YJA Star commander on the need for women to defend themselves

YJA Commander Nalin Dilpak talked about the beginning of the women's army

Nalin Dilpak, one of the commanders of the YJA Star, said that women's army was a defense force covering almost all peoples and women in the four parts of Kurdistan.
YJA Star commander Nalin Dilpak answered the questions of Dengê Welat Radio.

Why was it necessary to recruit women?

At the very beginning of the grouping and partying phase of our movement, women took part in the revolution. The opportunity to participate is, of course, linked to the ideology, philosophy and life of Önder Apo. At the very beginning of the Kurdistan revolution, it was thought that there should be a woman in every cell of the construction phase, and a great role and a mission were created for her.

The woman has taken her place in the revolution with her will, her color, her intellectual power and her participation strength.

The leadership helped us prepare for this process with trainings and said "there is a need for a women's army".

In terms of life, idea and thought, the oppression and vulnerability of women were great. You had to have a gun if you wanted to defend yourself, your idea and thought, but this weapon was not in our hands.

The leadership wanted to put a powerful weapon in the hands of women when he saw this need. The leadership said: "Nobody will take you into consideration if you don't have a strong structure in terms of defense and military quality in the reality of the Middle East".  

Even within the left, socialist or different organizations there was no mechanism for taking women who participated in the struggle into account. Now women wanted to be taken into account and felt this was the answer, creating a women's army.

In addition, as we expected the new century was going to be harder than the previous one as it was to be immerged in the Third World War and it was necessary to prepare for each front. The leadership had seen from the time that the Third World War we were in today would use unbridled massacre, annihilation and displacement policies on women. Preliminary preparation for this was done with the women's army.

World War Three was being prepared. The leadership saw this process. Today, villages, districts, cities are emptied, women are slaughtered without anyone paying for it, they are made slaves and still their existence is not taken into account. Their homes are being plundered, their lives are being plundered, their cities are being plundered, their villages are plundered, their species is being plundered, they are being plundered and destroyed. These attacks are carried out culturally as well as military.

Women were left so helpless and wanted to be left so helpless that even the defense ground had to be eliminated. Psychologically and intellectually, even the ground where the woman can defend herself has been eliminated. You stand up against the system, you are rebelling against the state, you stand up against the tribe, you are rebelling against the man...These were imaginary things.

How did the leadership see this and bring it to the agenda, how it was met by the women in the revolution, and how was your initial reaction?

Even when it came to the language, it did not seem rational, people did not want to believe. When the leadership put women's army on the agenda, we were worried about how we could create such a defense force. We had great anxiety and fear. When the leadership put women's army on the agenda, we used to talk secretly about these fears. 

What was your fear?

Either the men would hear it or the system. It wasn't easy. In spite of all these fears, women were recruited. We owe it to Leader Apo. Just as we had great fears at the very beginning of this work, we now have a serious fear that something will happen to women's army; we are trying to grow, to develop further, because our tastes as women, who have enjoyed the self-defense and have once enjoyed freedom, are of course now on a different dimension.