The Wall: The Making and Unmaking of the Turkish-Syrian Border [1st ed.] 9783030456535, 9783030456542

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The Wall The Making and Unmaking of the Turkish-Syrian Border Ramazan Aras

The Wall

The map showing Eastern Turkey and Vicinity where the fieldwork site is marked with a red spot. (Map: Courtesy of the University of Texas Libraries, The University of Texas at Austin): http://legacy.lib.utexas.edu/maps/middle_east_and_ asia/turkey_east_pol_2002.jpg

Ramazan Aras

The Wall The Making and Unmaking of the Turkish-Syrian Border

Ramazan Aras Ibn Haldun University Istanbul, Turkey

ISBN 978-3-030-45653-5 ISBN 978-3-030-45654-2 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-45654-2 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland

Preface

This book undertakes an anthropological analysis into the life stories, testimonies, and other oral accounts imparting the process of separation and ruptured social, cultural, religious, and economic structures and autochthonous bonds as a result of the constructed political borders of nation-states newly founded on inherited territories of the Ottoman Empire. Subsisting generations of local peoples and religious communities from the Ottoman Empire were residing within a geography of an established accommodation of diverse religious, ethnic, cultural, linguistic, and economic arrangements. However, with the emergence of many nationstate projects after the fall of Empire, the series of geopolitical, sociocultural, and economic events exposed vast communities to deep-rooted traumas and social pathologies. In this process, arbitrarily determined and constructed political borders began to inflict deep separations and ruptures at the border regions. The histories of determination and construction of Turkish political borders like political borders of many other nation-states founded after World War I and World War II document how these territorial borders troubled social, cultural, religious, ethnic, and economic fabrics of communities who have been partitioned and troubled by these geopolitical interventions. With a particular focus on the case of the Turkish-Syrian border, this book addresses the importance of investigation and analysis of political border in order to understand partitioned communities who

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PREFACE

have been surrounded by political border on their own lands. By providing a thick ethnography of political borders, this research focuses on the evolution of Turkish-Syrian border from the early years of the Republic to the present. During my childhood in Kerboran (Dargeçit), Mardin, and in the later periods, I listened to many life stories of border people and narratives of smuggling within the family settings. Under the influence of these kinds of life stories, the question of political borders began to pervade my thoughts; my interest, however, was mainly concretized after having started to work at the Department of Anthropology at Mardin Artuklu University in July of 2010. As an oral historian, sociologist, and sociocultural anthropologist, I prioritized to work on other urgent crises (displacement and migration of Assyrian/Syriac Christians, political violence, politics of fear of the state and suffering in the context of the Kurdish question in Turkey, etc.) in the region and thus postponed the question of political borders that actually had always lingered in my mind. However, in the fall of 2010, my experience and observations in my first visit of my aunt Naîma (died in 2016) who was living in the border village of Beyandûr in the border province of Qami¸slo (Syria) on the other side of the Turkish border crystalized my decision to commence in a project on the Turkish-Syrian political border. The story of nearly 90-year-old Naîma was just the tip of iceberg concerning the high cost of the political border that the local community have been paying for decades. During my three-day visit with my mother, questions were just popping up in my mind while talking to my cousins, their neighbors, and walking at the downtown Qami¸slo. I listened many stories of escape from Turkey and how people took refuge in Syrian side. I learned about the lives of stateless Kurds who were neither citizen of Turkey nor citizen of Syria. I heard stories of severe deaths of ordinary people who were trying to cross the border. Overall, I was informed about not only suffering and struggle of border people residing in both sides of the border but also ambiguities, resilience, adaptations, and opportunities of border mechanism which was thickening throughout decades. In sum, my short visit for my relatives residing in the Kurdish region of northern Syria not only triggered the research process but also enabled me to recognize how actually the phenomenon of political borders and its various catastrophic consequences at both subjective and collective levels have been ignored by social scientists in Turkey.

PREFACE

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The worsening political conditions in the region—the eruption of Syrian Civil War, the conflicts between the PKK and the Turkish forces— forced me to limit my research area with Nisêbîn (Nusaybin) border region although I was interested in doing a comparative research in Kurdish communities residing in both sides of the border. However, the border town of Nisêbîn with its nearly 90,000 population had numerous border stories to offer. Based on life stories and testimonies of former smugglers, their family members, mothers, widows, and many other border people, this book documents a genealogical exploration and an anthropological analysis of state-sponsored border making practices and policies. Besides revealing the social, economic, and political history of Turkish-Syrian border, the collected life stories, testimonies, and transmitted narratives of the past and present generations document significant data regarding the memory, identity, sense of belonging, and daily lives of local Kurdish people in a particular location in the border city of Nisêbîn in the Mardin Province and some surrounding border villages in the Kurdish region. This work not only critically analyses the making of the Turkish-Syrian border through an exploration of the statist discourses, the state border practices, and its diverse apparatuses, but further analyses the unmaking border practices along the Turkish-Syrian border in light of local people’s counter perceptions, discourses, life stories, narratives, and daily practices which can be interpreted as certain forms of local defiance to imposition, resilience, and incorporating strategies in everyday life. This book reveals local people’s diversifying perceptions of place, memories, border and state security apparatuses which can be interpreted as a legacy of the Ottoman past. Istanbul, Turkey

Ramazan Aras

Acknowledgements

I owe the greatest debt to all people who directly or indirectly have made contributions to this project. I am grateful to my interlocutors who shared their life stories, testimonies, and memories with me during the fieldwork in the Nisêbîn border region. Many of them emphasized their will to speak in order to let the outside world hear their voices. Therefore, they did not want to hide their names and they gave oral consent during the interviews. Here, I want to record my gratitude to Mardin Artuklu University for providing funds to carry out the fieldwork. I am indebted also to a large number of people who assisted me during the fieldwork in different times in 2013 and 2014. I owe a special debt of gratitude to my research assistant Adnan I¸sık and Abdülaziz Engin, Bilal Oktan, Sükrü ¸ Oktan, and Brahîmê Dorikî for their support, guidance, and hospitality in Nisêbîn and surrounding border villages. I want to thank Adnan I¸sık and Sedat Arı for making transcriptions and translation of all recorded interviews from Kurdish to Turkish. Early version of this book and one chapter have appeared in Turkish before. The large part of the book titled Mayın ve Kaçakçı: Turkiye-Suriye ˙ sa ve Bozma Pratikleri [Landmine and Smuggler: The MakSınırını In¸ ing and Unmaking Practices of Turkish-Syrian Border] was published by Çizgi Kitabevi in 2015. I am thankful to the following who read the Turkish version which was actually shorter and offered valuable comments and criticisms: Hidayet Sefkatli ¸ Tuksal, Sıtkı Karadeniz, Yunus Cengiz, Arzu Öztürkmen, Ay¸se Aras, Ali Bedir, Ferhat Tekin, and Cumhur Ölmez.

