Fasting in Tikrit Prison No. 16; Test of Faith in the Heart of Hardship

Hassan Beheshtipour
Translated by Mandana Karimi

2026-2-25

“And I entrust my destiny to Allah, for Allah is All-Seeing of His servants” (Surah Ghafir, verse 44);

This narration is the result of the author’s life experience during captivity based on his personal memory.

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Nine days had passed since the end of the holy month of Ramadan when we were taken captive in the scorching heat of June of Shalamcheh. We had to wait another eleven months to taste the taste of fasting in captivity in our second forced camp, Prison No. 16, near the city of Tikrit, Iraq. The real test, however, began in the hot months of spring. The long days of spring and the sweltering heat of Iraq were enough to make it difficult to endure, let alone the hunger and thirst of conscious fasting.

I still wonder: what kind of motivation and deep faith gave us the strength to endure fifteen or sixteen hours of fasting in those difficult mental and physical conditions of captivity? In Tikrit 16, not everyone was fasting. The conditions were such that the Iraqi guards provided so little and inadequate food that enduring the fast with the same meager ration was an added hardship. However, there were those who wanted to prepare themselves for situations that are even more difficult by fasting, in order to fulfill God's command and to create favorable conditions for avoiding outward and inward sins. This self-improvement and othering required a gentle spirit; a spirit that, when its stomach was emptied of excess food for the sake of God, could better communicate with its God and its fellow prisoners.

The problems began at dawn. The time for dawn was not known. We had no clock, and we could not hear the call to prayer to stop eating and drinking. Our “breakfast” was a very small amount of lentils, along with a quarter cup of sweet tea. This tea was the only sweet taste of the captivity that we could feel each day. Passing this small sip of sweet tea in order to carry out God’s command was one of the first stages of the test of faith.

The noon meal was usually rice, which was a big problem to keep until iftar. We had neither a suitable container nor a spoon. We used plastic bags that we had toiled to get from the kitchen to store our lunch. This method of storage sometimes caused food to spoil, putting the fasting person in an even more difficult situation.

However, these problems led to the fact that in the second year, the Iraqi commander of the prison, Ra’ed Khalil, ordered that the fasting person’s suhoor and iftar be separated from their daily food rations and distributed at their own time. This order allowed the number of fasting people to increase significantly in the second year; as if Ra’ed Khalil had become more familiar with the effects of fasting on calming the prison atmosphere than before.

In the first Ramadan, there was another challenge, which was to create understanding between those fasting and those who did not fast for various reasons. Sometimes, disagreements arose over the distribution of food or the method of storing it. However, surprisingly, the spiritual effects of fasting gradually became a factor for greater affection and kindness. It was as if the artificial boundaries began to fade as the soul began to be refined.

The hardships of captivity, when combined with fasting, refined the soul even more. In those situations, this noble verse would always come to mind:

“We created man in suffering and hardship.” (Surah Balad, verse 4);

Fasting, this sacred hardship made the mystery and need for God flow into our souls in the midst of the hardships of life, so that we would understand how a person is made and matured in the midst of the hardships of life. Fasting, only for God, after thirty days, creates in a person the feeling that he has gone to the “bath of the soul” and, having washed away his sins and impurities, has emerged with renewed vigor and greater readiness to continue the struggle against the hardships of captivity.

Inspired by this noble verse that says:

“And do not be discouraged or grieve, for you are superior if you are believers; our hearts would be at ease.” (Surah Al-Imran, verse 139);

This spiritual preparation showed its true value especially when we learned that Tikrit Prison No. 16, like ten other prisons in Iraq, had not been reported to the International Red Cross for unknown reasons. This international secrecy left the Iraqi authorities free to apply greater severity, because there was no concern about reporting the prisoners’ condition to the Red Cross.

In such a heavy and fearful atmosphere, fasting was a spiritual weapon that made not only the body but also the soul more resistant to persevering. Fasting in Tikrit 16 was not just a refusal to eat and drink; it was a declaration of a faith that lived free and unbreakable even in the most difficult of circumstances.