23 JAN MARYAM ALHLAQ: I WANT A GRAVE FOR MY SON, THE GRAVE DIGGER DOCUMENTARY

A flash of Maryam’s memory, the hours she was waiting to receive the death certificate for her son, Dr. Iyham Ghazzoul, where she gathered, and a number of other people waiting for the time to receive the certificates. “It’s good that it’s not crowded today,” said a woman who was silent, leaving everyone present with the impression that the place was usually crowded.

Silence prevailed in the place, to be broken again by the voice of the woman who indicated this time that a car might come soon to throw the bodies, and when she was asked how she knew, she replied that she had seen a similar car in the morning. Later, the white car comes, throwing 15 bodies, closed with transparent nylon bags.

It is no longer surprising to many that obtaining a death certificate is a luxury that many parents and children who are still waiting to know the fate of their loved ones have not received. Yes, the punishment of those opposed to the regime and its suffering does not end with his death but continues to the point where the documents of his death become a luxury that his family may not receive, and his impact and place of burial have become a dream for thousands of Syrian families.

Maryam al-Halak, about her memory of the day she went to the forensic medicine in Tishreen hospital to receive the certificate, and during her passage to reach the office of the Forensic Medicine there was a group of coffins covered with the flag of the Syrian regime are transported to cars, as a sign that they are fighters with Assad’s forces. Perhaps seeing the coffins, I reminded her that her son had a place to be buried, she might have forgotten that the right to bury him from the point of view of his executioners is not protected, to ask the person in the office of the forensic medicine, about the possibility of knowing where he buried them, and the
answer came screaming “Don’t!!! ask!, this question is forbidden.” …. “.

The story may seem unique, but it is the story of thousands of families still looking for their children, many of whom to date have not even had the right to know whether they are dead or alive.

The film#Digger_Graves, produced by Al Jazeera shows some of the details of the lives of the missing people, the number of which has reached 100,000, Maryam al-Halak was one of these mothers whose lives turned into activity and constant search for the truth generously for their children.  The film also tells another chapter of the story of the forcibly disappeared in Syria, and little about the mass graves that collected some of them without knowing who was buried there so far.

The movie link to watch in full: