assalamu alaikum greetings and peace
welcome to the dean show i'm your host
and it's that time of the year never
forget we're going to be talking about
the events that happened that created
this slogan we're talking a little bit
about afghanistan and someone who was in
the midst of all of this got wrongfully
detained
and taken to a place that i want you to
imagine being in this place this torture
chamber of a place and now at the end
being free of any charges and having and
showing such a forgiving heart to
forgive those
that oppressed you tortured you and now
you're on the dean's show to share your
experiences and your stories and help us
to understand more around this event of
the never forget and afghanistan and
much more here on the dean
how are you doing my brother i'm doing
well and of course it's a pleasure to be
on this show i've watched it many times
and i've heard of it for many many years
so i'm glad to be honest
everybody's saying you know when these
topics come up
get where's mozambique you got to get
them on the program this is the man and
we finally got them on alhamdulillah
have you ever heard this slogan never
forget
yeah of course uh many times uh all in
relation to september 11th a lot of the
american soldiers actually used to come
to guantanamo used to say that they were
before they came to guantanamo
were first taken as part of their
mission to kind of hype them up to
ground zero and then to come to
guantanamo and be told that you are a
very important mission here guarding the
guys who did 9 11
i.e us
and um that's what they were made to
believe until of course they
saw that after decades of torture
interrogation
intelligence gathering and law
enforcement agencies presence um not a
single person even to this day as we
speak has been convicted for anything to
do with 911 in guantanamo that's a
shocking uh statistic bearing in mind
that after the nazi war crimes tribunals
in world war ii
that saw the deaths of millions of
people uh people were prosecuted within
the year
so it tells you the kind of justice
system is entirely broken
now for those people that don't know you
actually spent what was it three years
unjustly in guantanamo bay is that
correct yes so i spent two years in
guantanamo but prior to that i was
actually held in the background
detention facility which is in
afghanistan which of course you may have
all heard that recently was freed by the
taliban and is no longer in of course
u.s custody
um
so essentially this uh
this this um
this imprisonment of mine
um
has now
amazingly and shockingly whatever you
want to call it found that members of
the taliban who were imprisoned with me
in bagram and tortured and then sent to
guantanamo uh were actually sent
uh and out leaders of are now ministers
in the afghan government
now i want you to for everybody out
there i know this is a very sensitive
subject for a lot of people and
people would rightfully so if the main
narrative what they've been told
was true but what if now are you going
to fall into a state of cognitive
dissonance you know when truth comes to
you if there is now things put into
perspective if now it's not everything
that you've been told for it to be let's
start with this from here tell us um
i started off with never forget this
might be a shock to a lot of people but
there's a new slogan i don't know if
you've heard this one and what are your
comments on it
wow
stop using muslims as the scapegoat what
do you think of this new slogan i mean
it's it's really powerful um
it is i don't know who's putting that
out but
yes you're right muslims if 9 11 wasn't
a muslim thing some muslims have been
involved in it um but just like uh
do we really want to say i mean
the response to 9 11 was that an
american thing was that a european thing
was that a
whose thing was it
blanket accusations against people
uh are a dangerous dangerous road to go
down
and if 9 11 i know the number i actually
know the exact number of people that
died on september 11th it wasn't 3 000
it was 2
976 people why is that important because
every single dead life
mattered
how many people died as a result of the
response to 9 11
we still don't know
and here's the pun
we don't count and they don't count is
it hundreds of thousands is it tens of
thousands is it millions doesn't matter
because
that's the damage that we were prepared
to inflict on the muslim world
and simply not care
about the lives that
would be shattered as a result of that
or taken
we've often repeated that when you look
at islam anybody who studies islam
calling the human being to have a direct
connection with the creator that happens
on earth calling to justice to peace
for a person to live a morally upright
life
nothing to do with such
atrocities such oppression islam is
totally clear of any
such acts this is clear islam calls the
human being to spread peace in the world
not injustice and chaos
so now and then
but now what happens when you have for
instance you have so many people like
for instance recently you had
spike lee come under i don't know if
you've you've heard of spike lee the
actor
uh the director i'm sorry yes the
director he's come out he's come under
some fire now uh because he was doing a
documentary i believe on hbo and he was
talking to some of these architects and
engineers and others and just
questioning he said we got questions
about this building seven that fell
right uh here's this if people haven't
seen it that's what we're talking about
so they're just questioning and again uh
we're not into conspiracy theories and
we don't have much time for this but
there's obviously there's a lot of
questions that
were unanswered to him so he was just
raising these questions and he got
attacked viciously by the media
and then there is uh again almost 4 000
architects and engineers who are raising
the same question about this building 7
that wasn't hit by a plane but if this
falls apart everything else falls apart
what are your comments when you see
stuff like this and then one more thing
you have uh for instance uh david ray
griffin you have this um and we're
talking about this now because it's that
time of the year so all the evidence
that america was attacked by muslims on
9 11 was subject to critical scrutiny
appears to have been fabricated david
gray griffin this is a christian also
professor
what do you think
is that
9 11 was going to happen and it was
going to happen because there was
intelligence that the united states um
intelligence agencies the cia fbi
all knew and within their intelligence
they knew something was happening they
just didn't know what was going to
happen the reason why they thought
something was happening is because
something did happen before and that was
the tanzania bombing embassy bombings of
the u.s embassy in tanzania
