Appendix II:
‘Abd ar-Rahman ‘Abdullah
(Hamdi al-Banna - Egypt)
“…With his facial features indicative of his Southern origins, and his dark Egyptian appearance, I met him for the first time while we were in a car traveling towards Kunar. Indeed, he is brother Hamdi al-Banna, the first Egyptian martyr in the land of Afghanistan.
He was always quiet, and he would speak just enough that his silence would make him like a lion whose chest was boiling like a kettle out of sadness for the pains and problems of the Muslims.
I asked:
“Where are you from?” He said:
“From Egypt, and my name is Hamdi.” And in a calm conversation, I came to know that he is an engineer who graduated from Egypt, then continued his education in London, and he did not complete his post-graduate studies there. Instead, he returned to Egypt and was unable to stand a life of luxury between all these types of pleasures, food, and drink. So, he decided to remove the shackles of the dunya from his neck and to step on it. He turned his face towards Afghanistan, beginning his quest for death wherever he could find it in order to bring the noble hadith to life through taking steps, his behavior, and manners. In the noble hadith:
“From the best livelihoods of the people is that of a man who grabs the reins of his horse, flying whenever he hears the sound of alarm and commotion, seeking death wherever he can find it.”
He went from battlefront to battlefront, seeking the most intense and heated frontlines. He went to Qandahar and participated in Sha’ban in Operation Great Victory under the leadership of Mawlawi Ghulam Muhammad Gharib, and Allah granted them a speedy victory. He returned to participate in the battle of Jadji in Ramadan, when the battle was becoming its most intense, and the T-22 and T-28 planes were destroying everything by the command of their Lord.
I had the honor of accompanying him on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday (the first, second, and third days of Ramadan), and he helped flatten some land for the camp’s mosque in Jadji. So, he would work in silence, and you would not see from him except hard work without him even biting his lips. You would not hear from him any complaints, nor would you see any signs of boredom or weariness. He was enthusiastic and happy to serve his brothers.
At one point in time, he took it upon himself to serve his brothers in the Services Office (Maktab al-Khidamat). He would eat only after his brothers had eaten their fill. He would wait for his brothers to finish eating, gather their leftover tea, and would sit to drink tea along with the leftover bits of bread that remained.
He would constantly try to implement the Sunnah by eating the leftover bits in the plate, as the hadith says – since you do not know what part of the meal contains blessings – and he would have us lick our fingers. He would fast on Mondays and Thursdays for the majority of his life, and he would fast all of Sha’ban.
{“That home of the Hereafter. We shall assign it to those who rebel not against the truth with pride and oppression in the land, nor do mischief by committing crimes, and the good end is for the righteous.”}
(al-Qasas; 83)
And at 10 a.m. on the fifth of Ramadan, the massive bombs of an air assault caused some rocks to strike his head, and he submitted his soul to his Creator, joining the caravan that included Yahya, Sa’ud, ‘Abd al-Wahhab, and ‘Abd as-Samad. And such was this hero registered in the group of martyrs in Islamic history with his blood, watering his tree with it.
So, we ask Allah to gather us with him along with the salihin: the Prophets, the truthful, the martyrs, and the righteous - and what excellent companions there are…!”