Posted on 01/20/2009 2:48:21 AM PST by Cindy
GUANTANAMO BAY NAVAL BASE, Cuba (AP) - Plans to close Guantanamo are not sitting well with the Sept. 11 victims' relatives who sat stunned while two alleged terrorists declared they were proud of their role in the plot.
(Excerpt) Read more at wtop.com ...
http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/025347.php
(AP, March 21, 2009)
March 22, 2009
“Obama complains that some released from Gitmo have rejoined the jihad”
#
Previously...
http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/024732.php
(THE CORNER at National Review.com)
February 5, 2009
“”September 10 America is back””
http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2009/03/britain_seeks_the_re.php
“Britain seeks release of the Guantánamo ‘professor’”
By THOMAS JOSCELYN
March 25, 2009 1:40 PM
SNIPPET: “The British government is once again seeking the release of a Guantánamo detainee named Shaker Aamer. During a visit to Washington earlier this month, Home Secretary Jacqui Smith explained to reporters, “There is one outstanding [detainee] that we would want returned to the UK.” Smith identified Aamer as that detainee.
According to Reuters, Smith elaborated: “We understand that his particular circumstances are being looked at at the moment, and that the US administration has said they don’t want to return him to the UK.”
This is not the first time that Britain has sought Aamer’s release. Home Secretary Smith approached the Bush administration about Aamer’s case in 2007, but the US government refused to transfer him to British custody.
At the time, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Detainee Affairs Sandra Hodgkinson described the intelligence accumulated against Aamer in an interview with the Associated Press. Hodgkinson said that Aamer shared an apartment with Zacarias Moussaoui in London in the 1990s. Moussaoui was later scheduled to take part in either the September 11 attacks, or a similar follow-on plot, at the time of his arrest in August 2001. Aamer had also met with convicted shoe bomber Richard Reid, Hodgkinson said, and received a stipend directly from Osama bin Laden.
Hodgkinson explained, “He has been involved in a lot of significant terrorist plots.” She did not, however, elaborate on what specific role Aamer played in al Qaeda’s plotting.”
NOTE: The following post is a quote:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/2216646/posts
USS Cole Dad on Obama’s Betrayal; US Rep. Boustany on BlogTalkRadio at 11:30 PM EDT
Evil Conservative Radio ^ | 27 March 2009 | EC
Posted on March 27, 2009 8:23:33 PM PDT by nysuperdoodle
EC interviews USS Cold dad Gary Swenchonis, and US Rep. Charles Boustany (R-LA) about the betrayal of our troops, and islamophilia in the White House at 11:30 on BTR
(Excerpt) Read more at blogtalkradio.com ...
Note: The following post is a quote:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2218613/posts
Yemeni Inmate to Leave Guantanamo
BBC ^ | 3/30/09
Posted on March 30, 2009 7:46:46 PM PDT by nickcarraway
The US justice department has agreed to transfer a Yemeni inmate from America’s controversial Guantanamo Bay prison.
But it declined to provide details of where Ayman Saeed Batarfi would go.
The 38-year-old Yemeni doctor has been held at Guantanamo since 2002, a year after he was detained in Afghanistan on suspicion of assisting al-Qaeda.
Some 250 detainees are being held at Guantanamo. In January, US President Barack Obama ordered the prison in Cuba to be closed within a year.
Mr Obama also ordered a review of military trials for terror suspects and a ban on harsh interrogation methods.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.bbc.co.uk ...
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/americas/guantanamo/story/976155.html
Posted on Tuesday, 03.31.09
GUANTANAMO BAY
“Obama administration OKs release of Yemeni doctor from Guantánamo
President Barack Obama approved the release of a Yemeni doctor accused of treating al Qaeda members and who met Osama bin Laden.”
BY CAROL ROSENBERG
GUANTANAMO BAY NAVY BASE, Cuba —
SNIPPET: “Ayman Batarfi, 38...”
SNIPPET: “Batarfi is held here as detainee No. 627. Defense Department records indicate he was born in Cairo, Egypt, to a Yemeni father, captured in Afghanistan and sent to the prison camps here in 2002.”
http://www.freerepublic.com/tag/anthrax/
#
http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/025466.php
March 31, 2009
“Latest Gitmo releasee: Al-Qaeda operative accused of taking part in anthrax plot”
SNIPPET: “”U.S. Decides to Release Detainee at Guantánamo,” by William Glaberson for the New York Times, March 31:
The Justice Department announced Monday that the administration had decided to release a detainee at the prison at Guantánamo Bay, a Yemeni doctor who the Bush administration once claimed had taken part in an anthrax program of Al Qaeda.
