Sunday, May 1st 2011

Fatima Dhaif, 17

My father was apprehended at the airport, I managed to catch a glimpse of him in handcuffs just before my mother, younger brothers (13 and 9) and I were driven away in a little red car from the group of about 10 masked men which had assembled in front of the airport. We weren’t told anything and the two men sitting in front had guns and masks and were in plain clothes. I gradually became more shocked over the next few hours; I couldn’t believe what was happening. I held my brother’s hand, he was shaking slightly as we entered the Directorate for Crime Investigation and Forensics in Adliya; this confused me because none of us had committed any crimes. We were led to a port cabin, where my mother was taken away and I sat facing my brothers for about 2 hours. There was a lady lying on a bench in one of the locked rooms; a man came asking about her and the ‘policewoman’ watching us entered the lady’s room and made her stand up, then the man went in and smacked her, she fell onto the floor and screamed; she was blindfolded and placed in handcuffs. The policewoman proceeded to bark questions the lady swore she didn’t know the answer to. I watched my brothers’ expressions change from worry to horror. We were taken to another car with our suitcases in the back and two men in front; I wanted to ask about my mother but I didn’t dare say more than was absolutely necessary. The man drove like a maniac, he ran a few red lights, occasionally asking us for directions to our house and talking on his walkie-talkie.

I couldn’t recognize my house as we approached it, surrounded with swarms of masked men and police cars. I noticed our cars lined up outside each with at least one masked man in it and they started to drive away with them; the scene resembled something out of a movie, the house was empty but it was as if it was sheltering a massive criminal organization. We were taken to my uncle’s house right next door where a man with a gun was standing at the front door. The house had been trashed, paintings ripped up, everything on the floor. My grandmother was in hysterics as she learned that two of her sons had been wantonly arrested. At my house, the front door had been broken down, as well as the door to my parents’ room. All my books had been thrown onto the floor and a picture of my uncle had been ripped up and placed on my bed and I noticed several of our things missing. My mother was brought back in tears at around midnight, she told us about how they questioned her and threatened to put out a cigarette in her eye and that they’d taken the deed to our house, other land we own and our cars. I didn’t sleep at all that night; I believed my father and uncle would return just as my mother had. We all jumped every time the doorbell rang for days afterwards.

I came home from school one day three weeks later to find my grandmother sitting outside, my mother hadn’t come home yet. I refused to believe she had been taken, too. I hoped desperately that she only had been working on an emergency case or was just late back from the hospital. Her phone was turned off and after calling a few people we found out she had been taken for questioning at the hospital and nobody had seen her after that. The police station told us they didn’t know anything about her. 

It hit me then, both my parents were incarcerated and unemployed; my brothers and I left without parents. I’ve been deeply traumatized by this ordeal, I continue to have very unpleasant dreams and find it almost impossible to focus on my studies but I do anyway and I haven’t missed a day of school because my father always emphasized the importance of education to me because it’s something nobody can ever take away from you. It feels very strange to suddenly have so many responsibilities as a seventeen year old, I have to run an entire household and take care of my grandmother and younger brothers, try to convince them that everything will be alright in the end, pay bills and go to school. I’ve had to explain to my brothers that our parents have been arrested without having done anything wrong and that there isn’t much at all we can do to help them.

When people were being shot in the streets, my parents couldn’t bear to be sitting at home and listening to news about wounded and dead people. My father tried to be reasonable and convince my mother that she’d be risking her life if she attempted to go to the hospital and that no injured people would be brought to the hospital. My mother went anyway. My parents are doctors, they have no political agendas and they did nothing to deserve this; it’s absurd that they’re being detained for telling the truth and treating the injured. My father and uncle have been allowed to call us twice in the 6 weeks that they’ve been arrested, we know nothing about what they’re going through or what they’re being charged with; my mother is allowed to call for a short while more often, though. I find it ridiculous that murderers roam the streets while doctors who tried to treat injured people without discrimination are being punished. I hold no contempt for anybody; I just want my family returned to me and for people to hear about the injustice that we’re enduring.

I recently learned from my mother that my father will be on trial and could be charged with 10 years in prison; we have yet to be contacted to appoint a lawyer. I’ve heard from doctors who have been released that they were threatened and forced to make confessions on tape, this is deeply disturbing, it seems Orwellian and not something that should happen in reality. Usually, things aren’t as bad as we make them seem; but in this case, things are so much worse than they seem. I am always immensely proud of all the doctors who have had the courage to stand up for the truth and it’s gotten past the point where it’s a matter of opinion, I hope that injustice won’t prevail.