A Mother’s Deep Sorrow--so passionate

A story of a mother like if she was from the time of sahaba

21-07-2008

I was informed that Isma’il died as a result of a blood infection (gangrene). The Arab physicians have agreed that the Afghani doctor, who treated him at Miranshah was responsible. The doctor stitched the wound ignoring the known fact that battle wounds are not supposed to be stitched. Stitching battle wounds leads to infections which was what happened to Isam’il.

Doctor Khalid, who works at the same hospital, had previously warned that the doctor was a jackass and he did not know anything about the medical field. He also caused the deaths of many of the Mujahdins. Due to this fact, Doctor Khalid and others have started to suspect that this doctor is deliberately killing the Mujahdins.

They believed that he is still a communist, due to the fact that he had fled the capital, Kabul, a short time ago. The Afghanis called those immigrants (Sakir Bist), in reference to the Egyptian rockets (Sakir 20) which were launched by the Mujahdins at the capital Kabul, causing a wave of immigration. Those immigrants were sympathizers of the communist government. They fled because they feared for their lives and not because they wanted to join the Jihad.

Unfortunately, this killer or jackass doctor, as Khalid described him, was able to kill many because he advocated Afghani nationalism among the Afghani workers at the hospital. He also conspired with the hospital workers against the Arab Wahabi doctors. He allowed the corrupted employees to steal medicine from the hospital and sell it on the black market, thus gaining their support and protection. This protected him from being investigated, despite the many complaints that were filed by the victims’ families. However, Haqani interfered and fired him from the hospital after the killing of Isma’il. Haqani was very lenient in that decision because others, including myself, were calling for putting the doctor on trial.

Isma’il was infected at Miranshah, and after his condition deteriorated he was promptly transferred to the military hospital in Rawalpindi. A Pakistani helicopter transferred him there. However, it was too late.

One of his kidneys had stopped functioning and then his other kidney stopped functioning as well. He died and the helicopter brought his body back to Miranshah in order to be buried there. Strangely, his mother was being treated at the same hospital for an advanced case of cancer. She was slowly dying. A few steps from her, the second of her children died and she witnessed his final moments at the hospital. She accompanied him in the plane in order to oversee the washing and the preparing of his body for burial. She also wanted to be at his funeral. A few days later she died.

For the third time my wife finds herself in the middle of a tragic death. The first time was when she lost her son and a few days later she lost the orphan infant she had been raising with our children since 1988. She lost her mother in 1988 at a hospital in Bshouar. My wife was the closest to her mother’s heart among her eleven children.

This time we shared our sadness with this Afghani society. This society opened its heart and door to us. We have shared with this society its happiness and its sadness as if we were an essential part of it. Isma’il was a compartment of the heart that supplied this Jihad group of men, women and children with life. His three brothers represented the other compartments of this strong beating heart. They supplied this heart with strong belief and instinctive heroism which only shows at the times when men are hard to find.
 

However, this instinctive heroism does not appear when there are an abundance of men with their heads held up high, and it is difficult to distinguish any of them over the other. Fate made the death of her loving son, Isma’il, the last death the Great Mother witnessed in an endless chain of losses of the men in her family. Perhaps solving the mystery of this mother, who is a legend, could help solve the secret of the miracle that happened in Afghanistan. The minds might be able to understand the miracle that was accomplished by people, who are living in extreme poverty and a backward civilization, who were able to stand up to the biggest military force in the world and defeat it. Then, they confronted the world and imposed their will and religion over their own land. They did this in a tyrannical world that does not allow a religion or will, which opposes the will of the great
Satan of the world, to exist.
 

The Great Mother was the safety valve of this society of immigrants. This society included her sons and daughters and also the families of her relatives who lived in close by homes in the immigrants district in Miranshah

Most of the time, the “Great Mother” was also responsible for the ‘homeland front’ in the absence of most men. There were men who were in charge of guarding and serving the homes and the families. On the other hand, the Great mother was in charge of organizing the domestic affairs at home. She made sure that the children went to the mosque, memorize the Quran and stopped them from arguing with each other. She stopped the fights among the women which occurred for different reasons. She took care of the orphan children and their mothers who lost their men in the Jihad battles. All of those assignments were part of the Great Mother’s duties. She handled her duties with toughness and kindness at the same time. She held a stick, in one hand, to wave in the faces of the violators be they men or women. In her other hand, she held a rosary to pray with.
 

In addition, she was in charge of managing the campaigns, which were launched from the front of the homes, led by one or more of her sons. She kept the children away from the passing cars. She would hit one of the children with her stick to remind them of the safety rules. She reminded them to stay away from the dangerous spots when the convoy was moving. The convoy might have contained tens of trucks that carried armed men. The great convoy moved along getting goodbye hugs and hearing shouts of God is Great from the people, all having conflicting thoughts of hope and worry. They worried because the trip for many of the men might have been their last Jihad battle, and they would have been leaving their wife, children and family for the last time.
 

