MB Civic

Cockburn in CounterPunch ..

The American liberal conscience began to make its accommodation with torture in June, 1977, which was the month the London Sunday Times published a major expose of torture of Palestinians by the Israeli armed forces and the security agency, Shin Bet. Suddenly American supporters of Israel were arguing that certain techniques – sensory deprivation, prolonged stress positions while hooded, incarceration in “cells” the size of packing crates, etc – somehow weren’t really torture, or were morally justifiable torture under “ticking time bomb” theory. Ahead lay the repellent spectacle of Professor Alan Dershowitz of Harvard Law School, and a supposed liberal defender of civil rights, recommending to Israel the notion of “torture warrants”, with the targets of the warrants being “subjected to judicially monitored physical measures designed to cause excruciating pain without leaving any lasting damage.” One form of torture recommended by the Harvard professor was “the sterilized needle being shoved under the fingernails.” With the Great War on Terror, launched after the World Trade Center attacks of 9/11/2001, torture made its march into the full light of day

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