No sleep was allowed. In order to enforce this, I was given 25-ounce water bottles in intervals of one to two hours, depending on the mood of the guards, 24 hours a day. The consequences were devastating. I couldn’t close my eyes for ten minutes because I was sitting most of the time on the bathroom. Later on, after the tension was relieved, I asked one of the guards, “Why the water diet? Why don’t you just make me stay awake by standing up, like in ■■■■■■■■■■■■■?”
“Psychologically it’s devastating to make somebody stay awake on his own, without ordering him,” said ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■. “Believe me, you haven’t seen anything. We have put detainees naked under the shower for days, eating, pissing, and shitting in the shower!” he continued. Other guards told me about other torture methods that I wasn’t really eager to know about.
I was allowed to say three sentences: “Yes, sir!” “Need my interrogator!” and “Need the medics.” Every once in a while the whole guard team stormed my cell, dragged me out, put me facing the wall, and threw out whatever was in my cell, shouting and cursing in order to humiliate me. It wasn’t much: I was deprived from all comfort items that a detainee needs except for a mattress and a small, thin, worn-out blanket. For the first weeks I also had no shower, no laundry, no brushing. I almost developed bugs. I hated my smell.
No sleep. Water diet. Every move behind my door made me stand up in a military-like position with my heart pounding like boiling water. My appetite was non-existent. I was waiting every minute on the next session of torture. I hoped I would die and go to heaven; no matter how sinful I am, these people can never be more merciful than God. Ultimately we all are going to face the Lord and beg for his mercy, admitting our weaknesses and our sinfulness. I could hardly remember any prayers, all I could say was, “Please, God, relieve my pain…”
I started to hallucinate and hear voices as clear as crystal. I heard my family in a casual familial conversation that I couldn’t join. I heard Koran readings in a heavenly voice.* I heard music from my country. Later on the guards used these hallucinations and started talking with funny voices through the plumbing, encouraging me to hurt the guards and plot an escape. But I wasn’t misled by them, even though I played along.
“We heard somebody—maybe a genie!” they used to say.
“Yeah, but I ain’t listening to him,” I responded. I just realized I was on the edge of losing my mind. I started to talk to myself. Although I tried as hard as I could to convince myself that I was not in Mauritania, I was not near my family, so I could not possibly hear them speaking, I kept hearing the voices constantly, day and night. Psychological assistance was out of the question, or really any medical assistance, beside the asshole I didn’t want to see.
I couldn’t find a way on my own. At that moment I didn’t know if it was day or night, but I assumed it was night because the toilet drain was rather dark. I gathered my strength, guessed the Kibla, kneeled, and started to pray to God. “Please guide me. I know not what to do. I am surrounded by merciless wolves, who fear not thee.” When I was praying I burst into tears, though I suppressed my voice lest the guards hear me. You know there are always serious prayers and lazy prayers. My experience has taught me that God always responds to your serious prayers.
“Sir,” I said, when I finished my prayers. One of the guards showed up in his Halloween mask.
“What?” asked the guard with a dry, cold emotion.
“I want to see ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■. Not ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■; I want the guy ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■,” I said.
“You mean ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■?” Oops, the guard just made a big mistake by revealing the real name of ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■. In fact I was already familiar with the name, because I saw it a long time before on a file ■■■■■■■■■■ carried, and if you can put two and two together the puzzle is solved.*
“Yes, ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■, not the ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■.” I really wanted to speak to somebody who was likely to understand me, rather than ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■, who hardly had an understanding for anything. But ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ didn’t show up, ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ did.
“You asked for ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■?”
“I did.”
“And you asked not to see me?”
“I did.”
“Well, I work for ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■, and he sent me!” said ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ dryly.
“OK, I have no problem with cooperating with you just as I would with ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■. However, I would also like Mr. ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ to take part in the interviews,” I said.
“I am not the one who decides about that, but I guess it would be no problem,” he said.
“I am starving, I want you to tell the guards to give me some food.”
“If you start to cooperate, you’ll get more food. I am going to come later today to interview you. I just want to tell you that you made the right decision.”
Confessions are like the beads of a necklace: if the first bead falls, the rest follow.
To be honest and truthful, I am telling many things here that I had been holding back merely because of fear. I just couldn’t find any common ground to discuss my case comfortably in a relaxed environment. I had no crimes to confess to, and that is exactly where I got stuck with my interrogators, who were not looking for innocent undertakings. They were looking for evil enterprises. But through my conversations with the FBI and the DoD, I had a good idea as to what wild theories the government had about me.
“We know you came to Canada to plot to harm the U.S.,” said ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■.
“And what was my evil plan?”
