GUANTANAMO BAY NAVY BASE, Cuba -- The military judge overseeing the 9/11 mass murder case on Monday froze proceedings for two months to give the Obama administration time to decide whether to take the case to federal court.

Army Col. Stephen Henley approved the delay in a three-page ruling that noted confessed Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed and his four fellow accused did not oppose delay.

Neither did Pentagon prosecutors, who say Attorney General Eric Holder will decide by Nov. 16 whether to try them before the military or a civilian jury.

The five men could face execution if they are convicted of conspiracy in the deaths of the 2,973 victims of Sept. 11, 2001. They allegedly plotted, financed and helped the 19 hijackers reach U.S. soil -- and have collectively submitted a written admission to the military court that says they welcome martyrdom.

All five former CIA-held captives skipped Monday's hearing, denying the parents and brother of seven 9/11 victims the chance to watch what may be the last hearing in a military setting.

``I came to see the faces of these criminal terrorists, the demented people who exploited the face of Islam and made it difficult for all Muslims around the world,'' said New Yorker Talat Hamdani whose rescue worker son died in the World Trade Center and at one point found her Muslim-American family under federal investigation.

President Barack Obama has ordered the prison camps by early next year, which would mean moving the 9/11 trial from Guantánamo and likely further delays.

``We aren't asking for bloodshed. We want justice,'' said Lee Hanson of Easton, Conn., whose son, daughter-in-law and granddaughter were headed to Disney Land when their aircraft was hijacked on Sept. 11, 2001.

They were invited by the Pentagon to this remote Navy base and the chief Guantánamo prosecutor, Navy Reserves Capt. John F. Murphy, also made an impassioned plea to keep commissions, saying ``no group of prosecutors is better prepared.''

Four different civilian prosecutors' offices are vying for the trials -- in Manhattan, Brooklyn, Alexandria, Va., and Washington D.C.

Murphy spent 17 years as a federal prosecutor and only recently donned his Navy reservist's uniform to become the chief Pentagon war crimes prosecutor. He used the Pentagon podium to pointedly challenge the White House preference for long-established civilian courts instead of the war court the Bush administration created after the Sept. 11 attacks.

``We allege these to be war criminals, not common criminals,'' Muprhy said, calling the events of 9/11 ``the worst war crimes against the United States in our entire history.''

Unresolved Monday was a bid by three of the men to fire their volunteer civilian lawyers, whose services were provided by the American Civil Liberties Union at a cost of $3.5 million so far.

Case prosecutor Robert Swann protested the absence of the accused. He and asked the judge to order prison camp guards to bring them from their cells, to determine if they want to retain their so-called stand-by counsel. Henley refused, saying the 60-day freeze would maintain the status quo.

Swann also told the judge that his team had providing Mohammed and his fellow accused with the defense legal resources they were requesting.

He specifically mentioned three films, adding he had no idea how they would fit in with their defense strategy:

• Judgement: The Court Martial of Lt. William Calley. focusing on the Vietnam era My Lai massacre, and starring a young Harrison Ford in 1975.

• Inside the Vatican, a National Geographic documentary.

• Inside Mecca, also made by National Geographic.