The 342nd Night of Memory-3

Compiled by: Leila Rostami
Translated by: Fazel Shirzad

2023-8-18

Note: The 342nd Night of Memory was held on Thursday, December 22, 2022, with the presence of a group of commanders, veterans, and engineering officials of the Ground Force and the 40th Sahib al-Zaman (pbuh) engineering group of the IRGC in the Sourah hall of the Arts Center. In this program, which was conducted by Javad Aini, Generals Javad Azimifar, deputy engineer of the IRGC Ground Force, Ali Akbar Puri Rahim, one of the former commanders of the 40 Sahib al-Zaman٬s engineers, and Abul Qasem Tabatabaei, the head of IRGC Ground Force Engineering, shared their memories.

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The third narrator of the Night of Remembrance program, General Abolqasem Tabatabai, the commander of the Khatam al-Anbiya engineering camp and one of the military veterans of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, referring to the symmetry of the Fatimid days and the Night of Remembrance program, began the first part of his speech with the famous memory by the Jassim River[1], martyr Kharazi and the eulogy of martyr Torjizadeh. He dedicated and said: When everyone at the headquarters of the 11th division of the Iraqi army, which was seven hundred meters away from the Jassim river, was complaining, Martyr Hossein Kharazi called Martyr Mohammad Reza Torjizadeh, who was also a preacher, and said: "Turn on the wireless and the calamity Sing Hazrat Zahra(pbuh)." By saying Salam Alik or Fatima Al-Zahra (pbuh) and by reading the plight of Hazrat Zahra (pbuh) which was also played on the loudspeaker, the knots behind this line will be opened one by one. I remember exactly what Mr. Puri Rahim remembers about those five nights when we were attacking the enemy's headquarters and did not get results, and even the last person, the bulldozer driver, who was killed by an arrow. The vow of martyr Kazemi made us succeed there. Mr. Kazemi's vow was a vow to visit Hazrat Fatima Zahra (pbuh).

The narrator continued: Martyr Shatri was also a praiser and he used to sing the plight of Hazrat Zahra (pbuh) in private and in front of us and even on foreign trips, for example in Germany, and we would cry. We used to talk to each other and our conversations were funny and we laughed. Then Mr. Shatari would start reading the tragedy and we would cry too. The van driver who took us to the exhibition was Iranian, but we thought he was German. He said it is not clear what kind of people you are! Neither your crying nor your laughter is known! Now you were laughing an hour ago, now you are crying!

In the continuation of his speech, the narrator said: During the war, there were times when we were in the front for ninety, eighty or sixty months and we were involved in the war and the front. During the night operations, for example, ten nights, fifteen nights, or finally seventy-eighty days like Dawn operation. But we were with ourselves and had no worries. Yes, we would fall down, we would get up, we would be torn to pieces, wounded and bothered; We saw bad scenes, but some of them sent their children to the front, following the example of Hazrat Zahra (pbuh) and Hazrat Zainab (pbuh). Not only their children, but their husbands and brothers. Not one, two, four, five, six and more. We had an energy source during the Holy Defense era. Right now, many of the things that Mr. Azimifar is doing are not applicable if you want to evaluate them with one or two, two, four engineering and comparative numbers. If you tell anyone, they will say that it is not possible, sir, and it is not possible at all.

The same places that were mentioned, such as Upper Qandil, Lower Qandil, Sarsaweh, North-West, South-East, etc., are not applicable and realized by today's academic and university standards. These same people who do these things here do not have wives, children and families!? I believe that the women who sent their children to the front or the women who sent their husbands and are still sending them, if the weight and the work they do, are not less, if not more. Who did they imitate? We were successful to the extent that we imitated and appealed to Hazrat Zahra (pbuh).

