[The doctor Ceren Güneş fought as an internationalist in Rojava. On November 3 2019 Ceren fell şehîd in the resistance against the Turkish invasion on the Serêkaniyê/Til Temir frontline.
Another internationalist woman who knew her as a friend and comrade wrote a letter to her some weeks later.
Dear comrade Ceren Güneş,
How to start this letter? How I can express in words all the love and rage I have inside of me? Still deep in the resistance of the defense in Rojava, still deep in the thoughts and wishes of freedom from so many comrades, the same as you also had. Born in Turkey, you soon started to be a militant of revolutionary organizations, carrying inside of you the most beautiful perspective as a woman revolutionary fighter and love for your women comrades. Your conviction drove to you until the lands of Kurdistan, where you took part in the armed struggle in the defense of every land under threat of oppression.
This is not a “goodbye letter”. Everything I learned next to you helps me to remember you and to remember why we meet, why our ways had to find each other. The two of us arrived to Rojava, in very different times, but sharing the decision to struggle, to build and to defend a new future. To build strong connections between comrades, to confront fascism, to support every women and young girl that grows up oppressed, to struggle for the freedom of every sister and comrade locked up in jails, choosing to walk next to the oppressed people and a collective life.
But yes…I miss you.
From the beginning I could see your strength and your light. Fighter and determined, full of value and compromise, fulfilling the sense of the meaning of giving your life for the struggle against fascism and capitalism. I had the good luck to share next to you intense moments in our daily life, the conversations in the moonlight with warm tea and revolutionary songs, moments of resistance. Here, in the villages and cities the invasion of the Turkish fascist troops and the jihadist gangs continues, and in the same way that you were participating in the defense of this land, your comrades continue going forward, because we know that this is also what you will like to do. We know that our struggle makes the comrades fallen in battle live on, and reminds us the reasons why we stand for revolutionary ideas, making even greater the values that together we were building.
I will have always in my mind your initiative to build solidarity between comrades, to know the struggle from the different feminist movements in every corner of this world, to make visible every revolt, for make of the Internationalism the most alive picture in defense of the autonomy of the womens organizations. I saw in you all the value you gave to the comrades with whom you learned to fight and live a life in community. For me, you are a big inspiration of courage and bravery. I hope to be able to continue in your footprints on the path of your walk, because your effort it is already part of our history. That history that we build ourselves, convinced that fighting for life is the only way. With the clear decision that we ourselves have to rise up strong in this war.
Comrade Ceren, every time I remember you I need to smile, because I know, that your revolutionary heart writes the history of all the women that are fight following your steps. Your decision and commitment will inspire across the world to rise up and to join the struggle against oppression, they will keep the memory of all women who decided like you, to give your lives to build a resistance against the fascism of Erdogan, the silence of Europe and the complicity of Russia and the USA.
I write to you from the villages in the line of defense of Til Temir. The same towns that saw you fight, the same ones that are being brutally attacked by Turkish soldiers and jihadist groups. They can use all the war weapons they want, but they cannot end the resistance of the Rojava people, they cannot end the memory of all these years of revolution and dreams that became true. The roots of this land arealready part of the example of the dignity that mothers, daughters, grandmothers, fighters, cooks, doctors, nurses … are building.
Writing to you I remember the internationalist comrades who came and fought with the strongest conviction, from the deepest love, in defense of this territory and the ideas that live in it. They chose to spread the revolutionary ideas to the world, becoming a great inspiration, for all those who like me decided to come, to learn,to see with our own eyes and participate with our own hands in the immense work that the women comrades have been developing in Kurdistan. Şehîd Aynur Ada, Şehîd Ivanna Hofman, Şehîd Anna Campbell, Şehîd Legerin Ciya, Şehîd Sara Dorsin, Şehîd Andrea Wolf, Şehîd Ceren Güneş. I remember you and I reaffirm the belief that women are the engine of the defense of this wild life.
More days of resistance are yet to come, and we will take care of each other, we will fight together for those that have fallen and for those that are to come. To all the internationalist comrades that find yourselves fighting and defending the territory of Rojava, to all the comrades that although far apart share the same steps and decisions, for all of you I continue to convince myself every day that ours is the struggle for life, and that although our enemy is powerful, we have the most precious and strong
weapons, unity and collective support. For the earth and the comrades that have fallen martyrs in this historic war against Power.
Comrade Şehîd Ceren Güneş, your words of freedom are more alive and present to me than ever. I will take you with me in my thoughts and within my heart, making our days the best tribute, to continue and not give up. If I stop for a moment, I can still hear you singing revolutionary songs in Turkish language, in the kitchen preparing tea for the comrades, and making us all sit together and share long moments of conversation. If I stop for a moment, I can remember those nights next to other comrades where we discussed how to continue fighting together when the time came when our paths would separate.
And I keep smiling, because our path remains the same and your memory teaches me the value of all the moments we share together.
Until the last corner of this world, until we are all free, we will not stop! Our steps and our revolutionary ideas make us stay together anyway, anywhere. One of the internationalist women comrades that you also know one day told me, that the work for the liberation of the women that is done here is so strong, that even with difficulties we go forward all together, that this love makes us become “forever “.
I have no better way to describe you… Comrade Ceren, we are forever!
The land where you rest fills with meaning the indefatigable resistance of the fighters, the land of Rojava will remember you in each new comrade that will join the revolution. And in my heart I take you with me dear sister, because those who fight never die and that fact neither fascist armies nor the most extreme capitalism is capable of changing. Hasta siempre, and you always with us!
Şehîd Namirin. To resist is to live, in any corner of this world …
From one of your internationalist women comrades. Always near.
December 2019. Til Temir. Rojava