Every day he would go out and sing and play in the street, then one day he did not come back home until very late. When he returned he could not speak nor eat. He opened his mouth to show his tongue had been carved around the edges with a kitchen knife, snipping it bit by bit. He said that his captors were loyalists of President Ali Abdullah Saleh, and they objected to him singing a revolution rhyme "irhal" which means "leave", referring to calls for the president to leave government office.

This was filmed in the city of Taiz, he is shown with his brother. Taiz is in a central-northern governate in Yemen and scene of almost continuous fighting since late May when the president burned down an anti-government protest camp killing about 60 people in a night, followed by the city being taken by pro-democracy anti-Saleh fighters, followed by the president shelling and assaulting the city until today.