“Who exactly has America detained all these years at Guantanamo? The Worst of the Worst? Or the Wretched of the Earth?”

From My Guantanamo Diary

It’s easy to mistreat something called No. 1154. It’s easy to shave its beard, to kick it around like an object, to spit on it, torture it, or make it cry. It’s harder to dole out such abuse when No. 1154 retains its identity: Dr. Ali Shah Mousovi, a pediatrician who fled the Taliban, worked for the United Nations encouraging Afghans to participate and vote in the new democracy. It’s harder to hate No. 1154 when you realize that he’s more like you than he is different. His wife, an economist by profession, waits month after month, year after year for the news that her husband is coming home; his two sons and young daughter grow up without him.

The numbers denied the humanity of those assigned to them:

No. 1009, No. 1103, No. 902, No. 0002, No. 1021, No. 693, No. 0004, No. 345, No. 560, No. 928, No. 953, No. 969, No. 713, No. 976, No. 1001, No. 914, No. 801, No. 848, No. 304, No. 1037, No. 1074, No. 702, No. 892, No. 1453, No. 0003, No. 10006, No. 1458, No. 0061, No. 753, No. 306, No. 1104, No. 371, No. 1094.

It’s easy to skim over the numbers. And there are hundreds like them.