One Year Later, Gitmo Remains Open

Obama administration misses deadline to shut down prison. Prediction: The prison will still be open this time next year.

FBI Director Rebukes Obama, Democrats on Terrorist Detainees (Video)

Via Republican Study Committee.

FBI Director Robert Mueller testified before the House Judiciary Committee about the dangers of releasing suspected terrorists from Guantanamo Bay into the United States. Unlike President Obama and Democrats in Congress, Mr. Mueller recongizes the threat posed by these detainees.



Fox News reports:

WASHINGTON -- FBI Director Robert Mueller told Congress on Wednesday that bringing Guantanamo Bay detainees to the United States would pose a number of possible risks, even if the they were kept in maximum-security prisons.

During his appearance Wednesday before the House Judiciary Committee, Mueller was asked what concerns the FBI has about the prospect of transferring to the United States some of the 240 inmates currently held at the naval base in Cuba.

President Barack Obama has ordered the Guantanamo Bay detention center closed by January 2010, but that timetable may be in jeopardy. Congress is seeking to block any funding for bringing any detainees to the U.S., whether freed or imprisoned.

At the start of Wednesday's hearing, Mueller was asked what concerns the FBI has about the release of Guantanamo detainees.

"The concerns we have about individuals who may support terrorism being in the United States run from concerns about providing financing, radicalizing others," Mueller said, as well as "the potential for individuals undertaking attacks in the United States."

"All of those are relevant concerns," Mueller said.

Senator Barrasso: GITMO Is "State Of The Art With Cable TV" (Video)

More fallout on the Senate blocking Obama's request for cash to close GITMO. Sen. John Barrasso (R-WY) weighs in on Obama's mistake.

"I'd rather have them not in the United States. These are basically enemy combatants intending on destroying us. These are not people that held up a 7-11 store," Says Barrasso.

Democrats To Obama: Screw You! Feinstein Says CA Prisons Are "Eminently Capable" of Holding Detainees, Reid "We Don't Want Them In U.S." (Video)

Strange things are afoot in The Senate...

I love saying I told you so, Mr. Obama. Again, you probably should have come up with a plan prior to issuing an executive order.





Fox News reports:

Senate Democrats threw cold water on President Obama's plans to close the Guantanamo Bay detention center Tuesday, pulling money for the closure from a $91 billion war spending request and publicly opposing the transfer of any detainees to U.S. soil.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said Democrats not only oppose the release of detainees into the United States but also oppose the transfer of detainees to U.S. prisons.

"We will never allow terrorists to be released in the United States," he said, adding: "Part of what we don't want is for them to be put in prisons in the United States. We don't want them around in the United States."

MSNBC's Joe Scarborough "America Less Safe With Obama" (Video)

Scarborough: "I knew by the second day [of The Obama Administration] that America was less safe."

It took you that long, Joe? I figured it out on Election Day!

Sen. Kit Bond: Closing Guantanamo Prison Security Threat (Video)

Sen. Kit Bond on Obama's backwards "Ready, Fire, Aim" strategy for GITMO.

The Misssouri says that President Barack Obama's plan to close the Guantanamo detention center "is a dangerous case of putting symbolism over security."

Bill Kristol: "Literally, on substance, there is now no argument for closing Guantanamo." (Video)

Bill Kristol calls on Obama to reverse his Executive Order to close the military prison at Guantanamo Bay. He's says the decision is merely a "symbolic" gesture to appease the Euro-Leftists.



From Kristol's Weekly Standard column in March:

First, Obama is, for PR reasons and PR reasons only (and not very good PR reasons at that), committed to closing Guantánamo. GOP members of Congress can make clear just how dangerous the remaining Guantánamo detainees are, and how irresponsible are some of the proposals for sending them abroad or trying them in the criminal justice system. The GOP should seek the release of the Defense Department report on terrorist acts by some of the less dangerous detainees released from Guantánamo under the Bush administration. Republicans can seek to slow or reverse Obama's decision, requiring that he certify that closing Guantánamo will not endanger American lives, providing funding for Guantánamo in the budget whether or not Obama wants it, and so forth. Lots of Democrats would have trouble opposing such efforts.

Sen. Lindsey Graham: Everyone at Gitmo Is An Enemy Combatant; We Can "Hold Them Forever" (Video)

Senator Lindsey Graham appeared on "On the Record" last night.

In January, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC)called Gitmo a "well run jail".

He contradicts what he said earlier in the day, that he wants to be "the President's Partner" over prosecuting GITMO detainees.



Mr. Obama had this to say about using the Army Field Manual from The Associated Press.

