Huffington Magazine Issue 52 | Page 57

THE HUNGER GAMES AT GUANTANAMO tanamo during his State of the Union address in February. The mass hunger strike began a few weeks later — the last resort of desperate men seeking attention. “I just hope that because of the pain we are suffering, the eyes of the world will once again look to Guantánamo before it is too late,” one prisoner, Samir Naji al Hasan Moqbel, wrote in The New York Times in April, detailing his HUFFINGTON 06.09.13 experience of being force-fed. After 11 years, he continues to be held at Guantanamo because the Obama administration refuses to send detainees home to Yemen while the country remains a hotbed of terrorism. Accounts like his did turn public attention toward Guantanamo, at least briefly. A day after al Hasan Moqbel’s op-ed was published, the Boston Marathon bombings shocked the nation and pushed Guantanamo off the front pages — the same week the military granted Col. John Bogdan speaks to reporters in April. Weapons confiscated from detainees during a raid lay on the table.