Shilan Eminoğlu, a member of the European Kurdish Women’s Initiative, said that women in Rojava are resisting both on the ground and in social life to defend the gains of the revolution and a model of free life, and described the attacks by ISIS and ISIS-derived gangs against Rojava as attacks on women’s will and the paradigm of free life. She evaluated the attacks on Rojava and the resistance and struggle led by women for ANF.
Recalling that the Rojava revolution is a women’s revolution, Shilan Eminoğlu said: “In Rojava, a revolution within a revolution developed. In the war waged against ISIS, the enemy of humanity, women fought on the front lines and saved human dignity. We gave thousands of martyrs so that peoples could live freely, equally, and safely without discrimination of color, language, or religion. We saved the honor of the world. While yesterday coalition forces appeared to stand with the Kurds, today they turn a blind eye to what is happening. They host the remnants of ISIS in palaces and forget their debt of honor to the Kurds. Once again, we clearly understand what male-dominated militarist forces fear so much about this will.”
Stating that “throughout the history of societies and in life, women have been pioneers in sustaining social life,” Eminoğlu continued: “A just and aesthetic sociality is woman-centered; woman is sociality itself. In a society woven around women, voluntarism is essential and there is no place for coercive violence. A conscious woman means a conscious society. A resisting woman means a resisting society. A liberated woman means a liberated society. Out of fear of this, patriarchal mindsets and hegemonic powers attack with all their means and carry out femicide. This is not only a war on the battlefield, but also a psychological and ideological war. By attacking women’s will here, the ISIS mentality is also sending a message to women all over the world. The structure in Rojava has put forward a system in which women have gained an institutional place in politics, local governance, and social decision-making mechanisms. A governance model based on equal representation and the visibility of women in the public sphere has offered an alternative to long-dominant patriarchal and centralist orders. Therefore, what is being targeted is not merely a specific actor or military structure, but a different approach to how power is shared.”
Recalling that ISIS carried out a genocide in Shengal in 2014, Eminoğlu said: “Kurdish Yazidi girls and women were sold in cages and in the markets of Mosul. This mentality, which fears even a strand of a woman’s hair, fears our dead, our gravestones, and our bones. They are capable of every kind of barbarity. A dehumanized mindset sacrifices the fate of peoples to its own interests. International hegemonic powers, especially the Turkish state and government, approach the issue with a trader’s mentality and plunder Kurdish geography. They change the demography in Afrin and Serekaniye. In other words, they reformat the memory of a people and a nation, and try to profit from the places they burn and destroy. Unfortunately, the relevant state actors also approach Kurdistan with a merchant mentality. Seeking morality in this would be naïve; war and peace are conducted through interests. Geography is governed with a ‘you give, I give’ logic. Today, through the hands of these state actors, a genocide is being carried out in Rojava. Kurdish regions are being occupied together with gangs and their supporters. As the Rojava women’s revolution enters its 15th year, Kurds will protect the gains they created with their own blood against this genocide.”