Personal notes

Personal notes from the torture chamber …
Thanks to digital cameras, millions of people around the world were instantly able to see the gruesome images of the Iraqi prisoners’ torture. However, in spite of the impressive delivery speed that relayed what happened inside the prison, those images were still only snapshots-pictures that are devoid of the context that only human eyes and minds can record and convey.
For me, there wasn’t any camera in the Egyptian torture chamber. But after 35 years the deep physical and emotional pain and its tragic details remain vivid in my memory . The year was 1968, when I was a freshman at Cairo High School. Israel had delivered a humiliating defeat to the Egyptian armed forces in what became known as the “6-day war.” Anti-government protesters were in the streets. I was too young to grasp the serious political implication of the event. Like most students my age, I was glad that classes were canceled that day.
Thousands of students poured into the streets from schools all over Cairo, but after shouting a few anti-government slogans, I moved away from the crowd to a side street in the affluent Garden City suburb. As I was looking for a short cut to get home, I lost my way in the confusing city streets. I was rounded up by the Egyptian secret police (The Mukhabarat), who were zealously trying to fill their daily quota of random arrests.
I was lined up with more students along with common criminals. A tall handsome police colonel standing at the front started shouting the worst kind of profanities at us, his harsh words quickly extended to our families and parents. Without thinking and in a fearful voice I mumbled, “my parent did nothing wrong.” Unfortunately, the colonel overheard my soft protest; what happened after that has changed my life forever and shattered my faith in authority; my innocence was tarnished forever.
The angry police colonel stopped his verbal humiliation and without looking at me, he ordered one of his guards to take me away to … “the room.” The guard knew exactly where to take me; inside the prison, it was a small dark smelly windowless cold room, naked room stripped out of any human sign, the dark silence in the room seemed as if it has witnessed lots of broken souls.
Shortly, the colonel entered the room, where he calmly and without uttering a word or acknowledging my presence, closed the door, picked up a big riot stick and started hitting me savagely and indiscriminately. I stood helplessly overwhelmed by the colonel’s outrage; the severity of the beating escalated, until my skin start peeling off my body before my own eyes. I lost my feeling and any connection to my body; my confusing thoughts were trapped with no place to go.
I wasn’t trying to be a hero, I couldn’t muster any words, I couldn’t scream or resist. I couldn’t understand the colonel’s anger and outrage, but I knew he had a free hand to do to me whatever he pleased in that room. He didn’t ask about my name, he never looked me in the eyes, he never explained my crime. I was reduced to a nameless, faceless object, as I stood motionless and void of any rights or expression.
I wasn’t the usual suspect -- a communist, a Jihadist or a government agitator. This wasn’t a national security issue, it was personal insecurity issue; The Colonel, unaccustomed to the slightest challenge, needed to break my will. He wanted me to beg for mercy, he needed a complete conquest.
My silence was deafening, and as the colonel grew more infuriated, he started getting more creative in his abuse. His relentless physical torture made his early verbal profanity seem like a friendly conversation. There is nothing more humiliating than unjust physical abuse; I couldn’t resist or retaliate, his savage hitting destroyed my ability to express my pain. At the time, I wished he would mix his severe beating with some verbal humiliation.
After what seemed like an eternity, the beating suddenly stopped, and without saying a word, the colonel stormed out of the torture room, he couldn’t stay and face his unbroken victim. I found myself standing alone licking my wounds, only to realize for the first time that the guard who brought me to the room was still there; he was standing in the corner wiping his tears. His display of sadness brought a much-needed touch of humanity to the torture chamber.
I often wondered how my brief confrontation with this colonel could generate so much fury against a helpless young boy. He was not following any orders; he was the whole chain of command. I now realize we were both victims. I was a victim of unjust violence and abuse. He was a victim of his sadistic obsession with violence and his intoxication with power. I was physically paralyzed for weeks. He was morally paralyzed for life. There wasn’t any digital camera to tell what happened inside the torture room that day; all these years, my own memory has had to carry the entire load … alone; … this is the real torture.

Ahmed Tharwat

Producer/Host of the Arab American TV Show Belahdan
Minnetonka, MN