Books for remembering three martyrs

“Flying from Fav”, “Yaqub Eyes” and “The Frontline of Fighting”

Mohammad Ali Fatemi
Translated by M. B. Khoshnevisan

2018-1-30

In this text, you become familiar with books “Flying from Fav”, “Yaqub Eyes”, and “The Frontline of Fighting”.

Toward the sound

Mehri Sadeqi in the book “Flying from Fav: A Review of Biography and Memoirs of Martyr Farhang Haji Qorbani” (August 24, 1939 – May 13, 1986) has introduced the martyr according to what his family, comrades and friends have said. These memoirs have obtained in 20 hours of interview with these individuals. This 144-page book has been released by Sayeh Gostar Publications the headquarters of which is in the city of Qazvin in 2017.

Among the memoirs written in this book, a piece quoted from Abolfazl Haji Qorban, the martyr’s son reads: My father was very interested in plants and animals. In the garden, we had a three-story hut the lower floor of which was a stable in which we kept livestock, the middle floor was a barn of straw and alfalfa, and its third floor was dedicated to our rest.

One day, I along with my father were cleaning the hut which suddenly I heard a noise in the ceiling of the hut, I gazed my eyes toward the sound, a snake on the logs of the ceiling was crawling slowly. While my voice was faltering as a result of the thrill and fear, I shouted, "Snake, snake!"

Without the least reaction, my father said, "Put your head down and don't say anything! The snake is living here for a long time, it has left us alone and we have also left it alone. Don't you dare telling your mother? She may fear.

While I had been hiding myself behind my father and my voice was still faltering, I said, "Ok, My dear father!"

As long as I remember, that snake was in our hut and we left it alone and so did it. My father did bother no animal. I remember that once, a cat had eaten the chickens in the yard. My father just followed the cat without harming it.

Our garden was outside the city and very quiet. Thus, wild animals including hogs came inside our garden and harmed the trees and products. But my father said, "We should not harm these animals."

My father said, "Hogs are afraid of noise. Drop stones inside the can of milk powder so that the hogs escape. Don't you dare bothering them?

We did so and the hogs were escaping."

So I was fellow-townsman with martyr Reza…

One of the books released in 2017 is titled "The Defenders of Shrine 8: Yaqub Eyes; Martyr Reza Kargar Barzi" (July 23, 1979 – August 2, 2013). This book has been authored by Shahla Panahi with the guidance of Mohammad Qassemi Pour and released by Ravayat-e Fat'h Publications in 120 pages.

The retold memoirs by the martyr's family and comrades have been collected and shaped in a way that the text's narrator is the martyr's father; he both talks about his current memoirs and what has seen (after the martyrdom of his son), and is a mediator for what has been narrated by others about his son. In part of the memoirs, we read, "Nazar Abad, autumn 2013 – we had guests for a few days when came back to Iran. One afternoon, when the commutes had reduced, Mohammad Reza called. After greetings, he said, "Dear daddy, a private guest is going to visit you and Haj Khanom (his wife). Are you ready today?" I said, "Yes, I'll become glad." Then I went to Haj Khanom in the kitchen and said, "Prepare the tea, we have a gust." She said with smile, "Is he a friend of Reza?" I said, "Mohammad Reza called me but said nothing. He just said that we would have a private guest."

I leaned my hand on the edge of one of the cabinets in the kitchen and said, "If you need help for matching the reception utensils, can I come?" Haj Khanom gave me a set of plates and said, "Go and put these bedside the phone desk." As I was coming out of the kitchen, I took a look at Reza's photo. Sometimes, in the afternoons when Reza had a short free time, he came and sat in front of the kitchen's entrance and said, "I've just come to see how you are. Sometimes, he was so tired that leaned to the wall and closed his eyes until his mother's tea was brewed. I touched his shoulder and said, "Reza, my dear son, you are very tired! He replied with smile, “No, I am not tired. I like to see you and mummy as much as I can”. Now, it's a long time that we are waiting for Reza to come and we have enough time to see him as much as we can."

When the bell's door rang, I remembered what Reza had said about the arrival of a private guest. I went toward the yard and opened the door. Haj Khanom also came to welcome the guests. When the door was opened, I pause for a moment. I did not believe that Haj Qassem (Suleimani) and a few others of Reza's friends have come to see us. I became very happy and directed them to the house. He accepted my compliments and came inside.

He greeted us with so much humbleness and kindness that I felt embarrassed. I knew that it was hard for him to do this kind of meeting with all this bustling, but he had come with openness and a world of affection to speak affably to us. It was hard to believe that a senior commander had come to visit us. We chatted briefly. Mohammad Reza Nasseri also accompanied him, speaking with Haj Qassem about Reza's behavior, the career and expertise that he had, the advances which had been carried out, and Reza's family and children. We also talked about the grave of Reza. I told him, "Reza's grave is in Nazar Abad's Martyrs Cemetery". When he found out that the cemetery was close to us, asked me to accompany him to go to his grave. And I accepted with pleasure.