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Chapter 2 is a revised and extended version of “Türkiye’de Sınır ve Sınır Bölgeleri Çalı¸smaları: Ele¸stirel Bir De˘gerlendirme (Border and Borderland Studies in Turkey: A Critical Evaluation,” in Journal of Mukaddime of Mardin Artuklu University vol. 5, no. 2, 2014, which has been used here with permission. Besides, Chapter 5 is an extended version of the paper not published but presented at the American Anthropological Association Annual Meeting, in November 2017 in Washington, DC. While writing the final version of this book at Ibn Haldun University, in Istanbul, some friends, colleagues, and students supported me. I wish to thank Talal Asad for his enlightening comments and guidance on the issue of security walls during our conversation in his house in November 2017, in New York. I want to thank Erik Ringmar for his valuable comments and criticisms on the completed version of the manuscript. I would like to thank my graduate research assistants Hibatuallah Bensaid, Hüseyin Da˘g, and Ruhul Amin at the Department of Sociology at Ibn Haldun University for their assistance and contributions. I would like to thank Mary Al-Sayed of Palgrave Macmillan for her impeccable assistance and excellent care throughout all stages of publishing my work. I also thank Madison Allums for her valuable editorial assistance. I would also like to thank two anonymous reviewers for Palgrave Macmillan for their helpful comments, criticisms, and suggestions. To my wife Ay¸se, I always owe a special debt for her love, patience, and support.

Contents

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Introduction 1.1 Methodology and Ethnography

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Anthropology of Borders and Borderlands in Turkey 2.1 Studies on Borders and Borderlands in Turkey 2.1.1 Economy and Trade in the Turkish Border Regions 2.1.2 Border Determination, Management, and Security 2.1.3 Society, History, and Memory

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The 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 3.5 3.6 3.7

Making Political Borders in Turkish State Discourses The First Signifiers: Border Markers Barbed Wire Landmines Watchtowers Gendarmerie Stations and Soldiers Border Gates

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The Unmaking 4.1 Local Knowledge and Landscape 4.2 Border Crossings

1 4 21 26 28 31 34 49 51 61 72 76 89 94 105 121 123 128 xi

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4.3 4.4 4.5 4.6

4.2.1 Smuggling 4.2.2 Rite of Passage 4.2.3 Networks 4.2.4 Fear, Death, and Destiny Women, Mined Zone, and Daily Life Landmine and the Body Caper Plant: Healing or Slaying? Grass and Game

134 137 143 151 164 170 177 180

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The 5.1 5.2 5.3

Final Phase: The Turkish Security Wall The Idea of the Security Wall The Making of the Wall The Unmaking: Underground Tunnels

191 197 203 207

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Concluding Remarks

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Bibliography

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Index

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Abbreviations

AA AK Party BDP FETÖ ISIS ˙ JITEM KDP MIT OHAL ÖSO PKK SETA TOKI˙ TTB UNHCR YPG

Anadolu Ajansı (Anadolu News Agency) Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi (Justice and Development Party) Barı¸s ve Demokrasi Partisi (Peace and Democracy Party) Fethulahçı Terör Örgütü (Fethullahist Terrorist Organization) Islamic State of Iraq and Syria ˙ Jandarma Istihbarat Terörle Mücadele (Gendarmerie Intelligence Against Terror) Partîya Demokrata Kurdistan (Kurdistan Democratic Party) ˙ Milli Istihbarat Te¸skilatı (The Turkish Intelligence Service) Ola˘gan Üstü Hal (The State of Emergency) Özgür Suriye Ordusu (Free Syrian Army) Partîya Karkeren Kurdistan (Kurdish Workers’ Party) Siyaset, Ekonomi ve Toplum Ara¸stırmaları Vakfı (Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research) ˙ T.C. Ba¸sbakanlık Toplu Konut Idaresi Ba¸skanlı˘gı (The Housing Development Administration of Turkey) Türk Tabipler Birli˘gi (Association of Turkish Medical Doctors) United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Yekîneyên Parastina Gel (People’s Protection Units)

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CHAPTER 1

Introduction

Political borders appearing after World War I had a great impact on sociocultural patterns, economic lifestyles, perceptions of geography, sense of belonging, individual and social memories, and the identities of inhabitants in the region. Political borders that aim to determine what belongs to the nation-state and what does not from different dimensions were not just drawn on a certain territory, they attempted to be inscribed in minds of people as well.1 The Turkish-Syrian border was determined and drawn up during the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne between Turkish authorities and European colonial powers, within a short span time. These territories saw construction when state authorities ventured into the field in order to mark boundaries with placement of stones as border (land) markers. Following the placement of border markers, the state proceeded in border making through the placement of military mechanisms such as patrols, barbed wire fences, gendarmerie stations, border gates, and eventually landmines in the early 1950s. The state authority’s establishment of such military mechanisms resulted in a wounding of social bodies and perpetuated violence in the process to achieve its intended strengthened hegemony and exercise of power upon the margins of the nation-state. The political borders that constitute the concrete boundaries of the state’s hegemonic domain emerged as an epistemologically and ontologically exclusive, divisive, and othering mechanism and construction between the imagined communities and neighboring nation-states or colonized states. The political territorial borders which nation-states attempt to construct and preserve through various ideological and physical sanctions have been © The Author(s) 2020 R. Aras, The Wall, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-45654-2_1

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perceived contrarily by local people and have against common expectation. The local people have developed different relationships with the statist narrative and the state’s border making project. Although studies on Turkey’s political borders and borderlands commenced in the 1990s, these studies have only begun to take center stage and becoming visible in the 2000s. One observes the deficiency in the deep lack of anthropological perspectives in these studies having been carried out by researchers hailing from fields of business administration, political science and international relations, public administration and partially sociology, and sociocultural anthropology. The number of history-, society-, and memory-oriented studies is relatively few and seems to be insufficient due to theoretical and methodological shortcomings. Therefore, the following chapter addresses the extension of this study’s framework by taking the shortcomings of borders and border regions studies into consideration. The pivotal answers are sought in this book emerge from these questions: in what way did the Turkish-Syrian border construction process determined following a great political struggle, negotiations and significance evolved in the early decades of the Republic? What are the physical and ideological tools utilized by state officials throughout the construction period of the border? How successful was the endeavor to protect and secure the border’s safety, which was given great importance by the state authorities? What kind of relationships were forged between local state authority representatives and the local subjects? On the other hand, how was the border perceived and defined subjectively and collectively in the local memory? Which elements did the border transgress and what kind of consequences do these attempts of border transgression yield in local communities? What extent of impact did such political borders have on the local family histories? What are the elements that displayed continuity or change in historical process in social, cultural, and economic structures and which elements endured the circumstances? What kind of relationship did people establish with the landmined zones formed by the state along the border? Lastly, what are the perceptions and reactions of local people to the final phase of border making process, the recently erected Turkish security wall? How may the weak protests and silence of local peoples be interpreted regarding the erection of the security wall? What can be said of the underground tunnel phenomenon as an emergent survival tactic against the security wall and the subject in the border studies in Turkey? This book attempts to provide answers to some of

