Sullivan makes two important comments today. First, about For God and Country, the new book by James Yee, former U.S. Army chaplain at Gitmo. Falsely accused by the military of colluding with al Qaeda, Yee now tells of routine tactical desecration of the Koran by American interrogators and guards. Sullivan quotes Yee:
I never heard of an incident where a detainee hid anything dangerous in the Koran; doing so would be considered an insult. Yet the guards shook the prisoners’ Korans violently, broke bindings, ripped pages and dropped the book on the floor, all on the pretext of searching them… Translators with the Joint Intelligence Group (JIG) also confirmed that some prisoners were forced to prostrate themselves in the centre of a satanic circle lit with candles. Interrogators shouted at them, ‘Satan is your God, not Allah! Repeat that after me!’
Then Sullivan adds:
I’m waiting for Michelle Malkin and Heather Mac Donald [sic] to describe all of this – which verifies widespread abuse of the Koran at Gitmo – as enemy propaganda. It isn’t. It’s true. Yee knew the truth which was partly why he was disgracefully framed and smeared by the Pentagon.
An important corollary to this: Matt Cooper’s Newsweek report of several months ago, so roundly condemned by conservatives, was retracted because it was inadequately sourced, not because it was false. On the contrary, now that we have Yee on record, it appears that it was accurate.
In other news, Sullivan reports that the operator of the Iraqi-corpses-for-porn website has been arrested. “The deeper question is: why hasn’t the military disciplined those soldiers who violated the Geneva Conventions?” Don’t hold your breath.
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