Continuing his words, the narrator said: The Prophet of Islam said: "And if the saints of God are settled in Jannah, the children of Adam, and I will be with them, when the world ends and the people of hell go to hell, and the people of heaven go to heaven, and everyone is settled in his place. Hazrat Adam )pbuh) from the front and all 124 thousand prophets behind him come to visit Hazrat Zahra. More than five hundred and six hundred thousand angels and nymphs follow and escort Hazrat Zahra (pbuh) from her grave to the grave. What did Hazrat Zahra (pbuh) do?! He did not live more than eighteen years, what did he do that God gave him so much authority? How is it possible that all divine saints should come and worship Hazrat Zahra (pbuh)? The entire universe and creatures, even our existence and the existence of other religions, are all indebted to Hazrat Zahra (pbuh).

The narrator continued: Today is the martyrdom of Hazrat Zahra (pbuh). Our warriors were fighting over the forehead band of Hazrat Zahra (pbuh) and the headband of Fatima (pbuh). Our intercessor was Hazrat Zahra (pbuh) and whenever her name was mentioned, we were moved to tears. There was no need to pray. By God, if you mentioned the name of Hazrat Zahra (pbuh) in the presence of Shahid Kazemi, he would cry. Things that were impossible were done with the same zikr or Zahra (pbuh) or Fatima (pbuh). Today, those who send their children and husbands to the deserts of Saravan, Kurdistan, and the Zagros highlands, all send them with trust in Hazrat Zahra (pbuh), and if we have any success, we owe it to her.

If there was no appeal to Hazrat Zahra (pbuh), there would be no revolution at all. Hazrat Imam (pbuh) said that a man ascends from a woman's lap. It was these women who caused you to go to the front. It was from these mothers that you went to the front and now you can serve. You can go and stay there for several months because of the sight and separation. You just go and get involved in work, you didn't do any art, you forget at all, you start counting and you see it's been a month.

During the war, when someone came to the door, the parents of the fighters would say to themselves that he must have brought the body of their martyr. Someone would call and say that they definitely want to report the testimony. Someone would come with a motorcycle, he had something else to do, he would say, Ah! This is the engine that brings the news of martyrdom, follow this, whose door is going to this house! In other words, their bodies were constantly shaking. As soon as the operation was launched, they were all looking at the corpses of their children, husbands and brothers two or three days later. What power made that lady able to endure and create such epics? Apart from the origin, could the Mullah and leader of Hazrat Zahra (pbuh) have done this?

You child, your daughter, your son will come half an hour, an hour late from work, you will lose your hands and feet. A seventeen-year-old, a sixteen-year-old, an eighteen-year-old child would present not one, not two, four... May God have mercy on Haj Abbas Ali Zain Ali, who passed away a few days ago, his four children were at the front. Three of his children were martyred. In Wal-Fajr, 8 shrapnel hit the neck and chest of martyr Zain Ali and he was injured. Wal-Fajr 8 lasted about ninety days. When he gets better, he says, tell the army to send an ambulance, I want to go back to Khat and the region from this hospital. When the father hears this news, he comes to the hospital and says: "Dad, I am not telling you not to go to the front!" Go, your brothers went, those brothers of yours were also martyred, you go too, that brother wanted to go too, but you are not ready now, you have stitches in your neck, wait a few days for this situation to improve a little bit, go as soon as you are better.

The narrator continued: The word defense is a sacred word in all religions, schools, eras and all over the world, and defense becomes sacred when it is headed by intention for Hazrat Zahra (pbuh), intention for the Prophet and intention for God. But today I want to tell you a more sacred word. In my opinion, paramedics are more holy than combatants; because the warrior has a gun, he shoots, shoots. But the rescuer has a stretcher, you can't fight with a stretcher, inside the rescuer's bag are some splints and some rescue equipment. He cannot defend himself; the injured person who cannot be carried by chest; He should lift it and put two people on a stretcher and be exposed to bullets.

The engineering forces, who during the sacred defense era and even today, have to sit on the bulldozer that is three meters above the ground in the most dangerous place, and their foreheads are the targets of the enemy's bullets from mattresses to tanks, are one step more holy than the others. If Hazrat Imam gave the title of trench builders to engineering children, this was not exaggeration or propaganda. All those who work in the field of engineering during the sacred defense period and now must go through such scenes. It doesn't matter, one day with PKK and Jaish al-Zalm and one day with Saddam. These have sanctity and their sanctity is higher.