The FBI, under the Freedom of Information Act, released its report on abuses against Muslim prisoners at Guantanamo. These include having a guard dress as a priest and baptize them, wrapping them in Israeli flags, having women guards touch them while they were praying so they'd be unclean, pouring urine on the Koran and duct taping the face of a prisoner so he couldn't recite the Koran. This in addition to the more prosaic forms of torture and cruel, degrading and inhuman treatment to which they were subjected. In this case, however, it seems that these people are being subjected to such degrading treatment because they are Muslim. In a proxy war, we, Americans, are attacking Islam.
The question that obviously comes up is why? It's practically impossible that these actions were done without orders from above, or at least its complacency. Had Superior officers ordered interrogators to torture the detainees using regular methods, but respecting religion, surely these acts would not have happened. It also seems unlikely that those in charge would have imagined that this would not have come up. Unless they planned to execute all prisoners, they must have known that as they were released, give access to lawyers or be interrogated by the FBI, these allegations would come up. Indeed, often times torture is not used just for torture's sake, but to intimidate a greater population. That worked very well in the short term in Argentina in the 70's, as people who were disappeared were released and told their stories, it scared others (and rightly so) into exile and silence. But when your audience is the whole Muslim population in the world, it seems your actions are more likely to cause rage than fear.
So why is it that we want to enrage the Muslim world? As much as we might want to deny it, we are neither physically or economically ready to confront it all. Its retaliatory tactics are as likely to scare us into passivity as to enrage us - by now the American people have realized that we can't win the war in Iraq, much less a war against the Muslim World. So I don't have an answer. The only thing I can think of is that Bush & co. really have a millenial desire to see an all-out war in the Middle East, to hurry Armageddon, the Rapture or whathaveyou. But surely that's too hairbrained? I don't know. What do you guys think?
Guantanamo Detainee "Baptized"
IslamOnline.net & Newspapers
The documents also showed that US jailers wrapped a Muslim prisoner in
an Israeli flag during interrogation sessions to "incense" him.
CAIRO — In a new embarrassment to the Bush administration, an FBI
probe indicated that detainees at the notorious Guantanamo detention
camp were "baptized" and wrapped in Israeli flags, the Washington Post
reported on Wednesday, January 3.
A US interrogator bragged to an FBI agent that he forced a Muslim
detainee to listen to "Satanic black metal music" for hours, according
to documents turned over as part of an ongoing lawsuit by the American
Civil Liberties Union.
Then, the US interrogator dressed as a Catholic priest before
"baptizing" the detainee, it added.
The FBI internal probe into abuse accusations at Guantanamo revealed
26 cases of mistreatments of the Muslim detainees.
The documents also showed that US jailers wrapped a Muslim prisoner in
an Israeli flag during interrogation sessions to "incense" him.
Other aggressive questioning techniques used included subjecting
detainees to extreme heat and cold and using strobe lights.
The tactics were allowed under aggressive Pentagon detention policy
place at the time, according to the probe.
The US has been holding hundreds of detainees at the notorious
detention facility, mostly arrested in Afghanistan after the toppling
of Taliban following the 9/11 attacks.
Guantanamo buildings hide behind multiple rows of 12-foot chain-link
fences covered in green tarpaulins and topped with tight spirals of
barbed wire.
Old wooden and newer steel watchtowers dot the perimeter.
Religiously-oriented
FBI agents also reported mistreatment of the Noble Qur'an by Guantanamo jailers.
An agent said that a Marine captain squatted over a copy of the Muslim
holy book in October 2002, while questioning a detainee who was
enraged by the abuse.
A second FBI agent described similar events, but it was unclear from
the documents whether it was a separate case.
The desecration of the Qur'an was first reported in 2005, prompting
deadly protests in the Muslim world.
At the time, the US military conducted an investigation that confirmed
five cases of "mishandling" the Muslim holy book.
It acknowledged that soldiers and interrogators had kicked the Qur'an,
had stood on it and, in one case, had sprayed urine on it.
The new documents also unveiled repeated desecration of the Noble
Qur'an, in a "religiously oriented tactic" against the Muslim
detainees.
An FBI agent said he was asked female interrogators to wet their hands
and touch detainees' faces, prompting them to consider themselves
unclean and unable to continue praying.
US interrogators also wrapped a bearded inmate's head in duct tape
"because he would not stop quoting the Qur'an," according to an FBI
agent.