The government had backed away from the anthrax accusations but had continued to hold the detainee, Dr. Ayman Saeed Abdullah Batarfi, asserting that he had worked for a charity that had terrorist ties and that he had met with Osama bin Laden.”
Note: The New York Times is the source for post no. 88 via JIHAD WATCH.org
BLOG:
http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2009/03/yemeni_detainee_at_g.php
“Yemeni detainee at Gitmo to be freed”
By THOMAS JOSCELYN
March 31, 2009 10:25 AM
SNIPPET: “Batarfi is a long-time jihadist. During two administrative review board (ARB) hearings at Guantánamo, Batarfi explained that he first traveled to Afghanistan in 1988. He was only seventeen years old at the time. Batarfi initially said that he participated in two nighttime raids on Soviet outposts, but eventually changed his story, saying that he only participated in one.
In the years that followed the jihad against the Soviets, Batarfi studied in Pakistan and became an orthopedic surgeon. But Batarfi was not simply a medical professional, according to documents created by the US government.
In fact, during his ARB proceedings, Batarfi freely admitted he had a colorful career prior to his detention. Batarfi admitted that he: stayed in known al Qaeda and Taliban guesthouses, worked for a charity that is a designated terrorist front run by al Qaeda, met with the Taliban’s Minister of Health in the summer of 2001, met with and assisted a scientist in charge of al Qaeda’s anthrax program (Batarfi denied knowing that the scientist was working on anthrax at the time), and even met Osama bin Laden twice, including once in the Tora Bora Mountains after the September 11 attacks.
An admitted employee of al Wafa
During his ARB hearings, Batarfi was asked about his ties to al Wafa, an Islamic charity that is a designated terrorist organization. Batarfi admitted that he was an employee of al Wafa and said that he worked for the organization for five months in 2001. (The US government has alleged that he actually worked for al Wafa for 9 months.) Al Wafa is a known front for al Qaeda.”
Note: The following post is a quote:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2222186/posts
Off Base on Terror: Judge’s Decision Throws Open U.S. Courthouse Doors to Our Worst Enemies
New York Daily News ^ | April 4th 2009 | staff
Posted on April 4, 2009 6:12:19 AM PDT by kellynla
A federal judge has taken the fateful step of ruling that three of the 600 prisoners at Bagram air base in Afghanistan have rights under the U.S. Constitution. This is dangerous folly.
One can only pray that higher courts reject Judge John Bates’ premise that noncitizens are not barred - as long thought - from contesting war captivity abroad in American civilian courts.
While Bates emphasized the distinct circumstances of the three, he built his holding on the notion that U.S. control of Bagram gave prisoners a leg up on getting into court.
Activists who have taken up the cause of the detainees were ecstatic. Tina Foster, of the International Justice Network, said the Bates ruling would extend “to any place where the United States seeks to hold individuals in a legal black hole.”
Presidents Bush and Obama - yes, Obama - argued against opening our courts to terror suspects abroad. But Bates drew his reasoning from the 2008 Supreme Court decision that foolishly granted Guantanamo detainees habeas corpus rights.
At the time, it was thought the effects of that case would go no further than Gitmo. That base in Cuba was seen as American territory for constitutional purposes because the U.S. controlled it under a long-term lease.
But now Bates has said the military has an “objective degree of control” at Bagram, putting prisoners, in effect, on U.S. soil. Then he applied a “functional, multi-factor, detainee-by-detainee test” to gauge rights.
He gave three detainees - two Yemenis and one Tunisian - access to federal courts because they had been apprehended elsewhere and taken to Afghanistan.
(Excerpt) Read more at nydailynews.com ...
QUOTE:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/bloggers/2191075/posts?page=19#19
A bit off topic, but interesting:
http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/025825.php
(Los Angeles Times)
April 24, 2009
“Obama Administration wants to settle Muslims freed from Gitmo in American communities to “set an example, helping to persuade other nations to accept Guantanamo detainees too””
#
http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/025822.php
(CHICAGO TRIBUNE)
April 24, 2009
“Relax: Chinese Muslim Gitmo inmates to be freed in U.S.”
#
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=31513
“The Uighurs and the ‘Torture’ Memos”
by Jed Babbin
04/20/2009
SNIPPET: “White House lawyers are refusing to accept the findings of an inter-agency committee that the Uighur Chinese Muslims held at Guantanamo Bay are too dangerous to release inside the U.S., according to Pentagon sources familiar with the action.
