A matter of honour

Since the American invasion in 2003, Iraqi women have fallen victims of sectarian violence. A recent report by the Observer shows that victims of “honour killings” increased by 70 per cent in Basra, from 47 in 2007 to 81 in 2008, and yet a lot goes unreported. Huda, 21, from Basra speaks for the first time about her experience witnessing her sister’s abduction and honour killing. Basma Rose reports.

“Yasmine was not only my sister, she was like my mother, my best friend. Everything. I still remember the day she was kidnapped. I want to forget it, but I can’t. September 2005. I was 17-years-old and Yasmine was only 19. That’s when it all happened.

My mother had cooked food for my uncle and his wife who lived just across the road from us. They had just got married, and my mother sent Yasmine to take the food to them. Yasmine did as she was told, but a minute or two after she left, all I heard was gun shots. A group of men came into our neighbourhood, all who had their faces covered, and they were just shooting whoever they saw. I fell to the ground because it sounded so near. I went underneath the table.

My mother came running into the room I was in and hid underneath the table with me. Holding me. All she kept saying was ‘Yasmine is outside. Yasmine is out there.’ I couldn’t speak. I was crying because I feared for the same thing. I could feel my mother’s heart beating so fast and that was making me feel even more nervous. We were hearing men and women scream outside, and the more screaming we heard the more we held on to each other and the more we cried. I couldn’t bare to hear anymore so I put my hands over my ears, but I still heard everything. I just hoped my sister was safe. That she was hiding somewhere. That nothing had happened to her.

“The relief I felt knowing my sister was alive did not last for long. My father dropped to the floor. ‘My honour,’ he kept shouting. ‘These people have taken our honour.’”

All of a sudden the shooting stopped, but the screaming continued. We heard the front door get knocked down but it was only my father and my uncle. As soon as we heard them calling for our names, me and my mother both went running to them. The first thing my mother asked my uncle: ‘Did Yasmine make it to your house.’ She was holding on to his clothes and shaking him, she wanted an immediate answer, but my uncle said she didn’t come. At that moment my heart fell to the ground. My chest felt so tight, I felt as though I couldn’t breathe anymore. My head was spinning. I just watched my parents run outside with my uncle to see if they could find her. But I stood still.

Eventually, I found the courage and walked to the front door. I went outside to see the worst sight of my life. My neighbour’s child had been shot in the head. He laid there, blood just coming out from him. His mother was just screaming. He was only six. I ran back inside and locked the door and ran straight into my room which I shared with Yasmine. I sat in her bed, hugging my knees, and crying. I just wanted to see her again. I wanted her to be safe. Alive.

It had gotten dark, and I started to get worried about my parents. The police and an ambulance were outside by then, but I was still scared that another raid was going to happen. I heard the door open and I just jumped out of my sister’s bed and ran to the front door hoping to see her.

But I didn’t. It was only my parents and my two older brothers who were at my [other] uncle’s house. I knew from the look on their face, she was dead.

We did not go to sleep at all that night. I don’t think anyone in the neighbourhood did. But it was around five or six in the morning my brother noticed a letter that came through the door. We didn’t know when exactly it came through, but he read the letter and shouted: ‘Yasmine’s alive!’ I ran to him crying and laughing hysterically. The relief I felt knowing my sister was alive did not last for long. He read the letter out loud to all of us, and my father dropped to the floor. ‘My honour,’ he kept shouting. ‘These people have taken our honour.’ My mother kept hitting her head against the wall. I just stood still watching the two strongest people I know, destroyed.

My sister was kidnapped and the criminals wanted a $10,000 ransom to give her back. She was kidnapped because she was a Shia Muslim. They did not target her specifically. We are a Shia neighbourhood. Those people knew that whoever they got their hands on is not a Sunni. My parents had 48 hours to get the money and put it in a bag outside the back door of the mosque that was ten minutes away from our house. My mother gave all that she owned to my father, and my father sold everything. Everything we owned, and with the help of my uncles, we had $10,000 dollars ready. My father and uncles went to where they were told in the letter, on a Thursday, and we just waited.

