Guantánamo and the Narration of the Muslim Threat

Abstract

Housing an exclusively Muslim male population, Guantánamo Bay prison has existed as one of the earliest relics and manifestations of Institutionalized Islamophobia.  Despite this fact, the identities of the prisoners as Muslim have been almost completely ignored or when acknowledged, treated like a coincidence.  The failure to recognize Guantánamo has emblematic of institutionalized Islamophobia has meant that narratives and policies that have helped sustain the prison’s operation have continued unabated and have served to further entrench prisoner abuse.  This paper will focus on the role of Islamophobia in establishing the use of Guantánamo in the War on Terror for Muslim prisoners as well as the Islamophobic narratives that have constructed Muslim prisoners as inherently prone to violence as a reason to continue their detention.  This paper will also include Islamophobic narratives focusing on former prisoners whose actions and outcomes are used to criminalize current prisoners, while also limiting the possibility of their return to any semblance of normalcy.  Finally, these narratives will be considered collectively in order to demonstrate the need for counternarratives that dismantle the inherent Islamophobia as critical to the discourse on closing Guantánamo Bay prison.

Bio

Dr. Maha Hilal is a researcher and writer on institutionalized Islamophobia and author of the forthcoming book Innocent Until Proven Muslim: Islamophobia, the War on Terror, and the Muslim Experience Since 9/11. She is also Co-Director of Justice for Muslims Collective where she focuses on political consciousness and narrative shifting.   Her writings have appeared in Vox, Al Jazeera, Middle East Eye, Newsweek, Business Insider, Truthout.