The Embankment Wounded Shoulders – 4

Diary of a Rescuer

Sabah Piri
Translated to English by M.B. Khoshnevisan

2025-4-27

The Embankment Wounded Shoulders – 4
Diary of a Rescuer

Sabah Piri
Translated to English by M.B. Khoshnevisan
Persian Version (1990)
Sooreh Mehr Publications

***

Mehdi Khandan, the commander of the Meqdad Battalion, was also martyred. His troops said that 72 hours earlier, he had dreamed of his martyrdom and had a face-to-face encounter with God.

At ten in the morning, we set off by car to scout the captured areas. We reached a grove where a road had been built. On the left side of the road, there were four trucks that had previously carried supplies for the Iraqis but were now carrying supplies for our own troops.

Further ahead, the road had a slight incline that led to Panjvein. The engineering team was working tirelessly to build a road in the heart of the mountain. On the left side of the mountain, the motorized section was constructing a trench and an ambulance station. As we brought in the wounded, we realized we were getting further away from the emergency room, which was two hours away. When I returned, the guys surrounded me, thinking I had been martyred. However, they had mistaken me for an old man. Piri was the first martyr of the third stage of Operation Fajr-4 in our division.

In the afternoon, we drove with Shahriari to the Height of 1886, where the motorized crew was working below. After we transported a few wounded individuals, we took a break. Suddenly, a member of the Intelligence - Operations of the Disturbed Division arrived. He was responsible for leading a group of 30-40 people, most of whom were injured. He had left them in a difficult situation and had come to request reinforcements. He was hoping we could assist. Shahriari, a brave and courageous man, agreed to help. We boarded the vehicle and drove across the three-way road on the left side of the mountain, heading towards Panjvein on the right.

We ascended as far as we could in the ambulance up the mountainside. Then, the intelligence combatant and I were supposed to disembark and proceed ahead, with the ambulance following behind us. We moved cautiously to avoid alerting the Iraqis above us.

The sound of the car engine was lost in the explosions. After we passed two or three hills, the intelligence combatant said that we had passed the Iraqis. We reached some trees with a steep slope to the left. On the other side of the hill, among the trees, there were wounded guys lying. We started to put them in. We put fifteen wounded people in an ambulance. They were in a bad condition, some of their wounds were deep. One person, whose body was broken almost all over, screamed in pain when we tried to move him; and we had to hold his mouth tightly so that the enemy wouldn’t notice. One of the guys had been shot in the head. There I saw Gholamreza Ajorloo, who was also a rescuer. He had been in this place among the wounded for three whole days, he had suffered a lot. He said: I would attach a syringe to one wounded person, he would be martyred, I would use the same syringe for another. That is, they were feeding three or four people from one syringe.

When we reached the road, the mortar fire was so intense that the ambulance could have been hit at any moment. We were moving quietly when suddenly the car fell into a hole and got stuck.

 Reza Partovi Shabestari, who we had traveled with from the Imam Hassan (AS) garrison in Tehran, had been martyred in this operation. He was a close friend of Ajorloo, who had not yet heard of Reza's martyrdom.

Anyway, we loaded the wounded into the ambulance. The intensity of the mortar fire on the road was so high that the ambulance was at risk of being hit. We were moving quietly when suddenly the car fell into a hole and got stuck. If we had accelerated, the sound would have alerted the enemy. Somehow, we managed to get out and miraculously lifted the car out of the hole together. Love, anxiety, a sense of life for the wounded, faith, and determination became a strength in our arms.

We eventually reached the main road, which felt like a highway to us despite being dirt. There was little space in the ambulance, so I was forced to sit by the window. When we arrived at the emergency room, the first thing we did was admit the injured man who had been shot in the brain. I thought he would be a martyr, but to my surprise, he survived. The doctor explained that the bullet had broken his skull, traveled around, and exited through the back of his brain! It was truly a miracle.

Every night, we were short of one person in the aid tent. Hedayati was the first person from this tent to be martyred. After a while, Shahriari also switched places with another person due to extreme fatigue.

The next day, they informed us that there were several wounded people in the Panjvein direction who needed to be taken to the rear. As we traveled some distance, I noticed that the driver seemed a little scared. After passing two or three hills, our car suddenly came under fire from the top of a hill where the Iraqis were positioned. To the left, there was a workshop that had been set on fire. We drove past it and continued over a few more hills until we reached the wounded individuals. We loaded them up and began our return journey. We had to move at maximum speed, and in our haste, we inadvertently took the wrong road towards the Iraqis.

Unaware of our mistake, we continued until the intensity of the gunfire made me realize we were on the Iraqi road. I immediately told the driver to turn around. As we did so, a bullet hit the windshield but thankfully ricocheted off without causing harm. It felt like divine intervention that the bullets did not harm us in that rain of death. It was the hand of God … everyone was sending salawat.

I don’t know who these people are. A wounded man, full of pain and suffering, was praying. I said, maybe he was praying for his life. A whisper passed through the noise: "God, don’t let the guys return from the mountain empty-handed!"

The breeze of prayer was blowing on the waves of suffering. People had suffered and were becoming transcendental in their suffering. I don’t even know their names. But whatever it was, it was a miracle that we came out of all that fire unburned. We took everyone to the emergency room.

Mojtaba Askari and Hajj Mamaqani were both injured. Their moving car had run over a cannonball and the bullet exploded under the car. The shrapnel had covered Askari’s entire body, and he was not in good condition.

I also saw Hajj Hemmat up close in the emergency room. His index finger was injured, and we had to pull out his nail. He came here a few times to change the bandage. The guys were strangely eager to see him.

If the children had been able to take Kani Manga Hill, they would have had a view overlooking Panjvein. The battle continued with full intensity on the heights, with the wounded and enemy prisoners coming one after another. The fourth phase of the operation began, but despite their efforts, the children were unable to capture Hill 1904 - Kani Manga. The excitement of the operation subsided, and there were many empty seats in our tent, with the emergency room deserted.

We went to collect the remaining equipment as the operation came to an end. The guys were now defending the liberated heights, and there was nothing else for us to do there. As we returned, the mountains remained silent and steadfast, holding onto the secrets of the battle and epic that had taken place over several days and nights. It seemed as though the mountains were shrinking as we moved further away, as if they couldn't bear to part with the memories. Maybe they couldn't bear it because their trust in humanity was being drained!

To be continued …