The agent, whose account was corroborated by a colleague, said that a
civilian contractor laughed about the treatment and was eager to show
it off.
Root Causes
"More comprehensive investigation is needed… into the root causes and
policies that led to those incidents," said Jaffer
The new abuse revelation sparked calls for comprehensive
investigations into the practices used at Guantanamo.
"More comprehensive investigation is needed, not only into the scope
of abuses but into the root causes and policies that led to those
incidents," said Jameel Jaffer, deputy director of the ACLU's National
Security Program.
Jaffer questioned how aggressively the FBI pursued accusations by its
agents, because authorities conducted follow-up interviews in only
nine of the 26 cases.
An FBI memorandum that accompanied the new documents said that none of
the incidents involved FBI or Justice Department employees.
The memo said that the reports concerned personnel from other
government agencies or outside contractors.
The Pentagon said the issues and facts raised in the documents "are not new".
Amnesty International has called Guantanamo the "gulag of our time"
and said it has become a "symbol of abuse and represents a system of
detention that is betraying the best US values and undermines
international standards."
A growing chorus of world dignitaries and politicians, including
former US presidents Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton, and incumbent
British Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett have pressed for the
closure of Guantanamo.
Guantanamo Bay Inquiry
A survey of 493 FBI personnel who were asked whether they observed aggressive mistreatment, interrogations or interview techniques of GTMO yielded 26 positive responses and several additional responses that were "not purely negative." These responses culminated in a 9/2/04 request through FBI's OGC to conduct a "GTMO, Counterterrorism Division, Special Inquiry" re 9 of the incidents identified. The conclusion was that there was no FBI involvement in the target interview techniques -- only outside entities. Following is a list of the positive and "not purely negative" responses that prompted the inquiry. Note that these documents have been vetted by both DoD and FBI, and that FBI believes this or substantially similar information has already been released in this litigation.
Positive Responses:
*
on several occasions, witness ("W") saw detainees ("ds") in interrogation rooms chained hand and foot in fetal position to floor w/no chair/ food/water; most urinated or defecated on selves, and were left there 18, 24 hrs or more. Once, the air conditioning was so low that the barefoot d was shaking with cold. Another time, it was off so the unventilated room was over 100 degrees, d was almost unconscious on floor with a pile of hair next to him (he had apparently been pulling it out throughout the night). Another time, it was sweltering hot and loud rap music played - d's hand and foot was chanined and he was in a fetal position on the floor. Upon inquiry, W was told that interrogators [military contractors] ordered this treatment. Took place in Delta Camp
*
d was kept in darkened cell in Naval Brig at GTMO, then transferred to Camp Delta where he gave no info. Then taken to Camp X-Ray and put in plywood hut. Interrogators yelled and screamed at him. One interrogator squatted over the Koran. Another day a German Shepherd was commended to growl, bark and show his teeth to the prisoner. Subsequently someone laughingly told the W "you have to see this" and took him to an interrogation room where W saw a d with a full beard whose head was wrapped in duct tape
*
civilian contractor asked W (an FBI SA) to come see something. There was an unknown bearded longhaired d gagged w/duct tape that covered much of his head. SA asked if he had spit at interrogators, and the contractor laughingly replied that d had been chanting the Koran nonstop. No answer to how they planned to remove the duct tape.