All of us went to the cemetery and Reza's grave. Haj Qassem talked to us a lot. He spoke about Reza's ingenuity and was trying to console us. While speaking, he asked, "Is the continuation of his surname Barzi related to Kerman?" I said, "Yes." He said, "So, I was a fellow-townsman with Reza. Why hadn't he told me anything about it? One of the companions said, "This was Reza's recommendation not to tell you anything about it." 

We took a few photos. One of the companions who was with Haj Qassem said, "In the meeting, we emphasized on training of the forces. Reza was introduced as an instructor and specialist in demolition training. Reza's skill and creativity was very much on the job. It was easy for him to make an explosive device out of everything or to identify different kinds of traps skillfully; he carefully reviewed the thwarted traps to see what the enemy was using. It happened that he used the same trap against the enemy again. Reza was stressing on training of native forces. We lost one of the best of this expertise."

Mohammad Hassan Khalili with a brown face and high tall had been standing beside Mr. Nasseri, who was introduced as the successor to Reza. I had seen Mohammad Hassan on the day of going to grave of martyrs and in the funeral ceremony.

Without considering the position of his commandership, he showed kindness to us. The event that happened on that day caused me to believe in the correctness of the path and purpose of Reza. The presence of commanders with this degree of faith and sincerity showed that the Malek Ashtars are still accompanying the Imam Ali of the time to defend the oppressed. I thanked God that Reza was the force of such a commander. " 

Daily notes and letters

The book "The Frontline of Fighting: A Fictional and Documented Narration from the Establishment of Missile Unit in Iran, revolving around the life of Martyr Hasan Tehrani Moqaddam" (October 29, 1959 – November 12, 2011) has been written by Faezeh Ghaffar Haddadi on the basis of research done by Mohammad Hossein Paykani. It has been released by Manzoumeh Shamsi Publications in 584 pages. According to the book's identity certificate, it was first published in 2015, but recently, the writer has given a copy of the book to the website of Iranian Oral History. Of course, this was concurrent with announcement of the results of the 17^th round of selection of the best sacred defense book of the year in 23^rd of January 2018 during which the book "The Frontline of Fighting" was considered to be highly praised by judges.

Although the phrase fictional narration is seen in the full title of the book, the points which have come in the book's introduction have other meanings and are noteworthy about how the work was shaped:

• The book is a documented cut from the middle of life of Hasan Tehrani Moqaddam far from the writer's imagination and dreams. From August 1981 to December 1986. A section which happened to be full of events and complicated obstacles.

• Many of the memories and documents which are the basis for writing this book have been first-hand and have so far been released nowhere. The collection of documents and movement of research in this book began from the lifetime of martyr Tehran Moqaddam and with his own encouragement. All the events of this book are based on reality and to the extent possible have been written according to it.

• It has been tried in all parts of the book that the daily notes remained from different people especially the martyr's wife is used, but the scenes happened in Syria and North Korea have been rebuilt from the daily notes of the martyr. Thus, these parts are stronger in terms of documentation and being closer to reality. The text of the letters and personal notes has been accurately quoted without any changes, deletions, and editions to keep the documentary spirit of the text. In some cases, in order to confirm and advance the documentation process, the relevant sections of the daily notes of Mr. Hashemi Rafsanjani, as one of the most authentic written documents, have been used unchanged in the years 1984 to 1986.

• One of the parts which has become the book more attractive according to others is the letters exchanged between martyr Tehrani Moqaddam and his wife at the time the book was studied which have been exactly included in this book.

• We took the first steps for research in 2005 with the support and encouragement of martyr Hasan Tehrani Moqaddam. Our goal at that time was to collect the memoirs and documentations of the missile period. At first, our research method was a retrospective review, and so we had to refer and interview the people who were present at that time and in that historic event.  In view of the long time between the events and the time of interviewing, in some cases, we were faced with a lack of matching of the details in the words of different people, which, in order to overcome this problem, we were forced to conduct technical and numerous interviews to find out the origin of the case. In some cases, the contradictions were still not removed, so we had to add documented and library review to our research concurrently through retrospective review and conducting additional interviews. Finally, the documents related to launchings of the missile unit during the Sacred Defense, the war time dailies, the documents of the Islamic republic of Iran News Agency, the books published about the Scared Defense, the United Nations documents, the war almanac, the photos' archive, handwritten notes, and letters and so on were among the sources which were reviewed. On 23^rd of November 2010, we conducted a detailed supplementary interview with Brigadier General Hasan Tehrani Moqaddam. After a while, we were constantly pursuing to conduct another interview with him that he achieved his long dream and attained martyrdom in a blast on 12^th of November 2011 and achieved his long dream. Deep and detailed interviews were conducted with more than fifty people for this book. In some cases, to complete and eliminate contradictions and ambiguities, interviews with some people were repeated more than 20 times.

These tips are enough for becoming familiar with the book and to encourage reading it, especially since the martyr's daily notes have been used and this clearly draws the attention of the audience.