This action — coupled with the release of previously top secret legal opinions on harsh interrogation methods — demonstrates the Obama administration’s willingness to ignore reality.
President Obama’s decision to close the terrorist detention facility (known as “Gitmo” to the military) was made despite Bush administration determinations that there were no realistic alternatives to it.”
#
http://www.jihadwatch.org/dhimmiwatch/archives/024746.php
(AP)
February 6, 2009
“China warns against providing asylum to Chinese jihadis released from Gitmo”
19 posted on April 25, 2009 1:09:19 AM PDT by Cindy
Note: The following post is a quote:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2238590/posts
Gitmo Detainees may be moved to Montana
The American Thinker ^ | April 27, 2009 | Otis A. Glazebrook IV
Posted on April 27, 2009 2:23:28 AM PDT by Scanian
An article with a sensational headline “Hardin jail tries for detainees from Gitmo,” recently appeared in the Billings Montana Gazette. It provides a glimpse into some fundamental problems with big government solutions and the Obama agenda.
Hardin, Montana is a city of 3,384 people and not enough jobs. The city council of Hardin voted unanimously to create 100 new high paying jobs for some of its citizens by getting into the prison business. The city fathers committed to a $27 million bond program to fund the construction of a medium security, 460-bed prison through its economic development agency, the Two Rivers Authority. The prison was completed in 2007.
There was one small problem, no prisoners. Apparently, somebody forgot to investigate the economic demand for a 460-bed prison in the southeast corner of Montana, where the population density is three people per square mile. As a result of not having any customers for a couple of years, the facility defaulted on its financial obligations.
It is not often that a city has a completely empty oversized jail. Thus the Gitmo closing was seen as God sent by the city council. They even passed a resolution:
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
http://www.onenewsnow.com/Politics/Default.aspx?id=506100
“Obama ‘bears a lot of watching’ on nat’l security”
Chad Groening - OneNewsNow - 4/28/2009 7:00:00 AM
SNIPPET: “The grades were not so glowing, however, in a report card issued by Military Families United (MFU), which evaluated Obama and his defense team on Iraq, Afghanistan, Guantanamo Bay, veterans, defense policies, and military family issues.
Commander Kirk Lippold (USN-Ret.), the senior military fellow for MFU, says while Obama scored Bs on Iraq and Afghanistan, he received an F for his actions involving Guantanamo Bay.
“I think that the decision to close Guantanamo Bay by an arbitrary date with no plans in place, no policy established, and no idea about what you’re going to do with those detainees, clearly is nothing more than a political model,” he contends. “And our nation’s security cannot be driven by politics.”
Obama, according to Lippold, needs to be closely watched. “I would say that overall his performance has been average. And quite frankly, he bears a lot of watching,” he adds. “You have to, again, look at what he does — not what he eloquently says he’s going to do. Keep an eye on him because if you don’t, he will try to fly things under the radar and do things in the dark of night.”
Lippold says Obama received C grades in the areas of veterans and defense policy, but only a D on handling issues related to military families.”
QUOTE:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2240776/posts
GOP to Obama: Show Us a Plan for Releasing Guantanamo Prisoners
FoxNews ^ | Wednesday, April 29, 2009 | Joseph Abrams
Posted on April 29, 2009 3:17:16 PM PDT by Joiseydude
Republican lawmakers are calling on the Obama administration to produce a plan for closing the Guantanamo Bay detention center as Attorney General Eric Holder struggles to find new homes in Europe for the prison’s detainees.
Guantanamo currently houses 240 detainees, about 60 identified by the Bush administration as being unable to be returned to their countries of origin because of fears they will be tortured or executed there.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
Note: The following text is a quote:
http://www.usdoj.gov/ag/speeches/2009/ag-speech-090429.html
Attorney General Eric Holder Delivers Remarks in Berlin on the Closing of Guantanamo Bay
Berlin, Germany Wednesday, April 29, 2009
It is my distinct honor to join you at the Hans Arnhold Center of the American Academy of Berlin.
The Academy is a fitting caretaker for a building that holds a special place in history as a safe harbor for freedom and a catalyst for cultural exchange.
When luminaries like Richard Holbrooke, Richard Von Weizsacker, Fritz Stern and Otto Graf Lambsdorff joined forces to create the American Academy, they knew that we must strengthen the bonds of friendship between the United States and Germany – not just for the future of our two nations – but so that we might together safeguard the flame of liberty that illuminates the darker corners of human character throughout our world.
Time and again, the strength of that flame has been tested in Berlin, and the dueling paths of freedom and oppression have often reached a crossroads here.
