An enclyclopedic website based on ABC TV show LOST
Category: Main Character Profiles
Sayid JarrahPlayed by: Naveen Andrews Profession:Communications officer, promoted to intelligence division in the Iraqi Republican Guard; one time chef in Paris
Sayid's Pre-Island Life
Sayid Jarrah is from Tikrit, Iraq. Educated at Cairo University, Sayid served in the Iraqi Republican Guard for 5 years, including during the first Gulf War, where he was a communications officer in an intelligence unit. He is the son of a great hero to Iraq, although the specifics of that are as yet unknown. At the end of the Gulf War, Sayid's intelligence unit was captured (by a group including Kate's father, Sam Austen) when American forces advanced. He lied to the Americans that the commanding officer Tariq had left for Hilla, but the Americans had had already captured him. They wanted to know the location of one of their missing pilots. Sayid interrogated his former commanding officer, but he was uncooperative, calling Sayid a disgrace. Sayid was brought before Joe Inman, an American interrogator. He told Sayid that Tariq was the head of a Chemical Warfare batallion and he was personally responsible for a gas attack in a village that had some of Sayid's relatives. Sayid told Inman that Tariq wouldn't talk to him. Inman gave Sayid an interrogation (torture) kit and said that Sayid would have to make Tariq talk to him. Tariq thought he was bluffing, and told him not to disgrae his father. Sayid tortured Tariq and got the information he needed. The pilot was executed two days ago, and Sayid took the U.S. soldiers to the gravesite. Inman left him on a road in Iraq, gave him some money and told him that if nothing else he's learned a new skill set that will come in handy if there's ever a time when he'll need to get information to someone. Sayid said he would never practice torture again. He fell in love with a childhood friend Nadia Jaseem, after she was brought to his military facility in Iraq for interrogation after an bomb attack on the Baath party headquarters. He saved her life by shooting his superior officer, and he fled Iraq shortly after that, more or less staying on the run for the next seven years.
While on the run, Sayid worked as a chef in Paris. He was approached by a fellow countryman who offered him a job at his own restaurant. However, this was a trap. The restaurant owner's wife, Amira, believed she had been tortured by Sayid in Iraq, and the couple wanted Sayid to confess to this. Sayid refused, until Amira told him how she had been effected by the torture. Sayid finally confessed, and she assured Sayid that she would tell her husband that she made a mistake, and Sayid wasn't her tormentor. She offered Sayid mercy to avoid becoming like him. He was in Australia because the CIA offered him the location of Nadia in exchange for him infiltrating and disrupting a terrorist cell in Sydney. The CIA wanted him because that cell had also recruited an old university friend of his, Essam Tazir. Essam eventually decided that he didn’t want to go through with the operation, but the CIA told Sayid that they needed to secure the explosives that the cell leaders were hiding. The CIA told Sayid that if he didn’t convince Essam to go through with the bombing attempt, Nadia would be arrested because she had committed terrorist activities in Iraq seven years ago. Just before Essam was due to perform the bombing, Sayid told him that he was CIA. Essam was furious for Sayid convincing him to go through the operation, and he killed himself. The CIA told Sayid that Nadia was living in Los Angeles. They gave him a ticket to Los Angeles, but Sayid requested a later flight so he could claim Essam's body for a proper Muslim burial. That flight turned out to be Oceanic 815.
See also: Flashback Cast and Summary - Solitary
|
Copyright (c) 2006 Long Lost List. All rights reserved.
