Beneficiaries of a Saudi government program that helps prisoners reintegrate into society were furloughed for family visits for Eid al-Adha, the Feast of Sacrifice, leaving the place eerily empty, like a US university campus Christmas Break. Only one painting in the gallery offered a glimpse of the religious tolerance that characterizes the program: It was of a woman smelling a flower, her hair uncovered and flowing, against the night sky. The program, with its campus in Riyadh and another in Jeddah, grew out of a counterterrorism campaign launched in 2004 to retrain civilians who had returned home from jihadist training camps in Afghanistan and others affected by them. About 6,000 men have gone through some form of the program, including 137 former detainees at the US military prison at Guantanamo Bay, none of whom have been convicted of war crimes. The last Guantanamo detainee was sent to the program in 2017, shortly before President Donald J. Trump disbanded the office that negotiated the transfers. Now the question is whether and how the center fits into President Biden’s efforts to close the prison at Guantanamo Bay, which opened more than 20 years ago to hold terror suspects arrested around the world after the 9/11 attacks. Over the years, the United States has held about 780 men and boys at Guantanamo Bay, with about 660 there at its peak in 2003. Saudi citizens were of particular interest because 15 of the 19 hijackers in the 9/11 attacks were Saudis. The Trump administration has released only one Guantanamo detainee, a self-confessed Qaeda operative serving a prison sentence in Riyadh as part of an Obama-era plea deal. The Biden administration repatriated another Saudi national in May, but under an agreement to send him for psychiatric treatment for schizophrenia rather than jihad rehabilitation. More than half of the detainees currently at Guantanamo have been cleared for release, but must wait for the Biden administration to find a country willing to take them in with security arrangements. Most are from Yemen, one of several countries that Congress deems too unstable to accept men from Guantanamo Bay. Other inmates are in plea negotiations with discussions about whether the convicts could serve their sentences in foreign custody. The Obama administration had tried to close the prison, and Saudi Arabia was one of the countries that figured prominently in the resettlement plans. Another was Oman, which took in 28 Yemenis in a top-secret project that found them spouses, homes and jobs as long as they didn’t tell their neighbors they had spent time at Guantanamo, according to former detainees. None of these resettled men were ever tried for war crimes. The Obama administration sent 20 detainees to the United Arab Emirates, mostly Yemenis but also several Afghans and a man from Russia. But the country effectively jailed them and then abruptly repatriated all but the Russians, prompting human rights protests that the returnees risked persecution. With that program deemed a failure, the Biden administration is looking at other options for captives, including Yemenis. A recent visit to the dusty brown campus on the outskirts of Riyadh highlighted one possibility. The program was founded and named after Prince Mohammed bin Nayef, a former interior minister who had close ties to US intelligence. When it was forced out by the kingdom’s de facto leader, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the program was renamed the Counseling and Care Center. As described by directors, the program combines lessons in nonviolent interpretations of Sharia law with fitness, entertainment and counseling with the goal of returning graduates to their families. Or, as one staff member called it, undoing “the brainwashing that happens” when a young man is drawn to religious extremism. A library includes recommended reading for successful Saudis, “the right people, to avoid the wrong standards, not the way that turns you into darkness or death,” Wnyan Obied Alsubaiee, the program’s director, who holds the rank of major. general, he said through an interpreter. One book tells the story of a Saudi who studied in New York in the 1970s and rose to prominence in political life back home, including a role in a Saudi-American dialogue after the 9/11 attacks. Another is a biography of a former government minister, “Building the Petrochemical Industry in Saudi Arabia.” General Alsubaiee said two former Guantanamo detainees in the Saudi Arabian prison system will be accepted into the program once they complete their sentences. One is Ahmed Muhammed Haza al-Darbi, the self-confessed Qaeda terrorist released by the Trump administration. The identity of the other is not known. The director interpreted the program’s depictions as a five-star hotel for extremists. “This is not a prize,” he said. “They are no longer prisoners. They must return to society. We want them to feel accepted and that this is another opportunity.” Of the 137 men sent to Saudi Arabia from Guantanamo, some through a Saudi prison, 116 have reintegrated into society and stayed out of trouble, 12 have been recaptured, eight have been killed and one is wanted, according to the program’s fact sheet. None of the men were identified by the Saudi government during the visit. But some of the dead are known, notably those who were sent during the George W. Bush administration and then fled to Yemen, where they joined al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. In Riyadh, program participants live in pods, individual bedrooms set around a courtyard with a mosque, kitchen and small outdoor fire pit for making tea on cool desert nights. As described by program administrators, participants’ first visits to Saudi Arabia at home are short, but evolve into longer stays with family—for example, the two-week leave that effectively emptied the center in July. The nation’s security apparatus is invisible but present. The manager is a military employee, and the security officers and care providers dress identically in the classic white robe and red checkered headdress favored by government officials and businessmen. At the gym, a driver gestured to a camera in a corner of the weightlifting area and explained that facial expressions there were being monitored. But on this visit, Saudi transparency only went so far. No one would say how many of the program’s 200 slots were filled or when the latest person or longest-serving resident arrived. At the gallery, an art therapist, Awad Alyami, described his program as an opportunity for men to express their feelings and for program sponsors to evaluate them. One painting was an expressionist view of the crowd circling the Kaaba in Mecca, Islam’s holiest site, but clockwise rather than the ritual counter-clockwise. Project staff members were concerned about the depiction of the holy site and had the artist meet with a clergyman. A section of the gallery features the work of former Guantanamo detainees. “Lots of strange things here,” said Dr. Alyami. The section is unmarked, but stands out for the image of a guard tower, razor and men in orange uniforms. The art of other participants in the program tended toward desert scenes and other Saudi Arabian themes.
