Robert Fisk, Jackass Extraordinaire.
Shackled, hooded, sedated. Taken to a remote corner of the world where they may be executed, where the laws of human rights are suspended. Shackled, hooded, and threatened with death by “courts” that would give no leeway to defense or innocence. In fact, it sounds like Beirut in the 1980s.
I’ve written this story before. Last time, I remember writing about the threats to my kidnapped journalist friend Terry Anderson of the Associated Press, tied up, hooded, always threatened by his captors in Lebanon.
That was between 1986 and 1991 and Terry – let us remember this distinction – was no man of violence. He was a journalist, a comrade, and a friend. But he was most cruelly treated, allowed no contacts with his family, held in cold confinement, threatened with death every bit as absolute as the American military courts that know they hold the fate of Al-Qaeda’s men in their hands.