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Bahraini Doctors: A Thorn to the Regime- part 6- Sitra’s Long Day
2011-07-30 - 6:49 am
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 Medical staff in Sitra Health Center carrying martyr Ahmed Farhan's body "We were at the Health Center. We were treating the wounded who were brought in hundreds. We heard terrible screams coming from outside the Health Center. We got ready for something important. A young man came in carrying one of the injured. His steps were heavy. His face was bloodless. His countenance could not fully express the shock on his face. As he entered, screams exploded in the center. I was standing away from the entrance, I only noticed trail of blood that was spilling on his walking line. When the man passed by anyone, that one would cry, slap their chest, curse, beat their head with their hands or against a wall. Still, he was far from me. I got a glimpse of a piece of something dangling behind the injured's head. I didn't figure out what it was. The young man got closer to me. I approached him to treat the injured. He looked at me momentarily in despair. He continued his way to the other door toward the ambulance. The place got hysteric. No one was able to believe what they saw, neither able to contain themselves. The victim's head was then directly in front of me. I saw the horrible view. I hadn't imagined I would see such a view for my entire life, a head was burst open by bullets. His brain was spilt out. Only skin remained. I totally collapsed"A female doctor remembered. This scene took place in Sitra, and specifically in Sitra Health Center. It was March 15, 2011. The first day of the martial law (National Security Law). The particular event which preceded the scenes at the Health Center was the besieging of Sitra and attacking it by the security forces. To be more specific, the event was the incursion of Peninsula Shield troops into Bahrain. The martyr was Ahmed Farhan (30 years) whose brain spattered. He was shot directly in the head. The young man who carried his body was Monem Mansoor. Monem would be sentenced for three years in prison because he carried Farhan's body. The ambulance arrived at Salmaniya Hospital with Farhan's body at around 3:00 PM(1). The receiving of the body was not different from that at Sitra Health Center. The same shock, self-beating and bewilderment. A female doctor recalled: "We were in a state of mourning. Even the male doctors collapsed and cried loudly. Some women fainted. Nobody dared to see the horrific and ugly scene. Dr. Ali AlEkri shouted hysterically: Treat him, why are you just looking at him? Another replied: Oh, doctor, how can we treat him while he's without a brain". Appreciation of Another Sort The medical staff were no longer outside the event. They became part of it. It was not because the killed and the wounded passed through them, but because they became subjected to dangers in the same way as the peaceful protesters. In the previous part of this report we saw what the medical staff were subjected to; beating and threats for exercising their humanitarian and professional role in treating the wounded and injured. In this part we will see more of punishment, harassment and torture.
Haneen Albosta was a young female doctor. She loved here profession. During her university study she scored the third among young scientists(2) in a competition that was held by the University of Medicine in Ukraine. That is how the international community acclaimed her talents while she was still a student. However, on March 15, 2011, and as a full-fledged doctor, she was waiting for a prize of another sort. The prize was from her own country. Haneen recounted what she had gone through to the Bahraini daily "Al-Wasat", which published her testimony the following day(9). She documented it on the police records when she would be interrogated later. "Bahrain Mirror" got more details from one of Dr. Haneen's relatives. Haneen was at home, she had just come from the medical tent at the Pearl Roundabout. She slept for only few hours. It was 10:30 in the morning. A paramedic phoned her: "Come now, they have attacked Sitra Area". She got up immediately, put on her dress. Her mother tried to stop her, her brother tried too. They yelled at her not to go. She did not care. She prepared her things to leave. The last she heard was her mother's voice calling her. She would know later that her mother lost her conscious after she left. In Salmaniya Hospital she stood waiting for an ambulance to take her to Sitra. A minibus with a wounded entered the hospital. Haneen helped in removing the wounded from the minibus. She got on the minibus, closed the door, and headed to Sitra. When the minibus approached Sitra, she saw that garbage containers and rocks were scattered on the road at the entrance of the area. Those acted a deterrent for security forces when trying to enter. At the Health Center, she saw the wounded lying on the ground, some of them suffering from tear gas suffocation, and some were wounded by gunshots(3). Haneen quickly set to work treating the gunshot cases and moving the ones with larger wounds to the nursing section. A large crowd(4) of people gathered at the entrance of the Center, orming a human chain to organize and facilitate the entry of the cases