrorists reveal actionable intelligence to unmask the 9/11 perpetrators and Al Qaeda gang, and also to prevent future attacks. During this period which was Bush administration, US became listed among countries that legalized torture and assumed the lead position among those using coercive interrogation techniques in combating terrorism and had bad popularity to the point Canadian government (US crony) stated that its has included US in list of nations that use torture against the international convention.
Guantanamo Bay, a US naval base on the southern point of Cuba, has long been a source of controversy for it’s alleged interrogation tactics and torture. The sitting President, Trump, has made it clear he wants to revive the use of waterboarding, and other extreme practices. On the other hand, General Mattis, White House Chief of Staff, commented, “Give me a pack of cigarettes and a couple of beers and I can do better with that than I do with torture” (Cooper). With terrorist attacks becoming more common events in American life, many have called to continue the questioning of the top jihadists at Guantanamo. The US should continue using Guantanamo Bay as a detention center that is necessary to national security.
Mazzetti, Mark, Julian E. Barnes, Edward T. Pound, David E. Kaplan, and Linda Robinson. "Inside the Iraq Prison Scandal. (cover story)" EbscoHost. N.p., 24 Oct. 2004. Web. 21 Mar. 2014.
“The political, social, and legal pressure on Muslim communities in the name of “national security” has created a new form of American legal exceptionalism” (Elver 139). Since Arab immigrants where viewed as potential terrorist threats they were legally placed under surveillance as they could be a “national security threat” (Elver 139). The government started ‘taking suspected terrorists in violation of the law off the streets and [kept] them locked up” (Elver 140). These individuals who where taken into custody were targeted because the government was going after “Muslim-looking” people.” (Elver 144). By incarcerating Arab immigrants, the United States government as well as some citizens, thought they would be safe from terrorism. A few weeks following the attack on the Twin Towers, there was a survey that found Americans believed “Arab and Muslim Americans should be profiled and targeted for surveillance and interrogation in the name of national security” (Cook 3).
In the article, “The Torture Myth,” Anne Applebaum explores the controversial topic of torture practices, focused primarily in The United States. The article was published on January 12, 2005, inspired by the dramatic increase of tensions between terrorist organizations and The United States. Applebaum explores three equality titillating concepts within the article. Applebaum's questions the actual effectiveness of using torture as a means of obtaining valuable information in urgent times. Applebaum explores the ways in which she feels that the United States’ torture policy ultimately produces negative effects upon the country. Applebaum's final question is if torture is not optimally successful, why so much of society believes it works efficiently.
The book’s title, with its dry allusion to the separation of powers, does not do it justice. “Guantánamo and the Abuse of Presidential Power” represents the best account yet of what Mr. Margulies calls “a human rights debacle that will eventually take its place alongside other wartime misadventures, including the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II, the prosecutions under the Espionage and Sedition Acts during World War I, and the suspension of the writ of habeas corpus during the Civil War.”
In the 12 years since the terrorist attacks on the world trade towers in New York city, thousands of hours of research and interviews has been conducted, scores of books have been written, and countless documentaries and films have been produced in an effort to help us understand how and why terrorists were able to carry out the massacre of nearly 3500 people. Despite the plethora of religious and nonreligious beliefs represented by the friends and family of those who died, one universal belief binds them all: the belief that an unspeakable act of cruelty has changed our nation and our people for all time. The name ascribed to this act of terrorism is debated widely. Some call it evil. Others call it nothing more than supreme cruelty.
For decades, the media portrayal of the Arab culture and Islam has contributed to a skewed public opinion in America. Looking closely at the news coverage concerning the Middle East and the United States, there is an inherent media bias against Arabs and Muslims as foreign threats to domestic security. Stephen Franklin argues that "Islamic nations are often portrayed in news reports as uniformly intolerant and anti-democratic" (Franklin 17). Unfortunately, such coverage has contributed to the public and government misconceptions of all Arabs and Muslims as terrorists. According to Fawaz Gerges, "terrorism has emerged as one of the most important political issues in the United States...[linking] it to Islamic militancy..." (Gerges 79). Moreover, the media's skewed depiction of the Arabs and Muslims has perpetuated countless stereotypes that undoubtedly affect the American opinion. These stereotypes and misconceptions of the Arabs and Muslims clearly indicate a media bias provoked by ignorance and ethnocentricity. The elite media's role in the portrayal of the Arab culture and Islam following the Oklahoma City bombing has had adetrimental effect on America's public opinion, investigation proceedings, and government action.
Mahmood Mamdani, Good Muslim, Bad Muslim: America, The Cold War, and the Roots of Terror (New York: Three Rivers Press, 2005), 5.