Gitmo prisoners: Jailers deride lawyers as ‘Jewish

Prisoners at Guantanamo claim their jailers tell them their U.S. lawyers are Jewish to discourage them from cooperating, according to the lawyers. A story in The New York Times of May 5 outlined a number of reasons why lawyers for the detainees at the prison camp in the U.S.-controlled corner of Cuba are having difficulty adequately representing them. Some detainees said jailers discourage them from cooperating with the lawyers by saying the lawyers are Jewish or gay, or by saying their release is likelier if they reject legal counsel. Pentagon spokesmen denied the allegation. The prisoners at Guantanamo are mostly Muslim, captured since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Their lawyers are trying to force the U.S. government to consider their cases under U.S. due process, a right the Bush administration has said does not accord to the prisoners.