"We believe that the Army Field Manual reflects the best judgment of our military, that we can abide by a rule that says we don't torture, but that we can still effectively obtain the intelligence that we need," Obama said. He said his action reflects an understanding that "we are willing to observe core standards of conduct, not just when it's easy, but also when it's hard."

An excerpt from the text of Obama's Executive Order regarding "Ensuring Lawful Interrogations".

By the authority vested in me by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, in order to improve the effectiveness of human intelligence gathering, to promote the safe, lawful, and humane treatment of individuals in United States custody and of United States personnel who are detained in armed conflicts, to ensure compliance with the treaty obligations of the United States, including the Geneva Conventions, and to take care that the laws of the United States are faithfully executed, I hereby order as follows:

Section 1. Revocation. Executive Order 13440 of July 20, 2007, is revoked. All executive directives, orders, and regulations inconsistent with this order, including but not limited to those issued to or by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) from September 11, 2001, to January 20, 2009, concerning detention or the interrogation of detained individuals, are revoked to the extent of their inconsistency with this order. Heads of departments and agencies shall take all necessary steps to ensure that all directives, orders, and regulations of their respective departments or agencies are consistent with this order. Upon request, the Attorney General shall provide guidance about which directives, orders, and regulations are inconsistent with this order.

Executive Order 13440 was signed by President Bush July 20th, 2007. It stated that that members of al Qaeda, the Taliban, and associated forces are unlawful enemy combatants who are not entitled to the protections that the Third Geneva Convention provides to prisoners of war.

The Third Geneva Convention provides protection for prisoners of war assuming they meet the following criteria


4.1.2 Members of other militias and members of other volunteer corps,
including those of organized resistance movements, provided that they fulfill all of the following conditions

that of being commanded by a person responsible for his subordinates;

that of having a fixed distinctive sign recognizable at a distance (there are limited exceptions to this among countries who observe the 1977 Protocol I);

that of carrying arms openly;

that of conducting their operations in accordance with the laws and customs of war.



President Bush was correct. Members of terrorist organizations DO NOT meet the above criteria and therefore President Obama is incorrect in his belief that the Geneva Conventions and The Army Field Manual apply to enemy combatants.

Further, terrorists are not covered by The Fourth Geneva Convention which applies to treatment of civilians.

Essentially, no court, domestic or international has yet to provide a definitive ruling defining any "intermediary" between a formal army, militia or organized force (which GCIII protects) and non-combatant civilians (protected by GCIV).

Article 51.3 of the Commentary states this: IV Geneva Convention also covers this interpretation: "Civilians shall enjoy the protection afforded by this section, unless and for such time as they take a direct part in hostilities.". In the words of the International Committee of the Red Cross. or ICRC "If civilians directly engage in hostilities, they are considered "unlawful" or "unprivileged" combatants or belligerents (the treaties of humanitarian law do not expressly contain these terms). They may be prosecuted under the domestic law of the detaining state for such action. Both lawful and unlawful combatants may be interned in wartime, may be interrogated and may be prosecuted for war crimes.

So it appears there is a distinct lack of a true definition of how a terrorist, or "enemy combatant" in the international community. If anything, IV Geneva Convention affirms interrogation tactics used on the Guantanamo detainees.

The War of Terror is a unique circumstance in world history. If President Bush misjudged anything, he did so to in order to protect America and American citizens.

Obama is erring on the side of protecting the terrorists and worried about his and the United States' "Image" around the world. Pretty narcissistic, don't you think?

Mr. Obama is worried about being popular more than doing what it right.

We are sorry Mr. Obama, but America and Americans are more important than how we look to outsiders.

"The time has come to set aside childish things", Mr. Obama. You want to hang out with the popular kids in the world, putting the so-called "world opinion" above American safety? Now that is truly childish.

With all due respect, THAT is the fundamental difference between Mr. Obama and Mr. Bush.

Sen. Lindsey Graham "I Want to be The President's Partner" Closing GITMO (Video)

In January, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC)called Gitmo a "well run jail".

He advocates for trying detainees in military courts, not civilian courts, but he agrees with Obama's "need to start over."

Like Obama, Graham says "we don't know" where to put the detainees when convicted.

Anti-Torture Rally At The White House Today (Video)

More than 100 anti-torture activists marched to the White House on Thursday to protest against US detention policy.

They also voiced anger against what they consider to be the governments refusal to punish those responsible for torture.

An anonymous source also told ConservativeXpress that these people have no jobs and may be on welfare. They also believe a land of "Happy Little Clouds and Rainbows" and perhaps "little green elfs."

