“Civil-rights advocates who sued to have dozens of Afghan war detainees held in Cuba brought before a U.S. court are pressing their argument that the courts have authority in the case,” The New York Post reports via the AP.

“U.S. District Judge A. Howard Matz is to hear their argument on Thursday although, at a hearing last month, Matz said he had ‘grave doubts’ about his court’s jurisdiction over the matter.”

Government lawyers have cited a 1950 Supreme Court decision involving German prisoners seized at the end of World War II in arguing that the U.S. courts don’t have jurisdiction. The court said then that the prisoners could not file habeas corpus petitions in U.S. courts because they were taken to an American-run prison in occupied Germany and were at all times outside U.S. territory.

In a related story, Happy 21st Birthday to Jihad Johnny Walker! — whose plans for this special day are to enjoy some gruel in his dingy cell while guards stationed outside read aloud to him passages from the collected works of Susan Faludi.

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