Those two days were the longest days of my life. It felt longer than two days. According to my brothers, people started talking about my sister. They were wondering why she was not at home and assumed that she had run away. My brothers got into a few fights and really hurt themselves for defending Yasmine. Respectable girls live with their parents until they are married. They are not allowed to stay the night outside their parent’s house or anyone not related. They did not understand that she was kidnapped. They asked questions we did not know the answer to. Why did they kidnap Yasmine? Why just Yasmine and not Huda? Ignorance, that’s what it was. I was so angry at them. By not supporting us through a difficult time, instead they made it worse. My father did not speak a word for those two days, and neither did my mother. They just waited, and so did I.

“My father told her to stop talking. Gradually his voice got louder, and that’s when I wished my sister had died during the raid rather than suffer this”

My sister finally appeared. When my brother opened the door, my sister did not look like my sister. Her face was destroyed. It was clear that she was beaten up. Her cheek looked as if it was going to explode because it was that swollen. You could hardly see her beautiful hazel eyes because of the bruise around it. She was hurt really, really bad. My brother got her inside not saying a word to her. I didn’t understand his reaction. I was so happy to see her I cried and ran to hug her. She pushed me away and ran to our room. She lay on her bed shivering. My parents came running after her and they were shocked to see the state of her. My father had tears in his eyes and came closer and closer to her. He pulled her up to hug her first and she just let her tears pour out. She kept saying to him: ‘I swear it wasn’t my fault.’ My mother just looked at her as if disgusted to see her alive.

My father asked her what had happened and she told him everything. She told him that she went out as my mother asked her to take some food to my uncle’s house. She was about to cross the road and a car came driving at a very fast speed and started to shoot at her. She ran as fast as she could away from the car to come back home, but a man came running up towards her, caught her and got her in his car. He punched her until she was knocked out.

The next thing she knew she woke up in a house with three other girls. She didn’t know any. They were all crying for help until seven or eight men came into the room. She said they grabbed the girl sitting next to her by the hair and took her out with them. She and the other two girls fell silent. They could hear the other girl scream ‘get off me’. She kept screaming that repeatedly, and she had no idea what they were doing to the girl until a man grabbed her. Grabbed Yasmine.

She was dragged into the room where there was a mattress on the floor and the other girl laying there. Yasmine said the other girl was shaking so bad she thought she had been electrocuted. Yasmine said she was breathing so fast that she kept feeling her heart skip a beat. The men threw the other girl out of the room and pushed Yasmine onto the mattress. That’s when three men, three dirty men, raped my sister, my innocent sister, repeatedly. After they finished, Yasmine said they spat at her and kept beating her. Kicking her everywhere. Pulling her by the hair and banging her head against the wall. Yasmine said they kept laughing at her, thinking it was funny.

My father told her to stop talking. Gradually his voice got louder, and that’s when I wished my sister had died during the raid rather than suffer this. He got his belt and beat my sister. My mother told me to get out of the room because I tried to stop my dad. Everyone else was just watching which angered me. It wasn’t her fault! My brother dragged me by the hair and got me out of the room and locked the door behind him. I kept banging on the door, I wanted to help my sister. “Please don’t kill her dad,” I kept shouting. Eventually, I heard nothing. My brother opened the door and slapped me so hard across my face I felt my cheeks burn. “You don’t say a word to no one about this you understand.” My mother said the same thing as she walked out with tears running down her face.

I watched my father sit next to my sister’s body. His belt was around her neck. He just cried. I was hysterical. I held my sister’s body so tight against mine. I hugged her. That’s all I wanted to do when she walked through the door. Hug her. Talk to her. Go back to normal. Like the past two days had never happened. But it just wasn’t as easy as that.

The way our [Iraqi] society thinks is that if a girl gets raped, she brings shame to the family and should be killed. My sister didn’t mean to bring shame to our family. She did not deserve to get killed. She is yet another victim of the war that has shattered my family. I wish society would see it like that. See my sister as an innocent victim that deserved a second chance.”

Some of the names have been changed to protect identity.