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these questions and in the process, reveal how political borders continue to be resisted, adapted, negotiated, and at times transformed into diverse mechanisms and domains by the local peoples of the past and present. In this context of the history of Turkish-Syrian border, the landmined zone which can be described also as a “no man’s land” was created by the state in the 1950s in the midst of life source agricultural fields and arid lands used for herding livestock by villagers living along the border. Therefore, the state’s use, repurposing and renaming of those regions as a security zone did not reflect similarly in the lives and minds of local people. For them, these land expanses remain their own and are to be employed for their own economic needs. For this reason, the local people’s perception of the land, their relationship with the border and their remaining ties with the relatives left on the Syrian side of the border can be defined as certain forms of resistance. What they felt, thought, and constantly did are in fact a continuation of their century-old patterns of life. However, these acts could be interpreted as subversive practices against a state imagined and constructed system. It is for these reasons the no man’s land permeated with deadly landmines was eventually purposefully “violated” and occupied as an everyday life space of border peoples and animals in different ways. In this context, “smuggling” is defined as a routine of illegal cross-border trade, as an act of resistance but also as a powerful and traumatic phenomenon. Following in the line of argumentation “no matter how clearly borders are drawn on official maps, how many customs officials are appointed, or how many watchtowers are built, people will ignore borders whenever it suits them,”2 I also argue that the various resistance mechanisms emerge in local memory and everyday lives in defiance of the nation-state-imposed political status quo alongside ideological discourses and fictitious cartographic imaginations. In other words, the local existence of diverse counter-perceptions, conceptions, and memories of the place (land), history, and geographies may be understood in light of historical legacies and past experience. This research contributes to the important studies on the formation of the nation-state, the politics of ethnicity, tribe, nation, sense of belonging, nationalism, and placemaking in the context of border and borderland studies.3 This book examines the border making processes, discourses and security apparatuses from past to the present in comparison with resistance, resilience and adaptation patterns, tactics and means that developed by local people against linguistic, psychological, and physical interventions of the Turkish state and its local apparatuses. In this regard, it is thought

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that the analysis and study of the incidents and procedures that took place in the Turkish-Syria border with a critical and anthropological perspective will constitute a distinctive and meaningful example in the studies on borders and borderlands in Turkey. In sum, this book is an endeavor to decipher the social, cultural, political, economic, and psychological impacts of the Turkish-Syrian political border on people living along the border.

1.1

Methodology and Ethnography

At the onset of planning for this research, the answer to the question over the ideal methodology to follow in carrying out an anthropological study around the construction, transformation, change, and ruptures experienced in the border region and on the political border is closely connected to the concept of “multi-sited ethnography.”4 While the discussions in the 1990s mainly focused on ethnographic methods in anthropology, Marcus’s article pointed out methodological anxieties and highlighted the importance of a multiplicity of agencies and sites. By defining the role of the ethnographer as circumstantial activist, he recommends to study the objects of research through particular modes and techniques such as following people, materials such as commodities, gifts, money, artwork, intellectual property, metaphors, signs, symbols, plots, story or allegory, life or biography, and conflict.5 In accordance with Marcus’s conception of multi-sited ethnography and by making use of the suggested modes and techniques, the question of how the placement of border stones, planting of mines, erection barbed wire fences, deployment of patrols, positioning of soldiers, and construction of border gates appearing in as part of a grander process within the state’s border making practice as well as the emergence of new agents is responded to, analyzed and described in light of the life stories and narratives of the border people. Later, by following the idea of “social life of things”6 developed by Arjun Appadurai and some other researchers in the context of “doing anthropology of things,” the network formed by these new agents and their existence around the border was analyzed through the local experiences and testimonies. As is known, the greatest contribution to that new ethnographic approach and pursuit of anthropology originated from Bruno Latour’s actor-network theory

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(ANT) that developed in the 1980s.7 Beyond this, a human-centered perspective and approach of classical anthropology, objects and living creatures other than humans were included in the analysis as agents.8 Following this approach, although life stories and testimonies of border people constitute the nexus of this study, the agency of other living beings (mules, donkeys, horses, sheep, grass, caper plant, etc.), objects (border stones, barbed wires, mines, etc.), and structures (gendarmerie stations, watchtowers, border gates) were also taken into consideration. In other words, these subjects are seen as significant agents in carrying out a comprehensive analysis into the phenomenon of the political border from a historical, social, and economic perspective. The appearance of nation-state projects in the Middle East region following World War I induced division of intertwined people and communities. The damage of these enforced political projects has been the fundamental breaching factor in various social fabrics in the region. Among the societies which greatly experienced the negative repercussions of the nation-states were the Kurds along with other subordinated ethnic and religious communities. Concerning the haunting Kurds question in the Middle East, the geopolitical division of the territorial Ottoman legacy by European colonial powers partitioned the Kurds forcing them to struggle in the face of what they believed to be a destiny of oppression, triggering their resistance and troubles with assimilationist nation-state systems in the decades to come. During these ongoing armed clashes, acts of state violence and counterviolence, and terror, political borders have constituted escape points for opposing Kurdish political and religious actors not only in Turkey but also in neighboring Syria, Iraq, and Iran. For this reason, the question of security in Turkey’s eastern and southeastern borders has always been largely a political issue as opposed to an economic one in the Turkish state discourses where the existence of the Kurds was denied until recent decades.9 In other words, “Turkey’s Kurdish question has always been discussed as a problem regarding border and border security as well.”10 The scope of this study is limited to the border city of Nisêbîn (Nusaybin)11 and several other villages along the border. The main reasons for selecting Nisêbîn is a result of my familiarity with the local Kurdish language dialect and people,12 the limited budget provided by my working and teaching institution Mardin Artuklu University during that period, the proximity to Mardin city center in convenience of daily transportation. There were many reasons for selecting Nisêbîn which can be counted as

