Every guerrilla has a story of resistance to tell. They are destined to resist because the more the resistance is expanded, the more stories to be told and written, and thus become history... And if it is war days, the guerrilla carries memories that are equivalent to an epic in her/his bag. The Aris Faris resistance was a resistance where each moment created myriad lifetimes.

Guerrilla Diren is one of the heroes of the resistance in the battle tunnels in the Aris Faris area of ​​Avashin. Diren Raman, one of the guerrillas who joined her martyred comrades after that great resistance, had told her memories of the resistance in her own language. Before taking part in a guerilla operation on July 12, Diren Raman spoke to journalists about the Aris Faris resistance as if she knew what would happen that day. After explaining what happened in the battle tunnels, she fulfilled her promise to history and fell a martyr on July 12, 2021 in the Avashin area along with her three comrades.

'TURKISH FORCES WERE SPECIFICALLY TARGETTING FEMALE FIGHTERS'

YJA Star guerrilla Diren Raman described the struggle against the Turkish army which headed for the Aris Faris area after Mamreşo resistance:

"I took my place in the Aris Faris resistance as part of the Bazên Zagros revolutionary campaign. The more we talk about what happened there, the better the enemy's atrocity will be understood and known. After the battle in Mamreşo, the Turkish forces focused on the Aris Faris area. The reason why they focused on it was to capture us alive. They thought that we would abandon our will, values ​​and loyalty to the party and surrender to the Turkish state. This was their expectation, but what happened was the opposite. There, resistance against the enemy developed in the battle tunnels. We intervened in the enemy forces constantly. They were shocked when they realized that their advanced weapons were ineffective, and we resisted gloriously. For this reason, they started to introduce different propaganda methods. They started to propose offers like 'Come, surrender, the state will protect you.' They were specifically targeting our female fighters, saying 'The life you lead is not a real life, the state will give you whatever you want, you are a woman, it is better for you to surrender'. They were trying to capture our female friends. They were saying things like ‘We do not want male fighters, come and surrender; we will protect you better than them’.

Every time we heard their voice, we became more pissed off. Because they knew, too: if we had a desire to surrender for food and drink, we would not have joined this movement at all from the very beginning. For us, loyalty to the martyrs and our leader was above everything else, and what they offered was so irrelevant to us. We were just making fun of their calls. When they realized that we did not surrender, we were chanting and shouting slogans, which made them super angry. Later on, they told us that 'If you don't surrender, we will use different things. We used chemical weapons in Mamreşo and will do the same here, too’. After each time they spoke, our friends were carrying out actions against them.

The resistance, self-sacrifice and devotion of our fighters shocked the Turkish forces. The resistance there almost formed a trench against the enemy. It was a battle position and so much effort had been put into defending it. Even though the enemy disseminated various propaganda by claiming that we had no more ammunition and living materials left and that we could not fight at all, the weapons and tactics we used against the enemy surprised them. Our friends did not allow the enemy to enter the battle tunnels with these methods. The friends fought until the end to prevent the enemy from entering the tunnels, especially to maintain our special methods regarding our deployment. A great determination was revealed to respond to the killings of our friends. Heval Amara, one of the fighters who took part in that resistance, had decided to carry out an action of self-sacrifice in order to frustrate the enemy. There was only one unit in those tunnels, and the actions carried out by this single unit still prevented the enemy from entering the Aris Faris area.

'WE WILL FIGHT IN SPIRIT OF OUR MARTYRED FRIENDS'

We now know the enemy and their brutal methods. As YJA-Star guerrillas, we will never leave Avashin until we take revenge for these martyred friends. ​​Aris Faris was an area of ​​resistance in past, and now there is the blood of our martyred friends everywhere. As Zagros falcons, we will definitely avenge those friends. We will always keep their dreams and actions alive. As guerrillas in the Avashin area, we know that none of us will fight in the old way. For instance, I will no longer fight like Diren, or none of the other friends will fight the way they used to. We will fight in the spirit of our martyred friends. They fought to the end in the spirit of resistance in their hearts. Their battle and their resistance are not over, we are their successors, and will continue to fight. The martyrs' flag has never fallen to the ground and will never fall. The more the enemy's aggression increases, the more we will strengthen our loyalty and confront the enemy."