The Story of Sofiane Berhoumi: Freed from Guantanamo
By Karin Friedemannnewtrendmag.org
Sofiane Berhoumi, now 53, was released from Guantanamo just 4 years ago after 20 years in captivity. His father, who was a private lawyer, died in 2004 while he was imprisoned. Sofiane graced me with his polite and positive presence for nearly an hour on the phone on 9/23/25 and for another hour on 6/7/26. He spoke about how people often fear him, but those who take the time to get to know him realize that he is gentle and kind. "You can't judge people from the cover." He said that communicating with understanding people makes life beautiful. Some strangers have become more than family to him. Recently he was invited to personally attend a human rights conference at Graz University in Austria with all expenses paid, but he was unfortunately denied a visitor's visa. I was very curious to hear his life story.
He is the eldest of five brothers and there is one older sister. As a student, he was a good swimmer and a soccer player and dreamed of playing for a team. Sofiane left Algeria for Europe in search of work opportunities. He looked for work in Spain and France and England at age 22. He also visited his sister in Paris. He left Spain by stowing away on a ship. He was working loading the ship with truckloads of coffee beans and other merchandise. Eventually he got asylum in 1996 in Britain due to the Algerian civil war. However, by 1998, after gaining safety in Britain, he learned about the war in Chechnya from charity presentations in the London mosque, in which videos and slides of suffering Muslims were shown and funds collected. Like many other Muslim men who were inspired to leave their homes and fight for the sake of Allah, Sofiane felt that his soul was longing to go to Chechnya to defend the Muslim cause.
He knew that in order to get sent to Chechnya to fight, he first had to go to Afghanistan for military training. From there, he would need assistance from an organized Islamic group to facilitate his transport and connect him with the Muslim fighters in Chechnya. This was standard practice in those days. There were many Islamic military training camps in Afghanistan who welcomed foreigners in search of adventure.
So, with the contacts he received through a Pakistani friend, and with his advice, Sofiane left London for Karachi, and then on to Peshawar, Pakistan, where he stayed at a Lashkar Taiba guesthouse until he was assigned to be sent to Khaldan Camp in Khost, Afghanistan. During his training, an accident with an explosive permanently destroyed the use of his left hand. Despite this severe handicap, he tried multiple times to go to Chechnya, but icy weather conditions prevented him. Therefore he was basically stranded in Afghanistan. Biding his time for six years, he learned a bit of Persian and Pashtun. Everything was okay, until al-Qaeda's attack on the World Trade Center on 9/11/2001. Then his life changed forever.
Sofiane was hiding in the mountains of Tora Bora when the United States bombarded Afghanistan in November and December 2001. It was a terrifying experience. He saw many of his brothers killed by rockets fired from an Apache helicopter. Sofiane fled to Pakistan; first Peshawar then Islamabad. He ended up in Faysal Abad, a suburb of Lahore. In May 2002, the property where he was sheltering with Abu Zubaydah was raided by special Pakistani forces working for the CIA and he was sent to Guantanamo under suspicion of being al-Qaeda and dangerous. He was not with al-Qaeda. Neither was Abu Zubaydah. They were free, unaffiliated fighters. Abu Zubaydah had connections with al-Qaeda but was not part of their group. Abu Zubaydah was a Palestinian subjected to severe and prolonged torture, during which the US realized and admitted he was not with al-Qaeda. He continues to be held in Guantanamo.
Sofiane was charged with conspiracy and material support for a terrorist organization in 2005. In 2008 and again in 2012, the charges against him were dropped. In 2016 he went in front of a review board that included the US Justice Department, the CIA, and the National Security Agency. The decision went through six agencies until finally in 2016 he was cleared for release under the Obama administration. But when Trump became president, all transfers out of Guantanamo were frozen. Years later after many actual high profile al-Qaeda members were released from Guantanamo, Sofiane remained imprisoned, because nobody knew who he was. He was essentially a "nobody." He had never even served in one battle.
It was not until the Biden administration that Sofiane was scheduled for release. He was put on a plane on March 13, 2022 headed home to Algeria but two hours into the flight, the Algerian government announced bad weather conditions, so the plane turned around and took him back to Guantanamo! Sofiane found this very upsetting, worried they were playing a trick on him. On April 1, 2022 he boarded a second plane, which finally returned him back to his family.