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following; my familiarity with the local Kurdish language dialect and people, the limited budget provided by my working and teaching institution Mardin Artuklu University during that period, the proximity to Mardin city center inconvenience of daily transportation, the opportunity of gathering rich data from Nisêbîn which has been one of the leading centers of legal border trade through the official Nisêbîn-Girmeli border gate (customs),13 and Nusaybin’s long history of smuggling and other forms of illegal border crossings. Lastly, cross border Kurdish political activism between the border cities of Nisêbîn (Turkey) and Qami¸slo (Syria)14 was another reason to be counted. In this study, individuals who shared their life stories and testimonies generously through semi-structured in-depth interviews and casual exchanges often provided consent to include their real names in this book. The majority of my interlocutors not only felt enthusiastic to be a part of my research but also they wanted to be heard and acknowledged. Furthermore, they felt a responsibility to reach into the outside world through my agency and inform outsiders of their struggles, suffering, loss, and pain they had endured throughout the decades. Nisêbîn was a long-standing ancient establishment with a Jewish and Christian population in the past until the early decades of the Republic.15 It is worth noting that Nisêbîn’s being turned into a “border town” following 1923 resulted in a substantial change in the town’s history. Secondly, the Nisêbîn-Girmeli border gate, which opens to the city of Qami¸slo in Syria, was officially opened on September 4, 1953.16 Thus, Nisêbîn was gradually transformed into a hotbed for smuggling activities and a devastating place for Kurdish migrant traders and villagers hailing from surrounding villages, towns, and cities causing the town’s demographic structure to be entirely transformed. As an attractive (il)legal trade center and a burgeoning population, the city has provided a strong social, cultural, and financial relationship network with neighboring settlements. Thirdly, Nisêbîn’s placement on a commercial railway (Toros Express Line operating between Haydarpa¸sa-Ba˘gdat) caused it exposure to greater amount of immigration in comparison with neighboring cities. A vigorous network of social, cultural, economic, and political dimensional relations began to develop between Nisêbîn and Qami¸slo during the early decades of the Republic. The town of Qami¸slo would become like the other half of Nisêbîn in the later periods. Upon examining its history, it is seen that Qami¸slo was initially founded as a railway station in 192617 on Haydarpa¸sa-Baghdad railway18 next to the Nisêbîn train station which was completed in early 190419 and was prone to an immense wave of immigration following that date, ultimately rendering it a big city. In addition to Muslim Kurds, Arabs, and Turkmens who migrated for various reasons, migration of other religious-ethnic communities such

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as Armenian, Jews, Assyrian, and Yezidis also contributed to the rapid growth in the population of Qami¸slo. The city is said to have hosted a significant number of Jewish population until the 1960s, however the majority migrated to Israel due to the eruption of political conflicts and wars between the Syrian regime and Israel that erupted in 1948. Armenians, Assyrians, and later Kurds heavily settled in Qami¸slo, in time turning it into a city of internal migrants. Here, it is essential to mention that the city of Qami¸slo had been a sanctuary for many Kurdish political activists, among whom were also criminals fleeing from local communal and Turkish authorities. The intense cross-border human mobility and (il)legal border trade carried out with Qami¸slo emerged in parallel with emergence of smuggling. It was thought that in the period following 1923, Nisêbîn grew into one of the most important centers of both legal and illegal trade (smuggling), border transgression, political and Kurdish nationalist activism. Thus, Nisêbîn as a case study provided richer and more valuable data in this regard and allowed me to carry out a more comprehensive analysis of the subject matter at hand. The time period of focus and examination in the early segment of this study which had earlier been published in Turkish roughly commenced in 1923 when the border had been determined on the map and ending in 1984 when the armed conflicts between PKK (Kurdish Workers’ Party) and the state forces erupted. In this work, I also cover the post1984 era with a particular focus on the period during which the border security policies and strategies were implemented more intensively due to growing infiltrations of the PKK militants from Syria to Turkish territories. In the later period, the construction of the Turkish security wall partially started in 2013 but state efforts of making a more qualified security wall initiated in 2016 and completed in 2018. It is the fact that political and economic developments in the process following the 1980 coup d’état and the eruption of the armed conflicts and terror in 1984 dramatically altered the dynamics along the Turkish-Syrian border.20 The Kurdish leftist-nationalist movement and its constant terror attacks on Kurdish civilians refusing to offer support and on the Turkish forces were worsening causing more casualties in the following years. The fact that the PKK was backed and subsidized by the Syrian regime further worsened relations between Turkey and Syrian states in the region, a new epoch was entered.21 The end of the Cold War, transformation of perceptions of state security, phenomena of transnational political violence and terror, the amplified cross-border smuggling, and other cross-border criminal acts were

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the historical developments causing various changes in the region. Toward the end of the 1980s, political and economic developments in the region saw gradually changes due to liberalization efforts by Turkish Prime Minister of the time, Turgut Özal (1927–1993) who worked to implement new policies from 1983 to 1989. He continued to practice this challenging mission as also President of Turkey from 1989 till his unexpected death in 1993.22 His liberal politics and endeavor to establish better relationships with neighboring countries lead to new developments along the political borders in terms of transgression, border management, security, and the emergence of new political agents in the region. The intensification of armed conflicts between the PKK and the Turkish state forces in the 1990s deeply shaped all aspects of life in the Kurdish region during which the border was turned into not only a zone of penetrations into Turkish side but also breakout and escape to Syria by the PKK militants and its local militia forces. This book is based on life stories and personal testimonies of local people which demonstrates how the region’s history and its social structure may be interpreted in multiple ways and narrated from varying perspectives. This study’s primary data consists of in-depth interviews, recorded life stories and testimonies, and ethnographic observations. Besides, some of the data utilized in this research was gathered through scouring news reports found in the archives of national newspapers with a particular focus on the border events that took place in the Nisêbîn border region in the Mardin province.23 The data regarding how the border was perceived in state discourses was gathered through available written sources. Additionally, findings of some prior studies were also utilized through literature review which is composed in the following chapter of the book. The research fieldwork was carried out in the city of Nisêbîn and some neighboring border villages at different times throughout 2013 and in 2014. Around 50 people were interviewed during the fieldwork, however only 28 of them were in-depth recorded interviews during which the interviewee’s life stories were recorded and individual testimonies were noted. In this research, men constitute most of the interviewees with ages ranging between 26 and 90. Nevertheless, the life stories of male and female interviewees above the age of 70 were recorded and proved a great importance to the study. Overall, families and individuals of different age groups, genders, educational status, classes, and ideologies affected by the existence of the border in different ways and who continue to reside in the Nisêbîn border region were interviewed.

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The most important factor which increased the trust between the researcher and the interviewees was the presence of mediators (contact persons) that enabled greater access to the interviewees. The assistance of several relatives and friends residing in Nisêbîn accelerated the access process and raised the level of trust between myself and my interlocutors. Being of a Kurdish ethnic origin and conducting the interviews in the Kurdish Kurmancî (or Kurmanjî) dialect24 granted me the advantage of an insider, on the other hand however, lacking a life experience in Nisêbîn and at the border region ultimately rendered me an outsider. Ethnographers must practice reflexivity and must be aware of “multiplex subjectivity”25 in order to phenomena of age, gender, class, or ethnic origin to not pose an obstacle. During my dialogues with the people, I attempted to exercise flexibility between my insider and outsider positions and strove to achieve smooth transitions between the positions. For instance, during my interviews with elderly men and women, I undertook the performance of a region’s inhabitant with curiosity regarding the local problems in attempting to increase levels of trust and cordiality in my interviewee relationships. Phenomena of culture and identity do not have a fixed and stable form; on the contrary, they constantly transform and change.26 Consequently, different identities and senses of belongings that are in constant transformation can have positive or negative on our relationships with the field. As Kirin Narayan stated, we, “native” ethnographers, just as all other ethnographers, can carry identities and senses of belonging of different communities. Therefore, among these senses of belongings of being inside or outside is related to our study in different ways.27 On the one hand, carrying out a field research in Nisêbîn was an “anthropology at home”28 experience, however, on the other hand it was an “anthropology of the other”29 experience when considering the history, culture, and experiences of the political border in a border community. In this first chapter of this book, it is important to point out how the life stories, narratives, and personal testimonials recorded during the interviews throughout fieldwork demonstrated the fact that “smuggling” has been a central phenomenon at the border region. Events which were often described as transitions between life and death in stories and narratives of smuggling reveal both the subjective and collective forms of suffering, fear, and anger among the region’s inhabitants. The act of smuggling was not the only a form of border transgression, in addition

