What enabled our leaders to create a nowhere for human rights in Guantanamo Bay?

Fear and bigoted fantasies promoted by preachers and politicians have certainly played a role.

Consider the Rev. John Hagee, who claims God sent Hitler "the hunter" to drive the Jews of Europe into Palestine to establish a Jewish state, a prerequisite for the second coming of Christ and the conversion of the Jews.

So Jews are expendable pawns in a biblical chess game? Ironically, Hagee leads Christians United for Israel and is apparently ready to fight to the last Jew pursuing his apocalyptic endgame.

"Turning part or all of Jerusalem over to the Palestinians would be tantamount to turning it over to the Taliban," declares Hagee, warning both Muslims and Jews.

In an infamous libel, Hagee claims that "those who live by the Quran have a scriptural mandate to kill Christians and Jews."

One man who attempted to live by the Quran in the post-9/11 world was Murat Kurnaz. I just finished reading his Five Years of My Life: An Innocent Man in Guantanamo.

Kurnaz is of Turkish origin and a permanent German resident. He recounts how he undertook a pilgrimage to the mosques of Pakistan to become a better Muslim after he got married. He was arrested by Pakistani police, sold to U.S. forces for a $3,000 bounty, and imprisoned in Guantanamo Bay for five years.

Only after German Chancellor Angela Merkel prevailed upon President Bush was Kurnaz freed. As with the vast majority of some 500 Guantanamo detainees released so far, Kurnaz was exonerated.

I always tell my students to read every text against the grain, to doubt motives and demand corroboration.

That Kurnaz was deprived of his freedom is undeniable, but perhaps he invented all the water tortures, close shackling, beatings and extremes of isolation, heat, cold and noise. After all, this is easier to think in a world that gives credibility to John Hagee. And Kurnaz was a Muslim.

I have a U.S. Department of Justice report titled A Review of the FBI's Involvement in and Observations of Detainee Interrogations in Guantanamo Bay, Afghanistan, and Iraq. This is a war crimes file. Everything Murat Kurnaz said happened to him happened to scores of Guantanamo detainees, according to FBI observers.

They reported these crimes up to the heads of the Departments of Justice and Defense. Many of these crimes were ordered by the secretary of defense and approved by the president.

In a pathetic attempt to salvage its reputation and promote a Republican successor, the administration is pushing for Soviet-style "show trials" for five Guantanamo detainees accused of al-Qaida links.

Only fanatics like Hagee or Osama bin Laden would pass judgment on every man, woman and powerless child in America for the crimes of Donald Rumsfeld and George W. Bush.

But what about federal prosecutors and the members of Congress, who could indict and impeach and end these crimes? What about those like Hagee who incite crimes against humanity?

Or John McCain, who embraced him, albeit temporarily. Or Senator Joe Lieberman, who calls Hagee an Eesh Elo Kim, a man of God. The dovish pro-Israel group J Street urges Lieberman to repudiate him. Jews established Israel because the soil of Europe had been turned to quicksand by people who thought like Hagee.

Repudiate anti-Semitism. Reject bigotry against Arabs and Muslims. End the rigged trials. Close Guantanamo Bay. Redeem America.