MY HELL IN CAMP X-RAY

Category: Americas, World Affairs Topics: Crime And Justice, Guantanamo Bay, Terrorism Views: 5405
5405

A BRITISH captive freed from Guantanamo Bay today tells the world of its full horror - and reveals how prostitutes were taken into the camp to degrade Muslim inmates.

Jamal al-Harith, 37, who arrived home three days ago after two years of confinement, is the first detainee to lift the lid on the US regime in Cuba's Camp X-Ray and Camp Delta.

The father-of-three, from Manchester, told how he was assaulted with fists, feet and batons after refusing a mystery injection.

He said detainees were shackled for up to 15 hours at a time in hand and leg cuffs with metal links which cut into the skin.

Their "cells" were wire cages with concrete floors and open to the elements - giving no privacy or protection from the rats, snakes and scorpions loose around the American base.

He claims punishment beatings were handed out by guards known as the Extreme Reaction Force. They waded into inmates in full riot-gear, raining blows on them.

Prisoners faced psychological torture and mind-games in attempts to make them confess to acts they had never committed. Even petty breaches of rules brought severe punishment.

Medical treatment was sparse and brutal and amputations of limbs were more drastic than required, claimed Jamal.

A diet of foul water and food up to 10 years out-of-date left inmates malnourished.

But Jamal's most shocking disclosure centred on the use of vice girls to torment the most religiously devout detainees.

Prisoners who had never seen an "unveiled" woman before would be forced to watch as the hookers touched their own naked bodies.

The men would return distraught. One said an American girl had smeared menstrual blood across his face in an act of humiliation.

Jamal said: "I knew of this happening about 10 times. It always seemed to be those who were very young or known to be particularly religious who would be taken away.

"I would joke with the other British lads, 'Bring them to us - we'll have them'. It made us laugh. But the Americans obviously knew we wouldn't be shocked by seeing Western women, so they didn't bother.

"It was a profoundly disturbing experience for these men. They would refuse to speak about what had happened. It would take perhaps four weeks for them to tell a friend - and we would shout it out around the whole block."

Jamal added: "The whole point of Guantanamo was to get to you psychologically. The beatings were not as nearly as bad as the psychological torture - bruises heal after a week - but the other stuff stays with you."

HE was talking from a secret location after being reunited with his family. The website designer, a convert to Islam, had gone to Pakistan in October 2001, a few weeks after September 11, to study Muslim culture.

He accidentally strayed into Afghanistan - believing he was being driven to Turkey - and was arrested as a spy, perhaps because of his British passport. He was held in Kandahar, Afghanistan, and fell into US hands.

Now Jamal bears the scars of Guantanamo. He stoops into a hunch as he walks because the shackles that bound him were too short.

As a punishment, inmates would be confined so tightly they would be forced to lie in a ball for hours. During lengthy interrogation, they would be tethered to a metal ring on the floor.

Jamal said: "Sometimes you would be chained up on the floor with your hands and feet actually bound together. One of my friends told me he was kept like that for 15 hours once.

"Recreation meant your legs were untied and you walked up and down a strip of gravel. In Camp X-Ray you only got five minutes but in Delta you walked for around 15 minutes."

Jamal said victims of the Extreme Reaction Force were paraded in front of cells. "It was a horrible sight and it was a frequent sight."

He said one unit used force-feeding to end a hunger strike by 70 per cent of the 600 inmates. The strike started after a guard deliberately kicked a copy of the Koran.

Rice and beans was the usual diet and the water was "filthy". Jamal added: "In Camp X-Ray it was yellow and in Delta it was black - the colour of Coca-Cola.

"We had it piped through with a tap in each 'cage' but they would often turn the water off as punishment.

"They would shut off the water before prayers so we couldn't wash ourselves according to our religion.

"The food was terrible as well, up to 10 years out-of-date. They would open a hatch and shove it through a section at a time.

"We had porridge and something they called 'like-milk', which was disgusting and 'like-tea' and a piece of fruit. The fruit had been frozen and pounded with chemicals. An apple might look red but there was waxy white stuff all over it and inside it would be black and brown.

