Restrictions on Islamic religious practice at Guantánamo

Restrictions on Islamic religious practice at Guantánamo denied Mohamedou Ould Slahi ordinary access to religious books and made prayer a practice he had to test, conceal, and cautiously resume. His account records both the controls themselves and a small but consequential shift in how guards enforced them in July 2004.

Scope and enforcement

Slahi described religious rituals as forbidden during his detention. When he tried praying, guards repeatedly stopped him; he therefore prayed secretly and watched for signs that the limits might be changing. The account presents the restrictions through their daily effects rather than through a quoted written order, so it supports a description of enforced practice, not a claim about the wording or formal status of a specific regulation.

The uncertainty was part of the experience: Slahi could not assume that a tolerated act would remain permitted. He periodically tested the guards’ tolerance, only to have them interrupt his prayers. Religious practice thus became subject to shifting enforcement, with Slahi left to infer the boundaries from what guards did.

Books and access to information

In July 2004, Slahi found a copy of Islamic scripture beneath the clothes in his laundry box. He took it to his cell, worried that leaving it there might amount to stealing it in order to save it. No one questioned him about taking it, and he did not raise the matter himself, because religious practice had been forbidden and the issue had become especially sensitive.

His account also places the discovery amid broader restrictions on reading. Many Arabic and religious books had been banned, as had books for learning English. When he asked why English-language learning books were restricted, he was told that detainees learned the language quickly and could understand the guards. The explanation linked control of reading not only to religious materials but also to detainees’ ability to interpret their surroundings.

The discovery did not bring lasting access. Slahi said he continued asking for Islamic books but never received any; the books available to him were novels and books about animals. The single volume in the laundry therefore contrasts with the continuing absence of religious books from his permitted reading.

A tentative change in prayer

At the very end of July 2004, Slahi prayed under the observation of new guards and was not stopped or challenged. The moment differed from his earlier attempts, which guards had repeatedly interrupted. He understood it as the beginning of a new period in his detention, but the account establishes only that this prayer passed without comment—not that the restrictions were formally rescinded or that religious materials became available.

That distinction matters to the rule’s operation in the narrative. The change appears first as an altered response by guards in a particular moment, while Slahi’s requests for Islamic books remained unmet. Prayer had become possible, at least once and under new personnel; access to religious reading had not followed.

Censorship and evidentiary limits

The published account is shaped by a manuscript whose redactions obstruct the description of people and events. Its editor explains that the accompanying notes use contextual clues, other material in the manuscript, and publicly available records to discuss redactions, while expressly declining to reconstruct classified text. The notes are presented as informed speculation, not as confirmation by people with access to the unredacted manuscript.

That distinction sets a limit on what can be claimed about these restrictions: the account supplies specific evidence of interrupted prayer, banned books, unmet requests, and one prayer left undisturbed, but it does not establish the full policy or its duration. Within those limits, the sequence shows how control over worship and reading could be experienced as both a continuing constraint and a cautiously observed change.