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to performances of the constant venturing to daily visitations for funerals, weddings, religious sites, and figures. In addition to diverse forms of smuggling, local daily activities within the landmined zone include collecting mines for later sale, gathering caper plant buds, grazing livestock, collecting fodder, having picnics, and the use of the zone as a playground can all be interpreted as diverse forms of adaptation of political border and various security apparatuses in place. Lastly, the security wall as the final phase of the making and absolutely fortifying the border by the state power can be seen as the most radical and violent of the state interventions on the border. Chapter 2 of this book provides an overview of anthropology of borders and borderlands in Turkey. It aims to postulate a general evaluation of studies conducted by a small number of researchers of varying social sciences and humanities backgrounds on Turkish political borders and borderlands which largely begin to emerge in the early 1990s. The majority of early works gave attention to the issues of border determinations in the 1920s, and the early years of Republic. The general focus of later studies centered around border economies, patterns of international and local cross border trade, rules and forms of border administration and formation as well as the maintenance of the border security, therefore lacking a multi-sited view unlike ethnographic researches which would otherwise delve into the “complexities, marginalities and ambiguities”30 of border regions and political borders. Why the study of political borders? In Chapter 2, I not only examine and review works on the subject matter, but also try to develop an argument on the political rationale behind disregarding the borders and borderlands as a research subject. I assert that the studies of borders and borderlands in the context of sociopolitical history of borders, border communities, and social memory as a neglected field in Turkey should be encouraged more with regard to diverse questions and problems at the state peripheries. The lack of anthropological and sociological studies on diverse formations of the Turkish political territorial borders and their sociocultural and political impacts on both subjective and collective levels becomes more apparent when currently expanding literature is critically scrutinized. Chapter 3 of this book provides a genealogical exploration of the making process of the border. First of all, I pursue an answer to the question of how the national borders (in Turkish milli sınırlar) discourse was formed throughout history. Following the fall of the Ottoman Empire

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and throughout World War I, the first territorial map considered by war leaders of war of the Turkish independence appeared during resistance planning meetings in Sivas and Erzurum in 1918 as declared by Mustafa Kemal in October 30th of 1918. In the process of border making and establishing its security, two crucial components in the state discourses are present. One of the most interesting discourses reveals when a comparison is made between the protection of “honor” (namûs ) and political borders on the one hand of the state officials. Therefore, there is a need to make a genealogical investigation into the “border making” discourses found in both official discourses and in statist media organs and analyze how these discourses were employed in the process of legitimizing destructive measures and the killing of any subjects who entered the forbidden zone and attempted to cross the border since the 1950s. This chapter aims to document the evolution of statist discourse of national borders as a newfound and strong component of the Kemalist ideology and the emergence of new cartographic imaginations in light of official records, written sources, and select national newspapers. As is known, one of the fundamental aspects of the nation-state’s ideology is to identifying the state through territorial sovereignty where the national-borders constitute determining catalyst in the process of “becoming a nation.” The state authority targeted two matters: the territory and its inhabitants. This strategy of the state power was exercised along borderlands to ensure border security and to maintain control over citizens inhabiting the borderland. In order to achieve a “new nation” through state-sponsored Turkification and assimilation policies, cutting historical, economic, and cultural ties with the kin subjects residing on the other side of the border by any means necessary was acknowledged as an indispensable strategy in state intervention since 1923. In this chapter, then, I try to document the symbolic, physical, and psychological state interventions in everyday life31 and in light of the life stories and narratives of locals as witnesses and observers of such occurrences. Commencing with in investigation into the first signifiers, or border markers, this chapter demonstrates how landmines, barbed wire fences, watchtowers, gendarmerie stations, soldiers and border gates have become gradually developed into destructive impediments of the state power. An anthropological exploration of surveillance32 and local apparatuses of the state is achieved in relation to “the social life of the things.”33 It is argued that the Turkish-Syrian border was transformed into newly “constructed

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space”34 where the state and its local apparatuses exercised their authority, and it has become a new ground for new forms of conflict between the state apparatuses and the local subjects. In this chapter, I analyze the state-making practices of border formation through the vantage point of local Kurdish subjects and explore the interactions between the state apparatuses and the local subjects during which the newly created space, the landmine zone was operating with a new rule, with a “state of exception.”35 Chapter 4 of this book offers an analysis into the unmaking practices of the political borders which have been transforming into thickening military entities.36 It defines these unmaking practices not only as reactions and economic survival tactics but also as consequences of diversifying epistemological and ontological aspects of the local communities and their cartographic understandings of place and region confronting the statist narrative. Here, I first describe the various acts of local people’s border crossings as a fundamental unmaking practice. Secondly, I approach local people’s various forms of use and abuse of the landmined zone as unmaking practices of the border during which emotions of fear,37 death, loss,38 and conceptions of faith and destiny in the everyday lives of local subjects come into play. Daily visits taking place during night and day, as well as daily business transactions, buying, selling, smuggling, marriages, eid celebrations, condolence/tazîye visits, weddings, animal herding, agriculture, and the use of landmined zones for leisure activities were among the fundamental activities within the scheme of counter-state practices and violation of state-imposed rules and regulations. In this chapter, I describe these unmaking practices based on local narratives and life stories of men and women as the continuing traditional, semi-nomadic, and sociocultural patterns of the diverse forms of life stretching back to the Ottoman era. I also analyze the act of smuggling as a rite of passage,39 a challenge of bravery, and an act of resistance in the man’s world. Furthermore, I look to the lives of women as mothers, wives, sisters, and daughters in coping with and registering of the traumatic consequences of violent acts as well as their altered roles. In Chapter 5, I describe the making and unmaking of the Turkish security wall as the final phase of border making process. In this context, I evaluate the Turkish state’s making of political borders on the Syrian border in relation to radical shifts in ideological, religious, and historical cartographic perceptions of the state authorities in different periods

