Adam Serwer

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Adam Serwer is a reporter at Mother Jones. Formerly a staff writer at the American Prospect, he has written for the Washington Post, the Root, the Village Voice, and the New York Daily News.

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Top Romney Adviser Tied to Militia That Massacred

How Walid Phares went from advising Lebanese warlords to counseling the GOP front-runner.

—By Adam Serwer

| Thu Oct. 27, 2011 3:01 AM PDT

Walid Phares lecturing in front of a Lebanese Forces banner in 1986

Walid Phares, the recently announced co-chair of GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney's Middle East advisory group, has a long résumé. College professor. Author. Political pundit. Counterterrorism expert. But there's one chapter of his life that you won't find on his CV: He was a high ranking political official in a sectarian religious militia responsible for massacres during Lebanon's brutal, 15-year civil war.

During the 1980s, Phares, a Maronite Christian, trained Lebanese militants in ideological beliefs justifying the war against Lebanon's Muslim and Druze factions, according to former colleagues. Phares, they say, advocated the hard-line view that Lebanon's Christians should work toward creating a separate, independent Christian enclave. A photo obtained by Mother Jones shows him conducting a press conference in 1986 for the Lebanese Forces, an umbrella group of Christian militias that has been accused of committing atrocities. He was also a close adviser to Samir Geagea, a Lebanese warlord who rose from leading hit squads to running the Lebanese Forces.

Since fleeing to the United States in 1990, when the Syrians took over Lebanon, Phares has reinvented himself as a counterterrorism and national security expert, traveling comfortably between official circles and the GOP's anti-Muslim wing. In a little over two decades, he's gone from training Lebanese militants to teaching American law enforcement and intelligence officials about the Middle East, and from advising Lebanese warlords to counseling a man who could be the next president of the United States.

"I can't think of any earlier instance of a [possible presidential] adviser having held a comparable formal position with a foreign organization," says Paul Pillar, a 20-year veteran of the CIA and a professor at Georgetown's Center for Peace and Security Studies. "It should raise eyebrows any time someone in a position to exert behind-the-scenes influence on a US leader has ties to a foreign entity that are strong enough for foreign interests, and not just US interests, to determine the advice being given."

[Read the full article]

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The Great Libya-Shariah Freakout of 2011

—By Adam Serwer

| Tue Oct. 25, 2011 9:24 AM PDT

Between the deaths of Osama bin Laden and Moammar Qaddafi, it's hard out there for conservatives trying to portray President Barack Obama as weak on foreign policy. But with Libya Transitional National Council Chairman Mustafa Abdel-Jalil's announcement over the weekend that Libya would have "Islamic Shariah law [as] the basis of legislation," the right is settling on a narrative: Obama is making the world safe for Shariah!

There are a few problems with this line of argument, but the most obvious is that President George W. Bush invaded two mostly Muslim countries, Iraq and Afghanistan, and both of them adopted constitutions that identify Islam as the state religion and decree that laws have to be consistent with the precepts of Islam. Despite this, both constitutions contain provisions respecting the rights of religious minorities—as does Libya's draft constitution.

That's not to say that there's nothing to worry about—any country that identifies one particular religion as its "state religion" will, by definition, end up treating religious minorities as second-class citizens in some fashion. Indeed, Iraq and Afghanistan's religious minorities continue to face persecution. But it's not like the Libyan TNC writing Islam into its constitution is an Obama-sponsored departure from the Bush policy of midwifing fully formed Madisonian democracies from the ashes of despotic regimes. You can have American-backed dictators forcing nominal secularism onto Muslim countries at gunpoint or you can have popularly elected governments reflecting the will of the mostly-Muslim populations of these countries, but you can't have both.

Conservative blogger Scott Johnson mocks Obama for saying shortly after Qaddafi was killed that "We’re under no illusions—Libya will travel a long and winding road to full democracy." Now you'd think that people from a country that wrote the right of white people to own black people as property into its Constitution and then fought a brutal civil war over it that killed a full two percent of its population might have some understanding of the fact that the road to "full democracy" isn't exactly a smooth one, but, you know, Orientalism.

As the process of building democratic societies in Libya, Egypt, and Tunisia goes forward, the rights of women and minorities should remain a priority for the US and the world at large. But wringing one's hands over the idea that Islam will likely play a prominent role in the Middle East's fledgling democracies is pointless. The US can't force its preferred outcomes in those countries any more than the fallen dictators who used to be in charge. It's hard to teach pluralism and tolerance at gunpoint. Those are values societies have to learn on their own.

Libyan TNC Chairman: We're Investigating Gaddafi's Death

—By Adam Serwer

| Mon Oct. 24, 2011 10:30 AM PDT

Moammar Qaddafi.

The Libyan Transitional National Council has ordered an investigation into the death of former Libyan dictator Moammar Qaddafi, the New York Times reports. TNC Chairman Mustafa Abdel-Jalil has raised the possibility that Qaddafi had been killed not by rebels, but by loyalists who wanted to silence him:

"Let us question who has the interest in the fact that Qaddafi will not be tried," he said. "Libyans want to try him for what he did to them, with executions, imprisonment and corruption. Free Libyans wanted to keep Qaddafi in prison and humiliate him as long as possible. Those who wanted him killed were those who were loyal to him or had played a role under him, his death was in their benefit."

Last week's celebrations following Qaddafi's death appeared to drown out concerns about the manner of his demise. But there is a growing volume of evidence that the dictator was not killed during or as a result of wounds sustained in combat, but instead summarily executed by his captors. Several videos obtained by the media showed Qaddafi captured alive. Videos taken later show Qaddafi lifeless with a fresh bullet wound to the head. Although the videos do suggest that the dictator was killed post-capture, there isn't much there to suggest he was killed by current or former loyalists as some sort of cover-up.