being received. At the entrance, there was a doctor who quickly triaged the incoming injuries and directed them to the appropriate section of the Center(5). I wouldn't wait for dead bodies to come "It was about noon time, the number of wounded was increasing quickly, we started to smell blood and see more of it. We felt that things started to warm up. We expected the worst" A member of the medical said. It was not long after the mid-day, before the devastating arrival of Farhan's body, that shook the Center and the people who witnessed that arrival. The ambulance left to Salmaniya Hospital with Farhan's body to issue a Death Certificate . For fifteen minutes after that the medical staff were still in a state of bewilderment. Screams prevailed over talk. The shock shrouded the place. Farhan's body kept Haneen shocked for a while. She was silent. Then she screamed: "I wouldn't stay here at the Center and wait for the wounded to come here dead. I'm going where they are. I wouldn't wait for dead bodies to come". She went to one of the paramedics. "I couldn't bear that, take me now, take me there immediately". The paramedic was smoking his cigarette nervously, he took a deep breath, looked at her insisting eyes, and said "Get in". They proceeded toward where the clashes were raging. They were behind the first row of the bare-handed protesters who were face-to-face with the anti-riot police. They started showering rubber bullets. Some of the bullets hit the garbage containers. frightening sounds were heard. The youths kept on shouting: "God is Great". They were increasing in numbers, not decreasing, while advancing closer to the police. The tear gas became denser. Fainting cases increased. The youths dragged the injured toward Haneen. The shooting became more violent and the police aimed their rubber bullets and birds gunshots directly at the protesters(8). With each round of attack the youths jumped into the houses, but then kept returning. "Those young men didn't break, they didn't get tired, attack and retreat" An eyewitness said. A small pickup truck will pick up the falling protesters who would be transported to the ambulance that was waiting in a place far away from the clashes. Officially, ambulances are not allowed to go into the danger zones. During that time, the sirens of coming and going ambulances did not stop screaming. Then the youths got closer to the policemen. The shooting got tenser, and so did the falling of protestors. The paramedic said to Haneen "Let's go, it's become very dangerous here". She replied: “But the youths are falling”. He said: "They will bring them to us". They moved toward the ambulance. In the way, a woman from Sitra area driving a car stopped. She hurriedly shouted: “Get in quickly”. They got in the car. The woman asked Haneen: "Are you a doctor?". She replied: "Yes". So the woman told her about the wounded in one of the houses. They needed treatment, but could not leave because of the security siege. She asked Haneen if she could help. Haneen was carrying the first aids kit. They all went there. Touching Death.. The injured was hit by birds gunshot in the face. Haneen closed the wounds. The young injured quickly wanted to finish his treatment and go out to join the protesters. It was late afternoon, and he police SUVs were surrounding the house. The house owners closed the door and switched off the lights. All of them sat in the salon in a horrifying silence. "We heard each others' breathing" Haneen said. She took a small notebook from her bag and started writing. “I felt it was the end”. The day's events were reeling before her eyes. She remembered her mother's face who screamed calling her before leaving. She started writing about the house where she was sitting alarmed. She wrote to her family as if she was writing her will: "If God does not want me to live after this, there will at least be something that would tell about my last moments". Haneen's relative told us. An hour an a half had passed. Silence and terror prevailed. There was a phone call from Sitra Health Center, conveying the message that the security forces had completely besieged the Center and that the anti-riot police raided it. Haneen asked for someone to take her to the Center. The woman told her she would drop her there herself, but she asked Haneen to wait until it was calmer and safer outside the house. Some of them looked through the window. No police cars were there. They decided to go. On the way, a faint light remained before the dark. The roads were deserted. There were no people, nor cars. Only the car that was driven by that lady whom Haneen described as the Iron Lady: "I felt that she had steady heart beats, and adrenaline of fear didn't find its way to her heart". She was a lady in her thirties, roaming the roads menaced by death, even her sons left before her to face it. The helicopter was hovering over the area. The car snaked its way through the narrow alleys and internal paths. The air was saturated with tear gas smell. The Center was not far, but the way to it seemed very long and eerie. In one of the side ways they were surprised by police SUVs moving in a caravan. They were twelve cars coming from the opposite direction. Everybody froze, while the Iron Lady quickly swiveled in a U-turn, and parked aside. Immediately, everybody lowered