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Al-Ahram Weekly 18 - 24 February 1999 Issue No. 417 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 18 - 24 February 1999 Issue No. 417
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Features Special Travel Living Sports People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters The hero returns
By Amira Howeidy
It is close to sunset on 10 February and dozens of children are playing in the sandy courtyard outside one of the houses of the El-Sawarka tribe in Al-Arish. Although a member of the tribe had died in the morning, the children had reason to be cheerful. Their hero, Mahmoud El-Sawarka, had just returned from Israel -- "The enemy!" they shout.
"He's my uncle. He killed hundreds of Israelis a long time ago and was a spy for Egypt. Now he's back," boasts a 10-year-old boy before running off.
This was only an hour after 74-year-old El-Sawarka, the oldest and longest-serving Egyptian prisoner of war in Israel, had crossed the Egyptian-Israeli border and then been driven to his hometown of Al-Arish.
Sporting a crisp white galabiya and a new pair of white running shoes, El-Sawarka is presented with a white Uqal (traditional Arab head-dress) and then poses for the cameras.
"Hold your arms up to thank God!"; "Kiss the sand of Sinai!"; "Now kiss your daughter! Give your wife a hug!" yell the photographers. The questions are asked over and over again, and the answers repeated. "I am happy to be home. I can't believe it... I want to thank the president," he tells reporters as he holds up photographs of President Hosni Mubarak.
Surrounded by dozens of relatives and reporters, El-Sawarka tried to encapsulate 22 years of imprisonment in a few sentences. Inevitably his words seem disordered and weary.
Over two decades ago, El-Sawarka was an active member of the underground Sinai Organisation, which staged resistance operations against Israeli forces at that time occupying Sinai. His most important operation, he says, was blowing up a bus carrying 51 Israeli soldiers.
In 1978, El-Sawarka was arrested, put on trial in Israel and given four life sentences. "I did kill a lot of Israelis, but they killed more of us. I haven't forgotten [Israel's air strike on] Bahr Al-Baqar [school in 1970, killing 119]. Their tears and last breaths are still in my heart," he told Al-Ahram Weekly.
"I did kill a lot of Israelis, but they killed more... I haven't forgotten Bahr Al-Baqar" says El-Sawarka
So how does a man who has spent a lifetime imprisoned in Israel, where he was considered a criminal, view today's peace process? El-Sawarka is ready with an answer. "Peace? What peace? What about the Golan Heights, Jerusalem, southern Lebanon? Where is Palestine?" he says. "If there is any peace, it's a cold one. Otherwise, how can one explain the presence of significant numbers of Israeli troops along the southern border with Egypt?"
He adds, "As long as [Israeli Prime Minister] Netanyahu is there, peace will never be achieved," he declares. "Netanyahu doesn't want peace, he only wants to win more land... If anything, he is destroying Israel." The late Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, who was assassinated by a Jewish extremist three years ago, was a "man of peace", says El-Sawarka with a nod, "which is why he was killed."
El-Sawarka's eyes blaze with anger and his relaxed tone suddenly turns bitter as he recounts the many years spent locked up in Israel's Shikma prison in the coastal city of Ashkelon.
"Before I was sent to prison in 1978, Israeli intelligence officers interrogated me for 75 days in an attempt to force me into giving them the names of my comrades," he says. "I refused and they tortured me... But this was a long time ago... I remember how they placed me on a chair which had long spikes and nails on its entire surface. They handcuffed me and made me sit on this chair and the nails went through my body. I continued to refuse to make a confession, so they brought in a huge dog which came very close to me and licked my entire face to frighten me. I bit the dog's tongue with my teeth and it started barking in pain... This provoked the Israelis and six of them started beating me everywhere, especially in my stomach which swelled up: as a result my navel burst open."