in nairobi in kenya there were embassy
bombings in the mam in saudi arabia
there were bombings of u.s military
facilities there was the hitting there
was the strike by al-qaeda against um
uh the uss cole so
there was there was something there was
a tension there was a deep tension that
existed and
when we look at 9 11 we've got to look
at
even if we disagree vehemently disagree
with the targeting of civilians and
killing innocent people have nothing to
do with this war and have nothing to do
and these targets have nothing to do
with the concept of islam
what we could say is
that
what were the reasons for 9 11 there
were some reasons that the people who
did 9 11 said they did it for
a thousand somalis dies for dikes for
example on the day of the black hawks we
remember the 19 americans in the film
black walk down and as a footnote at the
end of the film you're told a thousand
somalis died there in their own homes by
american soldiers
we are told also that after the invasion
the first invasion of iraq madeleine
albright said that it was okay that it
was a price worth paying that 5 000
children were dying in iraq as a result
of this medical sanctions on iraq um
you can see the the kind of continued
support of of the united states of uh of
the state of israel and its occupation
and so forth so this is why the guys at
al qaeda said they did it
so something was going to happen because
it was already happening and whether
they the questions that need to be asked
about how the building was brought down
or not um whether the american
government knew something about it
whether they uh exploited it and so
forth
it may be possible i'm not saying it's
beyond the realm of possibility
but what this does is that if we to
question it too much it says that
there wasn't going to be a response to
american wars around the world for the
past decades and that simply wasn't
true
so what do you when you when you see
this is the main thing when people see
just right before their eyes uh i don't
know if you're into uh a lot of people
are into this uh was it chris magic or
angel you know who i'm talking about
these uh people do magic tricks
but when you see this this is that
building that they're talking about and
it's like you don't have to go down that
dark rabbit hole or you know dark hole
of trying to like piece the puzzle
together but
people are just asking like hold on this
is a building it didn't get hit by a
plane and it's just falling like hold on
just look at it again like
uh you
wha what do you
see the points that you're making
not me not me no no not yeah not this is
what experts engineers scientists former
uh presidential candidates family
members they're asking the questions so
we're just like we know it's
we know islam is free of this and any
muslim that let's say if a muslim uh did
do some horrific act you cannot judge
islam by the action of some lunatic or
some person that's just like you can't
judge christianity by the kkk
uh et cetera et cetera but
yeah yeah
i mean i have a friend that i met he's a
fantastic character he he was actually
the janitor who had the keys for both
twin towers
um and was able to go into both and he
what was his name yeah he was uh william
rodriguez
yes
so he
uh he received an award for saving so
many lives
uh by president bush himself bush
actually handed him the award of uh for
saving lives but he says i mean this is
his own view he says that he had
explosions he said right below us the
building has six up levels of basement
b1 b2 all the way down to b6 i was on b1
the explosion came from between b2 and
b3 that's how we felt it now i work in
the building cars for 20 years i would
know exactly the difference between an
explosion coming from the bottom and one
coming from the top this one came from
the bottom and prior to the plane
hitting the tower but it didn't think
that it the whole story was being told
properly and he was also part of a
organization which included many family
members who wanted the truth so it's not
that i don't
i deny
what
may have been done it's just that i i
believe that
i just believe something was going to
happen and the reasons behind that
something
uh on 9 11 on the 20th anniversary of 9
11 it's still important for us to kind
of explore them
because america
was going to to face something for the
amount of people that had killed in the
muslim world from some organization
somewhere and that's the hard part to
actually get to grips with
uh our main thing here is
us
and over 1.8 almost 2 billion human
beings who live this beautiful way of
life who by the way harvard university
has a quote up on its wall on one of the
beautiful verses of justice uh where god
almighty is saying oh you who believe
stand out firmly for justice as a
witness to god even if against yourself
this is in the harvard university so if
a way of life that is about justice it
cannot be trying to wreak havoc on earth
and those people who go ahead and take
advantage of the situation and now
you're driving and you see these uh
signs never forget many people are like
those muslims now islam and then they
try to capitalize and try to divide us
and try to you know spread hate and
misinformation
there's even a this is
another verse in the quran which is
actually it's beautiful in it and it
kind of complements the verse that you
mentioned and it's called yahuwah
and do not allow your animosity or
hatred of a people to cause you to do do
them an injustice be just that is closer
to god consciousness now that's
essentially telling you what the prophet
salallahu did with his enemies so you
can imagine like hind and all these
other people who would try to would
rip the whole the heart of hamza out and
try to eat his liver and
plot and scheme against the muslims when
he came into power
mecca was conquered with in a bloodless
way there was nobody who was it was
killed
and nobody was tortured nobody there's
no vengeance he said those famous words
that joseph youssef allah salaam said to
his brothers though they had thrown him
in prison and had him
locked away and thrown away from his
family for many years he says to them
there's no vengeance upon you this day
go for you are free this is this is the
essence of islam to not even if your
enemy even if those you
despise even if those you are engaged in
hostility with uh uh
harm you you are supposed to rise up and
say
that
do not allow that hatred and animosity
to cause you to be unjust towards them
and that is the beauty within the
islamic texts
that found me
becoming close to
and friendly with and becoming friends
with
several of my former guards in uh in
america in guantanamo who were part of
the machinery that had abused me and
continued to abuse me but through their
humanity and through our connections
um
and through little acts of humanity that
