*Syrian mothers have shouldered the conflict’s heaviest emotional burden, the 50-year-old says. “Both Assad’s soldiers and rebel fighters have [suffering] mothers.”

She doesn’t know exactly where her sons are. Ahmad, she says, had left the house to join his army unit at the onset of the revolution, fighting for the Assad regime. Before that he arrested his brother, Mohammed, for taking part in anti-Assad protests.

Their mother now lives in a makeshift settlement on the Turkish-Syrian border, where she spoke with Syria Deeply.*

Ahmad and Mohammad are my two sons. I also have four daughters. Ahmad, who’s 27, is the eldest. Mohammad is five years younger. Ahmad graduated from engineering school two months after the uprising began. It started with peaceful protests that continued to take place for months. Mohammad participated in those demonstrations while he was a pharmacy student.

Before, neither of them had had any interest in politics or any clear position on the regime. Their father and I had always made sure they focused on their studies. Everything was going as planned; Ahmad graduated with honors and Mohammad was following in his footsteps.

However, as the first protests started in Aleppo University, Mohammad took a clear stance with the protests. He began talking like senior opposition figures about the corruption and injustice of the Assad regime, and about the crimes it committed in Daraa, Homs, the Damascus countryside and other areas. We felt worried and scared for our son. What terrified us was the thought of his arrest, since everybody knew what it means for the regime to arrest opposition members and protestors. I never expected to see one of my sons become directly responsible for the arrest of his brother.

Ahmad Arrests Mohammed

After his graduation, Ahmad started to consider volunteering in the Syrian army as an engineer. This surprised us, since he has never voiced interest in enlisting, and volunteering in the army was never his dream.

His father and I strongly objected to this decision. But he insisted and travelled to Damascus, where he applied before returning home to await his acceptance letter. It was in July 2011 when Ahmad returned to firmly ask Mohammad to stop partaking in the demonstrations, to keep quiet and stop publicly opposing the regime, so it wouldn’t impact his own chance of being accepted in the army. [It is common for the military intelligence to run background checks on all volunteers wanting to join the army. This includes their relatives.]

But Mohammad refused, accusing his brother of being an inhumane low-life because he chose to join an army that supports the president. Mohammad used to repeat that the army is part of a corrupt and oppressive regime.

Ahmad threatened his younger brother, saying he would report him and deliver him to the regime, but we never expected him to carry out his threat.

After two weeks of tension and exchanging accusations, we were surprised to find Ahmad storming the house with a security unit. They went into Mohammad’s room, taking him someplace I have yet to discover.

I was shocked, as I saw Ahmad do this. I felt Ahmad had committed a grave mistake that couldn’t be undone. So I stepped in and begged the unit leader to let Mohammad go, but Ahmad dragged me away and asked me not to intervene.

I couldn’t find a logical answer as to why my son was behaving this way. At that time, my motherly instinct was to save my other son from the frightening fate that most likely awaited him. I begged the unit leader with everything I had so that he wouldn’t arrest Mohammad. I told him that the two brothers had a personal feud, which is why Ahmad wants revenge, and reported his younger brother as a protestor, which isn’t true.

The unit leader softened and asked his troops to leave the house, telling Ahmad he would return after conducting thorough investigations. But Ahmad wouldn’t have it. He blatantly threatened the unit leader, saying if he doesn’t arrest Mohammad, his own brother, he would take the matter to his superiors and would hold his unit leader responsible.

My son arrested his brother and took him away to an unknown place. I don’t know anything about Ahmad’s whereabouts now either. He left with the unit, after saying he had officially joined the army. He hasn’t returned since.

I don’t have an explanation of what happened and what’s happening.

It is possible that Ahmad intentionally hasn’t contacted us, since he could be easily swayed by our emotions. Yet I can’t believe that he hasn’t even called us once after all this time. Sometimes, I worry about his fate and I often think that he might have been hurt or even killed in this war. But why haven’t we heard about it?

They say the regime doesn’t really care about retrieving the soldiers’ bodies. Therefore, it’s probably that my son is one of the many soldiers killed whose bodies either remain with the Free Syrian Army or that are left where they have fallen. I have always begged my husband to search or to ask the authorities, but he refuses. He insists that he no longer has a son called Ahmad. Whenever I ask him to search for Ahmad, he tells me he isn’t interested in knowing anything about Ahmad before he knows Mohammad’s fate. No one dares ask the security apparatus about what happened to Mohammad.

Look at me. I’m suffering from hemiplegia and I need to crawl to get a glass of water. What can my girls do if the men don’t dare and can’t do anything?

Everyone around me feels wrath for Ahmad, and no one sympathizes with [my need to find out where he is]. In the end, I’m a mother, and I can’t let go of my son, no matter what he’s done. Yes, Ahmad is responsible for his brother’s arrest, my own flesh and blood Mohammad. But can I forget Ahmad?

I sometimes wish they had both died in front of me in the shelling of our house. At least I would have had the chance to give them a final kiss and bury them in a marked grave, where I could visit whenever I wanted. But now, where are they? One has gone to fight for the army that arrested his brother and that shelled and destroyed our home, while the other is in a prison somewhere.

I keep two shirts with me, One used to belong to Ahmad, the other to Mohammad. I wipe my tears with their shirts awaiting their return.