The Great Mother was the most active and fit among all of them. She was the hidden force who pushed and moved everyone. With her skinny body, her slightly hunched posture, and her facial features that showed her inner goodness and firmness, she ran everything with controlled quickness. She surrounded her sons, and all the men, with motherly love, and the firmness of an Arab woman who did not allow weakness to find its way to her soul. She bid me many farewells and she prayed for me, as well, when I joined some of those missions. She said my name repeatedly, Mustafa, accompanied with other words. I did not understand those words, but I was happy to hear them as if my mother came to bid me a final farewell.

I purposely used to watch her for the longest possible time. My eyes were filled with tears several times while I was watching the moments of goodbyes. The men were going to their death. The mother was being strong while she was sending her sons to do their duties. The men were focused and full of laughter while they had mixed emotions. My car was the last one in the caravan. I use to be last, on purpose, in order to watch how the mother would react after the caravan left carrying her beloved men who loved her.
 

They loved her as a mother and a maker of heroes. She raised her hands when the caravan moved to pray. With a rosary in her hand she prayed until the last vehicle disappeared. Her eyes were full of tears as she was taking the children towards her house and then she closed the door. It was strange to see her cry as if I forgot that she is a mother. She cried even more during the time the caravan moved, while she was helping prepare the group to leave.
 

I used to go to our car, which was waiting in a distant place, after she left. I was hoping that she did not see me miss the caravan that just left. She would have hit me with her stick on my back or my head. You might think that my old relationship with the family and the area might protect me from the punishment for not joining the men for jihad.
 

However, the Great Mother does not play favors to anyone. The mother moved her wheel chair to a room where her son, Isma’il, was being prepared for his coffin. Although she was in a deteriorating condition, she supervised the procedure, After she finished supervising the procedure, she took her son s’ body to a big room so that the family could bid him farewell.
 

Isma’il was wrapped in white cloth with his face exposed. His white face was more bright and vibrant, which is a sign of the martyrs. It is as if they are telling the people they leave behind that they are happier as martyrs rather than staying with family and children. His face was surrounded with roses and flowers, as usual. His five children and his wife came to bid him a farewell before the men and the women started to come. The Great Mother sat in her wheel chair near the room’s door. Her body was solid and her facial features were frozen.

When my wife stood next to her, without looking around, she called her; Wafaa. My wife came to her and gave her a hug. The mother put her head on my wife’s shoulder and she cried hard until her sons came and asked her to stop crying so that the other women would not start wailing. Hakani and his bothers Ibrahim and Khalil were trying hard to stop the women from crying and wailing. They asked my wife to help calm down the women. Some of them were crying because they were sad and others were crying just to be polite and to follow traditions.
 

The way my wife looked would make anyone cry and be full of sadness. She was crying with heavy tears. She still feels the hurt, for her son Khalid’s grave is only a few meters away. The new sorrows have awakened her old sorrows and did not help her to forget them. The sadness and misery have exhausted her, and she was moving as if she was a machine that is falling apart and on its way to the junk yard after a long and exhausting trip. In spite of all that, she was successful in controlling the wailing women. This is an impossible mission to accomplish even for an international agency.

Despite the fact that she did not speak their language, yet she was able to accomplish this. She was speaking to them with a mixture of different languages and with different types of vocal expressions which she created herself. She did know the meaning of those vocal expressions. She never explained to me the secret of her success. I thought that she used a combination of a mystery language, her uncontrollable tears, and her exhausted voice to awake their pity or also their fears. They felt that they are in front of a real life tragedy which made them forget the tragedy they were crying about…they were hit with deep silence.
 

After Isma’il was buried, they continued accepting condolences at home for several days. Those days were very crucial for my wife who had somewhat performed some of the duties of the “Great mother,” whom the cancer had trapped her in a wheel chair and almost sent her to her death. With all this, my wife was feeling sorry for her Yemeni friend, Hakani’s new wife. She was worried that the tragedies surrounding her would get to her heart. She was always trying to calm her down and give her encouragement.
 

However, she was not as strong as the Great Mother, so she collapsed and she lost consciousness for several hours. They thought that she was going to die. At that time, I was at the front lines working on the long and arduous plan for the new airport project. They tried to call a doctor from the city for her but they did not find anyone. So they had to call an Arab doctor, a friend who worked at Miranshah Hospital. He treated her with shots and medications until she was able to regain consciousness. Then he told them to move her to the house so that she could get some rest. However, that did not happen because she stayed next to the Great Mother in order to comfort and take care of her. On the morning of August 29, a car came from Hakani’s home. In it was one of his younger sons. He was asked to come quickly, because the Great Mother was dying and wanted to see her.
 

