Tens of volunteers who came from different places of Turkey and from all around the world have been working in the units in Suruç where now there is the need for new volunteers. For Kobanê people, there are many other needs becoming compulsory with forthcoming winter. Even if one is not be able to do […]
Tens of volunteers who came from different places of Turkey and from all around the world have been working in the units in Suruç where now there is the need for new volunteers. For Kobanê people, there are many other needs becoming compulsory with forthcoming winter. Even if one is not be able to do anything else, they are in need of one pair of smiling eyes would relieve their pain…
While YPG continues to gain ground, there is a severe battle still been going on. Since the city center became ruined after howitzers of ISIS gangs, Kobanê people have moved towards the secure zones in the west of the city.
On the day of November 11th, a howitzer is fired upon civil people waiting near to the border. Two people died, six got injured. The refugees coming from the border claim that the loss of life was in fact much more than we know.
Kobanê people who doesn’t want to leave their city, has struggled to survive in the holes they dig next to their cars, facing with hunger, thirst and attacks of ISIS. Others who had to move to Turkey tells about the difficulties they lived through in the frontier.
“They both fight and protect the civilians”
Cevdet who has stayed in the frontier for long time with his children tells about how they came to Turkey just after they narrowly escaped death from howitzer attack:
“After the intensity of clashes increased, we passed to the frontier and waited here for two months. The clashes were only few kilometers away. When ISIS lost its position in the West, they started to bomb where we were. Lastly, a howitzer hit the place we were. People came apart in front of the eyes of my children and there were many people injured. They wanted to slaughter us. That day, I decided to take my children and to pass to Turkey.”
The families built their tents on their own, have difficulties for even to meet their basic needs. Cevdet says that YPG fighters were coming everyday, try to meet their needs. “Everyday, hewals(comrades) came and asked our needs. We were ashamed to ask for something. What else they would do? We wouldn’t ask for anything even though we die from the hunger. They never left us without food and water. We had fed ourselves with rice they brought” says Cevdet; emphasizing that YGP fighters have also protected civilians besides defending the city.
The children of War: Hunger, thirst, fear and trauma
Among the people been waiting in the frontier, the worst trauma is of children. Children who are camp cities coming from the middle of clashes are generally withdrawn; some of them don’t speak at all. In the education tents of tent cities, they draw the pictures reflecting war, of death bodies and of people from ISIS cutting heads of others.
When I asked Cevdet, “How your children are affected by the clashes?” He says that his little son haven’t eaten anything for two days, haven’t spoken at all and have been sleeping all day in the tent. Then, he adds: “I have three sons, five daughters. My children had difficulties in the desert for two months. Sometimes we suffered from hunger, from we were lack of water and we never washed. I was afraid that children would get sick.”
The biggest problem was when he tried to explain to his children about war. Cevdet explains his despair, saying, “Most of the time with my wife we tried to explain the situation, but they are too young to understand what is a war.”
Cevdet told his children, who were afraid from sounds of bombs and of planes, that bomb sounds are of the thunder passing far away. Though he had to tell about the truth in the end, when his children asked “Dad, what is it?” He says “They are planes shooting ISIS for us to be able to go back home.”
The Life in Rojava is upside down
Cevdet, who himself fight in the security unit, witnessed that 50 gang members were killed in one night: “Hewals have said ‘shoot them’, though they have never finished. There were no men anymore in Arabic villages. Gangs were saying to Arabs that they fight against Jews, they were forcing people to fight with them, and they were punishing the ones who go against them.”
The clashes have been going on for along time seems like totally changed West Kurdistan. Although an important headline of Rojava defense is that the clashes are now a civil resistance -with people from ages of 15 to 70 got armed against ISIS, it is seen obviously it will take long years to rehabilitate the destroyed lives of Kobanê people.
Cevdet, who couldn’t send his children to school for the last three years, says “The war is our school for three years.” Telling about his littlest child who makes victory sign when he hears slogans in the guerilla funerals, Cevdet says rebelliously, “God! If you don’t see us, at least see these children.”
The rejection of the identity that doesn’t exist…
After the interview while we are talking, Cevdet tells his daughter burnt her finger when she was making bread, he had to smash his daughter’s finger with a stone because there was no medicine and she couldn’t stand the pain anymore.
She is a girl around 10 years old. I am saying to him that her finger would become gangrened if they leave like this. When I understand he doesn’t know what to do, we go to hospital together.
For refugees to get health service, they have to get an AFAD (Disaster and Emergency Management Presidency) card. To get the card, there is a burocratic process. However, many refugees don’t have an identity and the ones like Cevdet have only a paper representing their family with their name written on.
When we arrive to the hospital I hear many sentences like “That patient without identity will be sent”, “Did you dress the one without identity?” , “What is the name of the one without identity?” I remember again about our disidentification. I put my id next to Cevdet’s. One of them is in Turkish, the other is in Arabic; we can only understand each other in Kurdish. Putting aside the romantic arguments about rejecting identity, I understand one more time, it is not possible to reject something if you don’t have it.
“We only wish to die in our own land”
There are tens of refugees, each has a heart-wrenching story. An old woman coming in front of Amara Cultural Center searching for some food for her grandchildren who have coeliac disease. I learn that she came to Suruç from the frontier not too long ago. She says she has one son and one daughter. She tells about his 28 years old son’s fighting in Kobanê defense. While rolling the tobacco she took out from her plastic bag, she continues to tell: “We stayed in the frontier 10-12 days. Then we bullets started to hit our car, we moved in front of the border gate. There we waited for 3 days 3 nights. Then we had to pass to Turkey, leaving everything we had behind.”
The woman tells that at first they stayed in the mosque and after they settled to a storehouse; “The winter had come. The children are small the storehouse is big. Whatever we did, in no sense we could get warm”, emphasizing the winter conditions became a burden for refugees.
“Our youngs, our daughters died in the clashes. Only my son remained alive. He is still fighting. His children are so small” she says, her eyes moves to tears… I hold her hand. Nothing more is am able to do at that moment. She takes one more puff from her cigarette: “We lost everything we had. We became refugee, so be it, this too shall pass. We only wish to die in the wrecks of our home. Let us dig a hole there and die in our land” she says and she walks away slowly.
Both the refugees and their needs been increasing
Şehid Kader Ortakaya Tent City is the last, the 5th tent city. The 6th tent city started to be built. Since there is no enough tents for the new comers from Kobanê, the refugees try to live in the social space of the last settled tent city, in the tents they built by themselves. The refugees tell about difficulties they live through because they are not registered yet. Mostly they are in lack of food; they do not have blankets and clothing. The rain of last night hit all the tents. They say that all tents were under the flood and the children barely escaped drowning. The tent area covered in mud. In the tents, there is nothing on the ground to protect them from water or mud.
The responsible people of tent city says the new comers will be taken to new tent area, but first the deficiencies of the place should be overcome and there is the need for new volunteers for the new tent city.
An old lady complains about cold nights says, “We were watching the massacre in Şengal and the refugees. We were feeling sad but it was far away. Now, we are in the same situation.”
Another one melt into tears when she tells about his one year old child died because of pneumonia.
Although people work in Suruç in Kobanê Crisis Desk have mobilized, it is not easy to meet the needs for hundreds of new comers, to prepare Suruç for the winter conditions. There is the need for new volunteers for the units where tens of volunteer from Turkey and all around the world have been working. There are many urgent needs of Kobanê people for the forthcoming winter.
Even if one is not be able to do anything else, they are in need of one pair of smiling eyes that would relieve their pain…
Translated by Deniz Dilan Arslan
Click for the Turkish original.