Image import fails

When trying to import images, I get this error for each image:

# warning: filesize() [function.filesize]: stat failed for /var/www/html/sites/default/files/images/temp/events-bg.png in /var/www/html/sites/all/modules/image/contrib/image_import/image_import.pages.inc on line 23.
# warning: filesize() [function.filesize]: stat failed for /var/www/html/sites/default/files/images/temp/events-bg.png in /var/www/html/sites/all/modules/image/contrib/image_import/image_import.pages.inc on line 108.

and the table lists the file names, but says:

events-bg.png bytes 0x0 Not a JPG, GIF or PNG file.

when I try to import, it says "importing 0 of 0" and does nothing.

I'm using red hat enterprise, and tried php 5.1.6 and 5.2.

I checked php info and with php 5.1 made sure that mime_magic was working, but that didn't help.

The permissions are all correct, I even tried 777. The files are all owner and group apache.

The files are the correct size, same on my local drive as on the server, uploaded with scp.

I tried a local path and an absolute path, both have the same behaviour. I tried a directory outside of the regular images directory, it didn't help. I checked the max image size, its over the size of those images. I set the php timeout to 400 that didn't help.

please help.