By ΕΛΛΗΝΙΚΑ (GREEK) TÜRKÇE (TURKISH)
July 21…
1974…
Exactly 49 years ago today…
The sun had not risen yet in the morning…
And my father, accompanied by me, my mother, and sister, were walking to the primary school in Gaziveren [Kazivera] from the road that passes in front of coffeehouses…
We had surrendered to the Greek Cypriots…
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My father was holding his hunting rifle, its pivot open, facing down…
Fear!
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Let’s go back a day…
July 20…
1974…
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Turkey had landed on the island…
The Greek Cypriots, Makarios supporters and EOKA B members had put their internal conflicts aside and were attacking Turkish Cypriot villages as much as they could mobilise…
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We were in Gaziveren [Kazivera]…
In the evening, the Greek Cypriots attacked the village…
For about 13 hours, chaos reigned…
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We reach the morning of July 21…
We surrendered!
For some reason, I remember the Greek Cypriot yelling from the mosque’s microphone, “Barahodides”!
I ask my Greek Cypriot friends what it means, but they tell me “There’s no such word.”
I must have remembered it wrong!
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My father, my uncle, and everyone in the village who could bear arms but who did not flee were boarded onto trucks and taken away…
We wait, sitting on the side of the road next to the primary school…
And I think everyone is peeing on themselves where they sit!
The place reeks of urine!
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There is silence on July 22…
It’s scorching hot!
Everyone is gathered in the school’s three classrooms…
Some of us are in the courtyard!
A Greek Cypriot arrives with a van, flinging quarter loaves of bread and canned beef at us as if he was feeding dogs!
By the way, canned beef is quite expensive these days!
—
And what I remember is July 23…
The roaring of the jets…
The sound of explosions…
A Greek Cypriot runs, and climbs up onto the truck-like vehicle parked across the school!
He rains bullets on the school from his machine gun!
The smell of soil and blood!
14 dead!
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We step on the dead and wounded as we get out…
Both my knees are bleeding!
I was hit by tiny shrapnel pieces!
Lying in front of the door is a pregnant woman; she lies dead, clutching her child younger than me and her unborn child…
I can never get that image out of my mind…
—
14 dead…
Peacekeeping Force soldiers…
Greek Cypriots…
Shouting, yelling…
We are sent to our homes…
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It’s 2023…
July 21…
Ersin Tatar is the President…
And he is a nationalist…
He hasn’t experienced the war…
But he guarantees his seat by advocating nationalism in favour of war…
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And we have established a “state”…
No one recognizes it!
It’s full of lies!
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It’s as if we never suffered; as if we were never shot; as if we never stood guard, never resisted…
The children of martyrs are in Australia, in the UK!
Their grandchildren and great-grandchildren are seeking jobs on the Greek Cypriot side!
Including Tatar, everyone has the passport of what they call the “Greek Cypriot state” in their pockets!
And those who claim, “We saved you,” continue to plunder this country!
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The country is under the control of flatterers and looters!!! and I’m sorry, it’s under their occupation!
The future of the Turkish Cypriot community is handed over to zealots!
The victory of the Turkish Women’s Volleyball National Team in the Nations League was perhaps one of the most significant championships in the country’s sporting history…
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And a group of “religious conservatives” in this country is attacking Ebrar Karakurt who is not only the greatest volleyball player of the Turkish National Team, but perhaps the greatest volleyball player of the world…
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Fascism and discrimination are being experienced at their fullest…
A clear example of backwardness…
Zealots who even hate women for being “human”…
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And these zealots are both the supporters and the very essence of those currently governing Turkey…
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And the most painful part of it all; secular Kemalist Turkey is under threat!
And even worse than that; those governing the TRNC have surrendered the future of the Turkish Cypriot community to these zealots in pursuit of personal gain and positions!
“We are under occupation, but we are happy!”
Even the fascists are starting to acknowledge the “occupation”…
A former staunch leftist turned fascist who works for Kıbrıs newspaper wrote an article along the lines of “I would sacrifice myself for this kind of occupation”…
Actually, what he said was, “Yes, there is occupation, but it suits us; we are happy!”
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By the way, something is bothering me:
If the TRNC is an equal and sovereign independent state, then why wasn’t the TRNC’S opposition invited to the opening of Ercan [Tymbou] Airport?
Why are the invitations sent out by Turkey?
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Alright, alright!
Let’s not discuss the occupation!
Let’s agree on the existence of a ceasefire, but your claim that we are an equal and sovereign state would be nothing more than a “joke”!
[Photo insert: Photograph of İncirli in his father’s embrace taken in 1974]
My father was taken prisoner on July 21, 1974… He remained a prisoner until October 22, 1974, along with hundreds of other Turkish Cypriots, first in Morphou and then in Limassol… He was released as part of a prisoner exchange on October 22, 1974… This photograph was taken by the late journalist, Bilbay Eminoğlu, in Nicosia that day… May God bless our older brother Bilbay… The photograph was published on the front page of the Bozkurt newspaper dated October 23, 1974… I worked in the same room with brother Bilbay for years, and I remember him with respect… By the way, my sister is a good archivist… She kept the newspaper all these years… I saw it for the first time… And in this country, the zealots who didn’t let us into Turkey, labelling us as”traitors and terrorists”; the clowns who don’t even allow us into a press conference at the palace; shamelessly plunder our country! For the sake of their interests, they don’t even want a solution to the Cyprus problem… They obstruct it… They’re disturbed when someone writes or speaks the truth, in other words criticizes them!
Source: THE FLATTERING AND PLUNDERING HEROES!
