A "Tortured" Gitmo Carol

Gather around the warm glow of your monitor and let us at New Security Action tell you a holiday tale about a certain "Scrooge" and his responsibility for America's tortured past. Say a hearty "Bah humbug" to Dick Cheney in this "Tortured" Christmas Carol.



Sign On Here

Inside a Prison Outside the Law

Mother Jones {MoJo} Drumbeat brings the link to the site for the book The Guantanamo Lawyers: Inside a Prison Outside the Law

Read exclusive excerpts from narratives by the attorneys who have represented Guantanamo Detainees, at above link

About The Guantanamo Lawyers

This new book contains over 100 personal narratives from attorneys who have represented detainees held at “Gitmo” as well as at other “black sites” such as Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan.

“One of the most inspiring features of the post-9/11 world has been the willingness of lawyers from all walks of life to volunteer to represent those condemned to indefinite detention at Guantánamo. This book provides an invaluable birds-eye view of what it’s like to fight for justice in a law-free zone, representing men who the government has labeled the worst of the worst.”—David Cole

“This is a fascinating and revealing behind-the-scenes account of the human stories inside Guantánamo, told candidly by some of America’s best, and most public-spirited, lawyers.”—Jane Mayer

Review: "The Guantanamo Lawyers: Inside a Prison Outside the Law"

"This collection of stirring narrative, government data and testimony, edited by two of the lawyers for those detained by the Bush administration as unlawful combatants at Guantnamo, puts America on notice about the issues of civil liberties and constitutional freedoms. Denbeaux and Hafetz have edited together accounts from 100 other detainee advocates into a chronological narrative of legal battles: to gain access to their clients, to establish the detainees' right to habeas corpus, to describe the occupants of 'Gitmo' (at its peak, 750 from 40 countries) and the torture and mistreatment of detainees. They describe their clients as underlings, working stiffs and not the high officials of any terrorist group. Plowing through legal red tape, bureaucratic mumbo jumbo and political maneuvering, Denbeaux and Hafetz fight for the men who are isolated without diversions or outside contact. The desperate words, quoted here, of Gitmo detainees on torture grab the heart and do not let go. This compelling book on the American penal colony and its residents is a cautionary tale of overzealous executive wartime power and the awful mess it sometimes leaves behind." Publishers Weekly

Justice as Paradox: Civilian Trials for 9/11 Suspects

Jonathan Hafetz has a blog post up at Balkinization. A Short excerpt is below.

Attorney General Eric Holder’s announcement Friday that Khaled Sheikh Mohammed and four other individuals allegedly responsible for the 9/11 attacks would be brought to trial in federal court takes an important—if long overdue—step towards restoring the rule of law. No longer are these men “high value detainees,” a label invented out of whole cloth to sanction their previous disappearance into a secret CIA prison and torture. After resurfacing at Guantánamo in September 2006, they are now, finally, defendants in the U.S. criminal justice system, which has shown repeatedly that it is well-equipped to handle terrorism cases while protecting legitimate national security concerns. This was the result advocated by the ACLU’s John Adams Project, and it is a welcome one.

You can also listen to a radio interview Jonathan did at The Takeaway about civilian trials for terrorists.

Or listen here:

The Book: "The Guantanamo Lawyers: Inside a Prison Outside the Law"

The Site: The Guantanamo Lawyers: Inside a Prison Outside the Law

American Justice Returns

From VetVoice

American Justice for Terrorists who Target America

by: Richard Allen Smith OEF/OIF Veteran
Fri Nov 13, 2009 at 15:26:35 PM EST

STATEMENT ON TRANSFER OF KHALID SHAIKH MOHAMMED,
OTHER TERRORISTS TO U.S. TO FACE TRIAL

Washington, DC -- Veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are strongly supporting the announcement by Attorney General Eric Holder that Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks, and four other terrorists are being transferred to the U.S. to face trial.

Jon Soltz, Iraq War Veteran and Chairman of VoteVets.org said in a statement:

"Finally, after years and years, those responsible for the worst terror attack on America will start to face American justice.

"Showing the world that we operate on a higher moral plane than fiefdoms, theocracies and dictatorships when it comes to justice will be a dagger in the heart of al Qaeda recruiting, as Guantanamo Bay has been one of the terror group's most effective recruiting posters. That helps our troops, and protects America.

"Additionally, this will prove that Liz and Dick Cheney, Mitch McConnell, John Boehner and their cohorts have been engaging in pure politics. Contrary to what they've said, transferring detainees to the US to face justice and punishment will be secure, safe, and strong, as it has been for nearly 200 other terrorists. Once that becomes evident, it will be clear that their only interest in opposing real justice was to take down President Obama -- American security be damned."

VoteVets.org is part of the Campaign to Close Guantanamo, found at Close Gitmo Now.

VoteVets.org is the leading progressive, pro-military organization of veterans, dedicated to the destruction of terror networks around the world, with force when necessary. It primarily focuses on education and advocacy on issues of importance to the troops and veterans, and holding politicians accountable for their actions on these issues.

This is a start, but the Country needs to look deep within and bring forth all the charges against our own who with their extremely failed policies created the next generations of criminal terrorist, know no borders, that is our legacy we are leaving to those who come after us, our children's children and theirs!!

The Youngest Detainee at Guantanamo Bay

Mohammed Al Gharani was the youngest detainee at Guantanamo Bay.

Now, seven years later, he has returned to Chad, his country of origin, after being freed and is adjusting to life without the fear of being brutalised.

Al Gharani spoke to Al Jazeera's Mohammed Vall about his first days of freedom and the abuse he had endured at Guantanamo.



