The Black July.. Returns More Somber.. Between the Third Anniversary of My Father's Departure and the Farewell to Maher Younes

July has ceased to be just a passing month in my life, and the first of it is no longer merely a date on the calendar pages. Since the first of July 2023, the day my father, martyr Major General Qadri Abu Bakr, passed away, this month has become a symbol of loss, and an annual date that renews the pain, as if time refuses to leave the heart a chance to catch its breath.

On the first of July 2026, three years will pass since his departure.. three complete years, and I still feel that life came to a halt at that moment, and that what followed is merely time counted in days, while the heart remains at the moment of the last farewell.

Three autumns have passed on the soul, yet the memory remains spring-like. Your images are still vivid, your words present, and the principles you instilled in us pulse in the details of our lives. Your presence still outweighs your absence, as if great men do not leave, but only change their way of being among us.

I thought July had exhausted all its pain when I lost you, but it returned this year darker, harsher, and filled more with loss. On the fifth of July 2026, the great national fighter and freed prisoner, Maher Younes, passed away after just three years of freedom, following forty continuous years spent in the prisons of the Israeli occupation. The man whose name is intertwined with the history of the prisoner movement departed, as if prison had stolen from his age the years he deserved to live freely.

The news was devastating and heavy on all our hearts.. just 1265 days.. that is all Maher lived after his liberation.. a small number in front of forty years of captivity, but it encompasses a pain that numbers cannot describe.. just 1265 days that fate allowed for his mother, the giant of patience, who waited for him for forty years, visiting dozens of prisons, before finally embracing him, only to bid him farewell a few short years later, as if life was truncating itself before her patience.

As for me, Abu Al-Ayman was not just a national leader or a freed prisoner known to the masses. After my father's departure, our relationship deepened, until he became for me an older brother, a loyal friend, and a true support in many difficult moments.

He would constantly call, and reprimand me whenever days passed without me reaching out to him. He carried the spirit of youth more than many young people, witty, always smiling, and knowing how to lighten the burdens of life for others, even though he bore pains that would overwhelm mountains, and he remained loyal in a time when loyalty has become a rare currency.

I will not forget how he spoke about my father, saying of him: "He was the white point on the black page." This phrase remained etched in my memory, because it came from a man who knew men, lived experiences, and perceived the value of those who remained steadfast in a time when concepts got mixed up, and there were many self-proclaimed patriots.

Since the seventh of October 2023, his spirit has been weighed down by what his people are experiencing under genocide. Even in moments of joy, this pain would peak through his words. When he congratulated me on the arrival of my child "Jihad" on the sixth of June 2026, his voice carried genuine joy, accompanied by a humanitarian worry for this child's future, and a generation born in a time when death weighs down the details of life. That concern was not an aversion from life, but a clinging to it, as preserving life and having children in Palestinian awareness is a form of steadfastness, and a determination to continue existence despite the surrounding annihilation, and an extension of a homeland meant to remain alive in memory and spirit. In all of this, the homeland remained present in his voice, even while he spoke of the most human moments.
Maher.. I was not satiated with your companionship, nor your conversations.

Every meeting ended before it began, and time always stole us.. I would leave you feeling that the conversation was incomplete, and that the next meeting would be longer.. but some meetings are preceded by fate.

Our last call was on Friday, the third of July 2026 - two days before his eternal departure - when he called to console me on my father's anniversary, to pray for him, to recall his virtues, and to ease my pain as he always did. Then he shifted to talk about me, insisting that I express what was in my heart. He understood the challenges I was facing, and the attempts to marginalize and exclude me in my professional life. He listened for a long time, then concluded our conversation with a phrase that will remain a testament I repeat whenever days become hard for me: "Every cheap thing has a cost." And today, as I recall these words, my memory returns to his first statement after his liberation from captivity, when he said: "Forty years in captivity is the dowry of Palestine.. and its freedom's dowry is expensive."

Today I feel that the two phrases have completed each other to form a single message:
"Palestine’s dowry is expensive... and every cheap thing has a cost."

Although everyone called him "Abu Al-Ayman", he was not a father to a child bearing this name, but he was a father in its broader sense; a father to comrades, a brother to all who knew him, and a support to everyone who came close to him. He embraced people with sincere love, giving them his time and heart, making each one of them feel like one of his children.

Therefore, Abu Al-Ayman did not depart without leaving children; children connected to him not by lineage, but by the values he lived for, the loyalty he instilled in them, and the love he showered upon them.

And so I say it today as I bid him farewell:

We are all Ayman.. everyone who learned from him the meaning of loyalty is Ayman.. everyone who carried his message, adhered to his principles, and walked in his path is Ayman.. everyone who believes that the homeland is bigger than interests, and that men are measured by their positions, not their titles, is Ayman.

Rest assured, O Abu Al-Ayman.. rest alongside your beloved father, the late fighter Abdul Latif, and beside those you loved who preceded you.

Rest easy, for you did not leave only a name, but a generation that carries your message, preserves your will, and bequeaths it to his children after him.

And as for you, my father..

The first of July will remain a date that renews nostalgia, a time when longing grows, and the heart returns to being a child looking for his father.

Fate has conspired this year to combine your memory with the memory of a man I loved and who loved us, making July darker, heavier, but it left us a timeless lesson: that men do not leave when their bodies disappear, but they remain as long as their impact endures in the people and as long as their principles live on in generations.

You will remain, O Maher, a witness to the era of men, to a homeland that was and still is the expensive dowry of its freedom, and to men who, when they departed, left behind thousands of sons, even if they do not bear their names.

You will remain, O Abu Al-Ayman.. because we are all Ayman.