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concerning continuity and discontinuity of Kemalist, secular and Turkish nationalist paradigm. As stated earlier, this book is largely based on an ethnographic research carried out at different times throughout 2013 and in 2014 when the political climate was peaceful and the conditions were fruitful for anthropological fieldwork. However, this chapter on the Turkish security border is not based on any ethnographic data due to emerged security reasons for both researcher and potential interlocutors in the border region. Then, one might ask what happened in the region? First of all, the political climate changed and conditions for ethnographic research started to deteriorate with the end of Kurdish Opening or Democratic Initiative in 2015. Later, the political conditions worsened after the July 15 coup d’état in 2016 during and after which more security measures were gradually taken all around the country by the government. The fact that the making of the security wall on the Turkish-Syrian border was launched in September 2016 overlapped with these precarious conditions that deeply affected the whole population in the country. While working on the chapter on the security wall in 2019, I attempted to do a small-scale fieldwork on the ongoing construction of the security wall in Nisêbîn. I wanted to do some observations and document how local people react and think about the Turkish security wall as the latest form of militarization of the Turkish-Syrian border. However, my local contacts strongly refused to help me and involve in any research due to security reasons in the region. When I insisted to interview some local people from the region, they just clearly stated how they are against the construction of the security wall and stopped to talk about this issue. Later, I asked one of my contacts in Nisêbîn to take some pictures of the wall that I might put in this book for my readers. Two weeks later, he told me how the police came after him while he was trying to take some pictures of the wall from a long distance. He was very scared. He was interrogated by the police, being warned not to take any pictures and then released. In short, there are two main reasons for the lack of ethnographic data on the security wall in this work. First, the wall has newly been erected in the border region and local people do not have that much experiences with that military entity. Second, people are not willing to express their feelings and thoughts openly due to precarious political conditions, fear of the state and security reasons in today’s Turkey. As a result, this chapter is mainly based on analysis of state discourses on the security wall and the secondary sources including some mainstream national newspapers.

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The fortification of Turkish security wall in 2016 requires us to respond the question of how the idea of making a security wall emerged during rule of AK Party and whether the wall contradicts or not their neoOttomanist and Islamist-conservative ideology based on Ummah (Muslim brotherhood). Today, there is a growing passion by state authorities for construction of security fences and walls as rising aggressive state strategy. The major legitimizing discourses of these countries are associated with cross-border economic disparities, ethnic and religious wars, political-military instabilities, the flow of refugees and transnational terrorism. Currently, the Turkish state has also been constantly addressing military-security reasons and transnational terrorism as the fundamental reasons being the construction of the walls first on its southeastern (Syria) border and then on its eastern (Iran) border. In this chapter, on the other hand, the phenomenon of underground tunnels is also scrutinized as an unmaking practice and an emergent tactic of not only transnational terrorist organizations and smugglers but also local people to overcome the security walls and establishing contact with the community residing on the other side of the wall. Here, it might be possible to go beyond the narrative on the physical security walls and develop a new argument. It can be claimed that actually all forms of efforts of modern nation-states of making political borders can be re-described as “walling strategies” that intended to disconnect both sides. In other words, employment of exclusive social, cultural, linguistic, economic, territorial, and military instruments can be interpreted as other forms of walling the state as can be seen in the case of making of the modern Turkish nation-state. To conclude, as the first in-depth analysis of the subjective, collective, and gendered aspects of political borders in Turkey, this research presents more than a glimpse into the past. This research is a foray into the fear of the state, suffering, and struggle which strengthen our understanding of the ways in which individuals and communities have dealt with and continue to deal with painful experiences and memories of political borders. This work provides in-depth analyses of collected personal narratives, life stories and interviews conducted with former smugglers, survivors of landmine detonations and armed conflicts with soldiers, families of victims (murdered smugglers and children killed in landmine explosions), disabled peoples, widows, and other border people dwelling in Nisêbîn border region for decades. Although political borders are partially successful in realizing the goal of severing the relationship networks among various ethnic and religious groups, it cannot be said that they have been

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completely effective and satisfying desires of the state authorities. This study puts forward the possibility of persistence of cross-border mobility and flows through “violating” and “illegal” practices which might prevail state security policies. Overall, this book intends to make a modest contribution to the anthropology of borders and borderland studies and memory studies by documenting and analyzing the impacts of changes, transformations, ruptures, conflicts, and developments in a post-Ottoman geography in a particular community on the Turkish-Syrian border.

Notes 1. Reece Jones, Border Walls: Security and the War on Terror in the United States, India, and Israel (New York: Zed Books, 2012), 3. 2. Michiel Baud and Willem van Schendel, “Toward a Comparative History of Borderlands,” Journal of World History 8, No. 2 (1997): 211–242. 3. Please look at Ne¸se Özgen, Toplumsal Hafızanın Hatırlama ve Unutma Biçimleri: Van-Özalp ve 33 Kur¸sun Hadisesi [The Patterns of Remembering and Forgetting in Social Memory: The Event of Van-Özalp and ˙ 33 Bullets] (TÜSTAV Yayınları, 2003); “Sınırın Iktisadi Antropolojisi; ˙ Kasaba,” [Economic Anthropology of BorSuriye ve Irak Sınırlarında Iki der: Two Towns on Syrian and Iraqi Border] in Gelenekten Gelece˘ge ˙ Antropoloji, ed. Belkıs Kümbeto˘glu and Hande Birkalan-Gedik (Istanbul: Epsilon Yayınları, 2005), 100–129; “Sınır, Devlet, A¸siret: A¸siretin Etnik ˙ sası,” [Border, State, Tribe: The ReconstrucBir Kimlik Olarak Yeniden In¸ tion of Tribe as an Ethnic Identity] Toplum ve Bilim 108 (2007): 239– 261; “Türkiye Cumhuriyeti’nin Kurulu¸sundan Günümüze; Co˘grafya Ders Kitaplarında Vatanın Sonu Gelmez Kurguları,” [From the Foundation of the Republic to Today: The Endless Constructions of Homeland in Geography Textbooks] Toplum ve Bilim 121 (2011): 24–42; Ferhat Tekin, ˙ Sınırın Sosyolojisi: Ulus, Devlet ve Sınır Insanları [Sociology of Border: ˙ Nation, State and Border People] (Istanbul: Açılım Kitap, 2014); Ay¸se Yıldırım, “Devlet, Sınır, A¸siret: Nusaybin Örne˘gi” [State, Border, Tribe: The Case of Nusaybin] (PhD diss., Hacettepe Üniversitesi, 2013). 4. George E. Marcus, “Ethnography in/of the World System: The Emergence of Multi-Sited Ethnography,” Annual Review of Anthropology 24, No. 1 (1995): 95–117. 5. Marcus, “Ethnography,” 106–113. 6. Arjun Appadurai, ed. The Social Life of Things: Commodities in Cultural Perspective (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986); Ebru Kayaalp, “Etnografik Çalı¸smalarda Yeni Arayı¸slar, Alanlar ve Failler,” [New Researches in Ethnographic Studies, Fields and Agents] in Türkiye’de Sosyo-Kültürel Antropoloji ve Disiplinlerarası Yakla¸sımlar [Socio-Cultural

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7.

8.

9. 10.

11.

12.