"They would play tricks on people by denying them things - you might be the only person on your block who didn't get any bread. I prided myself on never asking them for anything. I would not beg." Jamal said they were told they had no rights. "They actually said that - 'You have no rights here'. After a while, we stopped asking for human rights - we wanted animal rights. In Camp X-Ray my cage was right next to a kennel housing an Alsatian dog.

"He had a wooden house with air conditioning and green grass to exercise on. I said to the guards, 'I want his rights' and they replied, 'That dog is member of the US army'.

"You would be punished for anything - for having six packets of salt in your cell rather than five, for hanging your towel through the cage if it wasn't wet, even for having your spoon and things lined up in the wrong order."

Being forced to use a bucket as a toilet in view of other inmates and guards was particularly embarrassing. Jamal said: "I never got used to it - we would all put our towels and clothes around us.

"But the Military Police up in the tower would see us and would shout to each other.

"We were only allowed a shower once a week at the beginning and none at all in solitary confinement.

"This was very tough because you are supposed to be clean when you pray.

"Gradually the number of showers rose to three a week. They were always cold.

"You would be chained by two MPs while you were still in the cage before being taken off for what they called 'rec and shower'.

"You could sometimes see the guards tampering with the shower heads to make water squirt all over the inmate's clothes if he had put them up to protect his privacy."

Inmates were issued with "comfort items" - known as CIs - like shampoo, towels, a washcloth and boxer shorts. CIs would be removed as a punishment.

Jamal defiantly refused "treats", such as watching a James Bond film in a room dubbed The Love Shack by inmates.

He added: "Some people were given pizzas, ice-cream and McDonald's, but they didn't offer them to me. I guess they knew bribery would work with some and not with others."

To pass the time, inmates would chat to each other, pray, read the Koran and sing Islamic songs. In Camp X-Ray, they were given Mills and Boon-style romance novels in Arabic, which they refused to read.

Describing medical treatment, Jamal said he knew of 11 men who had legs amputated and two who lost toes and fingers. He was told that the Americans had removed far more tissue than was necessary.

HE added: "The man in the cell next to me had frostbite in two fingers and two toes. He also had it in his big toe, but they didn't treat that for a year by which time they had to cut off much more than was needed.

"All the men who had lost limbs complained they would chop them off high up and not bother to try to save as much as possible."

Jamal added that he didn't have close friends in Guantanamo, saying: "When I did meet the other Brits, we would reminisce about home - particularly the food.

"We were all obsessed with Scottish Highland Shortbread - we wanted some so much.

"One of the Brits told me he was asked why he was a Muslim, because he ought to be praying to the Queen."

Jamal, who is divorced with daughters aged three and eight and a son of five, is convinced his refusal to succumb to mind-games gave him the will to come through.

He said: "It was very, very hard at times, but I tried to think about nothing but survival.

"I kept my thoughts from home as much as possible because it would drive me crazy.

"About a year into my time, I had a dream. A voice said, 'You will here for two years'.

"In my dream I said, 'Two years! You're joking'. But when I woke up, I was calmer because at least that meant I would be getting out one day.

"I was sent to Guantanamo on February 11, 2002 and left on March 9, 2004, so I was there for just over two years, just like the voice in the dream said."

Source: Mirror


  Category: Americas, World Affairs
  Topics: Crime And Justice, Guantanamo Bay, Terrorism
Views: 5405

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Older Comments:
ASGAR ANSARI FROM INDIA said:
This is shows what the USA stands for. This entire war against terrorism is just another Crusade against Islam. The earlier ones for defeated ..and so will be this Isnha Allah. Where are all the Missionaries now..who claim that Christianity stands for love and sacrifice. Look what these Christians are doing.......
2004-05-25

YAHYA BERGUM FROM USA said:
Does brother Jamal al-Harith remember if the detainees seemed to get treated any worse after the arrest of U.S. Army Muslim Chaplain, Captain Youseff Yee? There did not, after all, seem to be all that much to the charges themselves. Also, the U.S. military's commitment to sexual morality seems somewhat less than genuine, considering its recent treatment of detainees.

