A Letter From Abu Ghraib

A letter from Abu Ghraib The following is a letter from the Abu Ghraib prison. Fatima's letter, a hand written document, was recently smuggled out of Abu Ghraib. Fatima is the sister of one of the celebrated Resistance fighters in the area. US occupation forces raided his house some time back but failed to find him, so they took his sister prisoner in an attempt to force him to give himself up. Here is Fatima's letter as originally published in Arabic by Mafkarat al-Islam and translated to English by Muhammad Abu Nasr of Free Arab Voice.

Fatima's Letter: In the name of God, the Merciful, the Mercy-giving. "Say He is God the One; God the Source [of everything]; Not has He fathered, nor has He been fathered; nor is anything comparable to Him." [Qur'an, Surat 112 "al-Ikhlas"] I chose this noble Surah from the Book of God because it has the greatest impact on me and on all of you and it strikes a particular kind of awe in the hearts of Believers. My brother Mujahideen in the path of God! What can I say to you? I say to you: our wombs have been filled with the children of fornication by those sons of apes and pigs who raped us. Or I could tell you that they have defaced our bodies, spit in our faces, and tore up the little copies of the Qur'an that hung around our necks? God is greatest! Can you not comprehend our situation? Is it true that you do not know what is happening to us? We are your sisters. God will be calling you to account [about this] tomorrow. By God, we have not passed one night since we have been in prison without one of the apes and pigs jumping down upon us to rip our bodies apart with his overweening lust. And we are the ones who had guarded our virginity out of fear of God. Fear God! Kill us along with them! Destroy us along with them! Don't leave us here to let them get pleasure from raping us! It will be an act to ennoble the Throne of Almighty God. Fear God regarding us! Leave their tanks and aircraft outside. Come at us here in the prison of Abu Ghurayb. I am your sister in God (Fatimah). They raped me on one day more than nine times. Can you comprehend? Imagine one of your sisters being raped. Why can't you all imagine it, as I am your sister? With me are 13 girls, all unmarried. All have been raped before the eyes and ears of everyone. They won't let us pray. They took our clothes and won't let us get dressed. As I write this letter one of the girls has committed suicide. She was savagely raped. A soldier hit her on her chest and thigh after raping her. He subjected her to unbelievable torture. She beat her head against the wall of the cell until she died, for she couldn't take any more, even though suicide is forbidden in Islam. But I excuse that girl. I have hope that God will forgive her, because He is the Most Merciful of all. Brothers, I tell you again, fear God! Kill us with them so that we might be at peace. Help! Help! Help! [Wa Mu'atasima!]

Fatima is dead. Fatimah’s eldest brother, who is one of the mujahideen whom the occupation forces are searching for, spoke in the mosque Thursday at the nighttime prayer said “Praise be to God” with tears in his eyes. Everyone in the mosque witnessed him saying ‘Oh God take her soul! Oh God this is a shame so please cleanse it!' ... Then after the prayer, one of the worshippers came up to him and remonstrated him for saying, ‘Oh God this is a shame so please cleanse it!’ The man told him, ‘Say rather, this is an honor, so raise it up and honor it. It is we about whom the word shame should be used, not Fatimah. She is the most honorable, purest, and cleanest of girls. I ask you for her hand in marriage after she gets out of prison, God willing.’ The neighbor went on, saying, “Fatimah’s brother and his fighting detachment carried out more than 50 rocket attacks on the prison before and after her letter came out. Every day they would hunt down a car or two belonging to the occupation forces. His name became famous among them in this area.." Fatima's elder brother organized a hundred men and launched an attack on the prison; Fatima was struck fatally in the head during the bombardment and died on December 21, 2004. The case of Fatima is not unique; many Iraqi women have sent messages begging loved ones to ‘please kill us all.’ U.S. guards are perpetrating systemic abuse and torture against Iraqi women who are held in indefinite detention without charge; this is happening not just at Abu Ghraib but all across Iraq. In my opinion, the rape of Fatima was one universal rape of all women of this world that cuts across all races, colors, ideologies and creeds. Join me in this one simple demand to the U.S. Senate and Congress: Release the hundreds of photographs and videotapes from Abu Ghraib that have been shown to members of the Senate but remain classified. Let the American people see and hear men being tortured, children being sodomized and women being raped by their US guards and interrogators, and then decide for themselves whether these methods are consistent with a democracy. American women activists, where are you?! Please bring Fatimah's story to the attention of your Congress(wo?)men and Senators and speak up for women's dignity in Iraq.