they showed me uh we are still friends
they still visit me we work together we
campaign together and this is one of the
great blessings of allah and some of
them i will tell you dear brother is
that some of them became muslims some in
guantanamo some after some men some
women some black some white some
hispanic
and uh
this was again it showed to me
that not all every single american hated
all muslims in fact some of them found
islam because of guantanamo
well that's amazing didn't this janitor
also this is uh the last man out who you
said heard these explosives did then he
also is it true that he ex i i saw a
video of him taking his shahada uh
accepting islam
is that true yeah i was there with him
on the day when he announced the
shahadah so i was i was ex you know
doubly privileged i was with him in
south africa um
and that and
i i remember just going and meeting with
him and talking with him and he's a guy
that's full of life and he said that he
accepted islam because when he went to
the muslim world and said asks the
questions that he did he said he was so
welcomed
um
not because of
the questions he was asking but because
of this guy had earned the hero award
from president bush he's a life saver
he's doing what the quran says
that whoever saves a life it is as he
has saved the entirety of mankind so he
is that embodiment you associate islam
with with terrorism and killing etc etc
but the numbers of people who actually
care about
saving life in the muslim world are far
greater
and that is something that
we need to focus more on
that's that's amazing him to accept
islam submission to the creator not the
creation that pure monotheism the way of
life of jesus moses and the last and
final measure problem muhammad peace and
blessings be upon that's for the
audience to really stop and think well
the media is trying to create a hysteria
to chase you away from islam when people
such as these guards and others who
truly look into it they end up accepting
islam you should be scratching your head
say should i look into this a little bit
deeper and really open my heart and mind
amazing i said let me tell you brother
there was this there's this young sister
she contacts me on facebook all right
and she she's got a picture of a hijab
on and uh she says brother you weren't
in guantanamo i said yeah i was and she
said so was i and then i say well there
were no females in guantanamo as
prisoners she said i wasn't a prisoner
um i was one of your guards and i was
just blown away at that point and she
said look i want you to tell
the other brothers the other prisoners
and yourself that i
first learnt about islam in guantanamo
as a practicing christian
i felt that when i had some problems in
life i turned to i couldn't turn to god
properly because i was too busy turning
to boys to alcohol to drugs sometimes to
depression but then i saw you guys in
the worst possible state cut away from
your family from your children from your
wives and so forth and the weak amongst
you became stronger from the presence
and the support of
those who were stronger and it didn't
matter what background they were didn't
matter whether they were black or white
didn't matter whether they were arab or
non-arab or pakistani or uyga or turkish
it didn't matter your one body
and that
sowed the seed that seed was sold in my
heart
with love for islam i went back to the
united states of america researched more
and i took my shirt
um so that's just one story i can tell
you of several others i've come across
and it is it's a blessing because when i
told this story to some young brother in
sudan who was released from guantanamo
and he said to me that if
my imprisonment of six years and the
torture that came with it
led to that moment of that girl
accepting islam then every moment of
that torture and abuse was worth it
subhanallah for the audience that is
watching and when you hear this word
shahada this is that testimony of faith
that there's nothing worthy of worship
except the creator that heavens on earth
god almighty the creator allah
and that muhammad just like jesus moses
abraham was a messenger muhammad just
being the last
so when we when we talk about torture
when we you talk when we talk about uh
being in this guantanamo bay and you
mentioned innocent i mean okay it's one
thing you got people who are
convicted and now there's evidence
against him but you were released there
was no evidence uh
you were there was evidence that you
were in it and you were in you were
innocent you were exonerated any of any
um
any crimes is that correct so let me
just explain how it goes in guantanamo
anybody who lives in a western country
generally understands that you're when
you're suspected of a crime you're
arrested
you are taken to a police station your
question you're giving you your rights i
think in america you call them miranda
rights here you're given your right to
silence you're given the right all sorts
of rights you are given right to legal
representation uh and if you are sent on
remand uh according to mind in prison
you have access to all the most basic
things like phone calls television
newspapers radios uh food canteen
association with other prisoners all of
those things that you are normal to you
and you have access to the legal system
which is the most important
none of those things existed in bagram
guantanamo or anywhere else despite the
fact that we were being held by the
united states so what this means is that
according to the law everybody is
innocent until proven guilty in
guantanamo everybody's guilty until
proven innocent and that is why over 800
prisoners were held from over 40
different countries
and
not a single one has been released
because of a of a legal proceeding
because they were presented in court
some of them have made plea deals and
then gone back home and those cases have
been overturned by the countries uh
where that where that person came from
meaning that that those convictions were
not safe they're not sound they were
based upon torture and evidence and so
forth um so
guantanamo is a place that is outside of
the law
there is no law there's no legal system
there there are several prosecutors in
guantanamo military prosecutors who
resigned from guantanamo saying that
even according to military law the stuff
that we have here i didn't train for
this this is a kangaroo court
and they've resigned and said i cannot
be part of this in fact if you recently
seen the film about
called the mauritanian which is stars
jody foster and benedict cumberbatch and
others about a mauritanian captive who
was in guantanamo 14 years and tortured
uh
the character played by benedict
cumberbatch who was a colonel actually
changes his view he comes to prosecute
muhammadu because he believes this guy
was involved in 9 11.