Also, I think that the word "be" might have been omitted from the third paragraph from the bottom of the article. It appears as if the second sentence should have read, "A voice said, 'You will be here for two years'." Or perhaps it could have been saying, "You will have been here for two years." (Masha'Allah.)
2004-05-23

SYED HUSAINY FROM CANADA said:
Allah s.w.a is a witness to all those who suffered and all those who caused the suffering. Allah is the best witness and He will never cause the sufferer the least injustice and He will give just punishment to the culprits.
2004-05-19

JUNAID KHAN FROM USA said:
History has seen time and again that cruelty and in-justice always loses at the end!
It takes it due course of time but it does certainly lose !
2004-05-19

AHMED ASGHER FROM BAHRAIN said:
One has to ask this simple question:

What is the reason for carting people form Afghanistan streets, labelling them terrorists, then sticking them up in a jail, thousands of miles away, BUT supposedly not under the jurisidiction of the US yet controlled by the US, with no rights accorded to these people at all.

Yet after a year, we learn of abuses, an over 70 years old man released, a few minors released and still some children detained and ALL we are told by Rumsfeld 'they are amongst the most terrorists in the world". if you can believe a 70 year old and a few minors can be so dangerous to the might of a superpower, then we must be like wlking death with no senses whatsoever, no brain of our own to accept what Rumsfeld et all, tell us to be the truth.

And all of this conjured up by some smart alec lawyer who comes up with terms like "enemy combatants" to avoid classing these people under any Human Rights laws.

They have torn the books of law and now they make the laws as they go on plundering! They'll soon come up with a new law for the next situation. Such is democracy and freedom!

In a nutshell: Export them somehwere where US has no rights of laws, BUT has total control over what goes on, brand them as some funny dogs, therefore US Army can urinate on them. Let them rot without any human rights or even their families knowing their loved ones are even there and certainly no right of representation by any lawyer.

AND all this done by the champion of human rights. A country that calls itself morally-guided by God and upholds freedom.

It would be funny if it weren't so damn sad. There is no word to describe this hypocricy! May be we should invent one.

How about ATROSHIT! It is an atroshity!
2004-05-19

AHMED ASGHER FROM BAHRAIN said:
We now have the State Department pressing on with its usual Human Rights Report on the countries of the world. Isn't that a joke with Bush being the champion of human rights in the world.

it is a little bit like that previous president Clinton giving us a lecture on family values!

Amazing how they can keep a straight face. They must really believe themselves, either that or they think we are all idiots or may be a bit of both, especially in view of no opposition to their vile plans in the world. - A NEW WORLD ORDER. Watch out for this NWO championed by the Zionist/Freemasonic evils.

They have a way with words and have all the excuses and reasons under the sun to justify what they do, with their lawyers, accountants, politicians and bankers. They are a force to be reckoned with. Islam is the only force they fear. Hence their vile attempt to put us all down even though they utter a lot of garbage, their deeds speak louder.

"By their fruits ye shall know them". Christ was right.

2004-05-19

YAHYA BERGUM FROM USA said:
About a year into my time, I had a dream. A voice said, 'You will here for two years'.

Spoken, in a dream. Of course, on the part of a person like myself, two years would have been merely a guess.

It's good to hear that you're out. Allah be praised.

Assalamu alaikum.

Yahya Bergum
Spokane, USA
2004-05-19

KASHIF SHAIKH FROM CANADA said:
Assalamua'alaikum,
As about 90% of person in Guantanamo bay are innocent of being al-queda(caught up in sweeps), Taliban and innocents look the same and wear the same clothing. I hope international community makes a larger outcry over such horrific abuse of innocents, and the quilty don't deserve it any more than Rumsfeld or Dick Chaney would if those imprisoned by the 'so called evil enemies that have American values' .
Why are not people sueing the US government forsuch abuse? Perhaps easier to sue when Iraqi contractors(private corporations that did not train employees properly as 90% of Iraqi prisoners caught up in sweeps are also innocent), that way they can sue the corporations making billions as well as implicat government.
Perhaps I am a naive dreamer that greater Justice in this world is possible through current legal means, but it would be better to try and not succeed than never try at all.
2004-05-19