My wife went quickly to their home. She went to the Great Mother’s room. When she opened the door, she found girls and women around her bed. The Great mother was lying down on the bed covered in a white sheet and her head was directed towards the door so that she can see who is coming and going from the room. As soon as my wife opened the door, the Great Mother called her; Wafaa. My wife went to her and gave her a hug and kiss on the forehead. She took a copy of the Quran in order to join the girls and the women in reading Yassin chapter. The Great Mother used to sense that my wife was approaching, and then she would call her name. At first, the women around found this strange, but they got used to it. There was a great love between the two of them. Death was taking away from Wafaa her second mother, and it was taking from The Great Mother her beloved daughter.
 

The women in the room were reading the Yassin Chapter in the room until Hakani asked for permission to enter the room to see his mother. They fixed up the place and the women got covered up. He stood next to her bed, with his tall and skinny body and his exhausted smiley face. He exchanged a quiet talk, and then he laughed when she spoke to him. He talked to her for a few moments, and he prayed for her then, he left. Hakani told me later about this last talk. It is still in my heart. It stirs up pain and admiration in my soul.
 

Later, Hakani told me, “I found my mother crying. So in order to comfort her I told her, “Mother, are you afraid of dying? It is inevitable for all of us. Be strong, remember God, and ask for his forgiveness.” So, she said to me crying, “My son I do not cry because I am afraid of death, because I know it is inevitable for all of us. I am crying, because I wanted to know what is going to happen to Afghanistan before I die.” I laughed and told her, “Do not worry my mother. God will never let our Jihad and the blood of the martyrs go to waste. Take care of yourself. Remember God and ask for his forgiveness.” (Document page 4)
 

This mother had surprised me and given me confidence that victory is near in the battle of Afghanistan. She also gave confidence in the fate of Islam in Afghanistan. This land and its people will stay as the Islamic force in attacking the world until the Day of Judgment. Islam is safe on this earth which produces women like the Great Mother. This mother was able to give Islam men like Hakani, Isma’il, Ibrahim and Khalil, who can fill the world with belief, courage, and advancement. This wonderful mix of human beings and believers on earth will make Afghanistan on the top of humanity. It will be a strong heaven for Islam on the face of the earth and on top of the world.
 

As darkness fell, they brought my wife to her home. However, they called her again, on August 30th, to attend the funeral of the Great Mother, who died during the night. At the big family home, Wafaa continued to perform her role during the long and sad days. She was there to stop everyone from crying and wailing, as if she was putting out fires. She did not have to work too hard this time because the women were exhausted from crying so much. The men and the women felt like they were orphans after they lost the Great Mother. Even the children were not getting into their usual mischief. Their eyes have gotten bigger in disbelief that they lost the Great Mother.

She never forgot to take care of them even if their parents forgot about them because they were too busy. Even the war caravans that left from the desert square that faced the immigrants’ houses felt the loss enthusiasm, and they seemed like they were in a funeral processions. This was how I perceived it. I think it was apparent in the eyes of the other men after they lost the Great Mother. She used to supervise all those caravans and she was there to bid them farewell. I asked myself if it’s possible for a weak being like her, with a skinny body and veined palms, and with no weapon except a rosary in her right hand and her short cane in her left hand, to give courage and hope to all those strong men who were fully armed with weapons of war and struggle which they hold with their rough, strong palms and muscular shoulders and backs.

Where does this weak woman get her strength? And how can she flood this huge gathering of strong and rough men who were armed with weapons of death which they played with as children play with a wooden dummy? In spite of all that, they were so attached to this weak being in order to get, from her, a prayer, a blessing and hope for a victory over the enemy. Why do I feel like an orphan again after I passed the age of 45? Why does this square of greatness, where countless military campaigns have been launched, now seem like a huge cemetery waiting for the corpses?

The caravans that used to shake my inner feelings in the past, have now become meaningless, cold and routine, in my opinion. There is no happiness in life and no fear in death. They have become the same. The death of Isma’il and his mother in the past few days has renewed in me sorrows which are less than two years old. In one year, I lost three of the most beloved people in my life, my friend ‘Abd Al-Rhaman, my son Khalid and my friend and brother, Abd Al-Mnan, who was the leader of Alkutshi. However, God’s blessings have been placed upon me as it was placed upon others like Hakani and his brothers. We’ve had several victories this year until it was stopped with the conquering of the city of Khost and then, in less than six months, we conquered Kabul. In less than two years, communism fell.

Submitted by a Mujahid

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