A Snake That Saved the Life of the War Veterans of Intelligence and Operation Unit

According to Epic and Resistance Group of Fars News Agency, the events and adventures which occurred during the Sacred Defense Era all of them have some features that if someone to think about them so deeply, that person will reach many good results. There is an example in this field which has been mentioned bellow:

It was 11:00 o’clock at night. We were five persons; also four persons had been dispatched to the place already. We were supposed to joint each other in the morning. We were moving inside a valley named ‘Hard Mineral’ that was under the control of Iraq at the time. The Iraqi regime had 12 headquarters there and four of them were so close to each other and they located in the left side of the valley and the military base ‘100 Stairs’ also located in the right side. It was the time of the end of summer of 1987.

The one who was moving in the front side was someone who had a camera which would work at night and he had two grenades and a weapon. The rest war veterans had some guns such as Kalashnikov and grenades. I did not have any gun; I only had two photography cameras for slides and an otophone which would be used in order to pass from the Iraqi ambushes. But I did not like to keep it on. It would ruin the comfort and it would disturb me.

At the beginning of the movement only Kite and the Pleiades star and Constellation Cassiopeia existed in the sky, and finally and big dipper appeared from the east north of the sky. We were moving in a distance of 15 meters from each other and I was so happy because I was the last person. Therefore if the enemy would ambush us, at first they would target the last one who was moving in the end in order not to get the opportunity of escape to them and it was better that I was the last person. Due to this issue that I was a guest in the war zone and it was the first time that I would pass that way. But the other war veterans were the personnel of the detection mission and they had many experiences regarding this action by working and it was not good if they would be martyred.

Mahmoud who was the first person in the line, sometimes he would stop and he would look at different direction including the left right and back side by his camera and again he would continue his path; therefore each time that he would sit or stand up, we would do the same act.

We were looking at the stars of sky and at the direction and we continued the way. Finally we reached a valley that was full of butterflies, rockets and the blue cigarettes packets, but we were not entitled to touch them at all in order not to make the enemy notice any changes in the war zone.

It was the time of morning prayer; we stood near a trench of water and we performed our prayers one after another respectively; of course we performed our prayers without taking of our boots; because it was possible that the enemy to ambush us.

Mahmoud demanded us to hide the cameras somewhere before performing our prayers. I wanted to hide them under a stone which had been covered with herbs, suddenly in that half-dark air, I saw a snake. It was a very big cobra snake which had lied down on the stone. It fell down but it did not change it direction. All of its body was moving and he was moving in a circle position. Its head had the shape of triangle. Mahmoud pointed to me with his hand that I should go away. I went a few meters away and I performed my prayer near the trench of water. When I performed my prayer, the four persons who had gone there already joined us and they opposed the three persons who said that we must kill the snake.

Those three persons would say: "Here is the single valley and in addition to this, we have to stay here several hours. We also have to return from the same direction in the morning and since the snake always lives near the water, therefore it is possible that this snake to be dangerous and it must be killed.” The rest war veterans believed that the poor snake should remain alive and the whole desert is God’s desert and killing the creatures is not something good and since it does not disturb us, it is better to leave it alone.

Finally we moved before the sunrise and we moved under the hills close to the Iraqi headquarters. We found a very good perspective. We had to stay there for the whole day and to return in the darkness of the night. Eventually we returned at the beginning of night. We were so thirsty and hungry and we arrived to the single valley.

It was really strange, though 12 hours has passed from that time, but still the snake was in the same place and it was moving in the circle direction too! It was a very big snake! We filled our canteens and we started resting! Mahmoud and one of the war veterans started guarding too. This strange event was discovered there that the snake that we wanted to kill it in the morning saved our lives! Due to this issue that the snake had bitted two of the Iraqis who had ambushed a few meters behind the valley after our movement and from those two persons one of them had died and one of them was still breathing and he was almost in coma.

We got in the preparedness condition so immediately and we disarmed the Iraqi man who was still half-alive. We were supposed to put him on shoulder and take him with ourselves. Mahmoud did not let the Iraqi who had been killed to be taken and he demanded that we kill the snake and put it inside a bag!”

I opposed this issue like others. Why should we kill our rescuer? Mahmoud described in order to detect the type of the poison and treatment of the Iraqi that had been snake bitten. In fact we need to take the snake too. I commented that we should not kill our friend due to the bloody enemy and that the snake was our rescuer , but Mahmoud described that: "This Iraqi is our captive and due to saving the life of this Iraqi man we have to kill the snake according to the percepts of dear Islam.”

At the end, Mahmoud came there and as his eyes were full of tears, he hit his gun stock to the head of the snake and after that he wept for it too.

Narrated by Rahim Chehre Khand

The End