Cuckoo! Cuckoo!

Rachel Maddow: Gitmo Prisoner Makes Secret Call to Al Jazeera (video)

MSNBC's Rachel Maddow reports that a Guantanamo Bay Prisoner made a secret call to Arab News Network Al Jazeera.

This would never have happened under George Bush's watch. Maddow and her MS BHO comrades get wet over stuff like this.

Any breach of security or breach of protocol is without a doubt a political maneuver by the Obama/Rahmbo machine.

No doubt in my mind that this was both staged and planned by the Left, the Maddows, the Obamas, the ACLUs and other anti-America jerk offs.

What a disgusting display of "arrogant" anti-American cowardly appeasement to the bleeding-heart moonbats around the world.

Here's the Al Jazeera report:

Who Will Take Gitmo Prisoners? (Video)

Interesting report from Russia Today.

US President Barack Obama says he wants to proceed with plans to close the Guantanamo Bay prison. But where will the detainees go? Some say they could move to a maximum-security prison in the town of Alexandria.

"It looks like signing the order was the easy part for Barack Obama. But closing up shop may be a long and messy battle."

Sarkozy: France Will Take Gitmo Prisoners (Video)

French President Sarkozy said he supports closing Guantanamo Bay Prison, adding that you "can't combat terrorism with terrorism".

The cowardly French are saying Gitmo prisoners are terrorized? Give me a break.

That said, he states it would be "inconsistent" of France to call for the closing of Gitmo and then "wash our hands" of the situation.

Now we know where to put the terrorists! France can have them all; and then the U.S. will have to rescue the Yellow French... again.

Judge Orders Guantanamo Detainee Released

So, why exactly am I supposed to have sympathy for this guy?

Is it that he trained for jihad? Hung out in a cave with Osama bin Laden? Or that he was fighting U.S. soldiers on the battlefield?

Sure, release him. But not here; send his sorry ass back to Yemen where they still have a justice system which punishes the scum of the earth. I would enjoy seeing how the Islamist Extremists handle a traitorous "brother".

Thanks for the tips on terrorists, pal, but that's no reason to let you loose in America.

But, I guess none of this matters since Attorney General Eric Holder already said we would release some detainees back into the U.S, the Obama Administration has officially abandoned the terms "war on terror" and "enemy combatant" so screw it! Let these American-hating pieces of crap loose!

Detroit, Oakland or Camden, NJ would be my top choices!

A federal judge on Tuesday ordered the United States to release a prisoner from the Guantanamo detention center who said he fears for his life after informing against senior al-Qaida leaders.

U.S. District Judge Ellen Segal Huvelle issued a one-page judgment ordering the release of Yasin Muhammed Basardh, a 33-year-old from Yemen. The judge didn't say in the ruling why Basardh should be let go, but she said it was explained during a closed hearing in her courtroom earlier in the day.

Basardh has begged U.S. officials not to send him back to Yemen or any other Muslim country.

"I am cooperative to the point where my cooperation with everyone has led to many people threatening my life," he said at a 2005 military hearing.

"Osama bin Laden's people know about me. They will not hesitate to kill me or anyone in my family. If they cannot kill me, they will kill at least one person from my family to get their revenge," Basardh said. At the time, he said he wanted to join the U.S. Army.

According to charges filed by the military in 2004, Basardh is a member of the Taliban who trained at a terror camp in Afghanistan that Osama bin Laden visited. The government says Basardh fought against the U.S. or its coalition partners, and fled to the Tora Bora region in November 2001, where he stayed in a cave with bin Laden.

He later left Tora Bora for Pakistan and was captured by the Pakistani military, according to the government.

Basardh told U.S. officials that before going to Afghanistan he spent time in Saudi Arabian jails for dealing drugs. He said other drug dealers who had repented persuaded him to train for jihad in Afghanistan.

AG Holder: Some Guantanamo prisoners could be released in U.S.

No surprise here! Just lie down, America, put your head between your legs and kiss your ass goodbye!

This is same Eric Holder who called us a "nation of cowards" on race.

The same Eric Holder who is Pro-Terrorism, Anti-American, Pro-Iran, and Pro-Bill Ayers!

Reuters reports:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Some of the Guantanamo Bay prisoners could be released into the United States while others could be put on trial in the American court system, Attorney General Eric Holder said on Wednesday.

Holder, who was chosen by President Barack Obama to lead the administration's efforts to close the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba within a year, said the review of what to do with each of the prisoners had begun.

