490 Annabelle Böttcher
charges. After his release, he remained in Yemen. In November 2009, he
has been the focus of intense scrutiny since he was linked to an army
psychiatrist accused of killing 13 people at Fort Hood, Tex., and then to
Umar Faruk Abdulmutallab, the Nigerian, charged with trying to blow
up a Detroit-bound airliner in December 2009. American counterter-
rorism officials accuse al-Awlaki of being an operative of al-Qāʿida on
the Arab Peninsula.^137 The Obama administration even authorized the
targeted killing of Anwar al-Awlaki in Yemen.^138 During his detention,
he was first in solitary confinement in an underground basement in a
prison in Sanaa with little light and no books. Later he could get some
books through his family. Among them were the Koran, Ibn Kathīr’s
historic work in ten volumes entitled al-Bidāya wal-nihāya, and Ibn
Qayyim al-Jawziyya’s book Madārij al-sālikīn in three volumes.^139
From Shaykh al-Awlaki’s description it is clear that he greatly appreci-
ated the spiritual dimension of Ibn al-Qayyim’s work. It is quite pos-
sible that after interrogations with torture experience and a period of
solitary confinement with no access to daylight and sunshine, a detainee
either may find Ibn Taymiyya too legalistic or no longer appreciates his
harsh calls. Instead, he seeks comfort to strengthen his faith. For some,
the mystically tinged writings of an Ibn al-Qayyim offer much more
relief in such situations than the unforgiving rhetoric of an Ibn Taymiy-
ya. However, both general options are possible as a reaction to the
haunting experiences in prison. When Ibn Taymiyya was imprisoned in
Cairo, he was said to have converted the prison into an institute of reli-
gious study and devotion, turning the inmates away from futile games
to prayer.^140 A similar agenda along the lines of Ibn Taymiyya’s prison
activities seems to be implemented nowadays by observant Muslims in
detention. If detainees are not held in solitary confinement but in col-
lective cells, they might participate in informal teaching lessons given
by an Islamic scholar or someone more advanced in Islamic religious
137 Anwar al-Awlaki, in: The New York Times (Dec. 07, 2010); online: http://
topics.nytimes.com/topics/reference/timestopics/people/a/anwar_al_awlaki/
index.html, accessed Dec. 11, 2010.
138 Savage, Charlie: Suit Over Targeted Killings Is Thrown Out, in: The New
York Times (Dec. 07, 2010); online: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/08/
world/middleeast/08killing.html?_r=1&ref=anwar_al_awlaki, accessed Dec.
12, 2010.
139 Begg, Moazzam: Moazzam Begg Interviews Imam Anwar Al Awlaki, in:
Cageprisoners, (Dec. 31, 2007); online: http://www.cageprisoners.com/articles.
php?id=22926, accessed July 5, 2008.
140 Little, Did Ibn Taymiyya Have a Screw Loose, p. 107.
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