He continues his account of his mistreatment: "My teeth got broken as well as many of my bones... They placed me in a refrigerator and then poured boiling water on me... Even after I was sent to prison this continued. I was placed in solitary confinement for eight years. The door of my cell opened only twice a day: to bring in food and to let me go to the rest-room. So I hardly saw sunlight. Then they turned me into a guinea pig as they brought medical students to operate on my stomach which was in bad shape because of the torture... They performed six operations until they almost tore me to pieces... As a result of the complications and ill-treatment, I could hardly eat... For 12 years, they served me only eggs and powdered milk. That is all I ate."
Thanks to a strike by the 550 Arab prisoners in Shikma prison, who had learnt of his suffering, El-Sawarka was spared solitary confinement.
"But I had lost all my strength. I became virtually handicapped. I could hardly eat with my hands because my bones were broken. I had to be carried from one place to another.. Only two years ago, anyone who saw me would have thought I was dying... and I thought I was but thanks to God I am better now," he says.
The plight of El-Sawarka only came to public attention in 1996 when the Egyptian Organisation for Human Rights (EOHR) launched a campaign on behalf of Egyptian POWs who had been killed or tortured in the 1956, 1967 and 1973 wars. Ironically, the campaign was triggered by reports in the Israeli press based on the testimony of a former Israeli army officer who confessed to committing crimes against Egyptian POWs during the conflicts. Human rights groups immediately launched a campaign and demanded that compensation be paid to the POWs or their families. The names of Egyptian prisoners of war held in Israel, such as El-Sawarka, were first published at around this time. Campaigners focused mainly on his ill-health, citing the testimony of eye-witnesses who were with him in prison.
Mohamed Bassiouni, Egypt's ambassador to Israel, told the Weekly that the embassy "was in communication with the Egyptian prisoners in Israel, especially El-Sawarka, even before 1991." However, he said that an official request for El-Sawarka's release was never made to avoid a possible counter-request from the Israelis for the release of their prisoners held in Egypt, such as Azam Azam who in 1997 began a life sentence for espionage.
Following his release, El-Sawarka was interviewed by an EOHR representative. "His testimony shows the deterioration in the situation of the Egyptian and Arab prisoners in Israel... whose basic human rights have been violated," said an EOHR statement. It described these practices as "an organised policy which violates international human rights conventions, especially the anti-torture agreements."
According to El-Sawarka, there are nine other Egyptians still held in Israel, four of whom have court orders for their release. "Israel is keeping them because it wants a price in return," he says. There has been speculation as to whether any conditions were attached to El-Sawarka's release; many believe that Israel expects Egypt to respond by freeing Azam. Officials deny this, as does El-Sawarka. "I was about to be released three years ago, but Azam was arrested and this delayed my case. However, I refuse to be exchanged for a spy. He has to spend 22 years behind bars and has to be treated in the same way before he wins his freedom. He has to go through what I went through," says El-Sawarka.
El-Sawarka's misfortunes were not confined to his prison cell. When he was arrested in 1978 he had spent 17 days honeymooning with his young bride, Aisha. "We only stayed together for these few days and then he was gone," Aisha told the Weekly. "I was the only bride in Al-Arish faced with such a situation." During their brief time together Aisha became pregnant, and nine months later gave birth to Samira, who is today 21-years-old. Mother and daughter had to rely financially on Aisha's father. "The government did not offer us any money at any stage... Even when I visited my husband in prison last year, the governorate gave me only LE300, and I had to sell my gold in order to cover the expenses," she says. Last year's visit was the first time Samira had met her father. "It was a strange feeling, but I knew I was going to see him again and hug him -- I just knew it," she says with a smile.
Now that he is back, what next? "I will live my remaining days with my family on what the government will give me," El-Sawarka says with a sigh. The "hero", however, has been promised only a Bedouin house that will be built by the local chapter of the National Democratic Party, said a source at the North Sinai Governorate. What about financial support? "The NDP general secretariat has got him a job," the source said.
Photos: Khaled El-Fiqi
