Brahim Yadel - McClatchy Interview

McClatchy Interview

On June 15, 2008 the McClatchy News Service published articles based on interviews with 66 former Guantanamo captives. McClatchy reporters interviewed Brahim Yadel in France. According to his McClatchy interviewer Brahim Yadel was disgusted by al Qaeda's attacks on September 11, 2001, and tried to flee Afghanistan immediately after he heard of them, and never engaged in hostilities against US forces. However he acknowledged receiving military training in Afghanistan, and: "...even took advanced al Qaida courses in electronics that would have led to bomb making."'

"I always differentiated between war to defend Islam and terrorism. I went to Afghanistan to defend Islam, for jihad. Had this been a military engagement, I would have stood and fought. Of course, it was not, and I wanted nothing to do with it." "I simply told the truth, that I wished to be a soldier to fight soldiers, that I had no intention of fighting civilians. I always told the entire truth. I think they respected that."

• He told his McClatchy interviewer that he saw the USS Cole as a legitimate military target, but felt his non-western companions in Afghanistan had no idea how appalling the attack on the World Trade Center was:

"I knew bin Laden was against the Americans," he said. "In the logic of war, attacking a warship made sense. It wasn't my battle, but I could understand it. Unlike the Afghans, I'd grown up in Western culture, which means American culture. They didn't understand the enormity of what had happened. I did. It was horrible. I didn't believe in this war."