WARRIOR CREED on Closing Guantanamo Bay
Former Guantanamo detainee Mansoor Adayfi's campaign
The ANNOUNCEMENT:
This Friday 4pm UK time / 11am EST WARRIOR CREED hosts former Guantanamo detainee Mansoor Adayfi on his drive to close Camp X-Ray, and his campaign against a new and unethical documentary that features detainees who are interviewed under duress, exclusive to Gettr via the Maajid Nawaz profile.
The TRAILER:
The BACKGROUND:
“By Tim Dodd
Mansoor Adayfi, who was a prisoner in Guantanamo for 14 years from the age of 18, shares his story with LBC on the 20 year anniversary of 9/11.
It comes as across the US, UK and the world, commemorations for those who lost their lives in the 9/11 attacks are being held.
Guantanamo bay was a detention facility used to house Muslim militants and suspected terrorists captured by U.S. forces in Afghanistan, Iraq, and elsewhere.
The facility caused worldwide controversy due to alleged violations of the rights of detainees under the Geneva Conventions.
There were also accusations of the torture and abuse of detainees by U.S. authorities.
Maajid said: "You were taken in Afghanistan, handed over by tribal warlords to the US military without any explanation at the age of 18 and put into Guantanamo bay in camp X-ray for 14 years.
"We know that 86% of detainees at Guantanamo were captured when the US distributed flyers in Pakistan and Afghanistan offering cash bounties for what they considered suspicious people, and it's now been determined that only 8% of inmates held at Guantanamo bay were thought to have any connection with Al-Qaeda."
Mr Adayfi explained what happened to him: "I was in a research mission in Afghanistan, doing research on Al-Qaeda and other Taliban roles and so on.
"A friend of mine who was working for a charity organisation, got an instruction from Saudi Arabia to liquidate and dissipate all the stuff they had.
"Our last mission we got to a hospital to take some logistic medicine and other stuff... on the way we were ambushed by one of the war lords and they said to get in the car.
"When they found out that America offered a large bounty, I was sold as an Al-Qaeda Egyptian General... I was sent to the black site."
"But you're not even Egyptian?" Maajid asked.
Mr Adayfi replied: "No, I am a Yemeni, I was 18 years old.
"It was a big mess when they came to Afghanistan.
"They just brought in people from different parts of the world under the name of the 'war on terror'.
"They wanted to send a message to the world that we can cross any boundaries and we're not bound by any laws.
‘That's what Guantanamo was about, it's a message that we can do whatever we want."
The CAMPAIGN:
The CIA ANALYST
Ex-CIA analyst Gail Helt explains why the above documentary featuring Guantanamo bay detainees who were never found guilty of anything yet interviewed for a public-release documentary while still in unethical detention, is exploitative.
“I spent two years supporting President Obama's effort to transfer Guantanamo detainees and close the prison, so the issues addressed in the documentary #JihadRehab are close to my heart.
The film has several strengths: it depicts what by all accounts is a successful rehabilitation program in Saudi Arabia, as well as the struggles faced by former detainees who try to reintegrate with little to no support. The United States Government should be providing stipends to these men, so they are not left struggling to provide for themselves and their families. It seems it would be in everyone’s interest to avoid this, particularly after the Saudi Government apparently changed its laws to ban non-citizens from working, leaving non-Saudi former detainees in a horrible position.
But #JihadRehab is also seriously flawed, in ways that make it dangerous. First, the documentary implies that there is no question that these men are guilty of the things the US government accused them of. The detainee “scorecards” list the accusations against the men as though they are unassailable. In reality, there are many reasons to question the allegations.
Just look at the numerous other detainees, former and current, about whose identity or activities the United States was wrong: abu Zubaydah, Lakhdar Boumediene, Mohamedou Ould Slahi, and Mansoor Adayfi come to mind.
Those are just some of the publicly known instances in which we got it very wrong. Yet this documentary doesn’t mention that possibility, and, given the publicity the film bestows upon these men, that seems irresponsible.
Second, #JihadRehab uses language that will affirm to viewers—who may already be predisposed to believe the questionable allegations on the scorecards—that these men were indeed terrorists.
For example, consider the claim that these men could be at risk because Al Qaida or ISIS is always “looking for their previous members, looking to take them back again.” Previous members…Take them back again.
These men were never charged and never convicted of terrorism or of belonging to a terror group. Yet this film paints them, perhaps unintentionally, but certainly carelessly, as members of a terror group who engaged in terrorism.
It is worth noting that ISIS did not exist when these men were sent to Guantanamo; that fact seems lost on the producers. Third, the film acknowledges that the general public, including potential employers, reject former detainees once they hear they were in Guantanamo.
The filmmaker knows that, yet airs this documentary without disguising the faces of these men. Likewise, while the rehabilitation center acknowledged that its goal is to reduce the likelihood these men “return” to terrorism.
The filmmaker has just dramatically increased the possibility that they will be targeted by a terror group and coerced into joining. Moreover, the filmmaker shows pictures of parents and children, placing them at risk as well.
Finally, Ms. Smaker asks very pointed, in some cases inflammatory questions of the director of the rehabilitation program. When he declines to answer, she pushes again—hard—seeking responses critical of the Saudi government.
Does she have no awareness of the position in which she has just placed this man? Is she so culturally unaware that she does not realize he could simply disappear if he says the wrong thing about the Saudi royal family?
Her questioning crosses the line from probing to irresponsible, and it is cringeworthy and reprehensible. I admire Ms. Smaker’s desire to tell this story. As a white woman myself, I certainly do not think the failings of this film are due to her gender or race.
But #JihadRehab's failings are enormous, and I cannot help but think that more research and empathy would serve this documentary well. This film places these former detainees at risk, and should never be allowed to circulate or be shown to a wider audience.
If the filmmakers think this film will not get to people who could cause harm to these men, whose lives are hard enough without the publicity, well, that’s just another indicator that they were ill-equipped to tackle the subject matter of this film.”
The REMINDER:
This Friday 4pm UK time / 11am EST WARRIOR CREED hosts former Guantanamo detainee Mansoor Adayfi on his drive to close Camp X-Ray, and his campaign against a new and unethical documentary that features detainees who are interviewed under duress, exclusive to Gettr via the Maajid Nawaz profile.
