TV News LIES

The United States has released several thousand Iraqi prisoners into Iraqi custody despite documented evidence that Iraqi security forces have abused detainees, Amnesty International said Monday. The handover of prisoners occurred following the end of U.S. combat operations in Iraq last month.

"Iraq's security forces have been responsible for systematically violating detainees' rights and they have been permitted to do so with impunity," said Malcolm Smart, Amnesty's director for the Middle East and North Africa.

The day after the American activist Rachel Corrie was crushed to death by the armored Israeli bulldozer she was trying to stop from destroying a Palestinian home, then Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon promised U.S. President George W. Bush "a thorough, credible and transparent investigation." It was the least that could be expected after the death of a U.S. citizen at the hands of its closest ally.

Seven years, two Prime Ministers and one President later, Corrie's parents sat in the front row of Haifa District Court on Sunday, a white-haired couple struggling to get to the bottom of their daughter's death. Corrie v. the State of Israel, a civil suit, is also putting a withering spotlight on Israel's conduct since March 16, 2003.

When a group of Israeli artists recently refused to perform in the new theater at this large Jewish settlement, local residents reacted with a mixture of hurt and defiance. When scores of leftist Israeli academics, prominent writers and intellectuals said that they would not lecture at the Ariel University Center or in any other settlement, many here said that nobody had asked them to come.

But the protest broadened again this week when an American advocacy group, Jewish Voice for Peace, said that more than 150 international film and theater professionals, including Julianne Moore, Theodore Bikel, Vanessa Redgrave and Tony Kushner, had endorsed its statement in support of Israeli artists against performing in the settlements, which are viewed by much of the world as a violation of international law.

"During war there are no civilians," that’s what “Yossi,” an Israeli military (IDF) training unit leader simply stated during a round of questioning on day two of the Rachel Corrie trials, held in Haifa’s District Court earlier this week. “When you write a [protocol] manual, that manual is for war,” he added.

For the human rights activists and friends and family of Rachel Corrie sitting in the courtroom, this open admission of an Israeli policy of indiscrimination towards civilians -- Palestinian or foreign -- created an audible gasp.

Twelve American soldiers face charges over a secret "kill team" that allegedly blew up and shot Afghan civilians at random and collected their fingers as trophies.

Five of the soldiers are charged with murdering three Afghan men who were allegedly killed for sport in separate attacks this year. Seven others are accused of covering up the killings and assaulting a recruit who exposed the murders when he reported other abuses, including members of the unit smoking hashish stolen from civilians.

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A closely divided federal appeals court in San Francisco has dismissed a lawsuit seeking damages from a private company that worked with the CIA as part of its "extraordinary rendition" program. The court ruled Wednesday that the government's decision to invoke the "state secrets" privilege means that the case cannot go forward.

Five foreign plaintiffs who were allegedly transported by the CIA to countries such as Egypt and Morocco for interrogation had sued Jeppesen Dataplan, a Boeing subsidiary, which provided flight planning and logistical support services. The five men said that they were tortured by foreign intelligence services working with the CIA and that Jeppesen was a critical player in the agency's rendition program.