As I explained in an article when this controversy began, “Jihad Rehab” endeavors to show how poor jihad terrorists imprisoned at Guantánamo are the good guys, and the U.S. government is the real terrorist entity. But even though it reflected reliably Leftist views, “Jihad Rehab” is still not acceptable to the victimhood propaganda industry. As I have pointed out many, many times over the years, any negative presentation about jihad violence or Sharia oppression, or even one like “Jihad Rehab” that some might perceive as negative if they tilt their head sideways and squint really hard, will be condemned as “Islamophobic.” The only narrative allowed in mainstream American culture today is that jihad violence has nothing whatsoever to do with Islam, and that any opposition to it is “racist” and “Islamophobic” and must be condemned, and that Muslims are innocent victims of American oppression, always and in every case, without exception or any kind of shading.
“Jihad Rehab: former Guantánamo prisoners call for documentary to be withdrawn,” by Thaslima Begum, Guardian, July 29, 2022:
A group of former Guantánamo prisoners are calling for the film Jihad Rehab to be withdrawn. In an open letter, the men express their “discomfort with the content of the film and its methods of production.”
The letter was published after the film was screened at the Doc Edge festival in New Zealand under a new name, The UnRedacted. “Changing the title of the film doesn’t change its harmful narrative or lazy stereotyping,” says Moazzam Begg, a former prisoner and director of the Cage advocacy group. “Following widespread criticism, the team behind Jihad Rehab had an opportunity to listen and learn. Yet this has been met with little corrective action or even acknowledgment.”
Filmed over several years, Jihad Rehab follows four ex-Guantánamo inmates, who are detained at a rehabilitation centre in Saudi Arabia. Despite not being convicted of any terror charges, the film introduces each of the men alongside a list of alleged crimes that were used to detain them without trial in Guantánamo for over a decade.
The film was condemned after its Sundance premiere earlier this year, which resulted in two Sundance staffers resigning in protest and a public apology from Abigail Disney, the film’s executive producer, as well as the festival itself. In her apology, Disney said she regrets not insisting “on a full fact-checking process to ensure that the highest standards of accuracy were being met” and that the film’s interviewees “cannot freely consent to anything in a carceral system, particularly one in a notoriously violent dictatorship”.
Critics have highlighted the ethics of interviewing the men after they have spent nearly half their lives at Guantánamo, where they faced physical and psychological torture. One of the men still talks with his hands together as if they are in handcuffs. Jihad Rehab has also been criticised over its failure to dispel offensive stereotypes of Muslim men – and more serious claims that it jeopardises the safety and security of its subjects.
Mohammed Al-Hamiri, one of the men featured in the film, told the Guardian that he wasn’t aware the film would be accessible internationally and only found out that it had been made available online after its showing at Sundance. “My life is already difficult but this film poses a serious threat to my life and that of my family,” said Al-Hamiri. Another man said that he had explicitly told the film-maker that he did not want to be featured in the film but his wishes had been disregarded. The film’s director Meg Smaker says that all the participants in the film signed consent documents and denied that the men expressed any fears in correspondence with her….
Human rights lawyer Clive Stafford Smith told the Guardian that he spoke with Smaker directly but felt his concerns were dismissed: “She appeared very defensive, although she admitted that elements of her film could put one of the men’s lives in jeopardy.” Smaker denies she made such comments.
Smith added that he was shocked that Smaker’s team hadn’t engaged with any of the men’s lawyers regarding their involvement in the film. He said he feared that such an approach was “manifestly unethical”….
Infidel says
For once, I agree w/ those jihadis. Those documentaries should be immediately banned
JCA Reid says
They simply want to pack it in & live in the West & non-Muslims pick up the tab. All a pack of lies – Taqiyya. also they don’t want a target on their back – tough sh*t! Pack ’em all off to their Spiritual Homeland…. Saudi Arabia. Everybody will be far happier. The only ones to stay are the ones that renounce Islam. Then again, can you trust them not to lie? Quite easily, some 90% can go.
mortimer says
Islam is OPPORTUNISTIC and shapes and adapts the Islamic message in order to deal with current events for the ADVANTAGE of Islamic SUPREMACISM.
