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Former Afghan interpreter says Taliban tortured him for weeks but U.S. still won't give him a visa_我的网站

A |     TEL AVIV, Israel -- Ayelet and Or Sella both pause for a few seconds as they recall the moment they were finally able to embrace their cousins Judith and Natalie Raanan at home in Israel a day after the mother and teenage daughter were released by their militant captors in the neighboring Gaza Strip."I realized I hadn't breathed for two weeks," Ayelet told ABC News' Matt Gutman in Tel Aviv during an interview airing Monday on "Good Morning America.""I've never felt a hug this intense in my life," Or added.But the nightmare is far from over as eight of their family members are still being held hostage by the Hamas militant group in Gaza. Three other relatives were killed. Ayelet and Or, who are siblings, are calling on the Israeli government to secure the release of the remaining hostages before launching a ground invasion into Gaza."We hope that they are alive. We hope that they are not injured," Or told ABC News. "And we hope and urge anyone that has any influence to do everything they can to bring them back as soon as possible.""We don't have the privilege to be happy or to celebrate. We don't have the privilege to mourn," Ayelet added. "We cannot rest. Getting Judith and Natalie back, it is not the end. It is the beginning."Judith, 59, and Natalie, 17, who both have dual Israeli-American citizenship and reside in Evanston, Illinois, were visiting family in southern Israel to celebrate a relative's birthday and the Jewish holidays when Hamas carried out an unprecedented incursion from Gaza on Oct. 7. More than 1,400 people were killed, thousands more were injured and over 200 were abducted that day, according to the Israel Defense Forces."It was unimaginable then and it still is," Ayelet said. "We haven't slept ever since and we cry at night."The Israeli military has responded with a total siege and blockade of Gaza, sparking a humanitarian crisis while killing at least 4,385 people and injuring 13,561 in the Hamas-ruled territory since Oct. 7, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health.Over the weekend, the Israel Defense Forces announced it "will deepen our attacks to minimize the dangers to our forces in the next stages of the war," indicating a ground invasion appeared imminent.Judith and Natalie were the first hostages to be freed on Oct. 20. Hamas said in a statement at the time that it released them for humanitarian reasons in an agreement brokered by the government of Qatar.Israeli Agriculture Minister Avi Dichter, a former chief of the Shin Bet security agency, told ABC News last week that officials will do everything they can to secure the release of all hostages but that the "first and last priority" is destroying Hamas.ABC News has learned that Israeli and U.S. officials have asked Judith and Natalie for any granular details about their ordeal -- like what did they see, hear and smell -- in hopes that the information could provide key intelligence about the remaining hostages.Ayelet and Or said their cousins are "physically healthy right now" and that the pair "kept each other safe" but "it is not our story to tell." They declined to share further details about what the mother and daughter endured in captivity, citing fears that Hamas could take vengeance on their other family members being held."We can't even image what they've been through these last two weeks," Or added. "It's going to take some time to sink in for them."It was also unclear why Judith and Natalie were the first to be freed."I feel so lucky but also a little guilty," Ayelet said. "There are so many others, we don't know why them."Ayelet noted that their family has not been contacted by a representative of the Israeli government "until now."Within hours of being freed, Judith and Natalie spoke on the telephone with U.S. President Joe Biden and expressed their eagerness to help "bring everyone back," according to Or."They are so brave and so strong," Or said."They are handling this better than I would expect," Ayelet added.。    As Massoud walked down a Kabul street one cold Sunday morning, looking for a day job to feed his family, pickup trucks full of armed Taliban members stopped in front of him. He told CBS News the men aimed their AK-47s at him, he was handcuffed, blindfolded and taken to an office of the Taliban's General Directorate of Intelligence.For more than a month, Massoud's family had no idea where he was. They searched everywhere, including hospitals, until they arrived at the Taliban's intelligence department. "After six weeks of searching, they found me at the Taliban's 040 intelligence department," Massoud told CBS News in a phone interview. He said during the first 15 days of his imprisonment, he was "beaten, struck with electric shock sticks, electrocuted, waterboarded and hanged upside down."

             

His crime? Massoud worked for the U.S. military as an interpreter from 2011 to 2013, including a year spent working with U.S. Navy SEALs. (CBS News is not using the real name of Massoud or the other former interpreter interviewed for this story to protect them from possible retaliation.)       

"Don't want to see that horror again" 

Massoud said that during interrogations, Taliban intelligence officers told him that, "with my help, the Americans have killed our people, and that I was still spying for the Americans.""I told them, 'You have announced a general amnesty,'" Massoud told CBS News, but he was informed by the Taliban interrogators, "there is no amnesty for you people."                 Massoud was finally released by the Taliban after more than three months of imprisonment, after his brothers signed two separate guarantees promising the Taliban they would bring him back to the intelligence agency if ever asked to do so. CBS News has seen the letters and other documents his family filed with Taliban officials while he was imprisoned."They can find me anytime they wish and put me back in the prison," he told CBS News. "I just don't want to see that horror again." 