Human Rights Watch offers more disturbing news from Sirte, the town near where Qaddafi was ultimately found:

"We found 53 decomposing bodies, apparently Gaddafi supporters, at an abandoned hotel in Sirte, and some had their hands bound behind their backs when they were shot," said Peter Bouckaert, emergencies director at Human Rights Watch, who investigated the killings. "This requires the immediate attention of the Libyan authorities to investigate what happened and hold accountable those responsible."

Human Rights Watch saw the badly decomposed remains of the 53 people on October 23, 2011, at the Hotel Mahari in District 2 of Sirte. The bodies were clustered together, apparently where they had been killed, on the grass in the sea-view garden of the hotel.

The summary execution of captives is a war crime under the Geneva Conventions. And although it might be tempting to dismiss Qaddafi's death as a single capricious act by people who experienced unimaginable suffering at the hands of a tyrant, the other bodies at Sirte suggest a level of pattern or practice that can't be as easily brushed away.

There was some consternation in response to Abdel-Jalil's speech over the weekend declaring that Libya will "strive for a state of the law, for a state of prosperity, for a state that will have Islamic sharia law the basis of legislation." The TNC's original draft constitution stated that the "principal source of legislation is Islamic Jurisprudence (Sharia)," so this isn't exactly news. Libya is an overwhelmingly conservative Muslim country, so it follows that a government responsive to Libyan public opinion will reflect that. The answer to the possibility of illiberal democracy in mostly-Muslim nations is not endless iron-fisted rule by American-backed strongmen.

But the nature of Qaddafi's death and the evidence of other unlawful killings in Sirte raise another, more disturbing possibility: that Libya's future will be governed by the rule of the gun, not the rule of law, Islamic or otherwise.

Senate Dems: Mandatory Military Detention Is "Dangerous"

—By Adam Serwer

| Mon Oct. 24, 2011 8:28 AM PDT

A group of Senate Democrats sent a letter to majority leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) last Friday slamming the detention provisions of the National Defense Authorization Act as "undue and dangerous":

Section 1032 would require that certain terrorism suspects be held in the custody of the Armed Forces, which could disrupt vital counterterrorism operations. For example, if these controversial provisions are enacted, the FBI might have to hand over a terrorism suspect captured in the U.S.—like Najibullah Zazi—to the military in the middle of an interrogation, even if the individual is providing usefl intelligence to the FBI about an unfolding terrorist plot. In addition, under these sections, a suspected terrorist captured abroad—such as Ahmed Warsame—may have to be kept in military custody, even if potential charges against the suspect are available only in Federal criminal courts and not military commissions. In sum, mandatory military custody is unwise and will harm our national security.

The letter was sent a day after a mostly party line vote on a Republican amendment adding even more onerous restrictions on detention to an unrelated spending bill. Months ago, Republicans and Democrats on the Senate Armed Services Committee agreed on a "compromise" in the NDAA that would have mandated military detention for non-citizens suspected of al-Qaeda related terrorism unless the Secretary of Defense explicilty approved a transfer to federal court.

The Obama administration objected, arguing that the provision would interfere with the president's ability to deal effectively with terrorism, and Reid has been holding up the bill while another compromise is negotiated. In response, Senate Republicans along with Sens. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) and Ben Nelson (D-Neb.), voted for an amendment put forth by Sen. Kelly Ayotte (R-NH) that was even more restrictive, mandating military detention of suspected non-citizen terrorists with no exceptions. Ayotte's proposal had previously been voted down in the Armed Services Committee, so the vote was basically a way for the GOP to tell Reid and the administration to go take a hike.

The sad thing is that in the name of being "tougher" on terror, most Republicans and some Democrats have agreed to detention provisions that would actually make it harder neutralize terrorists. It's pretty much the definition of culture war counterrorism.

Senate "Compromise" On Domestic Military Detention Deteriorating

—By Adam Serwer

| Fri Oct. 21, 2011 2:13 PM PDT

On Thursday night, the Senate voted down a Republican-backed amendment that would have completely banned federal criminal trials for terrorism suspects believed to be associated with al-Qaeda.

The 52-47 vote on New Hampshire Republican Sen. Kelly Ayotte's amendment was largely along party lines. The Senate GOP's libertarianish contingent, represented by Sens. Mike Lee (R-Utah) and Rand Paul (R-Ky.) voted against the proposal, while Sens. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) and Ben Nelson (D-Neb.) voted with the GOP. The vote is the latest blow to the problematic bipartisan "compromise" on domestic military detention reached earlier by the Senate Armed Services Committee.

That compromise measure would have made military detention the default option for terrorism suspects believed to be part of al-Qaeda but would have left open the option for federal trials as long as the Secretary of Defense gave explicit approval. As I wrote last week, the compromise detention provision—a rule that even former Bush administration officials criticized for limiting the president's options for dealing with terrorism suspects—would make it far less likely that someone like convicted underwear bomber Umar Abdulmutallab would be tried in federal court. (The now-defeated Ayotte amendment, of course, would have banned such trials outright.) Early this month, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), at the Obama administration's request, held up the entire defense authorization bill over the detention provisions.

"Senator Reid remains committed in working with Republicans, but he stands firm in his position on the detainee provisions," said a Senate Democratic aide, who added that Reid was hoping to reach a compromise on the detention issues "by the end of the year."

Chris Anders, a legislative counsel with the American Civil Liberties Union, which opposes both the amendment and the compromise provision, says Democrats should no longer feel obligated to compromise.

"It should be clear now that the bipartisan... detention 'deal' is a farce," Anders says. "It's like if I tell you that I won't run you over with my red truck if you give me a 1,000 dollars, then after you pay me, I go out and find a blue truck to try to run you over."