he afterwards finds out through the
terrible torture that muhammadu faced
that actually this guy's innocent
and so he turns from being a prosecutor
that supports the concept of guantanamo
to somebody who opposes it
and
this has been the story of many people
in guantanamo
now that's what i want you to do as an
audience better remember imagine you now
being in this situation you're innocent
you didn't do it you have nothing now
that you have a clear conscience but now
you're stuck in this kind of situation
imagine that don't just look at
somebody's color skin tone their
religion now and think like oh those are
you know less human than us and those
are the people that took these towers
and now look uh the evidence
was clear that you have
just even when you say you didn't do it
they don't even tell you what is it that
you're supposed to have done there is no
it there isn't a on this place at this
place at this time with this person uh
with this intent
you did this crime that doesn't exist
it's simply we have what how people
ended up in guantanamo was based upon
when george bush said to the rest of the
world you're either with us or with the
terrorists
most of the countries around the world
they got scared they got terrified
and they started picking people up based
on false and weak intelligence
for money in in afghanistan for example
millions of leaflets were dropped all
over afghanistan that offered bounties
of five thousand dollars for each person
i imagine afghanistan's a very poor
country five thousand dollars is like
you know a couple of years
earnings that you at that time you just
hand the person over if you think i
don't know this guy he might be i've
never seen him before he could be
suspect he's not from this country i can
earn myself five thousand dollars and
that's how the majority were handed over
and uh
so just to so you understand america had
to do something it was it was we
understand the world understands they
had to get the people who did it and
prevent any more attacks but 911 and the
response to it didn't do that what it
did is create a different world where
the law didn't exist
hold on so you're saying that let's say
someone had a feud with a family member
or a neighbor this is a great
opportunity for those people like let's
say who didn't have this justice in
their heart who didn't fear god love god
or whatever the case they just had this
malicious intent they can go ahead and
say for this person that they hated yeah
this guy you know he's a terrorist he's
one of them and they could he can get
the money
so several
u.s politics well i don't know about
politicians but military from the
military
have actually admitted this that this
happened in multiple cases and not only
that even it was even worse as a u.s
policy when they invaded afghanistan and
came along who's the taliban
any guys two groups of people who've got
like a feud between each other and
afghanistan is a feudal society the
majority people live in rural areas not
in the cities like most western
countries and they have a system
that it's a it's a feudal system
literally where if somebody has beef
with another guy from across the road
that guy's son will have beef with that
guy's son and it will last for
generations sometimes so there are
recorded cases of people literally
handing over another person or saying
that he's taliban and then somebody the
u.s soldiers raiding that person's house
um
because they've got intelligence that
this guy's taliban now it's just like
the war on terrorism really nowadays
when you say oh that guy's a terrorist
the assad regime calls
freedom fighters or those who are
protesting terrorists the chinese
chinese government calls the uyghurs
terrorists the indian government calls
muslims their terrorists so everybody
uses that label because the united
states used this language of the war on
terror
to
to get anybody um
that you might not like in one way or
the other were they involved in crimes
against the united states were they
harming and killing muslims that doesn't
really matter because you now have to
play to an audience that you've created
and said we're going to go out and get
the bad guys and we're going to win and
we're going to you know excuse my
language we're going to kick some ass
afghanistan now everything is about
afghanistan in the news what do you have
to say about afghanistan which is a
country that was invaded and if you look
at it this is an innocent country had
nothing to do with what people were
claiming that certain people did
and now you have a whole country that
gets invaded it's a terrible terrible
thing you know the united states uh knew
what had happened to afghanistan over
the past two decades they understood i
know i'll give you one example i was
held
in bagram prison with a young man his
name was sharif
he had been born the americans because
they accused him of being taliban
and
he said to them my father was buried
alive outside the background prison
right here where you're holding me right
now right outside these gates
my father was buried alive by the soviet
union
forces
do you think
that his son
is going to submit and bow down to the
usa when his father wouldn't bow down to
the ussr
that kind of tells you it gives you an
idea of what's in people's minds that
they
there are people nobody likes to be
occupied nobody likes to be invaded and
this occupation and america knew this
better than anybody else because america
supported the mujahideen against the
soviets you know
it's famous
but america didn't kind of realize that
the same people that fought you are
going to fought the soviets who are
going to fight you back or their
children are because that's just the
nature of occupation nobody likes it no
one's going to accept it now if you want
to be friends you want to talk we have
diplomatic relations
that's cool and that's in the end what
they had to do anyway they did talk to
the taliban in fact
not just the taliban but five senior
members of the taliban who were with us
in guantanamo went on to begin the
negotiations they talked with mike
pompeo that uh president um trump even
had a phone call with one of them with
mullah brother who's now the deputy head
of afghanistan
and five of those members released from
afgha from guantanamo are now ministers
get this they're ministers in the new
afghan government guys who were held in
guantanamo tortured abused stripped
naked vilified called the worst of the
worst
are now
diplomats they are now ministers in the
government
and you have to ask yourself
you could have had negotiations right in
the beginning what was the
why did you need to kill so many people
why did so many people have to die was
not life sacred
do not america does not america think
that life is sacred just as much as
muslims are supposed to i mean life is
sacred beyond to to all
but why is it that some lives are more
sacred than others
and this is a fundamental question we
have to ask ourselves as people of faith
or no faith
uh that where are we going with creating
all these weapons brother i just tell
you in afghanistan they dropped bombs i
kid you not
some bombs weighed 15 tons
when i was there there was a 15 ton bomb
it's called a daisy cutter it sounds
like a lawn mower but it's a people
mower
there was another bomb they dropped to
think around trump's time this was a 22
ton bomb
just think about that a bomb that weighs
22 tons it's these are the largest
weapons conventional weapons dropped
outside of being nuclear weapons
and and it tells you that our capacity
as human beings for
mass destruction
uh
knows hardly any limits and somebody has
to come people of faith people of
understanding people of justice people
of
diplomacy
uh and wisdom
and really say you know you were saying