Sofiane mentioned that a couple of the guards at Guantanamo really warmed up to him. He said 90% of the guards were mean and awful, but 10% were decent people who just happened to be in the US Army. So, generally speaking, he didn't like them and they didn't like him. They had been told that he was a dangerous terrorist, so how could they know? It was not until he started joking with them that they started to wonder, "How can you be cheerful when your life is so miserable?" He always tried to make the guards feel comfortable and laugh. Because keeping a positive attitude helped him keep up his morale despite his suffering.
Some of the younger guards started to confide in him instead of to their colleagues, because he sympathized with their lives. One female guard in her early twenties began to cry during her shift because she had no friends. Her mother had deserted her as a child due to mental illness, so she had to raise her younger brother alone. Sofiane encouraged her to give her mother a call. She took his advice, and experienced forgiveness with her mother. When Sofiane was released, she followed him all the way to the van that took him to the airport. "Please don't change," she said. "Stay like that." There was another young female guard who started crying when he was released. They cried together. There were some other guards, one was a Mexican-American man, who visited him and gave him a piece of food from time to time.
Sofiane's English interpreter for his legal proceedings was scared of him at first, but it wasn't long before the interpreter relaxed. Soon he was cooking special meals for Sofiane during their meetings with the lawyers, and watching movies with him.
Now, Sofiane is back in Algeria living with his mother. Long ago, when Sofiane was one year old, his mother was watching him sleep. She had a vision of a two-year-old with blue eyes wearing a US Army uniform. He was on top of her son, pinning him down. Several times the bully looked straight into her eyes in a way that was extremely frightening. This vision foretold his destiny with the Americans. Now his dear mother is old and sick. She is having trouble breathing, can't walk, and coughs a lot. Even so, she cooks for him and takes care of him. The local people are scared of him, and because he can't use his left hand, he has been unable to find work. She is patient and understands his situation, why he can't take care of her financially. Right now he is excitedly watching the World Championship games with his brothers at home.
It is very hard to scratch out a living in Algeria. Any medical care you need, you have to pay for it. Sofiane is in need of clothes. He asks anyone who has used or broken iPhone or laptops or anything he can sell to send them to him so that he can repair and resell them. Some supporters have started a collection to buy him a car so that he would be able to start a taxi service.
To donate: GoFundMe.com/f/a-taxi-and-a-new-beginning-for-sufiyan
Sofiane Berhoumi, now 53, was released from Guantanamo just 4 years ago after 20 years in captivity. His father, who was a private lawyer, died in 2004 while he was imprisoned. Sofiane graced me with his polite and positive presence for nearly an hour on the phone on 9/23/25 and for another hour on 6/7/26. He spoke about how people often fear him, but those who take the time to get to know him realize that he is gentle and kind. "You can't judge people from the cover." He said that communicating with understanding people makes life beautiful. Some strangers have become more than family to him. Recently he was invited to personally attend a human rights conference at Graz University in Austria with all expenses paid, but he was unfortunately denied a visitor's visa. I was very curious to hear his life story.
He is the eldest of five brothers and there is one older sister. As a student, he was a good swimmer and a soccer player and dreamed of playing for a team. Sofiane left Algeria for Europe in search of work opportunities. He looked for work in Spain and France and England at age 22. He also visited his sister in Paris. He left Spain by stowing away on a ship. He was working loading the ship with truckloads of coffee beans and other merchandise. Eventually he got asylum in 1996 in Britain due to the Algerian civil war. However, by 1998, after gaining safety in Britain, he learned about the war in Chechnya from charity presentations in the London mosque, in which videos and slides of suffering Muslims were shown and funds collected. Like many other Muslim men who were inspired to leave their homes and fight for the sake of Allah, Sofiane felt that his soul was longing to go to Chechnya to defend the Muslim cause.
He knew that in order to get sent to Chechnya to fight, he first had to go to Afghanistan for military training. From there, he would need assistance from an organized Islamic group to facilitate his transport and connect him with the Muslim fighters in Chechnya. This was standard practice in those days. There were many Islamic military training camps in Afghanistan who welcomed foreigners in search of adventure.
So, with the contacts he received through a Pakistani friend, and with his advice, Sofiane left London for Karachi, and then on to Peshawar, Pakistan, where he stayed at a Lashkar Taiba guesthouse until he was assigned to be sent to Khaldan Camp in Khost, Afghanistan. During his training, an accident with an explosive permanently destroyed the use of his left hand. Despite this severe handicap, he tried multiple times to go to Chechnya, but icy weather conditions prevented him. Therefore he was basically stranded in Afghanistan. Biding his time for six years, he learned a bit of Persian and Pashtun. Everything was okay, until al-Qaeda's attack on the World Trade Center on 9/11/2001. Then his life changed forever.
