Umm Isa

“How do you do it?'' one of the nicer guards asked me one day through the interpreter. ''How do you not lose your mind with loneliness? How do you starve yourself? How do you survive without wanting to die?''

''Allah,'' I said and then tried to explain to him about my faith and the belief that all of this was Allah's wish.

For years, the interrogators, Miller, the revolving door of colonels had desensitized us to the violence of our daily lives. They hit us so much that we no longer felt the pain of the punch. There was something bigger at work protecting us, something beyond our capabilities, and that kept us alive without losing our minds. This was Allah's Mercy, and we all felt it there. We couldn't survive without Allah's help.”
― Mansoor Adayfi, Don't Forget Us Here: Lost and Found at Guantanamo

“Where do we go in these moments of pain, when the world turns black? We always turned to Allah. I prayed to Allah to guide me, to protect me, to help me stop this madness and hasten my release.”
― Mansoor Adayfi, Don't Forget Us Here: Lost and Found at Guantanamo

“In one instance, whilst in Sham (Greater Syria), he was writing down ahadith when his pen broke. He borrowed a pen from someone but when he finished writing, he forgot to give it back and hence he put it into his pen-holder. He then travelled and returned back to Marw (Central Asia, present day Turkmenistan) when he recognised the pen and realised that it was still with him! Without any hesitation, he immediately prepared himself for travel again in order to return the pen to its owner all the way in Sham.”
― Farhia Yahya, The Life of Abdullah ibn al-Mubarak: The Scholar of the East and the Scholar of the West

“According to our faith, we're all created for a single reason, which is to worship Allah. One way to worship is how you handle hardship and dilemmas in your life. Life on this earth is a test for us, and we should expect anything, even the worst hardships, in our test. At the same time, nothing happens without Allah's permission; nothing moves without Allah's will. If we were at Guantánamo, He had willed it and we would leave when He willed it. But we had free will to choose our path while here.”
― Mansoor Adayfi, Don't Forget Us Here: Lost and Found at Guantanamo