you know let's not forget what we got to
say is no more
that's what we're going to say no more
it reminded me of a
verse an ayah in the verbatim word of
god almighty the quran when you talked
about life
and the sanctity of life where in
chapter 5 verse 32 where god almighty
allah is saying saving one innocent life
they often repeat verses that we hear
is as if you save the world right
killing one innocent life is if you kill
the world like so we know in islam how
valuable life is and a person
no muslim wants to come on the day of
judgment with innocent blood on his
hands because this is one of the first
crimes that a person we judge for for
murd for taking innocent life and
a true muslim wants to stay far away
from
doing any crime against an innocent
human being
right brother absolutely
just just look at what look just look at
iraq look what happened in iraq
we the west i say we the west invaded
iraq as a result direct result
of invading afghanistan so not only were
we not satisfied with afghanistan we
tortured people into giving false
information false evidence that al qaeda
was working with saddam hussein they
weren't there was no al qaeda in iraq
before the invasion there were no
weapons of mass destruction in iraq
and so what happens is al qaeda then
because of the invasion comes into iraq
and then they meet with saddam's former
cabinet members and others and they form
this group and this group the world
knows what this group is it's isis
isis is born
in the dungeons of abu ghraib and
campbell campbuka was run by the same
guy who ran guantanamo bay general
jeffrey miller he i remember seeing him
several times when when we were in
guantanamo he went off to run detainee
operations in um
in abu ghraib now you've got to ask
yourself this question
isis claim to be people of god
and so do many american soldiers i mean
i see them all the time with the bibles
and you know them they're not like
saying the uk or in other parts of it
people are just kind of more atheistic
around these places but these were
people of really people of the book they
would read the book
you ask yourself here
how are people of god claiming
in the name of this
such savagery the savage
the savagery of uh bombing mosques the
savagery of dropping ten times you know
22 ton bombs the savagery of cruise
missiles the savagery of beheadings the
savage of kidnap the savagery of rape
what
on earth are you doing
saying this is in the name of the most
merciful because this is the name of
allah
of allah
most beneficial most merciful his mercy
supersedes everything quranic was my my
mercy supersedes my wrath
and
here we are acting in his name as
muslims christians and other people
in the most merciless way known to
mankind i don't understand that
well subhanallah this is um truly
something that's um for people hearing
about this for the first time and you
know to really uh reflect over many of
the things that you're talking about
tell us share with us you mentioned
about some of many of the guards now i
had one guard
also who shared his his story
about seeing many of the the people
there the prisoners and how he would go
out and he was very unhappy he'd be
drinking
you know he'd be just
chasing contentment in life he didn't
have it but then he would see these
people in these situations they're
reading this book that he's hearing the
quran
and they're they're just their faith is
just increasing like he it was really
strange to him and eventually he also
this is terry holbrooks i don't know if
you've heard of him yeah of course he's
a good friend of mine we've traveled
together and done events together and
we're doing an event together
on
on on september 11th reflecting upon
this point in time um together to two
former guards terry holt brooks steve
wood
um and myself and once with bayfield who
was held in quantum 14 years
so if you do want to know about more
about that just tune into the cage
social media and you'll you'll see that
at eight o'clock uk time but yeah these
look i gotta tell you brother these
these soldiers the muslims and the
non-muslims that i came across that were
decent
i have to tell you after everything that
i face torture abuse being separated
from my family
these soldiers men women black white
hispanic east coast west coast mid
midwest whatever
they made the difference
they made a big difference and i will
never forget the acts of humanity
that they
uh
showed me just as i will never forget
the acts of brutality
others
um carry out against me
but
you know
these guys
they were
they would bring a smile to my face when
i was depressed and i'd be in solitary
confinement most of this time so that i
would see nobody else no other muslim
there was a period of time in one time i
didn't see another muslim for two years
and the only ones i saw were these
soldiers some of them sometimes would
sneak in a dvd player and show me
i don't if you've seen the film snatch
but it's hilarious you should you've got
to watch it if you haven't seen it
already
he he brought in a dvd player
and he showed me the film snatch and we
sat together i'm in my cage he's outside
we sat together watching it laughing um
and another time an american soldier
remember she's from the us virgin
islands she she bought me a cadburys
bean egg
and she said look i know this is made in
the city of birmingham because that's
where the cadburys factory is and that's
where that's where i'm a bit born and
raised and that's where i'm right now
and she's look i got you this just to
remind you of home
and i couldn't tell her that i don't
like cadbury's cremes in fact i can't
stand the thing
but
it was her act of humanity she gave it
to me i ate it and you know swallowed my
pride and sort of the egg
they do little things some guy once he
bought me a little piece of fish
i hadn't eaten proper fish like for
years and he'd caught it in guantanamo
cut it fried it and then i hid it and
brought it to me gave it to me like
um
don't tell anybody make sure nobody
knows give me the give me the the foil
back
and i didn't know who he was i don't
know him i've never met him i'm never
going to see him again in my life
but it was these kind of people
they'd sometimes bring me information
they do google searches on
ugh
[Music]
please
please please please please please don't
don't
in the end he was
can you give us a breakdown like what
what was actually
uh
what what is this procedure
really painful to watch mostly i i
wasn't subjected to this because i
wasn't involved in longer strike because
i was in solitary confined at the time
when they were happening but of course i
spoke to many many former quantom
persons who were not only involved in
them they were leading them and i've
i've still to this day you've got to see
what happened with mo stefan and i i i
do respect him for what he did because
that's a very painful thing to go
through
that's not even a
fraction of what the guys had to go
through so the problem
when they when they um
force-feed you the hunger strikes first
of all the reason for the hunger strikes
was that the quran was being abused
desecrated by some of the soldiers and
the prisoners were being physically and
sexually violated and of course most
important importantly they wanted some
access to legal redress and they weren't
getting any of these things so they
there was a mass hunger strike that took
place and it lasted on and off
you know for the period of guantanamo uh
it was open
the process of trying to force the
prisoner
to ingest food meant that they would be
tied to a chair so their hands
unlike in in with most deaths were
shackled to a chair
and the head
was
shut was bound to a post in on the chair
that's connected to the chair so you
can't move your head
the biggest problem that they have to
insert this tube into your nose is that