Even if the film is correct in every Islamic detail (according to Sharia law), unless it is presented from the JIHADIC POINT OF VIEW and PRAISES JIHADIC TERRORISM, it cannot be ‘permissible’. To condemn jihad would be ‘kufr’ (incorrect thinking or worship). To disagree with Mohammed in any way is ‘impermissible’ (haram).
In fact, accuracy and the acceptable ISLAMIC POINT OF VIEW are not even important to the mullahs.
What is actually important to the mullahs (who decide and make ‘rulings’ for other Muslims) is that the film PLEASE THE MULLAHS in the need of their PRESENT CIRCUMSTANCE. The mullahs want to SHAPE THE MESSAGE of Islam to opportunistically deal with current events.
So if in the current moment, the mullahs wish to say that ‘JIHAD IS NOT ISLAMIC’ … then that will ‘please’ the mullahs. However, if what is needed is to convince Muslims to fight, then the mullahs will REVERSE their message and emphasize the DUTY OF JIHAD.
Islam is OPPORTUNISTIC and DUALISTIC. One message from Islam is never accurate, since the opposite message is useful when required.
Allah allows the mullahs to lead Islam by lying about Islamic teachings in order to confuse the dirty non-Muslims KUFAAR and keep the kufaar UNPREPARED for jihad when it comes. .
Bikinis not Burkas says
As should the Quran, it’s a terrorist manual it tells the adherents to the MURDEROUS IDEOLOGY of ISLAM:-
Who to kill.
When to kill.
Where to kill.
Why to kill.
How to kill!
somehistory says
to film such, produce it and show it is just giving legitimacy to the claims made by the terrorists.
and this “an opportunity to listen and learn.” well, duh, Who wants to listen to **excuses** and claimed **reasons** for the terror? Such arrogance. Putrid demands.
when a serial killer has a story done…to “get inside the mind” of the killer, his life is given more meaning that his many victims, and excuses are made for the assaults, rapes, murders…to whatever degree the crimes are committed.
It’s the same with these monsters. And no mozlum wants the Truth to come out.
As Mr. Spencer makes clear: according to them, it has nothing to do with islam, but to talk about it in negative terms is to be putting on a big irrational fear and hatred for molzums.
there’s a song from the sixties: Loving Spoonful “Did You Ever Have to Make Up Your Mind?”
It has nothing to do with mozlums, but to condemn it, makes mozlums look bad. they don’t have minds that deal in logic, so they don’t see the need to make a choice: it has nothing to do with them, or it has everything to do with them.
mortimer says
SH wrote: “no mozlum wants the Truth to come out”.
This, in fact, could be various pieces of the truth that the jihadists and mullahs do not want to reveal to the general public, e.g. times, places, names, faces, crimes, charges, organizations, weapons, Islamic teachings and teachers, and a variety of other details they wish to be kept out of the public view.
The more they are OBSERVED, the more scrutinized they will be by Western people. The more SCRUTINIZED the jihadists are, the more PREPARED Western people will be to oppose them.
Bikinis not Burkas says
👍👍👍
gravenimage says
Former jihadis demand that documentary about their rehabilitation be withdrawn
……………………………………
In other words, they were never “rehabilitated” to begin with. Even this kind of appeasement is not enough.
mortimer says
For the detainees, it would be a point of honor that they were not ‘broken’ by the kufaar.
In fact, it is the duty of Western intel to destroy every shred of Islamic faith in the jihadist.
Fortunately, this is easy to do. The Koran was not ‘perfectly preserved down to the letter’ as the mullahs falsely claimed to these duped jihadists. There are dozens of Arabic Koran texts that have tens of thousands of variant readings. This proves that Allah did not preserve the Koran and that the Koran is a false book. This Koranic non-preservation argument alone could make the jihadists turn from Islam, but there many others equally convincing.
VICTORMc. says
I got as far as your first Para. Then I read the word ‘Guardian.’
This was once a long time ago a well-respected newspaper in Britain called the Manchester Guardian.
It is now a leftie rag that virtually nobody reads anymore. They permanently have the bailiffs knocking at the door. From being a decent respected newspaper it has now become a Jihad-supporting leftie rag financially supported by the equally appalling BBC. (publically paid for at some enormous annual cost) Yet another current media failure.
Personally, I don’t know anybody who ever reads/watches their stuff anymore.
WATCH your sources…whoever wrote this piece.