My name is Abdullah Ayoub. I am from Hawija, Iraq.
In 2014, ISIS soldiers came to my town, killing anyone who resisted. Torture was common, beheadings were routine; their sheiks said they’d bring us heaven, but brought us only hell.
It was at the hands of ISIS that I lived through the two worst days of my life.
–
The first began the morning my wife left for market.
Less and less food was making through the front lines into the market stalls. So I was concerned about the amount of food my wife would be able to bring home.
That should have been the least of my worries.
There was a commotion in the neighbourhood, I could hear people shouting outside our home. I came to understand that Daesh were about to execute someone and that everyone should go to the town square to witness.
There, in view of a baying mob, they held my wife.
A Daesh commander was explaining that the prophet had strictly forbid red clothing, that anyone who disobeyed had to be cleansed.
I rushed to prevent the execution, but guards kept me away. The best I could do was make sure the children didn’t see. Then, before my very eyes, they shot her in the head.
–
The second was two years later.
I had chosen to stay in Hawija for the sake of our two twin boys, but as the Iraqi Army closed in and began to shell the town, the situation became unbearable.
We had to escape.
I managed to get hold of some sleeping pills from a friend. In the evening, I crushed them up and put them in some milk for my sons. They drank it and I waited for the chemicals to take effect.
When they were asleep, I put my sons on my shoulders, and headed out into the night. My plan was to sneak out towards the Iraqi Army, but it would not be easy. For Daesh had given their snipers orders to shoot any civilians feeling the city, and as I rushed through the dark city streets, one fired at me.
The bullet ripped through my shoulder, one of my boys had been hit. By the time I found cover, it was too late, my son had died. But I couldn’t stop, religious law dictates a body must be buried very quickly after death, so in the rubble and the darkness, I dug a grave by hand and lay my son in it.
–
It was dawn by the time I made it to the Iraqi Army positions just outside the city.
I was mentally shattered, there was no sense of victory at all. The soldiers rushed to take my other son from me.
But as I sat in the dirt, gulping down water, the soldiers said something that made my heart stop.
“Chest wound, kid was killed instantly”
“Must have been a sniper as they fled”
The horrific realization.
I had buried my son alive.