their heads to avoid the direct shots. Strangely, the SUVs sped by without stopping in what seemed an urgent mission. No one believed what had happened. They survived. They breathed a sigh of relief. Quietly, the Sitra Iron Lady said: "Now, we can go on". Who Saves the Ambulance? The roads were an utter chaos. Garbage containers were lying everywhere. Stones were scattered here and there. A cell phone rang. The Iron Lady replied. She turned toward Haneen: "There are some wounded in a house!". Haneen did not hesitate. They rang the bell. The door opened. The blood traces on the floor lead Haneen to where the wounded were laid. Inside, four cases waited for her. A fracture in the knee, gunshots in the arm, gunshots in the face including one eye and gunshots in the buttock. Haneen removed the gunshots pellets from the areas close to the eye and mouth and closed the remaining superficial wounds. The last one was bleeding heavily, whose blood had been Haneen's guide to the wounded. She avoided extracting the pellets from his buttock, as that would increase the bleeding. She decided that the gunshot pellets would act as plugs that temporarily would block the wounds till the wounded protester was transported to the Health Center. The paramedic phoned a colleague to come to fetch the cases. Darkness had descended. The ambulance arrived. He asked them to go out quickly as the hovering helicopter was monitoring their movement. Five wounded were got in the ambulance along with three of the medical staff. The ambulance was crammed. There was no space to sit or stand. While Haneen was closing the ambulance back door, she had a glimpse of a police SUV coming. The ambulance moved quickly trying to find an escape. The helicopter was hovering over them and the SUV was behind. Everyone was nervous and scared. Some of them started reciting prayers, others recited verses of Quran. Haneen repeated a verse of Quran: "And We have put a bar in front of them and a bar behind them, and further, We have covered them up; so that they cannot see" (Holy Quran 36:9). Everybody joined her in her recitation. Everybody felt as if it was their last moment in life, and everything was about to end. Minutes passed as though they were hours. The driver sighed and said: "Done, it seems that we lost them", everybody sighed a relief. Their hearts did not stop drumming in their frightened chests. It had been only minutes when they were surprised again by a police SUV coming in front of them, followed by other four SUVs. They surrounded the ambulance. The driver stopped the car. He switched off the lights. A Terrifying silence followed, then he said to his passengers: "I'm sorry, please forgive me".. Who Treats the Paramedic?
They threw stun bombs at the ambulance tires which exploded(7). The officer turned to Haneen and asked her: "You, what are you doing here?", she replied: "We transport the wounded in the ambulance". He yelled: "Are you considering those as wounded?". She held her hand to him and said "The hand that treated these people is the same hand that yesterday treated the Pakistani people who clashed with the youths. Our mission is to treat the wounded whoever they were". He said to her: "I'm a man, if I weren't I would beat you,". Then he threatened her that he would abuse her sexually, he repeated that threat several times. He then turned to the youths. Haneen tugged the hem of his trousers and pleaded: "Don't beat them, enough please". He yelled at her:"Take off your hand". He went to his men and said to them: "Enough, finished". He looked at Haneen and told her to bring scissors. Immediately she got up and cut the plastic ties around the youths and the paramedics wrists. Ameen's Fall
Ameen's limbs started to get cold. His friends tried to bring him saline bags. They were worried that he might get a low blood pressure. One of them went to bring saline bags from the ambulance. He quickly returned. There was a sniper standing near the ambulance and was shooting. After 45 minutes some of the youths went out and brought the needed kit from the ambulance. Ameen did not accept that the saline to be given to him. He was pointing with his eyes to another groaning injured, saying, that injured needed the saline more than he did. The Adventurous Return They stayed in that house for three hours. They phoned Salamaniya Hospital for an ambulance to transport them. It was not possible for the ambulance to enter the besieged Sitra. After 20 minutes Sitra's youths brought two large vans. The two vans moved on the roads very cautiously. The minutes were long and frightening, and the people falling from exhaustion and horror. O' Sitra, how long your day was! Finally the youths were able to reach a safe road and from there they went to Salmaniya. There was another hysteria. Another crowd, other stories. The paramedic Ameen and the injured youths were removed immediately, Rula Al-Saffar embraced Haneen. Haneen did not believe she had returned and still alive. Her body was groaning after a long violent day, her energy was drained out. She slept in the hospital, but would she have rest? On Wednesday March 16, in the morning another event was waiting for her and for the other medical staff in a sequel of horror. That will be the topic of the next part.
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