"Still in danger"

U.S. Army Sgt. Jordan David Johnson, who has since been honorably discharged, was Massoud's direct supervisor in Helmand province and has written to members of the U.S. Congress supporting his former Afghan colleague's application for a U.S. visa, but to no avail. "Every time I hear from Massoud I feel guilty, because he is still in danger," Johnson told CBS News. "We told them that, 'You help us, and we will help you.' But now we are not, and that is wrong."

             

In a September 2022 letter to lawmakers, Johnson said he trusted Massoud then, "and I am proud to call him a friend today," adding that he did not believe the Afghan "poses a national security threat to the United States of America."                      

"They will come after me and my family"

Omar, 32, told CBS News that he worked with the U.S. military from 2008 until 2012 and was deployed alongside U.S. troops in eastern Paktia province. From 2012 until Afghanistan fell back into the Taliban's hands in August 2021, he worked on various projects with the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) at the U.S. Embassy in Kabul. He was threatened many times for working with the U.S. and was injured in what he believes was an assassination attempt in 2014, after he filed for a U.S. visa. 

    

                                                     

    

Despite the threats, which he continued reporting to his supervisors at the embassy, Omar was informed that his U.S. Special Immigration Visa, or SIV, application had been rejected because documents he submitted previously had been deemed fraudulent. He believes it's because he failed a polygraph administered by U.S. officials eight years earlier, and that the process was unfair. "They intentionally make you a criminal," he told CBS News. "You are only allowed to answer their questions with yes and no, and they don't give you a chance to explain." Omar filed an appeal against the rejection of his application in mid-June and is waiting for a response. He urged the U.S. government to "seriously look into our cases and take us into safety," adding that if it doesn't happen, "they will come after me and my family one day."

"Absurd that it takes so long"

During the 20-year war that followed the 2001 U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan, thousands of Afghans served as interpreters and translators, working shoulder to shoulder with U.S. troops and diplomats, risking their lives serving on the battlefield and communicating with locals.                       These interpreters were essential to bridge the language barrier, but also to provide cultural context, gather intelligence, negotiate with tribal elders and build trust with local communities. Massoud and Omar both applied for SIVs under a program created by the U.S. Congress in 2006 to offer legal pathways to the United States for Iraqis and Afghans who helped during the U.S. military operations in those countries. But the bureaucracy of the SIV application process has left many applicants frustrated, with little faith in the program.Massoud said his application was rejected due to a lack of documentation from his supervisors, despite Johnson trying to help. He said he submitted the requested documents and has waited for more than 320 days with no update from the U.S. government. "Every time Massoud submits all his documents and we think, 'now we are waiting for his visa to be approved,' then Massoud would contact me again saying, 'I need this and this document, because they keep changing the requirements,'" Johnson said. 

    

                                                     

    

"The SIV process is flawed and ridiculous and absurd that it takes so long. These interpreters, their lives are in danger," the former U.S. soldier told CBS News. "We don't do enough for them, and it's very frustrating."

The backlog, and work to improve a "vital program"

"We have surged resources to this vital program, significantly increasing the number of staff dedicated to it. We have reviewed every stage of the multiple step application process to streamline it wherever possible, consistent with U.S. law, and continue to look for areas to improve," a State Department spokesperson told CBS News.The official said the steps had enabled the State Department to issue "nearly 34,000 SIVs to principal applicants and their eligible family members" from the beginning of the Biden administration until August 1, 2023.                      As of the end of March, State Department figures show about 9,800 principal SIV applicants had cleared a major hurdle in the process, securing Chief Of Mission (COM) approval. Those individuals are "awaiting further processing and their eventual visa interview before being issued an SIV," the spokesperson said, adding: "We are working to process these cases as quickly as possible."The State Department's figures show that another 69,000 principal applicants were undergoing the review process, and the spokesperson told CBS News that, historically, about half of the applications who reach that stage of the process do not end up qualifying for an SIV.According to the figures, 3,241 Afghan applicants were "deemed unqualified to receive COM approval or had the approval revoked during the second quarter" of 2023."The Department will continue to ensure Afghan SIV applications are processed as quickly as possible in accordance with the statutorily required program parameters and national security requirements," the spokesman told CBS News. A report issued this week by a State Department inspector general said, meanwhile, that according to the department's own estimation, as of April 2023, a total of "more than 840,000 principal and derivative SIV applicants remained in Afghanistan."CBS News' Tucker Reals and Paulina Smolinski contributed to this report.                                 

In:    
• Taliban
    
• Immigration
    
• War
    
• Afghanistan
    

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