Taliban Commander Released From Gitmo Has Already Vowed to Continue Fighting Americans

Noorullah Noori, one of the five senior Taliban leaders recently released from the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay, has already vowed to continue fighting Americans, according to an NBC News report.

"After arriving in Qatar, Noorullah Noori kept insisting he would go to Afghanistan and fight American forces there,” a Taliban commander in Afghanistan told NBC in a telephone interview.

Photo via TheBlaze TV

The NBC report continues:

Noori pushed to return to Afghanistan after learning that the U.S. had provided written assurances that no country would arrest any of the five freed for a year as long as they lived peacefully, one of his relatives told NBC News by telephone from Afghanistan.

Under the terms of the deal, the former commanders would remain under the control of the government of Qatar for one year and be subject to “restrictions on their movement and activities," a senior U.S. official has told NBC News –- including a one-year travel ban. A diplomatic source later told NBC News that their movements within the Arab emirate are not restricted.

No stranger to battle, Noori was a senior Taliban commander in Mazar-e-Sharif when the Taliban fought U.S. forces in late 2001, according to CBS News.

The Obama administration has stated that it exchanged the Taliban commanders for Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, who has been in Taliban captivity for nearly five years, because the U.S. has a "sacred" obligation to leave no man behind.

But a report Thursday by NBC News' Chuck Todd, Mark Murray and Carrie Dann suggested that "the five Taliban prisoners who were released in exchange for Bergdahl were probably going to be released anyway" because of the administration's commitment to close Guantanamo Bay, and so the U.S. tried to "get something" in return for their release.