Yet for six decades, when those moments of consequence have come, the United States has consistently stood together with the people of this city and shown the world the strength of our common values.
In 1948, when the Soviet Union threatened two million innocent citizens with a blockade of food and basic services, President Truman ordered an unprecedented military airlift operation to protect our friends and defend our freedom.
The following year, the founding of NATO bound our nation with Europe in a common alliance to promote peace and provide for a common defense. And only six short years later, the Alliance welcomed West Germany as a full member of the Alliance. The Alliance, the partnership we formed then to unite our countries in defense of common values, has in the years since brought peace to the war-torn Balkan nations and today offers new hope to the citizens of Afghanistan.
The people of this great city understand hope. The United States worked with the citizens of a fractured Berlin for more than forty years when it was isolated from the West and divided by a wall that stood for the worst in mankind. This academy, in fact, was a central gathering point for American officials in what was the American sector during that period.
Forty-six years ago, President Kennedy came to this city, stood at the wall, and said, “All free men, wherever they may live, are citizens of Berlin.”
President Reagan echoed that young President’s refrain in 1987, when speaking at the Brandenburg Gate, he said, “Yes ... this wall will fall, for it cannot withstand faith, it cannot withstand truth ... cannot withstand freedom.”
And a candidate for President of the United States, Barack Obama, came here last July and said, “This city, of all cities, knows the dream of freedom. And you know that the only reason we stand here tonight is because men and women from both of our nations came together to work, and struggle, and sacrifice for that better life.”
When Americans faced our darkest hour, following the terror of September 11th, the people of Germany stood with us. President Kennedy may have said that we were all citizens of Berlin, but when the future’s grip on freedom was threatened, in those hours and days before the smoke and dust even cleared the air, our European allies proclaimed in words and deeds that “we are all Americans.” The American people will never forget that support. We will always be grateful.
With our shock and grief still raw, we stood together as one united global community, prepared with solemn purpose to root out terrorism from every cave and crevice of the earth. In a page of history never written, we together could have seized that tragic moment to raise liberty’s torch brighter and more broadly than ever before. The decisions made in the years that followed have been long debated and will be studied for generations to come. But let me be clear tonight: The course the United States will take going forward will honor both the spirit of our historic alliances and the outpouring of support and goodwill we received after that terrible day, as well as our commitment to the rule of law.
Nothing symbolizes our new course more than our decision to close the prison at Guantanamo Bay.
I recently visited Guantanamo. I felt it was my duty to see the detention center, meet with military officials stationed there, and determine where things stand. I can confidently report that the prison is now run in an efficient, professional manner. Detainees are treated humanely.
But President Obama believes, and I strongly agree, that Guantanamo has come to represent a time and an approach that we want to put behind us: a disregard for our centuries-long respect for the rule of law and a go-it alone approach that alienated our allies, incited our adversaries and ultimately weakened our fight against terrorism.
Simply put, keeping the detention facilities at Guantanamo Bay open makes America less safe, and makes our friends in this and other European cities less secure.
That is why one of President Obama’s first acts in office was to issue an executive order mandating that Guantanamo be closed within one year.
Many in the global community have been quick to point out that the logistics of closing the prison won’t be easy. That is true. In fact, I expect it to be one of the most daunting challenges I face as Attorney General.
The President has directed that I lead a team to determine the disposition of each detainee housed there. We must devise a plan that abides by American and international law while ensuring the safety of the American people. For some detainees, the decision will be fairly easy. Some, we will conclude, no longer pose a threat to the United States and can be released or transferred into the custody of other countries. The Bush administration already took this approach with many detainees. Others, we will choose to prosecute in federal court.
We are making progress every day. And I can promise you that our ultimate solutions will be grounded in the Constitution of the United States, the international laws of war, including the Geneva Conventions, and consistent with the rule of law and the democratic histories of our peoples.
We closely weighed and met those criteria in the case of a detainee named Ali al-Marri. Al-Marri had been sitting in a naval brig in South Carolina for more than five years facing no charges, without the prospect of either release or prosecution. But in February, the Justice Department indicted him in federal court on two counts of providing and conspiring with others to provide material support to al-Qaeda. He will soon answer to those crimes in court, and justice will be served – perhaps by his conviction but certainly by his opportunity to defend himself in an open court.
We will find no one policy or sweeping approach that will appropriately apply to all detainees. But by treating take each case individually, I am confident that we will get this right.
As we work to close Guantanamo, the President has also instructed us to develop new policies to govern the handling of future detainees captured in the fight against terrorism. As important as it is that we find just solutions for each current detainee, it is equally important that we learn from the mistakes of the past rather than repeating them.
