Moulessehoul was born in 1955 in Kénadsa, in the Algerian Sahara. His mother, of nomadic origins, was her tribe's "chief storyteller". His father, initially a male nurse, joined the Algerian National Liberation army, as Algeria began to fight for independence from France. He became an officer, wounded in 1958. Parents sent their three sons, Mohammed aged nine and later his two younger brothers, to the cadet school of Revolution in El Mechouar Palace, Tlemcen. Khadra describes the beginning of his passion for writing in his autobiography entitled "The Writer", in this way he was able to keep privacy that he missed in the cadet dormitories. At first, he wanted to be a poet in Arabic language, but met professor of French origin.