“Maybe not exactly to harm the U.S., but to attack the CN Tower in Toronto?” he said. I was thinking, Is the guy crazy? I’ve never heard of such a tower.
“You realize if I admit to such a thing I have to involve other people! What if turns out I was lying?” I said.
“So what? We know your friends are bad, so if they get arrested, even if you lie about ■■■■■■■■ it doesn’t matter, because they’re bad.” I thought, “What an asshole! he wants to lock up innocent people just because they’re Muslim Arabs! That’s Nuts!” So ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ very much told me a precise crime I could admit to which would comply with the Intel theory.
“Back in the states, if I recommend somebody to a good school and he ended up shooting and killing people, is that my fault?” ■■■■■■■ asked me once.
“No!”
“So, if you have recruited people for al Qaeda, it’s not your fault if they become terrorists!” said ■■■■■■■■.
“The only problem is that I haven’t, regardless of the consequences.”
■■■■■ was clearer. “We don’t give a shit if you helped ■■■■■■■■■■■■ and two other hijackers go to Chechnya. We only give a shit if you sent them to your ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■.” So, according to ■■■■■, I could stop the torture if I said I recruited ■■■■■■■■■■■■ and two hijackers. To be honest with you, they made me believe I recruited ■■■■■■■■■■■■; I thought, God, I might have recruited the guy before I was born!
“Looks like a dog, walks like a dog, smells like a dog, barks like a dog, must be a dog,” ■■■■■ used to say repeatedly during his sessions with me. It sounded awful, I know I am not a dog, and yet I must be one. The whole police theory of doing every trick to keep people in jail by pinning things on them doesn’t make sense to me.
I believe simply that an innocent suspect should be released. As the just, legendary Arabic King Omar put it, “I would rather release a criminal than imprison an innocent man.”
■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ explained the ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ the most: ■■■■■■■ said that you helped him go to Chechnya by suggesting that he and his friends transit through Afghanistan, because Georgia was sending Mujahideen back. Furthermore, when I asked ■■■■■■■■■■■ what he thinks you do for al Qaeda, he said that you’re an al Qaeda recruiter.”
“I believe that without you September 11 would never have happened,” ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ concluded. According to his theory I was the guy; all I needed to do was to admit it. Many interrogators asked me, “What do you know about al Qaeda cells in Germany and Canada?” To be honest with you, I’d never heard of such a thing; I know al Qaeda organizations, but I don’t know about al Qaeda cells in other countries, though that doesn’t necessarily mean there aren’t.
■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ pushed the issue even more into the light. “You are a leader, people like you, respect you, and follow you,” he said to me multiple times. As you can see, my recipe was already cooked for me. I am not only a part of an al Qaeda cell in both Germany and Canada, but I am the leader.
I argued the case of ■■■■■■■ with ■■■■■■■■■■■ many times. “According to you, I recruited ■■■■■■■ and his two friends for al Qaeda,” I said.
“Yes.”
“Okay, but that allegation requires many other things and coincidences.”
“Like what?” he said.
First, I explained, I supposedly knew ■■■■■■■ and ■■■■■■■ himself said he has seen me only once, and that is not enough for knowing somebody, let alone recruiting him. Second, I must have recruited ■■■■■■■ without his knowledge, because all he claims is that I told him how to get to Chechnya. “According to you,” I told him, “And maybe to him, too, I told him to travel through Afghanistan, so what guaranteed that he was going to stay in Afghanistan? And if he miraculously stayed in Afghanistan, what guaranteed that he was going to train? And if he decided to train, what guaranteed that he was going to meet al Qaeda’s criteria? And if by chance he met al Qaeda’s criteria, what told me that he was ready to be a suicide bomber, and was ready to learn how to fly? This is just ridiculous!”
“But you are very smart,” ■■■■■■■■ said.
“Under these circumstances, I agree with you that I’m beyond smart: I am a psychic! But what makes you guys think that I’m so evil?”
“We just don’t know, but smart people don’t leave any traces. For instance, we had an ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ who had been working for Russia for 20 years without being noticed,” said ■■■■■■■■.*
“We have people who still believe that you conspired with ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ said ■■■■■■■■■■ when I told her not to ask me about ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ because the FBI had settled his case since he had started cooperating.†
“Obviously there is no way out with you guys,” I addressed ■■■■■■■■■.
“I’m telling you how!” ■■■■ responded.
Now, thanks to the unbearable pain I was suffering, I had nothing to lose, and I allowed myself to say anything to satisfy my assailants. Session followed session since I called ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■.
