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Mansoor Adayfi منصور الضيفي Profile picture
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Jun 10 • 11 tweets • 8 min read
#CloseGuantanamo
16 years ago, 3 of my friends were “found” dead in their cages on my cell block, hanging by the neck, hands and feet bound, cloths shoved in down their throats. Their names were Yasser, Mana, and Ali. The #Guantánamo camp admin called them suicides.
رحمهم الله.
This was 6/9/06 and we were in Camp 1’s Alpha block. Yasser, Mana, and Ali and I had been on hunger strike recently and were known by the camp for protesting our indefinite and arbitrary detention, constant harassment, and #torture.
Yasser was barely 17 when he was sent to #Guantánamo and had been sexually harassed by female guards and interrogators. He’d been told he was going to be released soon. He had the most beautiful singing voice.
Mana was 25 when he was brought to Guantanamo. He’d also been told he was going to be released soon. Ali was also young but had a wife. None of my them ever talked about taking their own lives.
The night they died, Yasser sang to us & we had shared some food through the holes in our cages. We were recovering from a hunger strike that had brought about changes to the camp and were talking about another one. I wrote about that night in my book.
The US Govt. sent their bodies home bodybags, no names just their ISN Numbers. All organs & parts of the neck had been removed so that no autopsies could be performed. No apology. No explanation. Imagine getting your son like this.
No one believed those men committed suicide. How does one bind their own hands behind their back, then hang themselves? We had nothing in our cages. Seton Hall Law has done several reports on the deaths. law.shu.edu/policy-researc…
And Scott Horton wrote about it for @Harpers harpers.org/archive/2010/0…
Everyone has determined that the deaths were suspicious and not suicides. 9 men have died at #Guantánamo, 6 men allegedly by suicide, all were suspicious. And yet the US govt and most media continue to refer to them as suicides and not as murder. There’s no accountability.
37 men are still held at Guantánamo. 21 have been approved for release/transfer. 10 charged in military commissions that legal experts say are fatally flawed. 5 are held indefinitely with no charges. Only 2 men have been convicted crimes. nytimes.com/interactive/20…
It’s time to #CloseGuantánamo. Share this thread. Read my book, DON’T FORGET US HERE, LOST AND FOUND AT GUANTÁNAMO.
hachettebooks.com/titles/mansoor…

AND take action by adding your name to Cage’s action to close #CloseGuantánamo.
closingguantanamotogether.com

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More from @MansoorAdayfi

Mansoor Adayfi منصور الضيفي Profile picture
Jan 10
#GITMO20
Thread 1/
20 years ago, I was sent to #Guantánamo after being sold to the US for bounty. I was 19 years old and didn’t know much about the US. What I learned, I learned at Guantánamo.
2/
 The Bush administration said that prisoners held at Guantánamo were all illegal combatants and weren’t covered under the Geneva Conventions.
3/
 We lived in dog kennels at Camp X-Ray for the first months, where we weren’t allowed to talk, stand, or pray together. We weren’t told where we were or why we were being detained.
Read 11 tweets
Mansoor Adayfi منصور الضيفي Profile picture
Oct 9, 2021
On 10/7/01, when the US launched the #WarOnTerror w/ Operation Enduring Freedom, they littered Afghanistan with Tomahawk missiles, cluster bombs, and pamphlets like this offering $$$$ for al Qaeda & Taliban fighters.
Like thousands of others, I was sold to the US for bounty money, sent to a black site where I was tortured & then sent to Guantanamo. I was only 18 years old. I wasn’t a fighter. I wasn’t al Qaeda leader or Taliban.
At Guantanamo, I met farmers who were sold by neighbors who wanted their land. I met charity workers, teachers, engineers, all kinds of men who were sold as fighters.

[Me at #Guantánamo Camp 6 2012]
Read 9 tweets
Mansoor Adayfi منصور الضيفي Profile picture
Oct 2, 2021
This week I graduated w/ excellence from college, at the very top of my class and student of the year. 20 years ago this week, I was kidnapped by warlords in Afghanistan and later sold to the US for bounty. I was 18 yrs old.
Education has always been important to me and to my family. My father insisted my sisters go to school and expected US ALL to get top marks. I left my village at 13 for high school in Sana’a. I knew I wanted to go to college.
When I was sent to #Guantanamo, I protested our inhumane treatment w/ hunger strikes and block riots, I refused to talk to interrogators. For this I was stripped of all “comfort items” including books, pens, paper.
Read 11 tweets
Mansoor Adayfi منصور الضيفي Profile picture
Sep 25, 2021
Hunger Strike Thread:
1/8
We had no rights at #Guantanamo. We had no power. We had nothing but our bodies and our lives and we had to use them to bring about change. Going on #hungerstrike is like entering a dark tunnel & the light at the end is death.
#artfromguantanamo
2/8
 In the beginning, your stomach growls & begs for food. You dream of food. I dreamed of meals my father made after Ramadan--lamb mandi that melted in my mouth. I regretted every grain of rice left uneaten.
3/8
 Days later, your stomach shuts down. Your body consumes your fat, then muscle. You feel pain in every cell consumed. You don’t sleep. You can’t concentrate and feel confused. Your vision blurs. Your heart beats so fast it’s hard to breathe.
Read 8 tweets
Mansoor Adayfi منصور الضيفي Profile picture
Sep 18, 2021
#Thread 1/8
20 years ago today, just 6 days after 9/11, George W. Bush gave the CIA broad powers to "Capture and Detain" anyone in what would become the #WarOnTerror
2/8
 Weeks later, I was sold to the CIA and sent to a black site in Afghanistan where I was tortured along with many others until I confessed that I was someone I wasn't just to stop the pain. This is what I wrote in my book
3/8
 I was then sent to #Guantánamo, where I spent over 14 years as a prisoner of the US. I didn't have rights, I didn't have an attorney or legal representation until 2009. I was never charged with a crime. I was never told why I was being held. I was only detainee ISN 441.
Read 8 tweets
Mansoor Adayfi منصور الضيفي Profile picture
Sep 11, 2021
1/8
 20 years ago, I heard about 9/11 on the radio in Afghanistan. At 18, I couldn’t imagine buildings so tall or why someone would kill so many people. Soon after, I was sold to the US & sent to #Guantanamo. 8 years later, when I saw video of 9/11 for the first time,
2/8
 I wept for all the innocent lives that lost since 2001.
I never could have imagined that this tragedy would be used to justify keeping me and hundreds of others locked up and tortured for nearly 15 years.
3/8
 This is what I wrote about the day in my book, DON'T FORGET US HERE, LOST AND FOUND AT GUANTÁNAMO.
Read 8 tweets

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