*
W saw canine used aggressively to intimidate a d
*
d in darkened cell in Naval Brig where they planned to interrogate him for 24 hours straight, W was told the Secretary [Rumsfeld] approved this technique. Saw interrogator straddle the Koran while d was handcuffed to chair, d held in chain link cage w/cover over top
*
W observed sleep deprivation interviews w/strobe lights and loud music. Interrogator said it would take 4 days to break someone doing an interrogation 16 hrs w/lights and music on and 4 hrs off. Handwritten note next to typed synopsis says "ok under DoD policy"
*
Rumors that interrogator bragged about doing lap dance on d, another about making d listen to satanic black metal music for hours then dressing as a Priest and baptizing d to save him - handwritten note says "yes"
*
W heard rumor that male d was dressed in female clothing, made up and given a lap dance by female prison guard. Was told this was a tactic to break the d and get cooperation
*
W observed d in a stress position - w/in regs of military techniques but outside MIOG
*
W walked into Camp Delta observation room and saw d rubbing his leg due to possibly being in stress position. D was wearing leg irons and handcuffed w/cuffs chained to waist. W was advised the chains were adjusted to force D to stand in "baseball catcher" position. D was being questioned by 2 military officers. D was previously held in brig and questioned for 2 months w/no results. Permission had been granted to use "special interrogation techniques"
*
Nurse informed that a d was admitted to hospital for hypothermia, had low blood pressure and low body core temp; Lt Col subsequently said at daily staff mtg that d did not have hypothermia
*
After hearing what sounded like "thunder," W saw 2 individuals dressed in BDUs standing and an inmate kneeling on a bloody floor with his forehead on the ground, holding his nose and crying. They said d become upset and threw himself on floor. W heard previously that a female military personnel would wet her hands and touch the ds face as part of their psych-ops to make them feel unclean and upset them. W heard that in an effort to disrupt ds who were praying during interrogation, female intelligence personnel would do this
*
A detainee brought into interview shack at Camp x-ray appeared to have broken fingers and facial injuries. W was told that d exhibited noncompliance w/prison guard and rapid reaction team was brought in to bring d into compliance. He was in a plywood shack adjacent to "dog cages". D had black eye, facial cuts around nose, and taped fingers. He motioned to guards and said "they"
handwritten note "yes - Do interview so we will have a formal record. I think I know what all he saw."
*
W saw d in interview room sitting on floor w/Israeli flag draped around him, loud music and strobe lights. W suspects this practice is used by DOD DHS based on who he saw in the hallway
*
d pointed to marks on wrists from shackles, upset at wearing hood, alleged guards beat him. Claims he is innocent of any crime and was arrested while dining w/guests at his house. Two weapons found at his house; he said he got them 8-10 yrs ago. Insisted he was a simple farmer and allegations were false. Yet his hands were smooth.
*
D says he was beaten unconscious at Camp x-ray. Guards entered cell unprovoked and spat and cursed at him, called him SOB, bastard and crazy. D rolled on stomach to protect self due to recent stomach surgery. Soldier jumped on his back, beat him in the face, then choked him till he passed out. Said he was beating him because he was a Muslim. Female guard also beat him and grabbed his head and beat it into the cell floor. D taken to hospital after.
*
D put in isolation after a dispute over arguing with a guard over his food.
*
D's story re his arrest/innocence. D claims he was arrested by the Saudis under suspicion stemming from Khobar Towers bombing, sent to prison in Dammam where beaten for 2 weeks prior to interrogation. Detained 3 mos then released. Later detained again and released. Traveled to Bahrain and got 5 yr tourism visa from US embassy. After 2 months went back to Saudi Arabia to visit sick father. 8 mos later returned to US. Back and forth until 9/11. His travels were funded by Saudis, including his father.
*
W situated in observation booth in between two interview rooms, booth crowded. D seated in chair and secured w/shackles at feet. Lights off except for strobe, loud rock music. Continued for 30-60 minutes. W was told such tactics were common there.
Handwritten notes "No - This would be consistent w/DoD guidelines"
*
W saw d w/bloodshot eyes and blood congealed to eyelashes, attaches photos
hw notes - "No. No other bruising to suggest he as hit. Looks like conjunctivitis or other eye infection rather than result of bruise."
*
interviewers sat D down on floor in center of room while rap music played loudly and interviewers laughed, smoked cigars and blew smoke at d's face
hw notes - "No. Seems consistent w/DoD policy"
*
W heard of technique (not allowed by FBI agents) where a difficult d who would not cooperate would be left in shackles for extended time (12 hrs or more) and the AC turned way low or off.
hw notes "environment down - doesn't seem excessive given DoD policy"
*
d on floor w/Israeli flag draped around him, loud music playing, strobe light flashing
hw notes "No - consistent w/DoD policy. Israeli flag is over the top - but not abusive."
email from Valerie Caproni: "No further interview necessary. Loud music and strobe light would be within the notion of ‘environment down' that is an approved technique for DoD. The Israeli flag, though obnoxious, doesn't seem to change the basic technique into one that would be unlawfully abusive."