Anthropology and Interdisciplinary Approaches in Turkey], ed. Ramazan Aras (Konya: Çizgi Kitabevi, 2014), 137–138. Bruno Latour, Science in Action: How to Follow Scientists and Engineers Through Society (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University press, 1987), Reassembling the Social: An Introduction to Actor-Network-Theory (Oxford: Oxford University press, 2005). In this context, one of the groundbreaking works was presented by Timothy Mitchell titled “Can the Mosquito Speak?”, in Rule of Experts: Egypt, Techno-Politics, Modernity (University of California Press, 2002), 19–53. Also, see Ebru Kayaalp, Remaking Politics, Markets and Citizens in Turkey: Governing Through Smoke (Bloomsbury Academic, 2015). Mesut Ye˘gen, “The Kurdish Question in Turkish State Discourse,” Journal of Contemporary History 34, no. 4 (October 1999): 555–568. Ne¸se Özgen, “Sınır Ticareti ve Sırnak’ta ¸ Etkileri,” [Border Trade and Its Impacts on Sırnak] ¸ in Uluslararası S¸ ırnak ve Çevresi Sempozyumu Bildirileri, ed. Nesim Doru (Sırnak: ¸ Sırnak ¸ Üniversitesi Yayınları, 2010), 1009. The city formerly known as Nisibin and in the earlier sources it was named as Nisibis. For more information on the ancient history of the city please see; Ahmet Kütük, Nisibis (Nusaybin): Kadim Bir S¸ ehrin Hikayesi [Nisibis (Nusaybin): The Story of An Ancient City] (Divan Yayınları, 2018). Today, the city is called Nisêbîn in the Kurdish local community and it is called Nusaybin in Turkish. In the following parts and chapters of this work, the Kurdish version of the name of the city will be used. As a native speaker of the Kurmancî dialect of the Kurdish language and all interviews were conducted in this dialect. In fact, there are also local intonations (accent) in the Kurmancî dialect at times resulting in misunderstandings and miscommunications among Kurmancî speaking Kurds constitutes the majority of the Kurdish population in Turkey. It is worth mentioning here that a considerable percentage of Kurds in Turkey speak the Zazakî Kurdish dialect. My ability to speak the same accent (in Kurdish Torî accent) with the people of Nisêbîn was one of the methodologically deciding factors in selecting Nisêbîn and its vicinity as my region of fieldwork. The Torî accent is spoken in eastern parts of Mardin (Midyat, and Dargeçit), Batman and several counties and villages in the provinces ˙ of Siirt and Sırnak ¸ (Idil) where the spoken accent differs in neighboring cities of Kızıltepe (Mardin) and Cizre (Sırnak). ¸ The word Torî comes from the Syriac/Aramaic phrase Tur Abdin (Region of Saints) which refer˙ ences the mountainous part of the region including Dargeçit, Idil, Midyat, Gercü¸s, Batman and its vicinity where many Syriac/Assyrian monasteries and churches are located. In Kurdish, it is used for naming Kurds residing in this mountainous region and for naming their accent of Kurmancî.

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13. According to the Turkish Ministry of Trade website of (updated by 05.12.2017), there are 10 active border gates on the Turkish-Syrian border, some of which are temporarily closed due to the ongoing war in Syria. The Nisêbîn (Girmeli) border gate was founded and activated in September 4, 1953 with the 4/1407 issued law by the committee of Ministers. More information on Turkish territorial border gates can be obtained from the link below:https://ggm.gtb.gov.tr/gumruk-idareleri/hudut-kapilari/ kara-hudut-kapilari (accessed on January 9, 2019). 14. The city is called Qami¸slo in Kurdish, it is called Kamı¸slı in Turkish and al-Qamishliye in Arabic. In this work, I preferred to use the Kurdish name of the city. 15. For more information on this social, cultural, historical, and political history and transformation of province of Mardin and Nisêbîn see ˙ Yousif, Mezopotamya’nın Yıldız S¸ ehirleri & Urfa, Nusaybin, Ephrem Isa Diyarbekir, Mardin, Erbil, Kerkük, Süleymaniye, Duhok [The Star Cities of Mesopotamia: Urfa, Nusaybin, Diyarbekir, Mardin, Erbil, Kerkük, Süleymaniye, Duhok] (Istanbul: Avesta Yayınları, 2011); Ahmet Kütük, “Tarihi ˙ Süreç Içerisinde Nusaybin Yahudileri,” [Jews of Nisibis in the Histori˙ ˙ cal Process] Islami Ilimler Dergisi 10, No. 2 (2015): 93–115; Adday Ser, ¸ Nusaybin Akademisi [Nisibis Academy] (Istanbul: Yaba Yayınları, 2006); Suavi Aydın, Kudret Emiro˘glu, Oktay Özel and Süha Ünsal, Mardin: A¸siret, Cemaat, Devlet [Mardin: Tribe, Society, State] (Tarih Vakfı Yayınları, 2001); Ay¸se Yıldırım, “From Gun Barrel to Passport: Smuggling on the Turkish-Syrian Border,” Sociology and Anthropology (2017) 5(11): 941–953. 16. Muzaffer Bakırcı, “Türkiye’nin Uluslararası Ula¸sımında Demiryolu Sınır Kapılarının Yeri ve Etkinli˘gi,” [The Importance and Role of Railway Border Gates in International Transportation in Turkey] Marmara Co˘grafya Dergisi 28 (2013): 381. 17. Encyclopedia Britannica, accessed on January 10, 2019, https://www. britannica.com/place/al-Qamishli 18. For the history of Istanbul-Baghdad Railway, please look at Edward Mead Earle, Turkey, the Great Powers, and the Bagdad Railway: A Study in Imperialism (Russell § Russell, 1966); Jonathan S. McMurray, Distant Ties: Germany, the Ottoman Empire, and the Construction of the Baghdad Railway (Praeger, 2001); Sercan Yıldırım Özgencil, “Anadolu ve Ba˘gdat—C.F.O.A—ve Ba˘gdat-Halep-Nusaybin—B.A.N.P— Demiryolu Sirketleri ¸ Yolcu Binaları Tip Projeler,” [Anatolian and Baghdad—C.F.O.A. & Baghdad-Aleppo-Nusaybin-B.A.N.P Railway Companies Passenger Buildings, Typologies] Beykent University Journal of Science and Engineering 5, No. 1–2 (2012): 69–93. 19. Earle, Turkey; Ay¸se Yıldırım, “Devlet,”.

