As IF Times

link BBC News – Newsnight – Yemen al-Qaeda link to Guantanamo Bay prison

Not sure of the point of this story. We are informed that some ex-residents of Guantanamo prison were released a couple of years ago. They were sent to Saudi Arabia for rehab, only to fall off the wagon. They slipped into Yemen and got back with the boys in the hood, er the dunes.

In fact, two of these guys, Mohammed al-Awfi and Said al-Shihri were ambitious enough to found their own Al Qaeda chapter, even getting their own acronym, AQAP. Apparently, they were none too impressed with the rehab stint in Saudi Arabia, so they set about returning to their unsociable ways even making a recruiting video. This impressed numerous conscripts to their cause including the now famous undie bomber this past Christmas.

Oddly, al-Awfi returned to Saudi Arabia and gave it all up because according to him,

“…it was because he had received a phone call from his wife telling him to return to look after her and the children…”

!!!! That’s it???!! The wife says, “you get your sorry butt back here and look after us or I’ll send you to 20 virgins myself” and he returns??

As the writer suspects, there’s probably more to this story than is being revealed by al-Awfi, though of course, we’ve never met his wife. We’re not sure if the idea is to convince us that rehab actually works, or that prisoners should not be released in the first place.

The descriptions of ‘enhanced interrogation’ are not for the squeamish as anyone who has watched the recent Casino Royale James Bond movie will attest, for it sounds like the techniques were lifted straight from the movie. It should be pointed out that this allegedly occurred in Afghanistan, not Gitmo. It should also be pointed out that to expect to be treated otherwise is pretty naive considering they were in the blowing up innocent people business. I would say he’s pretty fortunate to be now living in relative luxury and comfort given the escapades he’s been involved with.

Maybe he’s being sincere. If so, he should maybe star in a video telling others in the fuse business that it’s all wrong, that no religion should be offing disbelievers, even if they are infidels. Of course, the video would be more convincing without his wife hovering nearby with a rolling pin in hand.

As for fighting the war on terror, how about researching the idea of marrying off all the single guys in that part of the world, it seems pretty effective.