Sofiane was hiding in the mountains of Tora Bora when the United States bombarded Afghanistan in November and December 2001. It was a terrifying experience. He saw many of his brothers killed by rockets fired from an Apache helicopter. Sofiane fled to Pakistan; first Peshawar then Islamabad. He ended up in Faysal Abad, a suburb of Lahore. In May 2002, the property where he was sheltering with Abu Zubaydah was raided by special Pakistani forces working for the CIA and he was sent to Guantanamo under suspicion of being al-Qaeda and dangerous. He was not with al-Qaeda. Neither was Abu Zubaydah. They were free, unaffiliated fighters. Abu Zubaydah had connections with al-Qaeda but was not part of their group. Abu Zubaydah was a Palestinian subjected to severe and prolonged torture, during which the US realized and admitted he was not with al-Qaeda. He continues to be held in Guantanamo.
Sofiane was charged with conspiracy and material support for a terrorist organization in 2005. In 2008 and again in 2012, the charges against him were dropped. In 2016 he went in front of a review board that included the US Justice Department, the CIA, and the National Security Agency. The decision went through six agencies until finally in 2016 he was cleared for release under the Obama administration. But when Trump became president, all transfers out of Guantanamo were frozen. Years later after many actual high profile al-Qaeda members were released from Guantanamo, Sofiane remained imprisoned, because nobody knew who he was. He was essentially a "nobody." He had never even served in one battle.
It was not until the Biden administration that Sofiane was scheduled for release. He was put on a plane on March 13, 2022 headed home to Algeria but two hours into the flight, the Algerian government announced bad weather conditions, so the plane turned around and took him back to Guantanamo! Sofiane found this very upsetting, worried they were playing a trick on him. On April 1, 2022 he boarded a second plane, which finally returned him back to his family.
Sofiane mentioned that a couple of the guards at Guantanamo really warmed up to him. He said 90% of the guards were mean and awful, but 10% were decent people who just happened to be in the US Army. So, generally speaking, he didn't like them and they didn't like him. They had been told that he was a dangerous terrorist, so how could they know? It was not until he started joking with them that they started to wonder, "How can you be cheerful when your life is so miserable?" He always tried to make the guards feel comfortable and laugh. Because keeping a positive attitude helped him keep up his morale despite his suffering.
Some of the younger guards started to confide in him instead of to their colleagues, because he sympathized with their lives. One female guard in her early twenties began to cry during her shift because she had no friends. Her mother had deserted her as a child due to mental illness, so she had to raise her younger brother alone. Sofiane encouraged her to give her mother a call. She took his advice, and experienced forgiveness with her mother. When Sofiane was released, she followed him all the way to the van that took him to the airport. "Please don't change," she said. "Stay like that." There was another young female guard who started crying when he was released. They cried together. There were some other guards, one was a Mexican-American man, who visited him and gave him a piece of food from time to time.
Sofiane's English interpreter for his legal proceedings was scared of him at first, but it wasn't long before the interpreter relaxed. Soon he was cooking special meals for Sofiane during their meetings with the lawyers, and watching movies with him.
Now, Sofiane is back in Algeria living with his mother. Long ago, when Sofiane was one year old, his mother was watching him sleep. She had a vision of a two-year-old with blue eyes wearing a US Army uniform. He was on top of her son, pinning him down. Several times the bully looked straight into her eyes in a way that was extremely frightening. This vision foretold his destiny with the Americans. Now his dear mother is old and sick. She is having trouble breathing, can't walk, and coughs a lot. Even so, she cooks for him and takes care of him. The local people are scared of him, and because he can't use his left hand, he has been unable to find work. She is patient and understands his situation, why he can't take care of her financially. Right now he is excitedly watching the World Championship games with his brothers at home.
It is very hard to scratch out a living in Algeria. Any medical care you need, you have to pay for it. Sofiane is in need of clothes. He asks anyone who has used or broken iPhone or laptops or anything he can sell to send them to him so that he can repair and resell them. Some supporters have started a collection to buy him a car so that he would be able to start a taxi service.
To donate: GoFundMe.com/f/a-taxi-and-a-new-beginning-for-sufiyan
