Thirty five days without food.

At least eighty prisoners detained at Guantanamo Bay are rolling into their fifth week of a hunger strike. Some reports say there may be as many as two hundred participants refusing to eat. They are demanding that the camps abide by the Geneva Convention rules for the treatment of civilian detainees. They want a guarantee of humane treatment and fair trials. These prisoners hope to attract the attention of the world to their stagnant situation, and they are willing to risk their lives for the chance.

It is difficult to imagine how it would feel to be stripped of all personal freedom except the most basic action of feeding my body. Yet there is power even in this. If detainees start dying from starvation, the world will start looking at Guantanamo again. Self-starvation is a universally unnatural occurrence, and it embodies the most frantic cries for attention. The public may begin to wonder why trials haven't been offered and basic civilian rights have continually been ignored.

Unfortunately for the prisoners, the world isn't looking for news at the moment. There is so much happening between the hurricane relief, the new Iraq constitution, and the continuing Israeli withdrawals that there isn't much space left in the headlines for this new appeal. I just hope that this saga will end in positive change, not preventable tragedy.

"The Truth is far more powerful than any weapon of mass destruction" - Mahatma Gandhi