I was overwhelmed with gratitude and thanked him for the love.
We could hear the two new Shabiha coming long before they entered our cell—not because of their footsteps or those of the guards, but because they were being tortured the whole way. We sat silently listening to their screaming; as they were ushered toward the cell it didn’t sound like they went a single step without the cord flogging them across their backs. We heard both men on the ground outside the entrance to the room, being whipped repeatedly and without mercy. Then the door opened and they were thrown in.
“They look like thieves,” the Moroccan whispered in my ear.
And he was right. They did look like thieves—both were dressed in tight, tacky black outfits like something from a cheesy eighties movie. One of the men was covered in jailhouse tats that looked like they’d been done in crayon by a six-year-old; healed up inside his cheekbone was a bullet from being shot in the face. They were Syrian-born Palestinians, raised in the ghetto among their own people, who were still loyal to the regime.
The men sat against the wall catching their breaths as the call to prayer sounded and we all lined up. At first I thought the Palestinians passed on the prayer because they weren’t religious, but the Moroccan explained to me that it was because they were both filthy from being beaten on the floor, and to pray in such a state was haram. After prayer, the soldiers pooled some of their extra clothes for them to change into and welcomed our new cellmates into the circle.
When the next set of Shabiha joined us it was worse—much worse. We heard one lash falling after another and two different screams roaring out, all directly outside our door. We heard others being tortured often, and every time we did I would look around the room at all the men’s faces. It was the only time I remember seeing Fatr without a smile on his face; he would sit with his arms around his knees staring at the floor with this blank expression. We all knew we were safe for the moment, but it didn’t spare us from feeling the pain of others. The only person who seemed unfazed was Theo, who would just sit there stroking his mustache with two fingers. It was something that not only I noticed—some of the other men did too, and they took great offense at it.
This time, when the jihadis had finally finished, we heard the padlock open and turned to the wall. A second later the two men hit the floor inside the cell and we were given permission to turn around by the Wolfman, who was practically foaming at the mouth with rage. He told us our new cellmates were Shabiha and that we were not to speak to them or go near them at all, but as soon as the door closed, several of the soldiers ran over to help the injured men.
These two were also Palestinians—neither one looked older than twenty, but they both looked broken. One of them, Norie, who was cute as a button when he wasn’t face down in agony, was an ex-con like the last two Shabiha. His hands were tied behind his back so tightly that tears poured from his eyes. A couple of soldiers untied the men’s wrists to get the blood flowing again and then loosely tied them back up. Eventually someone came by the cell and gave us permission to untie them, and as soon as we did Norie’s friend lifted his shirt.
“Oh my God,” I said. “I’ve never seen anything like that in my life.”
All over his back were dozens of purple welt marks the exact dimension of the PVC piping they’d beaten him with. It looked like the Shabiha had been used as piñatas and their interrogators had been dead set on breaking them open. Norie’s back wasn’t as bad, but his arm was worse, and any attempt to move it made him cry out in pain.
“He thinks his arm is broken,” the Moroccan translated, after he hurried over to play doctor with the first aid kit Obeida had provided for the room.
While Abdelatif was with his patient, a third prisoner was thrown into the cell, and when the Wolfman saw the Moroccan treating Norie he went ballistic and promised to punish him. Drowning in fear, Abdelatif immediately jumped to his feet and handed the Wolfman the first aid kit, apologizing and begging for mercy, saying he was only fulfilling his Hippocratic oath. This calmed the beast and a second later the door closed again and we were alone.
After someone untied our newest arrival he lifted his shirt, and what I saw made the injuries of the previous two look like nothing. Instead of dozens of pipe-sized welts there was just one—and it took up his entire back.
“Oh my God, it looks like The Passion of the Christ,” I remarked in shock.
No matter how out of his mind the Moroccan had already proved to be, the more time that passed, the more insane captivity seemed to be making him. He was now fighting constantly with everyone in the room, and trying to unite all the Sunnis—which meant him and the Shabiha—into a katiba, with the hopes they’d be released to fight on the jihadis’ side. I fought with him more than anyone, but for the sake of all in the room did my best to uphold the peace in between disputes. He claimed to have “racial superiority” over all of us, and the good treatment we were getting had clearly gone to his head. One evening, Abdelatif hobbled up to the entrance and spoke adamantly to Obeida, who nodded and then closed the door.
“What’d you say?” I asked.
“I told him I wanna file a