you're moving your head and you're
turning around left and right so they
need to be able to
immobilize your head as much as possible
your legs are of course tied down as
well
and then there's a tube the tube has a
plastic end that's pushed into your nose
and then forced into your throat and
then eventually into your stomach and
they feed you with some a liquid drink
which you probably got it's not here in
the uk but we became uh
familiar with it in the us in us custody
called ensure and then they pour this
they push this in and they they force it
into now
you twist and you turn you try to get it
out
and sometimes
when you talk with most stuff
it's a little bit more sanitized but
what happens really is that it's covered
with blood
with
you know mucus
with spit
um there's a lot of a lot more pain
involved
and they'll do it repeatedly multiple
times during the day
and sometimes they have got so many
people to put through because there's so
many people on hunger strike they're
using the same tube with the same blood
and the same
snot on it and on all of this
um and it's a deeply brutal process
uh which
they wouldn't even use here you go they
wouldn't even use in the 1970s against
ira hunger strikers in in in britain uh
irish republican hunger strikers they
wouldn't do that
and the reason was they didn't want the
prisoners to die because the prisoners
dies then america looks bad oh look
these guys died in your custody so
that was the method forced them to
remain
to to kind of remain alive or to exist
at least
help us understand how many people are
there right now
that are free of any charges
but they're still there why why is a
human being if he's free
to go pretty much but he can't go
very very good question so we have we
have about 10 to 11 who are who have
different charges amongst them is
something called khalid muhammad who's
allegedly
after 20 years he's not been convicted
the mastermind of the 9 11 attacks there
are others who are involved in different
attacks against the us who are facing
different charges problem with trying to
convict them is that because many of
them were severely tortured um the u.s
essentially shot themselves in the foot
they could have easily taken them to u.s
courts prosecuted them and put them away
but because torture evidence is not
admissible in in american courts you
can't use any of that evidence so what
they've done is created an alternative
system in uh in guantanamo called the us
military commissions where they're
trying to prosecute these guys but they
can't do it
it's taken 20 years and they still are
unable so that leaves the the the rest
so there are 39 in total 11 of those who
are facing these kind of different jobs
charges but the majorities there's six
who were being cleared by biden uh to be
released uh there are i believe another
number uh i'm not sure exactly how many
four or five who are also cleared from
last time they're still sitting in
prison they're cleared by all the us
departments of justice department of
defense fbi cia and beyond why they've
been sent not been sent home or released
is because you know 20 years
what difference is another year or two
or three gonna make that's the attitude
and then there's some a category called
the forever prisoners which is bizarre
what is a forever prisoner forever
prisoner is somebody that there's not
enough evidence to charge but has been
deemed too dangerous to release now
bearing in mind we're talking about
20 years later when the taliban are in
back in power
and you've released all of these guys
these big level uh characters and so
forth and you're saying these guys are
too dangerous to release on what basis
on the basis of the court of a court
decision
law on what basis
so
you've got this black hole
that would never be accepted anywhere on
u.s mainland or even by the us allies
which still exists and
as a result of that
the majority of the 39 people in
guantanamo are innocent
do you know much about this
half a billion dollars that was spent
creating these fake terrorist videos and
what was the purpose of taking money
like that taxpayers money and spending
it
on videos like this
do you know about these videos that were
created fake the fake terrorist videos
yeah i did hear about that again
i would like to say that i was shocked
but i'm not shocked at all there is a
machinery there's a media machinery that
is being pushed by
people who want to have endless wars who
profiteer from these endless wars who
get money who become rich
by demonizing people by saying that they
are all terrorists we need to be afraid
of all of them if we securitize our
language and our country and our
borders um then i get more money because
i get the contracts or i
i
gain from from this and i become the
expert and i can say
that such threats exist now nobody's
saying threats don't exist there are
threats everywhere all the time at any
given time around the world that's just
the world we live in which we live in
and i believe if we followed our faith
more uh adhere to our faiths
uh
more religiously than those threats we
would be able to minimize them but the
problem is people are away from faith
people are away from taqwa or god
consciousness people are away from um
integrity
and being good people on based upon that
religious integrity and as a result of
that greed greed creates hubris
arrogance
and the the desire for more
is what's propelling this
industry and i call it the the war on
terrorism the terrorism
industry the islamophobia industry
because you get rich from it you make a
lot of money
and you can see this in the media you
can see this as you said this story is
released fake stories you're prepared to
lie you know one of the biggest things
about any faith
is is to be able to be truthful one of
the
best things about the noble prophet
peace be upon him
is that he was known as the truthful as
al-amin the trustworthy you can trust
this man even if you are his enemy
you can trust him with whatever you tell
him you tell him a secret
you give him good you give him money you
know that even if in if you're opposed
to even if you're fighting against him
he's not going to lie against you
he's not going to make up stuff
and we're in such a
such a a world where truth doesn't
matter what what matters is winning
and
somebody needs to change that because
um
you will have to answer in this life or
the next you'll have to answer to the
people or you have to answer the creator
of the people you take your choice
can you paint a picture of
when people you talk about takua iman
got consciousness when people go to many
of the universe universities college
students they get exposed to a lot of
the partying and you know a lot of
debauchery that's out there
uh the hedonism and whatnot and they end
up losing themselves many end up turning
towards atheism now contrast that with
being put in this situation innocently
being charged you know of horrendous
terrorism charges you know and now
you're innocent you're innocent you're
exonerated and what not you would think
you know many people would just turn
away from god they would was was gitmo
producing atheists
no the opposite
how's that that's actually really that's
a really good question isn't it that's
it
that's a fundamental question of a human
being is that what why am i here for
i'll tell you once and it's the
fascinating is it's once
and allah subhanahu wa he brings you
sometimes guidance from places where you
don't expect and help once i was very
very down in my faith i was really down
in my religion and uh i'd been in
isolation for quite some time and i
didn't know when this is going to end
and an american soldier came along and
he said to me you know at times he's
practicing he's a southern baptist and
he said
