Testimony from Cell No. 13 at Mezzeh Military Airport

At the beginning of the revolution, the Mezzeh Military Airport prison in Damascus was the most prominent detention center, but there was no media coverage revealing what was happening inside. Detainees were dying by the dozens, and their bodies were left piled on top of each other until special trucks arrived to transport them.

In these cells, there were political detainees who had been incarcerated for years—that is, they had been imprisoned "before the revolution" on political charges.

Nawras Salem, a survivor of the Mezzeh detention center, says, "In Cell 13, the detainees weren't praying to God to save them from prison as much as they were praying that the jailer Abu Shaib's shift wouldn't be on."

He continues, "When his shift began, even the elderly would sit weeping, bidding farewell to the younger ones. The mere mention of his name was enough to make a room full of detainees tremble with fear."

At the start of his shift, he would enter the cell shouting, "Attention!" Everyone was required to be in a prostration position, facing the wall. Then he would search for the heaviest detainee to begin beating him, until his voice sounded almost like his insides were being torn apart.

His nights never passed without a torture party. He would choose a random group and order them to howl until morning. Anyone who stopped would be hit with the green hose.

He enjoyed gathering fathers and sons, or brothers and brothers, and torturing them in front of each other. Just hearing his name would turn the detainees' faces pale and trembling.

Salem recounts: "Once, we were punished for making a scene. We spent more than five hours between beatings, whipping, waterboarding, kicking, and insults. There was a young man with us named Abu Abdullah Al-Karki, who whispered to me, 'If the doctor comes, don't tell him I'm sick or need a hospital.'"

The next day, the doctor came in asking, "Who's having a heart attack?" One of them pointed to Abu Abdullah. The doctor replied, "Bring that dog, I'll wake him up."

A few days later, on a dark night, Abu Shaib came in dragging a half-dead man behind him. His body was emaciated, his hands swollen, his teeth broken, his face burned by a candle, and his stench was foul. He was Abu Abdullah himself. He came home from the hospital bearing signs of torture from which he had never recovered. Just three days later, his comrades carried him out, wrapped in a blanket. Abu Shaib greeted him with a kick to the face and said, "Didn't you just die, brother...?"

Nawras Salem concluded his testimony: "This is the bare minimum. Abu Shaib was the nightmare of Cell 13, and his name alone was enough to sow death in people's eyes."

Zaman Al-Wasl