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The Arrest: Just Five Minutes
On one of the coldest nights in Damascus, Wednesday, December 31, 1980, I kept awake while my roommates drifted to sleep. I spent half the night struggling to stay awake, struggling to understand the sentences in my Sharia textbook, and struggling to absorb information for my final exam in the morning. The winter chill, my sleepy eyes, and my cozy mattress fought against my will to stay awake, against my ability to concentrate and comprehend the words I read. My mattress called me to its comfort and warmth. Somehow, I resisted.

I stared at the words in my book. Scenes from the past swirled in my mind. My stomach cramped. The memories came back blurry and elusive, but still I could no longer study, still I could no longer sleep.

I spent the entire first semester at the University of Sharia living in this anxiety. When the semester ended, I went back to Hama, my city, to spend my break between semesters with my family and loved ones. During the visit, my mother surprised me with a request.

“Heba, your brother wants me to talk to you. He wants me to convince you to drop your courses and leave the country right away. He wants you to go to Amman as soon as possible.”

Safwan, my brother, fled to Amman, Jordan, several months ago, seeking refuge from the Syrian government who accused him of being a member of the Ikhwan, an outlawed opposition group.

“I’m afraid the Mukhabarat will arrest my sister instead of me. I’m afraid they’ll take her as a hostage,” Safwan told my mother when she visited him in Amman.

I knew that Syria’s secret service police, the Mukhabarat, commonly held hostages in place of wanted members of the political resistance, but still Safwan’s worries sounded unreasonable to me. I never in my life imagined that his fears might be justified.

“Sorry mama. I just don’t see why I need to go.”

My break ended and I returned to Damascus to begin the second semester at university. My roommates and I renewed the lease on our apartment in Al-Baramka. I immersed myself in my second semester courses and began to forget my brother’s warnings. But I couldn’t completely forget, for the atmosphere around me began to change. I began to feel unsafe. Armed men and search blockades, like I had seen in Hama, appeared throughout Damascus and quickly spread to our campus. Security officers appeared at the doors of our university and demanded to see identifications. Whispered rumours spread throughout the campus about the arrest, imprisonment and even murder of many members of the resistance movement.

Day by day, the situation deteriorated. Soon the sounds of gunfire and explosions became an everyday occurrence in Damascus. Newscasts and newspapers could no longer keep up with their reports of every “criminal” hideout the police raided, of every “criminal” the police arrested, and of every “criminal” the police shot dead. In the midst of all the chaos, and as every heart in Damascus filled with fear, I felt the danger inch closer and closer toward me.