*
observed short shackling to the floor, cold temperatures, loud music, strobe lights and left in interrogation room for long periods - consistent with Dod policy - not FBI policy
*
lights were off in interview room except for a strobe light and loud music played while a clothed d sat on the floor alone
handwritten note: "No. Psych-ops appron [?] w/in DoD guidelines"
*
W saw interrogation thru one-way glass - d seated in middle of floor while loud rap or heavy metal music played. Two interrogators stood above d laughing and blowing cigar smoke in d's face. W thinks they were with Defense Humint Services or contracted by Army
handwritten note "No - consistent w/DoD policy"
*
occasionally ds complained of inappropriate behavior i.e., incident in which d alleged female guard removed her blouse and, while pressing her body against a shackled and restrained d rom behind, handled his genatalia and wiped menstrual blood on his head and face as punishment for lack of cooperation
*
W observed d shackled to the bolt on the floor in a kneeling position in dark room w/flashing strobe light and loud music
handwriting "no - consistent with DoD policy"
*
practice in which d wd be placed in interview room approx 6-8 hrs prior to interview w/AC turned down as low as 55 degrees. D would be restrained from adjusting AC
hw note - "no - consistent w/DoD policy"
*
when d said he only wanted to speak to someone introduced by his regular interrogators he was yelled at for 25 minutes. D was short shackled, room temp lowered, strobe lights used and maybe loud music 2 males interrogators yelled at him and said he was never leaving here They left d along in this condition for 12 hours. D could not eat, pray or use the bathroom.
*
D being debriefed by NAE for 15 hours periodically threw up in trash can. W was told D had ulcer and stress was irritating it. Later told he had stomach virus.
hw note - "no - consistent w/DoD policy – not nice but not abusive – consistent w/ [?]oD policy"
*
W observed women crying near the river, their homes had been destroyed by planes. Trucks full of people trying to surrender were blown up by planes. On 2d day after capture, d was put in a ditch by Northern Alliance people. Next day, he was allowed to jump into a truck and taken to Mazar-e-Sharif where he was forced into a metal "shipping"-type container w/about 100 men. The container was then closed and d blacked out due to lack of air. When he awoke, there were new holes in the container., The man next to him was dead. He thinks he was in the container 24 hours - only 20 men survived. When it opened he was at Sabergaan jail. The dead were put into a hole and buried, he heard that those too weak to get out of the container were as well. US soldiers arrived about a month later
*
loud music and strobe lights
Responses which are not purely negative
*
fluctuations in room temperature
*
W is Uighur translator Uighurs are moderate muslims who occupied E Turkestan - which ultimately became the Kinjiang province of China. They were offered land in Afghanistan and considered themselves US allies. D was a broadcaster for Radio Free Asia. When their camp was bombed they fled to Pakistan, were captured and half turned over to US. [the other half were immediately executed by the Chinese]. Those at GTMO fear immediate execution if sent to China.
*
W heard that every time the FBI established rapport with a d, the military would step in and d would stop being cooperative. Rumor that military would present themselves as FBI agents.
*
loud music, ds said they were shown pornographic photos to upset them
*
the only complaints this W saw were about lack/delay of mail, lack of dental appts, not allowed to grow beards long enough
*
hooded d was led into room by hooded MPs
A young professor of Middle Eastern studies is asked by a campus Palestinian student organization to be on a panel on the effects of the occupation. She makes some remarks about the humanitarian costs of the occupation on Palestinians and the necessity of a just political solution. Next thing she knows she is receiving e-mails accusing her of being anti-semitic, akin to someone who "shoveled Jews into the ovens at Dachau." She is surprised, comforted by the support of her colleagues, but, as an untenured professor, knows herself to be vulnerable. Her choices are to self-censor or, quite likely, lose her job. Her article about her experience appears below - under a pseudonym.
Everyone who has ever, even casually, worked on the human rights of Palestinians can probably sympathize with her. The moment you stand up for even one Palestinian child who has been shot, express concerns about Palestinians being tortured, having their homes destroyed, hey, even say the word "Palestinian" without "terrorist" in your next breath and you risk being branded an anti-semite.
Your interest, they'll tell you, is not on human rights. "Why aren't you focusing on human rights in Sudan or China instead? Surely because you are anti-semitic and are using this issue only as an excuse. Why do you ask Israel to be better than other countries? That's a sure sign of your prejudices."
What is particularly puzzling to me is that these words, these accusations come from people who generally have liberal points of view. They don't think torture is right (though of course, it's different when it's a Palestinian-cum-terrorist), they believe in freedom of speech and so forth. Indeed, many of these people join us hand in hand on other battles, against human rights violations in Latin America, Africa, Europe. They'll even stand against the death penalty in the US - that brutal act. But don't say a word about Israel.
