Imprisonment
The Good Books That Go Unread
Thousands of books are banned in U.S. prisons, including a family medical guide because it contains photos of a nude child and 12 books about Leonardo da Vinci, also due to “sexually explicit images.” Adolf Hitler’s “Mein Kampf,” on the other hand, is allowed.
A Letter From an Egyptian Prison
In prison, one is not just broken by torture, beatings and violent treatment. It is the continuous, systemic and unrelenting dehumanization that wrecks you in the end.
Bob Dylan Helped Me Survive Pirate Captivity
I was spending hours alone with my thoughts, ever since a gang of pirates kidnapped me from a car outside the dusty crossroads town of Galkacyo, in central Somalia, during a reporting trip in 2012. The mystery of this song became an obsession.
Ten Years a Prisoner in Bahrain
In these past 10 years, the Bahraini regime has come up with new ways to torment my father. Prisoners have nothing, so the prison administration grants them certain requests only to then take them away. The regime wants prisoners to suffer beyond the prison term and the torture.
Sacred Terror in Secular Tunisia
Tunisia, today, remains mired in corruption and offers few prospects to its youth; it is a very different country than the one dreamed of by the thousands who took to the streets inspired by Bouazizi. A returning ISIS fighter on the systemic dysfunction that has set so many of its youth on the path of radicalization.
After 13 Years in Syrian Prisons, I Knew Assad Would Win
I defied the regime of Hafez al-Assad in Syria since its very inception, and I spent 13 years in prison because of it. I saw how he rebuilt his reign of terror from the bones of his people after he defeated the insurgents in the 1980s. His son will accept no less.
A Notorious Prison and Libya’s War of Memory
Abu Salim was once notorious as the prison where Gadhafi’s opponents were imprisoned, all but forgotten. But in a few short years, conflict has changed the memory of that place and the prison has become embroiled in the contested narratives of post-revolution Libya.