{"id":31208,"date":"2026-08-28T18:19:00","date_gmt":"2026-08-28T18:19:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/?p=31208"},"modified":"2026-08-28T18:19:00","modified_gmt":"2026-08-28T18:19:00","slug":"memories-of-the-days-i-spent-in-prison-under-the-rule-of-the-godless-baath-party","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/memories-of-the-days-i-spent-in-prison-under-the-rule-of-the-godless-baath-party\/","title":{"rendered":"Memories of the Days I Spent in Prison Under the Rule of the Godless Ba’ath Party"},"content":{"rendered":"

Memories of the Days I Spent in Prison Under the Rule of the Godless Ba’ath Party<\/strong><\/h1>\n

Haydari Nazar<\/strong><\/p>\n

55<\/strong><\/p>\n

Peace be upon you.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

This prison is somewhat luxurious by comparison (one of the brothers posted a picture of a prison on WhatsApp and commented on it, which stirred my sadness, so I wrote this.)<\/strong><\/h3>\n

I was imprisoned in the old Ministry of Defense.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

At night, the room might contain as many as 70 prisoners, and during the day around 30.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

There was half a barrel in the middle of the room serving as a toilet.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

There were many different kinds of insects.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

The bedding was scarce and extremely dirty.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

We slept in three shifts because the room was so small.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

There was an air-exhaust fan in the wall that brought air from the kitchen into the prison, carrying the smells of food into the prison.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

This was done to torment the prisoners, because everyone was hungry.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

They took away my clothes and left me wearing only pajamas and underwear.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Those who did not wear pajamas under their trousers were left in their underwear.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

And anyone who did not wear underwear had to remain naked.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Then they shaved our hair completely, down to the skin.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Drinking water was restricted to one cup and no more.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Anyone who was in pain would be left outside in the cold at night, naked.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Outside the prison, in the yard, there was a wooden beam, and at all times one of the prisoners was hanging from it.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

A small fire was lit beneath his feet. He would lift his feet, then become exhausted and lower them, only to have them burned, so he would lift them again.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Everyone suffered from severe skin itching.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

One of the guards, a Sunni man from Samawah, would bring a radio and secretly tune it to Tehran Radio at night, keeping the volume very low.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Everyone could hear the news from Iran.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

The Sunni prisoners treated us well.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

The Shi’a were afraid.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

The use of salt was forbidden in the prison.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

The prisoners ate at three o’clock in the afternoon, and there was only lunch\u2014no breakfast and no dinner.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Most meals consisted of rice and broth containing a large amount of fine gravel mixed in with the rice.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Crawling insects would be moving through the broth.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Anyone who refused to eat was beaten.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Every day, the prisoners were taken out at ten in the morning and kept outside until two-thirty in the afternoon.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

A human beast from Tikrit or Ramadi, belonging to the ruling party, would come and take pleasure in torturing the prisoners.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

He would ask a question, and you had to answer.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

If the answer was wrong, you would receive 30 lashes with a military belt\u2014a beating with a heavy belt.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

And if the answer was correct, the beast would strike you once on the head with his stick.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

The toilet barrel would be brought out and emptied in the middle of the yard in the morning.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Then one of the guards would order the prisoners to run or walk through the filth.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Sometimes you would fall into the mud, and the whip would quickly come down on you, while they ordered you to continue walking.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

The strangest thing I witnessed in that prison was seeing young men from northern Iraq who were Shi’a, and others from southern Iraq\u2014from Basra and Samawah\u2014who were Sunni.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

And the handsome young men were subjected to abuse openly in front of the other prisoners.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

I was the only one who prayed.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

They would tell me, ‘Don’t pray, for fear for your life.’<\/strong><\/h3>\n

And I would say, ‘I was imprisoned because of prayer.’<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Because I was in a military session of the party, and there was little time left before the afternoon prayer.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

So I prayed, and the political guidance officer saw me praying. He called me, but I did not answer him.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Then he called me again, but I did not answer him.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

The next day he said, ‘I called you during the meeting, but you did not answer me.’<\/strong><\/h3>\n

I said, ‘I had a superior officer who ordered me, so I answered him.’<\/strong><\/h3>\n

He said, ‘Who was he?’ I said, ‘God Almighty.’ He then insulted God and insulted me and ordered that I be sent to prison.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

By God, there is no god but Him.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

The best days of my life were the days I spent in prison, because of the reward they brought me and the closeness to God I experienced.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

I felt that God was with me, with me\u2014He heard me in my fear and my silence.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

He encouraged me and motivated me to<\/strong><\/h3>\n

answer. And to challenge them.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

It is not like now, when I have become distant.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Praise be to God, Lord of the Worlds, and may blessings and peace be upon Muhammad and his purified family.<\/strong><\/h3>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Memories of the Days I Spent in Prison Under the Rule of the Godless Ba’ath Party Haydari Nazar 55 Peace be upon you. This prison is somewhat luxurious by comparison (one of the brothers posted a picture of a prison on WhatsApp and commented on it, which stirred my sadness, so I wrote this.) I …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":31209,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1526],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-31208","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","","category-miscellaneous-articles-"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31208","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31208"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31208\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31210,"href":"https:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31208\/revisions\/31210"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31209"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31208"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31208"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wilayah.info\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31208"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}