SPY! TRAITOR!
It was growing dark. A voice said: “Come, you can meet with your daughters. Follow me.” Sadiq felt an AK47 in his back and then he received a blow to the head. Followed by two more. He fell to the ground, where they kicked, spat and swore at him. Spy, he heard. Traitor! Then they hauled him up, covered his eyes, bound his arms and legs and threw him into a car. He lay on the floor in the back, between the feet of the men.
At times they stamped their boots on him or kicked his head. “We know your type, we’ve killed a lot like you,” a voice said. The car stopped. This is where they would kill him, he thought.
They dragged him out. The ropes around his ankles were loosened and, still blindfolded, he was ordered to walk. A door was opened and he was thrown forward, a terrible stench hitting his nostrils. The door slammed. He pulled the rag from over his eyes. It was just as black without it. The walls were damp, the floor was wet, the stink was coming from a hole in the ground. He was in a lavatory.
Eventually, three men entered and set upon him. Then he heard the click of a handgun. One man stood pointing it at him. “We are happy Allah wants us closer to Him by spilling the blood of a traitor,” he said in poor Arabic. “Allahu akbar.” The other two joined in like a chorus. The echo was frightening. His mind was whirling.
After they left, something landed on him. It was wet, heavy, warm — a person. For a moment he just lay there with a man on top of him. Then he heaved him aside and nodded off again. Two men entered and grabbed hold of the other man, hauled him up and pounded him with the butts of their weapons.
Sadiq tried to get out of the way, but could not escape blows to his own head, shoulders, and neck. The other man cried out: “Ya ummi!” Mother! The last of the kicks provoked no reaction as the man lay motionless. The men took one foot each and pulled, hauling him like a sack. His head thudded against the floor. Streaks of blood were left behind down the corridor. “Lock the door on that other piece of shit!” the stocky one with the beard shouted. The guard slammed the door. The lock clicked. Sadiq was alone. He lay dazed, hollowed out and feeble.
THEY’RE TRYING TO BREAK ME
How long had he been here, without food or water? One day? Two? Three? He saw the outline of a man in the doorway. He was tall and well built. Sadiq crouched in the corner, readying himself for the blows. They had come to get him. It was his turn. His time was up.
The man handed him a cup of lentil soup. Sadiq drank slowly. It was the best thing he had ever tasted. The guard returned with water and a crust of bread. Why was he being given food, what did that mean? Was it a good sign? A bad sign? A last meal? Sadiq asked what had happened to the man who had been taken out. “You don’t want to know,” the guard replied.
That evening, or that night, or whatever it was, the three men returned. The guard had screwed a lightbulb in the ceiling, so now Sadiq was better able to make them out. The broad-faced, well-built one squatted in front of Sadiq. He did not say anything, merely stared at him, his eyes fixed on Sadiq’s. The two others stood behind him. They all had handguns. No one said a word. They’re trying to break me, Sadiq thought.
DEATH ROW
“Why are you here?” the guard asked him the next morning.
“I don’t know,” Sadiq answered.
“You ought to know,” the young man went on. “Because this is death row.”
Sadiq felt a jolt pass through him.
“What have you done?”
“I’m innocent,” Sadiq said. “Let me explain, let me see a judge.”
“Impossible,” the guard replied. “The judge has had his say.”
“I’m here to find my daughters, to take them back home . . .”
“You’re a traitor.”
“I’m a father.” The guard spat in his face. “Kazab!” Liar! He spat again. “You’re spying for western intelligence.”
The guard left and returned sometime later with a copy of the Koran. “Can you swear on the Koran?” he asked, looking Sadiq in the eye.
“No,” Sadiq replied, “I’m covered in shit. I can’t touch God’s book like this.”
The guard went out, with the book in hand. When he returned, he led Sadiq into the backyard and hosed him down. A rush of life gushed through him and he gulped greedily at the water. Blood, shit, and sweat ran down his body, it was as though the cold water whipped him back to life.
Once he was back in the cell, the guard returned with the Koran. Sadiq placed his hand on it and repeated the words the guard said aloud. I swear on the Koran . . . That he was not a spy. That he was not a traitor. That he was not an infidel. Then Sadiq said: “I have only one mission in Syria — to find my daughters.”
The Isis guard studied him for a time. “I believe you,” he said. “Call me Abu Ahmed.”
“My name is Abu Ismael,” Sadiq replied, which in Arabic means the father of Ismael, his eldest son. Abu Ahmed went out and returned with a dry blanket. “I can’t really help you, but I’ll try. I don’t want to meet Allah after making a big mistake. But if they come for you, there’s nothing I can do.”
That night Sadiq was awakened again by a person being thrown into the cell. A heavy man, large and muscly, was dumped on top of him. He was coated in blood. “Wish al-jahim hada?” the man bawled. What kind of hell have I wound up in? “Zinzanat al-qatl bi qisas,” Sadiq said. Qatl bi qisas was the term in sharia for retribution, an eye for an eye, a death sentence, in other words. Zinzanat meant “cell.” ………. continued on the next page