you know at times are difficult people
say yeah oh lord oh lord and he said
this with a southern drawl which i'm not
going to try to replicate but
he said
people say oh lord why me why me what
did i do and he said oh lord why don't
they say oh lord why not me
and this reminded me of a hadith of the
prophet salallahu
a servant he tests him so the majority
of the prisoners
that i've come across yeah faith goes
down and up based upon your ability to
do good deeds or not
but the majority of the prisoners that
are the overwhelming majority of
prisoners not only did their
faith increase
their taqwa increased they became better
people they memorized the many of them
memorized the whole quran i remember the
day when i memorized sultan bukhara the
largest chapter in the quran it was it
was in bagram
it was the happiest day of my life
because i was very slow to memorize the
quran
and
you'd see people in in prayer and
prostration
being that sometimes you know in in
situations where you'd expect like
there's going to be great hostility just
a smile and it reminds you of the the
the hadith or the saying of the noble
prophet peace be upon him when he said
smiling in the face of your brother is
an act of charity and you'd see people
like being abused and they're smuggling
and
i'm not going to say this
there was not lots of tension and
clashes between the prisoners and the
guards there were plenty there was lots
especially in the early days there was
lots of abuse
as well
but after a period of time people start
to
um
turn to and remember who they're
supposed to be representatives of
that we as muslims we as human beings
are supposed to be representatives of
something far greater
in this life
and then
that has a different effect and if you
speak to even some of the soldiers who
met people like that they will tell you
that they though those individuals had a
life-changing effect
is there any plan
they've talked about it but do you see
anything in the future that they're
going to close this gitmo facility um i
believe that joe biden and and what he's
the overtures that he's given uh
suggests that he wants to close
guantanamo that it's a very dark chapter
in the history of the united states of
america and it's still not over you know
america
for all intents and purposes
has withdrawn from afghanistan and the
taliban have won there's just no way
about that it's a defeat um
and
biden had to do that uh
knowing that he'd get attacked by the
hawks he even got attacked by
by trump's supporters and people and
mike pompeo who met with the taliban who
talked to the taliban actually began the
process so people are going to attack
you regardless but
it's the right thing to do you have to
stop the war you have to stop the
killing there is it's pointless so if
that can stop
then the byproduct of it which was the
guantanamo tortures and the program that
began this dehumanization of people that
needs to stop too there's no sense in
doing one and not doing the other
and the last few minutes that we have
just a few more questions have you
gotten a chance to connect and talk to
some of these uh conservative christians
and now they always you know use this
pretext uh you know islam those people
they hate our way of life you know the
people out there who are living in a
cave that's why we got to be over there
they just hate our way of life this is
always that you know mantra that's
repeated uh have you got a chance to
connect because we do have a lot in
common you know people uh who believe in
a creator look we love jesus peace be
upon him we want to live a morally up
light we have so many things in common
but now this is the thing that is
usually used to separate us this uh hate
and fear you know that's created and
usually this misinformation that's
spread about muslims in islam have you
gotten a chance to connect
i'm trying to look behind me excuse me
but i can't see where it is at the
moment but i have this bible right i
have this bible that was given to me by
a southern baptist soldier in in bagram
prison
and it is an american military bible
it's got like a combat colors on it and
he gave it to me thinking that perhaps i
might become a christian but i i read it
to
strengthen my faith and to also
uh to point out to him that there are
some similarities and differences but in
in the end
even though
you may think of the trinity for example
we as here in the bible you can see
repeatedly jesus talks about
the one god the one creator uh being the
son of man referring to
all human beings as the bible does in in
various aspects to as the sons of god
and so forth so there was this kind of
theological uh thing i tried to explain
to them but of course it was there were
some of the prisoners who were quite
upset seeing me read the bible thought
thinking oh why are you entertaining
that but i said look this is
inspired by allah by god and we are from
the same direction
so
remember we were in a place that
the afghan mujahideen had become famous
for fighting communists who didn't
believe in anything
so of course there's always been a place
at which
um there's been
where muslims and people of faith will
come together look for example in china
what's happening right now to the week
is
somebody just now told me that um
you know with the americans it was
brutal and the war on terrorism has been
broken there's no doubt about that but
with china it's far far worse because
what you've got is people who don't
believe in a faith at all a government
that don't believe in any faith
completely atheistic trying to force and
remove
uh
the faith from the hearts of the weaker
people um so when i took so here we
there's a confluence between us
and we a convergence rather between us
and people of including these
conservatives who are christians and so
forth that this isn't neces this isn't
about islam or you hating islam
this is about
are you true to your faith are you true
to your to the principles of your faith
are you true to the principles you know
after all the quran says oh people of
the book you are
you're nothing
unless you hold on to the principles
of the books that you follow
that's that that's it that is it isn't
it if if we followed if the world
followed the principles the divine
principles of the creator
then we
by necessity
would be better people more have have
more
more god consciousness we all would have
um
and i've heard many many people say that
is that i don't have a problem with
somebody who
disagrees with me or my religion and
thinks their religion is better just
hold on to yours be true to yours but
don't allow greed and animosity and
arrogance
uh
to
dominate you just because you happen to
come from a country that's more powerful
don't let that happen
yeah that's a great reminder for the
people who say they love jesus where if
you follow him he says love your
neighbor as you love yourself right so
he's preaching and teaching this message
as you say of love so where's the love
when you're torturing someone and you're
doing the most unjust things to them and
but what has caused you now to be so
forgiving
um you know that first that verse i kept
on coming across it the one i mentioned
oh you believe
stand up as just witnesses for allah for
god and do not allow your animosity or
hatred of the people to to
allow you to do them an injustice be
just that is closer to god consciousness
um i forgive those who sought
forgiveness from me
i don't have the right to forgive
those
who abused somebody else other than me
that's not my right
um so i
i i forgive anybody who's asked for it
and i will embrace them i'm happy for it
um
and that's been that's been my practice
but just as passionately i hold to
account
governments states individuals
organizations who've been involved in
these abuses
um and it's important because
