Handan Tufan/JINHA

ŞIRNEX – Ayşe Erbek and Hediye Erdoğan are two women who, despite all the pain they have gone through, are still on their feet. As the women wait outside the morgue to retrieve their sons killed in the besieged town of Cizre, they express their pride in their sons’ struggle and say that they will continue to resist as they have before.

In Cizre, Turkish state forces trapped over 150 people in basements throughout the town, then denied medical assistance and finally perpetrated massacres against those trapped inside. The bodies of those slain in the “basements of atrocity” in Cizre are slowly being identified. The bodies have been sent to multiple cities across the region, where the families waiting in front of the morgues are trying to maintain one another’s morale.

Most of the bodies at the temporary forensic medical institute set up to receive bodies at the Habur Border Gate in the town of Silopi are burned beyond recognition. Nine bodies have been identified so far; 41 more dead bodies are still in the temporary morgue. For the families waiting here, pain is shamed.

The women, singing laments outside the morgue, say that this is the latest in the string of suffering that they have gone through. Two of these women are Ayşe Erbek and Hediye Erdoğan. Despite all they have gone through in their lives, they remain on their feet.

The women’s story begins in the village of Kereşan, located in the Güçlükonak district of Şırnak province, where they grew up together as relatives. While Ayşe has been able to identify her son Muharrem Erbek, Hediye has still not been able to identify her son Mahsun Erdoğan. Ayşe begins to tell their story, starting in 1993, when their village was burned down in the Turkish state’s dirty war in Kurdistan.

“I had just given birth. My daughter was eight days old. We were trapped in the house,” says Ayşe. “We had to abandon our village. We lived on the mountain for a while; we moved four times. Finally, we moved to Cizre. We made our home there. And now, they’ve brought this massacre to us. Now we’ve been forced to leave Cizre.”

Ayşe said that what was going on today in Cizre was a repetition of what was done to their village years ago, when their children were just born. Ayşe said that she told her son Muharrem to leave Cizre as the recent attacks by the Turkish state began.

“They didn’t accept it. They were always in struggle,” said Ayşe. “They were children; they grew up in struggle, together.”

The family initially heard that Muharrem was wounded. They never heard from him again.

“They burned the bodies of those they killed. They assassinated some, and did whatever they wanted with the bodies,” said Ayşe. “They perpetrated a massacre. No human does something like this.”

Ayşe addressed all youth, calling on them to stand up for the struggle of her child. She said that they would continue their children’s struggle to the end.

Mahsun’s mother Hediye said that soon after her son was born in the village, it was burned down. The family was forced to move to Cizre, where they have lived for 20 years.

“We made a home here; we made a life for ourselves. Everything had just started to go right when they destroyed our homes again,” said Mahsun. Hediye’s father was an imam. He was tortured to death in the Şırnak Prison. He was among four members of Hediye’s family who were killed by the state. Hediye said her son grew up hearing the stories of his grandfather’s resistance.

“Go see—they killed our children so savagely,” said Hediye. “Look at my son’s photo and you’ll see that beauty. But now look, see what they’ve done to them. What right, what law, what conscience let them do this?

“The Kurdish people will not accept this. They don’t yet know the Kurdish people,” said Hediye.

(gc/cm)