Done "In Our Names"!

Still busssshed....6.08.09: Still More Proof

ABC News Exclusive: Ex-Gitmo Prisoner

Recently Released Gitmo Detainee Talks to ABC News

Held Seven Years, Former Aid Worker Tells ABC News He Was Tortured

This report is up at ABC News site and probably will be telecast tonight.

For 7½ years, Lakhdar Boumediene was known simply by a number: "10005."

These were the digits assigned to him when he arrived at the detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, swept up in a post-Sept. 11 dragnet and accused of plotting to blow up the U.S. and British Embassies in Sarajevo.

In an exclusive interview with ABC News, Boumediene said the interrogators at Gitmo never once asked him about this alleged plot, which he denied playing any part it......Rest found here

"I cried, just cried. Because I don't know my daughters," he said. "The younger, when I moved from Bosnia to Gitmo, she had 18 months, only 18 months. Now 9 years. Now she's big. Between 18 months, baby and 9 years, she walking, she's talking, she play, she's joking. It's a big difference."

And one doesn't need to wonder why some that have been released are reported to be, not back into, fighting American Troops in our occupations!!

Going Back To Terrorism??

You had to have been one that falls under the loosely define word 'Terrorist' to 'Go Back To!', and if they were why would they have been released after these years of being held, out of touch of any contact and thousands of miles from their homes and families!

Did 'returning' terrorists become extremists in Guantanamo?

One of the detainees whom a newly released Pentagon report says returned to the battlefield after he was released from the Guantanamo Bay prison camp told McClatchy that he was a local security leader in Afghanistan when he was arrested and became a radical Islamist only during his detention.

A second, a Kuwaiti man charged with links to al Qaida, told McClatchy that he'd never been to Afghanistan when he was arrested in a hotel room in Peshawar, Pakistan. He later contradicted himself, however, was held for three and a half years and is now listed as a suspected terrorist............

For those released, as apparently there was not enough evidence that they were even fighters against an invader to their country, after years in Gitmo and elsewhere and the more than just 'waterboarding' torture used, What Would Make Some Think That Some of Them Wouldn't Become Combatants and Possible Criminal Terrorists, than add in the numbers of innocents who survived these years in Afghanistan and Iraq and the Numbers are out of site!!

It only takes a few to wage Criminal Terrorism against masses, they've already lived in the terror waged on them and their countries!!

And we'll be living the results of these years for the decades to come!!

The REALITY: Will We Get It Now!!

We already know that those that Ordered what went on don't and won't Get It, nor care, just as they've accused others for same!!

Ex-inmate recalls days of abuse at Abu Ghraib

"But, at the end, the American people are responsible for everything that happened," Abu Ahmed said, referring to the war that he believes turned his life upside down.

Abu Ahmed spent a total of 20 months in U.S. custody, between Abu Ghraib and Camp Bucca, outside Basra in southern Iraq.

He then returned home, where he spent less than five months with his family before being arrested again, this time by the Iraqi army in yet another sweep through his neighborhood.

He says his treatment inside Iraqi facilities was even worse than what he faced at the hands of the U.S. military. His Iraqi captors, Abu Ahmed says, beat him with cables and pipes; he even had a cement block hung from his genitals.

Abeer Qassim Hamza al-Janabi


RIP Abeer and your family, saying Sorry is not enough for what you were put through that ended your precious life, RIP!!

Iraqis unhappy about life for U.S. rape soldier

"What the American soldier did is a terrorist act and he deserves execution," said Ahmed Samir Jaber, 27, a mechanic, from underneath the bonnet of an old car he was fixing in Mahmudiya, a dusty trading town on the edge of the desert.

"The court has not delivered justice. If I killed an American girl, the American court would have executed me."..........

Will we as a Country Now Finally Get It, I Doubt It, but remember this word "Blowback!"!!!

We Are All To Blame

cheney/bush Tried to Absolve themselves of their sins "In Our Names!!"

Gitmo detainee asked to drop torture claim

British court documents claim U.S. asked man not to speak of ordeal
U.S. authorities asked a Guantanamo Bay detainee to drop allegations of torture and agree not to speak publicly about his ordeal in exchange for his freedom, according to British court documents.

A ruling by two British High Court judges, issued in October but released only on Monday, said the U.S. offered former detainee Binyam Mohamed a plea bargain last year — six years after he was first detained as an enemy combatant.

Gitmo Slide Show with the report.

Guantanamo - Human Rights - Torture - War Crimes

Gitmo Guard Brandon Neely Speaks

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Let Me Get This Straight.......

With Guantanamo closing, where will the detainees go?

If not Guantanamo, then where? Anything but a welcoming party is forming at Fort Leavenworth in Kansas. When President Barack Obama signed an order Thursday forcing the closure of the Guantanamo Bay detention center within a year, he put in sharp relief the possibility that some of the world's most potentially dangerous terror suspects could be hauled to the military's maximum security facility in Kansas.

The gopers who 'Rubber Stamped' these Illegal Policies and over and over...........,defended same, Are Now whining and screaming about Not In My Backyard????

Gitmo: Ex-Detainee and Guard Answer Questions About

BBC: Wednesday, 21 January 2009

Chris Arendt, a former guard at the prison camp and Moazzam Begg an ex-detainee spoke to the BBC.



Three of the main points were:

1. It will be seen by many as "too little too late".

2. (Question: Do you think Guantanamo has radicalized them?) These people are just tired, they want to go home to their families and to children who they have in some cases never seen...

3. They had to pay the ultimate price because of a war that appears to have no aims or objectives.

Chris Arendt, Former guard on Guantanamo 'torture' Jan 9th '09