To see what principles will guide our approach, look to the action we took just recently in our own legal system when we withdrew for Guantanamo detainees the use of the term “enemy combatant,” which had become needlessly inflammatory to our allies around the world. While the symbolism of this decision made headlines, you will also find here a legal rationale that demonstrates the manner in which this administration will proceed in detainee matters.
Rather than baldly asserting that the President has the inherent authority to hold detainees, we grounded our authority in a congressional enactment, specifically in the Authorization for Use of Military Force passed by Congress in the days after the September 11th attacks. And we relied upon the international laws of war, which have been developed over centuries and have legitimacy in the eyes of our global allies.
Our nation will be stronger – and safer – for that approach.
We are facing these issues head on, and making the hard decisions that this moment in history requires. But we cannot confront these challenges alone. Just as we joined hands with our international allies to bring down the Iron Curtain that divided this great city, so must we join together to close Guantanamo.
Our history has shown that Europe and America are strongest when we work together. Divided by an ocean, we are united by our belief in the rule of law and a commitment to extending freedom and prosperity to every corner of the globe. And just as we defeated communism together in the last century, so too will we defeat the international terrorist networks that threaten our civilizations in this century. But we will do it not just with the force of our armies, but also with the strength of our ideas and the example of our actions. And we must do so together.
I know that Europe did not open Guantanamo, and that in fact, a great many on this continent opposed it. But as we turn the page to a new beginning, it is incumbent on us all to embrace new solutions, free from the rancor and rhetoric that divided us in the past. To close Guantanamo, we must all make sacrifices and we must all be willing to make unpopular choices.
The United States is ready to do its part, and we hope that Europe will join us – not out of a sense of responsibility, but from a commitment to work with one of its oldest allies to confront one of the world’s most pressing challenges. The story of the last half-century is one of each side of the Atlantic turning to the other for help in times of need, and today is no different.
America’s Constitution – our founding document and living, breathing moral compass – begins by contemplating the pursuit of a “more perfect union.” Implicit in those words, of course, is that we are imperfect. We make mistakes. But we embrace the pursuit of perfection. I am confident that the steps President Obama is taking to close the prison at Guantanamo Bay will help us to become a safer and more perfect world. And I hope you will join us in that pursuit.
Thank you.
Thanks to Squantos for the ping to this thread:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2241379/posts
#
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=31670
“BREAKING: White House Overrides FBI and DHS on Gitmo Release”
by Jed Babbin
04/30/2009
SNIPPET: “Moving quickly to release Chinese Uighur terrorists into the United States, Obama administration officials have — for the second time — overridden objections of federal agencies responsible for national security.
The first time — as I reported on April 20 — the White House overrode the inter-agency panel it created from all the national security agencies to review all the cases of the Guantanamo Bay prisoners. That panel found that the seventeen Uighurs — members of the East Turkestan Islamic Movement captured at an al-Queda training camp in Pakistan — were too dangerous to release in the United States.
Now — according to a federal agency source who requested anonymity — the White House has also overridden opposition to the release from both the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security.”
Video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fRmBsvWgdbE
“Guantanamo Bay Terrorists: Coming to a Neighborhood Near You?”
Video Description - Quote:
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RepublicanSenators
May 05, 2009
(less info)
The Obama administration has a plan to close the terrorist detention camp at Guantanamo Bay. Unfortunately, it doesn’t have a plan for what to do with the terrorists — which means terrorists may soon be taking up residence in a neighborhood near you.
Category: News & Politics
Tags: terrorists Guantanamo Bay Gitmo Oklahoma Virginia Republican Senate national security Democrats detainee Obama
HUMAN EVENTS.com: "BREAKING: WHITE HOUSE OVERRIDES FBI AND DHS ON GITMO RELEASE" by Jed Babbin (SNIPPET: "Moving quickly to release Chinese Uighur terrorists into the United States, Obama administration officials have -- for the second time -- overridden objections of federal agencies responsible for national security.") (April 30, 2009)
HUMAN EVENTS.com: "THE UIGHURS AND THE 'TORTURE' MEMOS" by Jed Babbin (SNIPPET: "White House lawyers are refusing to accept the findings of an inter-agency committee that the Uighur Chinese Muslims held at Guantanamo Bay are too dangerous to release inside the U.S., according to Pentagon sources familiar with the action. This action -- coupled with the release of previously top secret legal opinions on harsh interrogation methods -- demonstrates the Obama administration's willingness to ignore reality.") (April 20, 2009)
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