If you do, you should expect not just to receive insulting mails and veiled or not so veiled threats. On the internet, you can expect the most obnoxious and terrible things written about you. Of course your job will be threatened - they will call your bosses and try to get you fired. But they might also get the Israeli intelligence services involved. Your phone might be tapped, you might get a strange visit from some art student, you may find you are actually followed when you travel (!). And whether you think you are paranoid or not, you may be afraid. Second guess yourself, there are so many other things to do in the world, why risk it all for something that's only marginal to your work anyway?
That's how they create terror. Those same people, services and so forth who are so ready to justify any action against anyone who might be a terrorist, use terror and intimidation techniques to get what they want: your silence.
Alas, these are the same techniques being used by the US administration against anyone who might oppose them: peace activists, civil rights activists and, you can bet on it, immigration activists. Criticize the US and you are branded unpatriotic or even a traitor. Intimidate to silence.
So let's not be silent. If advocating on behalf of human rights for all human beings, including Palestinians, is being anti-semitic, I'll stand up for your right to label me however you like.
Monday, April 10, 2006
The New Blacklists
By Leah Bowman
It's rare that I get an e-mail accusing me of being a Nazi, much less an expletive-laden one, but those were the words that stared back at me as I stopped by my office to check my e-mail after a particularly long day of teaching. The message immediately following that one had a subject line that read "anti-Semitic leftist professors."
I was at the end of my first semester of teaching Middle Eastern history at a large research university in the South. Like any new faculty member, my anxieties revolved primarily around not breaking the Powerpoint projector, not being mistaken yet again for a graduate student instead of a professor, and not spilling spinach dip on the dean at one of the innumerable faculty mixers held at the beginning of the academic year. Hate mail wasn't on the list.
Since neither of the letters specified exactly what I had done to place myself in the ranks of someone who, as one of the letters put it, "shoveled Jews into the ovens at Dachau," it took me a couple of days of inquiries and some Google searching to figure out what was going on.
Two weeks earlier I had spoken on a panel about the Israeli occupation of Palestine. It was on the closing night of a weeklong Palestinian film festival called "Life Under Occupation" sponsored jointly by a few human rights groups on the campus and a Palestinian advocacy group for which I am the faculty adviser. The group is a university-approved student organization that aims to educate and raise awareness about the plight of Palestinians living under Israeli rule. Similar organizations are found on many American campuses.
The students had been trying without success for close to a year to find a faculty adviser. Some of the people who had been asked to serve as the group's adviser were just too busy. Others apparently were nervous about having their names associated with a Palestinian group, even one dedicated to a just and peaceful resolution to the conflict for both Jews and Palestinians.
At the time, I confess I thought those people to be slightly paranoid. I'm now a little more understanding.
I wish I could say I became a target because of my passionate feats of oratorical brilliance and advocacy on the panel. In fact, overtired and underprepared, I said a few words about the humanitarian costs of the occupation on Palestinians and the necessity of a just political solution. Then I went home to catch up on some sleep.
A student in the audience who is the head of a pro-Israel group on the campus was apparently more impressed with my performance than I was. She wrote an article that appeared on a right-wing Web site, identifying me as someone who condoned terrorism and objecting to my use of the term "occupation" to describe Israel's military presence in the West Bank.
That's when the e-mails began arriving. I know now I was na?ve not to have expected something like this. Being a scholar of anything having to do with Islam, the Middle East, or the Arab world has become, in the post 9-11 era, a full contact sport.
Charging Middle East scholars with "anti-Semitism," "liberal bias," and "support for terrorism" has become (in fashion parlance) the new black of right-wing political discourse. Entire Web sites are devoted to exposing academics with expertise on the Middle East as dangerous radicals who pose a threat to the young minds of America. I have seen many of my professors, colleagues, and friends over the past few years placed on such blacklists.
The message to those of us who believe there must be room for ethical and reasoned debate on American involvement in Iraq, on the Israeli occupation, and on the war on terror has never been clearer: We are watching you. And we're going to take you down. I never thought I would be immune to it. I just thought I would have a little more time before it happened to me.
I'm luckier than many other young scholars who have found themselves in this situation. My departmental colleagues have been supportive, both personally and professionally. They reassure me that they will back me up when I get called into the dean's office someday because angry alumni and donors write letters asking why my institution allows student groups that "promote terrorism" to operate on the campus.
