{"id":4123,"date":"2009-01-15T15:00:42","date_gmt":"2009-01-15T15:00:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/jesuscreed\/2009\/01\/what-can-we-do.html"},"modified":"2009-01-15T15:00:42","modified_gmt":"2009-01-15T15:00:42","slug":"what-can-we-do","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jesuscreed\/2009\/01\/what-can-we-do.html","title":{"rendered":"What can we do?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"GTMO.jpg\"<\/span>We ask this question: If it is the case that American military personnel tortured those in GTMO, and this piece from The Washington Post<\/a> shows that torture occurred, what can we do? To whom do we write? The Obama Administration will be challenged both to acknowledge such cases and respond to the justice issues.<\/p>\n

<\/i><\/p>\n

\n

\nThe top Bush administration official in charge of deciding whether to bring Guantanamo Bay<\/a> detainees to trial has concluded that the U.S. military<\/a>
\ntortured a Saudi national<\/b> who allegedly planned to participate in the
\nSept. 11, 2001, attacks, interrogating him with techniques that
\nincluded sustained isolation, sleep deprivation, nudity and prolonged
\nexposure to cold, leaving him in a “life-threatening condition.”<\/b>\n<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

<\/p>\n

\n

“We tortured [Mohammed al-]Qahtani,” said Susan J. Crawford<\/b>, in her
\nfirst interview since being named convening authority of military
\ncommissions by Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates<\/a> in February 2007. “His treatment met the legal definition of torture. …\n<\/p>\n

\nCrawford, a retired judge who served as general counsel for the Army during the Reagan administration<\/a> and as Pentagon inspector general when Dick Cheney<\/a>
\nwas secretary of defense, is the first senior Bush administration
\nofficial responsible for reviewing practices at Guantanamo to publicly
\nstate that a detainee was tortured.\n<\/p>\n

Crawford, 61, said the combination of the interrogation techniques,
\ntheir duration and the impact on Qahtani’s health led to her
\nconclusion. “The techniques they used were all authorized, but the
\nmanner in which they applied them was overly aggressive and too
\npersistent. . . . You think of torture, you think of some horrendous
\nphysical act done to an individual. This was not any one particular
\nact; this was just a combination of things that had a medical impact on
\nhim, that hurt his health. It was abusive and uncalled for. And
\ncoercive. Clearly coercive. It was that medical impact that pushed me
\nover the edge” to call it torture, she said. \n<\/p>\n

… Qahtani was denied entry into the United States a month before the
\nSept. 11 attacks and was allegedly planning to be the plot’s 20th
\nhijacker. He was later captured in Afghanistan and transported to
\nGuantanamo in January 2002. His interrogation took place over 50 days
\nfrom November 2002 to January 2003, though he was held in isolation
\nuntil April 2003.\n<\/p>\n

“For 160 days his only contact was with the interrogators,” said
\nCrawford, who personally reviewed Qahtani’s interrogation records and
\nother military documents. “Forty-eight of 54 consecutive days of
\n18-to-20-hour interrogations. Standing naked in front of a female
\nagent. Subject to strip searches. And insults to his mother and
\nsister.” \n<\/p>\n

\nAt one point he was threatened with a military working dog named Zeus,
\naccording to a military report. Qahtani “was forced to wear a woman’s
\nbra and had a thong placed on his head during the course of his
\ninterrogation” and “was told that his mother and sister were whores.”
\nWith a leash tied to his chains, he was led around the room “and forced
\nto perform a series of dog tricks,” the report shows.\n<\/p>\n

\nThe interrogation, portions of which have been previously described by other news organizations, including The Washington Post<\/a>,
\nwas so intense that Qahtani had to be hospitalized twice at Guantanamo
\nwith bradycardia, a condition in which the heart rate falls below 60
\nbeats a minute and which in extreme cases can lead to heart failure and
\ndeath. At one point Qahtani’s heart rate dropped to 35 beats per
\nminute, the record shows.\n<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We ask this question: If it is the case that American military personnel tortured those in GTMO, and this piece from The Washington Post shows that torture occurred, what can we do? To whom do we write? The Obama Administration will be challenged both to acknowledge such cases and respond to the justice issues. The…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":70,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4123","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-public-issues"],"yoast_head":"\nWhat can we do? - Jesus Creed<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jesuscreed\/2009\/01\/what-can-we-do.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"What can we do? - Jesus Creed\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"We ask this question: If it is the case that American military personnel tortured those in GTMO, and this piece from The Washington Post shows that torture occurred, what can we do? To whom do we write? The Obama Administration will be challenged both to acknowledge such cases and respond to the justice issues. The…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jesuscreed\/2009\/01\/what-can-we-do.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Jesus Creed\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2009-01-15T15:00:42+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/jesuscreed\/files\/import\/imgs\/GTMO.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Scot McKnight\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"What can we do? - Jesus Creed","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jesuscreed\/2009\/01\/what-can-we-do.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"What can we do? - Jesus Creed","og_description":"We ask this question: If it is the case that American military personnel tortured those in GTMO, and this piece from The Washington Post shows that torture occurred, what can we do? 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