About 240 terrorism suspects, including suspected planners of the September 11 attacks, are being held in the prison. Many have been detained for seven years without charges and some were subjected to interrogation techniques denounced by critics as torture.

The administration faces intense political resistance to the idea of bringing the prisoners to the United States as part of closing the detention camp. The administration seeks to transfer some detainees to Europe or other countries while freeing others.

Holder told reporters at the Justice Department that the administration's review, made on a case-by-case basis, would determine whether the prisoners need to be put on trial or whether they can be released.

"For those who are in that second category, who can be released, there are a variety of options that we have. Among them is the possibility that we could release them into this country," he said.

Holder said it was possible the 17 Chinese Muslims who have been held for years at Guantanamo, and two or three others prisoners, could be freed in the United States.

The 17 members of the Uighur ethic group have been cleared for release but have nonetheless remained at Guantanamo while the United States tries to find a country willing to take them. The U.S. government has said it cannot return them to China because they would face persecution there.

Face persecution in China!? Good! Maybe the Chinese have the balls lack the Obama Administration lacks!

Eric Holder is a pussy!

President Obama Officially Abandons Use of the Term "Enemy Combatants"

President Obama is officially abandoning its use of the term "enemy combatants" to describe terror suspects - ending a key policy of the Bush administration.

It is the latest shift on Guantanamo Bay by President Barack Obama, who has announced the camp is to be closed.

The decision to drop the term is deeply symbolic, correspondents say.

President George W Bush argued that his status as commander-in chief allowed him to hold "enemy combatants" indefinitely and without trial.

Announcing the end of the term's use, the Justice Department said suspects would in future be held according to legal standards set by the international laws of war.

Under the new definition, only those who provided "substantial" support to al-Qaeda or the Taleban will be considered detainable, officials said.

But no worries.

Liberals who figured out what Obama is up to are not happy. They call the move symbolic with good reason. On the issue of enemy combatants, Obama is essentially doing the same thing as President Bush. He’s just calling it something else.

Oh Bama! You jokester!

VIDEO: Bush Should Have Executed Gitmo Detainees, Says Former CIA Officer

A former CIA officer has said its ridiculous that the Bush administration didn't execute numerous prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, regardless of whether they have had a trial, when it had the chance.

Many of those individuals that are there are enemy combatants and thats based on the Geneva Conventions and should be executed, said Gary Berntsen, who spent 20 years with the CIA, to Foxs Gretchen Carlson on the show, Fox & Friends. Its ridiculous that the Bush administration, after seven years, didnt deal with many of those that we know are enemy combatants.

REPORT: Prisoner Abuse At Guantanamo Has Increased Under Obama!

"That is why I have ordered the closing of the detention center at Guantanamo Bay and will seek swift and certain justice for captured terrorists because living our values doesn't make us weaker, it makes us safer and it makes us stronger. And that is why I can stand here tonight and say without exception or equivocation that the United States of America does not torture."
--President Obama 2/24/2009

How can this be? I thought the conditions at Gitmo were okay!

Obama's own comission said so! I thought we were all supposed to accept the Messiah's word as Gospel, right?

Maybe the Gitmo guards are taking justice into their own hands before we send them all to France to be liberated and freed to return to a life of terror!



Reuter's reports:

LONDON (Reuters) - Abuse of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay has worsened sharply since President Barack Obama took office as prison guards "get their kicks in" before the camp is closed, according to a lawyer who represents detainees.

Abuses began to pick up in December after Obama was elected, human rights lawyer Ahmed Ghappour told Reuters. He cited beatings, the dislocation of limbs, spraying of pepper spray into closed cells, applying pepper spray to toilet paper and over-forcefeeding detainees who are on hunger strike.

The Pentagon said on Monday that it had received renewed reports of prisoner abuse during a recent review of conditions at Guantanamo, but had concluded that all prisoners were being kept in accordance with the Geneva Conventions.

"According to my clients, there has been a ramping up in abuse since President Obama was inaugurated," said Ghappour, a British-American lawyer with Reprieve, a legal charity that represents 31 detainees at Guantanamo.

"If one was to use one's imagination, (one) could say that these traumatized, and for lack of a better word barbaric, guards were just basically trying to get their kicks in right now for fear that they won't be able to later," he said.

"Certainly in my experience there have been many, many more reported incidents of abuse since the inauguration," added Ghappour, who has visited Guantanamo six times since late September and based his comments on his own observations and conversations with both prisoners and guards.

He stressed the mistreatment did not appear to be directed from above, but was an initiative undertaken by frustrated U.S. army and navy jailers on the ground. It did not seem to be a reaction against the election of Obama, a Democrat who has pledged to close the prison camp within a year, but rather a realization that there was little time remaining before the last 241 detainees, all Muslim, are released.

