Sweetness & Light is tying together an interesting fact about the first person to publicize the Haditha incident. A certain Iraqi reporter who was detained in Iraq because of pictures he had. The pictures caused a joint US/Iraqi Review and Release Board to keep him in prison for 5 months.

New York, January 16, 2006–The Committee to Protect Journalists welcomes the release of two Iraqi journalists detained by the U.S. military without charge for several months, but calls again for U.S. officials to specify charges against at least three other journalists still in custody or to release the detainees at once…

Ali al-Mashhadani, a television cameraman working for Reuters, and Majed Hameed, a correspondent working for Reuters and the Dubai-based broadcaster Al-Arabiya, were released from Baghdad’s Abu Ghraib prison on Sunday, Reuters reported. They were freed without charge as part of a larger prisoner release that included around 500 Iraqi detainees.

Al-Mashhadani, a freelance photographer and cameraman, had been held incommunicado and without explanation by U.S. forces since August 8.

Al-Mashhadani was taken from his home in Ramadi during a general sweep of the neighborhood by U.S. Marines who became suspicious after seeing pictures on his cameras. After his detention, a U.S.-Iraqi Combined Review and Release Board (CRRB) determined that al-Mashhadani posed a “threat” and ordered his continued detention. Officials did not publicly substantiate the basis for his detention.

Hameed was arrested along with several other men at a gathering after the funeral of a relative on September 15 in Anbar province. Both Reuters and Al-Arabiya said his arrest appeared connected to footage found on his camera by U.S. troops. U.S. officials never specified the basis for his detention.

After his release he suddenly came in possession of the Haditha video.

U.S. military officials have since confirmed to Reuters that that version of the events of November 19 was wrong and that the 15 civilians were not killed by the blast but were shot dead.

Time magazine said this week the video of the corpses it provided to the military in January had prompted the revision.

Abdel Rahman al-Mashhadani (not the same Mashhadani), head of Hammurabi, said U.S. Marines had killed 15 people in Haditha after the roadside bomb attack. The group’s Haditha branch said it got the video from a local man.

Well this photographer was arrested again attempting to retrieve the pictures that landed him in jail the first time:

An Iraqi journalist working for Reuters was released from U.S. military custody at Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad on Thursday after 12 days in detention.

Ali al-Mashhadani, 37, was arrested by U.S. Marines in his home town of Ramadi on May 20 when he went to a U.S. base to retrieve Reuters telephones taken from him earlier that week.

He spent five months in U.S. custody last year before being released without charge in January.

[...]Mashhadani, who reports and provides video and pictures, is one of a small number of journalists providing news from Anbar province, where U.S. Marines and Sunni Arab insurgents, including al Qaeda militants, are locked in a fierce conflict.

[...]Among Mashhadani’s recent stories was reporting from the town of Haditha in March. Following Time magazine’s revelation of accusations that U.S. Marines shot dead 24 civilians there in November, he filmed fresh interviews with local officials and residents that were widely used by international media

So you think he had a bone to pick? How about the hostility of the group he is associated with, Hammurabi, towards the US?

Mashhadani (head of Hammurabi)said he had brought the case to the attention of the United Nations office in Baghdad. “These violations of human rights happen every day in Iraq,” he told Reuters.

Would the fact that this group who is affiliated with the Sunni side of things color their reporting? Do you think they would report things in such a way to make the US look bad?

Of course.

Hell, look at the fact that the first time he was arrested there were reports that the photographer had links to the terrorists:

Reuters quotes a military spokesperson who said the tribunal decided that the photojournalist is, in their opinion, “a threat to the people of Iraq.” Reuters says the military will not tell them why the photojournalist is being held and has refused all requests to detail their suspicions about Mashhadani, or to make any specific accusations. The military response to a demand for his release is that he’s “a security detainee with links to insurgents.” …

Reuters journalist al-Mashhadani was arrested by U.S. troops on August 8 after a search of his Ramadi, Iraq, home; the military has refused to say why he is being held and there are no charges against him. His brother was detained with him and then released, and he says al-Mashhadani was arrested after they looked at images on his cameras…

All of this is just interesting footnotes to this story. There is an investigation on-going and we will see how it plays out. But the picture the MSM, the left, and the terrorist collaborators inside Iraq are painting may very well not be the whole picture.

We have to look at who exactly is making these allegations and producing evidence:

The video tape obtained by the BBC shows a number of dead adults and children at the site with what our world affairs editor John Simpson says were clearly gunshot wounds.

The pictures came from a hardline Sunni group opposed to coalition forces.

And investigate with an open mind. These Marines cannot be presumed to be guilty without looking at the whole situation and the past history of those opposed to this war.

Just remember Lt. Pantano, who was also charged with Murder. Lots of calls for his head from the left and the terrorist collaborators for his head until evidence came to light that exonerated him.