“People are very happy with what you’re saying,” said ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ after the first session. I answered all the questions he asked me with incriminating answers. I tried my best to make myself look as bad as I could, which is exactly the way you can make your interrogator happy. I made my mind up to spend the rest of my life in jail. You see most people can put up with being imprisoned unjustly, but nobody can bear agony day in and day out for the rest of his life.
■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ started to take the shape of a human being, though a bad one. “I write my report like newspaper articles, and the members of the community submit their comments. They’re really happy,” ■■■■■■■■■ said.
“So am I,” I said. I was wondering about the new, half-happy face of ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ is an angry person; if he talks to you he always looks at the roof, he hardly ever looks anybody in the eyes. He can barely lead a dialogue, but he’s very good when it comes to monologues. “I divorced my wife because she was just so annoying,” he once said to me.
“Your request to see ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ is not approved, in the meantime I am working on your case,” he said.
“Alright!” I knew that ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ was a trial, and that the DoD still wanted me to deal with the “bad guy.”
“■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■,” he said.
“But since you don’t know my limit, you drove me beyond it,” I responded. When I started to talk generously to ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■, ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ brought ■■■■■■■ back into the picture; for some reason the team wanted ■■■■ back, too.
“Thank you very much for getting the ■■■■■■■ back,” I said.
■■■■■■■ looked both sad and happy. “I enjoy talking to you, you’re easy to talk to, and you have pretty teeth,” ■■■■ told me before I was kidnapped from ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■. ■■■■■■■ was the closest person to me; ■■■■ was the only one I could relate to.*
“I can never do what ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ is doing; all he’s worried about is getting his job done,” said ■■■■■■■ commenting ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ methods when ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ was absent. ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ were now interrogating me in turn. They dedicated the whole time until around November 10, 2003, to questioning me about Canada and September 11; they didn’t ask me a single question about Germany, where I really had the center of gravity of my life. Whenever they asked me about somebody in Canada I had some incriminating information about that person, even if I didn’t know him. Whenever I thought about the words, “I don’t know,” I got nauseous, because I remembered the words of ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■, “All you have to say is, “I don’t know, I don’t remember, and we’ll fuck you!” Or ■■■■■■■■■■ “We don’t want to hear your denials anymore!” And so I erased these words from my dictionary.
“We would like you to write your answers on paper; it’s too much work to keep up with your talk, and you might forget things when you talk to us,” said ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■.
“Of course!” I was really happy with the idea because I would rather talk to a paper than talk to him; at least the paper wouldn’t shout in my face or threaten me. ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ drowned me in a pile of papers, which I duly filled with writings. It was a good outlet for my frustration and my depression.
“You’re very generous in your written answers; you even wrote a whole bunch about ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■, whom you really don’t know,” ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ accurately said, forgetting that he forbade me to use the words “I don’t know.”
“■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ reads your writing with a lot of interest,” said ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■. I was extremely frightened, because this statement was ambiguous. “We’re gonna give you an assignment about ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■. He is detained in Florida and they cannot make him talk; he keeps denying everything. You better provide us a Smo
king Gun against him,” said ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■. I was so sad: how rude was this guy, to ask me to provide a smoking gun about somebody I hardly know?
“All I can say is that Ahmed L. is a criminal and should be locked up the rest of his life.* I’m ready to testify against him in court,” I said, though I was not ready to lie in court to burn an innocent soul.
“■■■■■■■■■■■■ is facing the death penalty if we can make him guilty of drug smuggling,” ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ said once, showing me his picture. I burst out laughing as soon as I saw the expression on his face and the Bob Barker–Calvin Klein prison uniform.†
“What are you laughing at?” ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ asked me.
“It’s just funny!”
“How can you laugh at your friend?” I felt guilty right away, even though I knew I was not laughing at him. After all, my situation was worse than his. I was laughing at the situation: I could read everything that was going on in his head just from the expression on his face. I’d been made to take that same picture many times, in Senegal, in Mauritania, in Germany, in Jordan, in Bagram, and in GTMO. I hate the pose, I hate the look, I hate the height measure. Let me tell you something, whenever you see that bleak-looking face in a jail uniform, posing in front of a height measure scaled on a wall, you can be sure that is not a happy person.
In fact, I really felt bad for that poor guy. He had sought asylum in Canada for a certain time but the Canadians refused his petition, partly because they considered him as Islamist. ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ was willing to try his chances in the U.S., where he faced the harsh reality of the highly electrified environment against Muslims and Arabs, and where the U.S. gave him asylum in a high-level security prison and now was trying to link him to any crime. When I saw his face, I knew he was like, “Screw these Americans. How much I hate them! What do they want from me? How did I end up in jail when I came here seeking protection?”
Guantánamo Diary Page 29