My supporters also let me know when faculty members in other departments -- people whom I've never met, seen, or spoken to -- write letters urging the department to help purge the campus of dangerous viewpoints and the faculty members who espouse them.
But my colleagues have also pointed out that as an untenured faculty member I am vulnerable. Just don't do anything "stupid" in your classes, they caution, and you'll probably be alright.
It's good advice of course. But I have to ask myself, What does it mean?
I do stupid things in my class all the time. I suspect every new teacher does. I forget to put the week's readings on the Web in time for the students to read them. There's always one student every semester whose name I continually get wrong. I snap at a student who is repeatedly disruptive in class instead of calling him into my office for a calm, rational talking-to about his behavior.
Still, I get my colleagues' message. Somewhere between teaching students to try to think critically about the world and their place in it and giving students a reading, delivering a lecture, or asking them to discuss issues that might land me in the middle of a public witchhunt, there's a line that can't be crossed. The problem is that no one can tell me where that line is.
Plenty of resources out there tell untenured professors how to teach, how to get grants, and how to balance the pedagogical side of their career with the imperative to publish. But there's nothing that explains how negotiate the road to tenure in a climate that is increasingly hostile to the meat and potatoes of a liberal-arts education -- classroom exposure to, and engagement with, alternative ideas.
So I stand in front of my class. I think about the articles I won't write and the book I won't publish if I inadvertently take a wrong step and have to spend all of my time defending my integrity as a scholar and a teacher to the university administration. I think of my partner having to deal, day after day, with a grumpy, depressed, and anxious spouse. I think of the career that I dreamed about during endless years of graduate school and dissertation writing that might be destroyed.
It is in that moment that I choose between educating my students and saving my own hide. And it is in that moment that those who want to stifle debate on campus win. They don't need to get me fired to shut me up. I'm already doing it to myself.
And I know I'm not alone. I talk all the time with untenured friends and colleagues about how our attempts to be cautious in the classroom too often translate into self-censorship. We also share our feelings of anger and frustration that the political agendas of a few well-placed, well-organized people can dictate how we do a job for that we've spent years training for.
Yet in those feelings of anger and frustration I find reason to hope. Because it means that, in spite of the uncertainty and anxiety that come with teaching controversial subjects in an inhospitable intellectual climate, we haven't given up on the idea that it's still our job to teach our students that the world is a messy and complicated place; a place that is not easily reducible to simple political platitudes or clich?s about "us" and "them."
When that struggle becomes less important that getting tenure or leading a comfortable life, I know it will be time to start looking for another line of work.
Leah Bowman is the pseudonym of an assistant professor who teaches Middle East history at a research university in the South.
Today I came across Mafqud.org an online memorial to the disappeared in Iraq under the Baathist regime. Mafqud means "disappared" in Arabic. The website contains the names and some information of over 10,000 of the hundreds of thousands who "disappeared" in Iraq under the Hussein regime. Unfortunately you have to use a search engine to look at the records, which minimizes their visual impact, though it must aid administration of the website.
As the coordinator of Proyecto Desaparecidos, an online memorial to the disappeared in Argentina, I find the project very laudable. We must remember the disappeared, we must not allow their torturers and killers to erradicate their memory from this world. Their names and faces should remind us of our commitment to create a world that is just for all, where everybody's fundamental rights are respected. So I applaud Maqfud.org and I'm glad it's there.
And yet I find it interesting that the Mafqud.org website seems to have come into being in March 2003, just as the American troups were readying to invade Iraq and that its creation was made possible by a grant from the United States Department of State.
Mafqud.org is/was a project of a Washington DC based organization originally called "Organization for Human Rights in Iraq" and later renamed Huquqalinsan.org , so as to not confuse it with a well-known Iraqi organization also called "Organization for Human Rights in Iraq". Another partner in its creation was the Teheran based "Documental Center for Human Rights in Iraq", itself associated with the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq.
It's difficult to believe that the timing of the site was circumstancial, that it was not part of a greater propaganda effort to justify the invation of Iraq on human rights terms.
Ultimately, however, I'm not sure how to feel about this site. On the one hand I think that anything that help us remember the disappeared is good. On the other, it seems perverse to use people who had suffered because of political reasons for a political agenda. And yet many of the disappeared themselves might have agreed with that agenda - though many surely not.