"It's 'hey, let's have our fun while we can,'" said Ghappour, who helped secure the release this week of Binyam Mohamed, a British resident freed from Guantanamo Bay after more than four years in detention without trial or charge.

"I can't really imagine why you would get your kicks from abusing prisoners, but certainly, having spoken to certain guards who have been injured in Iraq, who indirectly or directly blame my clients for their injuries and the trauma they have suffered, it's not too difficult to put two and two together."

***

Liar, liar pants on fire!

French Appeals Court Overturns Convictions Of Former Guantanamo Detainees

The sets a very, very dangerous precedent. 11% of released or rehabilitated terrorists return to a life of murdering innocents.

And I'm sorry to break it to the bleeding-heart human rights activists, but these people do not have any constitutional rights and should be prosecuted to the fullest!

The Associated Press reports:

PARIS (AP) — A Paris appeals court on Tuesday overturned the terrorism convictions of five former detainees at Guantanamo Bay, ruling French police agents were out of line in questioning them at the U.S. prison camp.

France is among the few Western countries to prosecute nationals who have returned home from Guantanamo — and the ruling marks the latest high-profile foreign disavowal of the secretive center that President Barack Obama's administration wants to shutter for good.

The appeals court ruled that agents from the French counterterrorism agency DST who questioned the five inmates at Guantanamo in 2002 and 2004 had overstepped their roles. Overturning a lower court's conviction, the appeals court said DST could not act as both a spy agency and a judicial police service, the body French law says is authorized to interrogate detainees.

State prosecutors said they would appeal to the highest French court, the Court of Cassation.

The men, who were arrested in Afghanistan in 2001, each spent a total of 2-1/2 to 3 years in custody at Guantanamo and in France, to which they were repatriated in 2004 and 2005.

Legal experts said the ruling could send a message to any future U.S. court that prosecutes Guantanamo inmates by showing how a foreign court feels about the admissibility of evidence taken from interrogations there.

"I hope that American courts are brave enough to demand that the government come forward with the records about the torture and coercion that was conducted by our intelligence agencies," said Martha Rayner, a law professor at Fordham University, by telephone from New York. She said her office represents two Guantanamo inmates.

Judith Sunderland, a Human Rights Watch researcher for Europe and central Asia who specializes in counterterrorism, said the ruling could provide lessons about how intelligence information in such cases can be used in court.

"Here we have the court of appeal taking a clear stance against improperly acquired intelligence information being used in court proceedings," she said by phone. "That is clearly a very, very positive step."

All seven French citizens who were at Guantanamo were sent home in 2004 and 2005. One was immediately released; another was acquitted in trial; the other five were convicted for participating in a terrorist group in Afghanistan.

The NY Times is equally ecstatic:

The court ruled that information gathered by French intelligence officials in interrogations at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, violated French rules for permissible evidence, and that there was no other proof of wrongdoing.

No proof of wrongdoing? What a pile of camel dung! They were in a terrorist camp!

Mourad Benchellali, who was at Guantánamo, wrote an Op-Ed article for The New York Times in June 2006 in which he said that in 2001, when he was 19, “I made the mistake of listening to my older brother and going to Afghanistan on what I thought was a dream vacation.” His brother’s friends, he wrote, sent him to a training camp for Al Qaeda. He spent two and a half years in Guantánamo as an “enemy combatant” and said he could not “describe in just a few lines the suffering and the torture.”

Oh boo hoo Mourad! Cry me a river! You thought Afghanistan was a "dream vacation"? Where you going for your honeymoon, Somalia? Besides, uh, what torture? Even Obama's own committee said conditions in Gitmo uphold the Geneva Conventions!

You know what, America? Screw France!

Report: Turns Out Gitmo Is Not That Bad; Meets Requirements Of Geneva Conventions

So what's all the fuss? What is Obama's argument now?

The Washington Post reports:

A Pentagon review of conditions at the Guantanamo Bay military prison has concluded that the treatment of detainees meets the requirements of the Geneva Conventions but that prisoners in the highest-security camps should be allowed more religious and social interaction, according to a government official who has read the 85-page document.

The report, which President Obama ordered, was prepared by Adm. Patrick M. Walsh, the vice chief of naval operations, and has been delivered to the White House. Obama requested the review as part of an executive order on the planned closure of the prison at the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, on the southeastern tip of Cuba.

Most Americans disagree with closing Gitmo.


(Hat Tip: Hot Air)