Khalid Sulayman Jaydh Al Hubayshi

Khalid Sulaymanjaydh Al Hubayshi is a citizen of Saudi Arabia who was held in extrajudicial detention in the United States Guantanamo Bay detention camps, in Cuba.^[1] His Guantanamo Internment Serial Number was 155. Joint Task Force Guantanamo counter-terrorism analysts estimate he was born in 1975, in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.

According to the Washington Post he was released from Guantanamo, in 2006.^[2] According to the Department of Defense he was repatriated to Saudi custody on July 19, 2005.^[3] According to a Human Rights Watch report a Saudi named Khalid al-'Uaizi, and two other Saudis, were repatriated, from extrajudicial detention in the United States Guantanamo Bay detainment camps, to Saudi custody on July 20, 2005.^[4][5][6] Human Rights Watch reported that, as of May 26, 2006 he remained held, without charge, in Riyadh's al-Ha'ir prison.

Combatant Status Review Tribunal

Initially the Bush Presidency asserted that they could withhold all the protections of the Geneva Conventions to captives from the war on terror. This policy was challenged before the Judicial branch. Critics argued that the USA could not evade its obligation to conduct competent tribunals to determine whether captives are, or are not, entitled to the protections of prisoner of war status.

Subsequently the Department of Defense instituted the Combatant Status Review Tribunals. The Tribunals, however, were not authorized to determine whether the captives were lawful combatants -- rather they were merely empowered to make a recommendation as to whether the captive had previously been correctly determined to match the Bush Presidency's definition of an enemy combatant.

Summary of Evidence memo

A Summary of Evidence memo was prepared for Khalid Sulayman Jaydh Al Hubayshi's Combatant Status Review Tribunal, on 24 September 2004.^[10] The memo listed the following allegations against him:

a. The detainee is associated with al Qaida and the Taliban:

1. The detainee traveled to the Philippines toward the end of 1996 or the beginning of 1997 to train for Jihad at Camp Vietnam.
2. The detainee received advanced weapons training in the operation of the M-16 machine gun and rocket propelled grenades (RPGs) while at the camp.
3. The detainee traveled to Afghanistan in 1997 and trained at the Kaldan Camp.
4. The detainee attended 3 courses at the Kaldan Camp; The Basic, The Gunnery and the Tactics course.
5. The detainee's Basic Course consisted of training on the AK-47 Kalishnikov 7.62mm assault rifle, the Seminov SKS/Type-56 7.62mm semiautomatic rifle, the RPD 7.62 light machine gun, the PK 7.62mm medium machine gun, the Dushka DShk-38 12.7mm heavy machine gun, the RPG-7 (Anti-tank Rocket Propelled Grenade), and the Grenov (RPG-18).
6. The detainee's Gunnery Course consisted of learning how to fire the Soviet built 82mm mortar, the U.S. built 75mm recoilless rifle, Soviet built 72mm recoilless rifle, the BM-12 ground mounted Katushya rocket launcher, and the Soviet built AGS-17 30mm automatic grenade launcher.
7. The detainee's Tactics Course consisted of learning camouflage, map reading, urban warfare, and small unit tactics.
8. In July 2001, the detainee traveled to Afghanistan and trained at a camp outside of Jalalabad. At the camp he received training in grenades, the pistol, RPG, Kalishnikov, Seminov, sniper training and mine removal.
9. The detainee stayed at an al Qaida guesthouse in Kandahar, Afghanistan.

Transcript

Khalid Sulaymanjaydh Al Hubayshi chose to participate in his Combatant Status Review Tribunal.^[11]

Administrative Review Board

Starting in 2005 every captive remaining in Guantanamo had an Administrative Review Board convene to make a recommendation as to whether it made sense to hold them in detention. In September 2007 the Department of Defense released the Summary of Evidence memos prepared for the Boards that convened in 2005 and 2006.^[12][13] No records were released showing that a Board convened to make a recommendation about Khalid Sulayman Jaydh Al Hubayshi's continued detention.

Repatriation

Khalid was repatriated on July 20, 2005 with two other Saudi captives.^[4][5] The two other men were Salih al-Awshan and Mishal Awad Sayaf Alhabri. According to a Human Rights Watch report, as of May 26, 2006 the three remained held, without charge, in Riyadh's al-Ha'ir prison.

Khalid was widely interviewed after being repatriated, and graduating from the Saudi rehabilitation program.^{[14][15][16][17][18][19]}

Al Hubayshi is offered as a success case of the rehabilitation program, who met the Minister of Interior Affairs three times.^[14][15] According to Al Hubayshi the Minister said, “Okay you made a mistake ... maybe following the wrong fatwa, being zealous. You are young, and you have been used. We will give you another chance. Are you going to take the chance or be stupid and miss that chance?”

On November 20, 2008, when Barack Obama was elected President of the United States, Al Hubayshi was quoted to offer an explanation as to why Ayman Al Zawahiri used racially loaded language to characterize the President-elect.^[20] According to the Christian Science Monitor Zawahiri compared Obama to Malcolm X, and asserted that Obama, Colin Powell, and Condalleeza Rice were the kind of black Americans that Malcolm X would have called "house negroes". The Christian Science Monitor quoted Al Hubayshi explaining that Muslims had hopes that Obama's election would be good for the USA's relationship with the Muslim world, and that this forced Al Zawahiri to try to come up with a criticism.

Khalid Al Hubayshi's Washington Post profile

Khalid Al Hubayshi was the subject of an article in the Washington Post on March 24, 2008.^[2] In the article Al Hubayshi describes receiving training in Afghanistan, living within a broad jihadist community, within Afghanistan, helping to train fighters planning to travel to Chechnya, and an attempt by Osama bin Laden to recruit him to Al Qaeda. He described his long held reservations about al Qaeda. He described declining to be recruited into al Qaeda. He said that after the Al Qaeda's attacks on the USA on September 11, 2001, and the subsequent American counter-strike on Afghanistan soon afterwards, Afghans blamed all Arabs for the counter-attacks. He ended up fleeing Jalalabad, and ending up digging in, in the Tora Bora region. He described Osama bin Laden's sudden retreat from Tora Bora as a cowardly betrayal. He asserted that the attacks on September 11, 2001 were a mistake, because they had targeted civilians. Al Hubayshi is described as a former Guantanamo captive who has re-integrated into the mainstream of Saudi society.

See also

• Care Rehabilitation Center

References