in the pursuit of peace requires justice
it requires a balance it requires a
offsetting if you don't do that then
what you get is is torturers
you get organizations that in the name
of different religions and different
ideologies will do things to get
vengeance not in the name of that
ideology i mean nobody would say that in
the name of democracy we have bombed and
killed over a million people in iraq and
afghanistan and so forth
did you did was that done in the name of
democracy
does democracy claim that as its prize
of course not and in the same way when
people are killed in the name of islam
or in christianity or judaism
those ideologies are free from that
generally but
when people are aggrieved
that's what they do they they walk
outside of the principles
that they claim to follow
and unfortunately the rest of us get to
see it
uh what message do you have for those
out there
who are trying to
live islam you know they have the dunya
open up for them this whole worldly life
some are going away from making salah
reading quran living a morally
upright life trying to you know
imitate the people you know who are out
there they shouldn't be imitating the
rappers you know the musicians and now
they're hearing your stories touching
their heart you know because they're
taking things for granted they're taking
their deen for granted what what advice
do you have for people like that
so i'm gonna just without actually
advising i'm just gonna tell you a
little story and probably take from it
what you wish it would be pretty obvious
um
i was when i was first taken into us
military custody i was taken by american
soldiers and put onto a c-130 transport
plane forced down
a strap was put across my legs my my
ankles were shackled
um my hands were tied behind my back and
a strap was put right between my hands
so i was you've probably seen some of
those images in contact with prisoners
and then there was a hood of my head now
i noticed i couldn't see him because
i've got this hood there's the sounds of
this of the engines of the plane there's
dogs barking soldiers swearing at us
people
prisoners
screaming in pain
it was really a terrible situation to be
but look at this this is
the lord sending somebody to remind you
of who you are even at this point
so
by my left i noticed it i wanted i knew
there was somebody and i said
salaam alaikum he said well sorry he
said salaam alaikum i said walking
and it turned out that he's a libyan guy
he's also a prisoner
look what he says to me
he says
have you prayed your sunset prayer
and that just blew me away i thought wow
i'm thinking whether i'm going to live
or die or what are these people what are
they going to do to us i don't know
we're in the we're walking into the
abyss here
and
this guy is reminding me of a verse in
the quran which says
verily prayer was prescribed at its
fixed times muslims everybody knows
we've prayed fixed times in the
and i same no i haven't prayed i didn't
even think about prayer pray was the
last thing on my mind
and then he said i think the time for
prayers come brother
let's pray
now anybody who knows how muslims pray
we pray in a particular way we raise our
hands we bow we prostrate we sit in
between it's a there are fixed things we
turn our heads
we recite certain verses and prayers
at this point some american soldier
noticed that we're talking so he comes
over to be the soldier and he puts a
knife to my throat and he says if you
speak again i will slit your throat
that's really funny right but at this
point
just as he said that
the libyan guy on my side said allahu
akbar
and
he started to recite the prayer the
lord's prayer as it were that we know
the opening he started to recite so now
i'm in a state of prayer i don't care
whether that knocks up my throat
in fact if i die in this situation that
would be the best way for me to die in
this way
so that's how i performed my first
prayer in us military custody
hands tied hood over my head
uh legs chapled
screamed up knife at my throat
so i asked people you know
when you say you you're not praying
what's your excuse
you don't have an excuse the only people
who could have stopped the only person
the only human being that can stop you
from praying is you
thank you so much for spending some time
with us is there any other advice or
anything else you want to leave us with
go go right ahead uh just only to you
know if you want to know more about the
work that i do um campaigning work that
i do that we're still fighting for uh
the the rights of prisoners in
guantanamo the rights of muslims are
being targeted under very various
anti-terror legislation
and islamophobia and so forth and also
the hand of stretching out to others and
opening dialogue and discussion rather
than war
and hatred please visit visit cage dot
ngo that's my organization i'm the
outreach director
and i pray that allah grants you all
that is good and success and defends you
and protects you from all that isn't
thank you very much to
me god almighty allah reward you
recompense you for all
of the tests and trials that you've
you've gone through
my pleasure absolute pleasure
all right guys so this is a very
a lot can be said here from this
interview
it's very sad to see
any human being
i mean on both ends you know the
innocent human beings that died
uh such an evil event that happened
uh 9 11 you know we very sad for the
family members everybody who's
experienced this and the same time
innocent people who are accused of
crimes that they didn't commit so it
goes back to
being just you know this beautiful
verse in the quran that talks about
being justice at harvard university it's
there it's on the wall and it talks
about you know being just so if you're a
politician if you're somebody in has
some authority somebody who can press a
button and by pressing that button you
can go ahead and destroy
thousands of people's lives why would
you do that if you're a god conscious
person if you have any humanity
left in you
so hopefully this can wake up some of
the humanity and never forget
never forget that we're here for a short
amount of time
that god almighty the creator allah
created us for a purpose what's the
purpose go ahead and ask him directly
alone and ask me ask him ask him to
guide you
guide you as
those people who are guiding who are
actually
watching over the supposed terrorists
there who are exonerated and free to go
and they ended up also coming to
submission is surrendered to the one
creator that happens in the earth
because they were sincerely seeking and
they were looking at these people who
were in such a horrific situation but
they had some contentment and peace and
their faith was increasing but
they were out there drinking partying
and they were miserable and you're
probably miserable too and now you're
projecting that hate onto a group of
people who want nothing but the best for
you who want guidance for you who really
want because they love for humanity what
they love from themselves and they get
that from islam so make the human
connection i i adore you to go ahead and
call us if you have any questions
further questions
1-800-662-islam pick up the quran read
it for yourself visit a mosque because
we have enough hate in the world we have
enough people
dividing us let's go ahead and unite
united in the worship of one and only
one creator
and do what that creator wants us to do
to spread peace amongst ourselves in
this world and not hate
and not evil and corruption so go ahead
and do something noble with your life
instead of wreaking havoc
and spreading misinformation and fear
so go ahead and we'll see you next time
here on the show subscribe if you
haven't already hit that notification
bell and we'll see you next time until
then peace be with you salaam nick