Iraqis See Dignity Crushed in Prison Abuse Photos

In Washington, shocking images of foreign troops abusing Iraqi prisoners are an exception to the rule of American good intentions. In Baghdad, they look like signs of what Iraq’s dignity means to its occupiers. “Pimps…don’t do what the Americans do. Who takes a bearded man, a Muslim, and lays him down with his face in another man’s genitals?” said Abdel Wadoud Muhbal, a currency trader in the Iraqi capital, on Saturday. “They want jihad (holy war).” Photos from a Baghdad prison, aired on a U.S. network and Arab channels, show nude Iraqi men forced to lie in a heap and simulate sex acts, as their laughing captors pose and give the thumbs-up sign. The images, as well as those of soldiers from U.S. ally Britain urinating on their Iraqi captives, have sparked Arab outrage, international condemnation and a plea from President Bush for Iraqis to judge his nation on its avowed principles, not the scenes of degradation in Iraq. Full Story