Ali al-Bahlul

Ali Hamza Ahmed Suleiman Al Bahlul (also transliterated as Ali Hamza Ahmed Sulayman Ismail) is a citizen of Yemen who is held consistent with the law of war in the United States Guantanamo Bay detainment camps, in Cuba. His Guantanamo detainee ID number is 39. Joint Task Force Guantanamo counter-terrorism analysts estimate captive 39 was born in 1969, in Hudaydah, Yemen.

Background

Joint Task Force Guantanamo counter-terrorism analysts describe captive 39 as al Qaida's public relations director. He faced charges before the first Guantanamo military commissions, before they were over-turned by the United States Supreme Court.

In 2004 he was held in solitary confinement.

Identity

Captive 39 was named inconsistently on official Department of Defense documents:

• Captive 39 was named Ali Hamza Ahmed Suleiman Al Bahlul on the official list released on April 20, 2006, and on the Summary of Evidence memo was prepared for his Combatant Status Review Tribunal, on 7 September 2004.
• Captive 39 was named Ali Hamza Ahmed Sulayman Ismail on the list from May 15, 2006.
• Captive 39 was named Ali Hamza Ahmed Sulayman al Bahlul on the document from the Office of Military Commissions.

Combatant Status Review Tribunal

Combatant Status Review Tribunal notice read to a Guantanamo captive. During the period July 2004 through March 2005 a Combatant Status Review Tribunal was convened to make a determination whether they had been correctly classified as an "enemy combatant". Participation was optional. The Department of Defense reports that 317 of the 558 captives who remained in Guantanamo, in military custody, attended their Tribunals.

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 Ali Hamza Ahmed Suleiman Al Bahlul's Combatant Status Review Tribunal, on 7 September 2004. The memo listed the following allegations against him:

a. Detainee is a member of al Qaida and associated with the Taliban.

1. Detainee admits being a member of al Qaida and swearing an oath of allegiance to Usama Bin Laden.
2. Detainee traveled to Afghanistan in 1999 to aid the Taliban in their struggle against the Northern Alliance. The detainee stayed at severl Taliban guesthouses in Pakistan while in transit to Afghanistan.
3. Detainee trained at a military training clinic in Afghanistan for five weeks. He received basic tactics and navigation training and instruction in the use of Russian weapons, light and heavy machine guns, and 75mm and 82mm Howitzers. Detainee also attended two months of advanced training at an al Qaida training camp.
4. Usama Bin Laden appointed detainee as his media office director and public relations secretary. Detainee was responsible for producing all al-Qaida propaganda, including the video commemorating the USS Cole attack. In his capacity as public relations secretary, detainee regularly escorted Usama Bin Laden and often provided computer assistance to the Taliban. When with Bin Ladne, the deteinee carried a Kalashnikov rifle, two loaded magazines, a Makarov pistol, and a suicide belt equipped with explosives to protect Bin Laden.
5. Detainee was a roommate with two of the 9/11 hijackers while living in an al Qaida facility in Kandahar.
6. Detainee stated that he would kill Americans at the first opportunity upon his release from prison.
7. Detainee evacuated Kandahar with Usama Bin Laden several days before the 9/11 attacks. Detainee was taske with establishing a video feed in order for Bin Laden to watch the 9/11 attacks.

b. Detainee engaged in hostilities against the United States.

1. Detainee engaged in combat on the front lines in Kabul from 1999 to 2001. While on the front lines, the detainee witnessed a speech by Usama Bin Laden praising the USS Cole bombing.

Transcript

There is no record that captive 39 chose to participate in his Combatant Status Review Tribunal.

Charged before a military commission

Ali Hamza Ahmed Suleiman Al Bahlul held up this boycott sign during a January 11 2006 hearing before his military commission.

Bahlul faced charges before a Guantanamo military commission, prior to the United States Supreme Court ruling in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld that the Bush Presidency lacked the constitutional authority to create military commissions. He was indicted along with Ibrahim Ahmed Mahmoud al Qosi.

Lieutenant Commander Philip Sundel, his first military defense attorney, described difficulty getting a security clearance for a translator to talk to his client. Consequently, six months after al Bahlul had been charged, he still had not had a real opportunity to discuss his case with him when he and other defense attorneys challenged the lack of fundamental justice of the commissions.

Sundel told CBS News: "There's virtually no chance he can get a fair trial"

Al Bahlul asked Peter Brownback, the President of the commissions, if he could represent himself.

Some press reports have explained that Al Bahlul's case is going forward, while the proceedings against the other three detainees to have been charged have been postponed, pending the result of the Supreme Court's consideration of Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, due to Al Bahlul's insistence that he represent himself.

Al Bahlul and the question whether detainees should be able to represent themselves were featured in the October 2007 issue of the Yale Law Journal in an article by Matthew Bloom entitled: "I Did Not Come Here To Defend Myself": Responding to War on Terror Detainees' Attempts To Dismiss Counsel and Boycott the Trial.

Al Bahlul's most recent military lawyer is Major Thomas Fleener. Fleener has called the commissions a "wholly illegitimate process".

In Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, in July 2006, the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that the Bush Presidency lacked the constitutional authority to set up the military commissions. Only Congress had the authority to set up military commissions. Congress subsequently passed the Military Commissions Act of 2006.

On February 9 2008 Ali Hamza Suleiman Al Bahlul and Ibrahim Ahmed Mahmoud Al Qosi were charged before the Congressionally authorized Guantanamo military commissions authorized by the Military Commissions Act of 2006.