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20. During Turkey’s 1980 coup d’état in which thousands of political activists and university students (from leftist, Turkish right and Islamist movements) were arrested, tortured, and many were killed. In the times, the PKK leadership and other founding members escaped to Syria to settle there. Following some time, the armed movement initiated their first terror attack on Kurdish civilians who did not offer support in 1984, this was considered a starting point for the region’s violence and terror to ensue in coming four decades. For further information see, Ramazan Aras, The Formation of Kurdishness in Turkey: Political Violence, Fear and Pain (New York: Routledge, 2014); Cengiz Güne¸s, The Kurdish National Movement: Prom Protest to Resistance (New York: Routledge, 2013); Aliza Marcus, Blood and Belief: The PKK and the Kurdish Fight for Independence (New York: New York University Press, 2007); Mehmet Ali Birand, Apo ve PKK [Apo and PKK] (Istanbul: Milliyet, 1992); Nihat Ali Özcan, PKK (Kürdis˙ sçi Partisi) Tarihi, Ideolojisi ˙ tan I¸ ve Yöntemleri [PKK’s (Kurdistan Workers’ Party) History, Ideology and Methods], (ASAM, 1999). 21. Concerning the history of relationships between Turkish and Syrian states, please see Robert Olson, Turkey’s Relations with Iran, Syria, Israel and Russia 1991–2000 (Mazda Pub., 2001); Erdem Erciyes, Orta Do˘gu Den˙ skileri [Turkey-Syrian Relations in the Midkleminde Türkiye-Suriye Ili¸ dle East Equation] (IQ Kültür Sanat, 2004); Raymond Hinnebusch and Özlem Tür, Turkey-Syria Relations: Between Enmity and Amity (New York: Routledge, 2013). 22. Berdal Aral, “Dispensing with Tradition? Turkish Politics and International Society during the Özal Decade 1983–1993,” Middle Eastern Studies 37, No. 1 (2001): 72–88. 23. Milliyet was founded on May 3, 1950 and has been one of the leading and mainstream national newspapers in Turkey. Its extensive archive (covering issues from May 3, 1950 to December 31, 2007) is accessible in the following link:http://gazetearsivi.milliyet.com.tr/. 24. Jaffer Sheyholislami, “The Language Varieties of the Kurds,” in The Kurds: History, Religion, Language, Politics, ed. Wolfgang Taucher, Mathias Vogl and Peter Webinger (Austrian Federal Ministry of the Interior, 2015), 30–51. 25. Renato Rosaldo, Culture & Truth: The Remaking of Social Analysis (Boston: Beacon Press, 1993). 26. For the further arguments, please look at Sidney W. Mintz, “The Anthropological Interview and the Life History,” The Oral History Review 7 (1979): 18–26; Johannes Fabian, Time and the Other: How Anthropology Makes its Object (New York: Columbia University Press, 1983), Language and Colonial Power (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986), “Ethnographic Misunderstanding and the Perils of Context,” American Anthropologist 97, No. 1 (1995): 41–50; Kirin Narayan, “How Native is

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27. 28.

29. 30.

31.

32.

33. 34. 35. 36. 37.

38.

39.

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a ‘Native’ Anthropologist’,” American Anthropologist 95, No. 3 (1993): 671–686; George Marcus, “Ethnography in/of the World System: The Emergence of Multi-sited Ethnography,” Annual Review of Anthropology 24 (1995): 95–117. Pablo Vila, ed. Ethnography at the Border (University of Minnesota Press, 2003), xviii; Narayan, “How,”. Anthony Jackson, ed. Anthropology at Home (London: Tavistock Publications, 1987); George E. Marcus and Michael M. J. Fischer, Anthropology as Cultural Critique: An Experimental Moment in the Human Sciences (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1986). Fabian, Time. Sarah F. Green, Notes from the Balkans: Locating Marginality and Ambiguity on the Greek-Albanian Border (New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 2005). Akhil Gupta, “Blurred Boundaries: The Discourse of Corruption, the Culture of Politics, and the Imagined State,” American Ethnologist 22, No. 2 (1995): 375–402; Timothy Mitchell, Rule of Experts: Egypt, TechnoPolitics, Modernity (California: University of California Press, 2002); Michael Taussig, The Nervous System (New York: Routledge, 1992). Jeremy Bentham, The Panopticon Writings, ed. and Intro. Miran Bozovic (London: Verso, 1995); Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison (New York: Vintage Books, 1995). Arjun Appadurai, ed. The Social Life of Things: Commodities in Cultural Perspective (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986). Edward Soja, Third Space: Journeys to Los Angeles and Other Real-andImagined Places (Oxford: Blackwell Publications, 1996). Giorgio Agamben, State of Exception (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005). Reece Jones, Border Walls: Security and the War on Terror in the United States, India, and Israel (New York: Zed Books, 2012). Carole Nagengast, “Violence, Terror, and the Crisis of the State,” Annual Review of Anthropology 23, No. 1 (1994): 109–136; Linda Green, Fear as a Way of Life: Mayan Widows in Rural Guatemala (New York: Columbia University Press, 1999); Sara Ahmed, “The Politics of Fear in the Making of Worlds,” International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education 16, No. 3 (2003): 377–398. Mamphela Ramphele, “Political widowhood in South Africa: The Embodiment of Ambiguity,” Daedalus (1996): 99–117; Veena Das, Critical Events: An Anthropological Perspective on Contemporary India (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995), “Language and Body: Transactions in the Construction of Pain.” Daedalus (1996): 67–91. Victor Turner, From Ritual to Theatre: The Human Seriousness of Play (New York: PAJ Publications, 1992).

CHAPTER 2

Anthropology of Borders and Borderlands in Turkey

The new nation-state projects, novel colonial politics, and independence movements which emerged following World War I and throughout the post-World War II ended with the formation of countless geopolitical borders around the world. The dominating colonialist Western sovereign powers which continued to maintain political power often settled and methodologically and conveniently determined the political trajectories of such so-called independent nation-states under the premise of a supposed new postcolonial period when in fact the reformulation of new colonial forms were effectively underway. In this context, emergent political borders in the Middle Eastern geographies ruptured century-old social, historical, religious, ethnic, and socio-economic patterns in the most violent and destructive of manners and forms. The historical accumulation, inaccuracies, and contrarily destructive functions of these political borders have significantly harmed the social fabrics of the geographies in which they were plotted, instigating profoundly deep social traumas and perpetual severance for generations to come. Nation-state projects have thickened political borders through monotypic ideological rhetoric and policies and the employment of reinforcing new security procedures. Borderlines and borderlands with varying security apparatuses and technologies have over the course of the time and with the evolution of the nationstate have slowly transformed into challenging, devastating, and lethal space. Nevertheless, despite continuously deteriorating conditions, fragmentations, partitions, and exclusive geopolitical conditions, local peoples residing on the borders and border regions have responded to the © The Author(s) 2020 R. Aras, The Wall, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-45654-2_2

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circumstances in maintaining cross-border connections and relations with their marginalized family relations, friends, and neighbors. Social, cultural, economic, and political relations sustained through autochthonous social institutions, social structures, human networks, memory, oral culture, traditions, and practices produced in everyday life may also be regarded as a continuation and inherited socio-political and cultural heritage of the past. To what extent did the social, cultural, economic, and political collapses and emergent impediments of the territorial political border practices and implementation attract the attention of social scientists in Turkey? Upon examining existing literature on the subject matter, very few comprehensive studies on political borders tied to the subjects of social, political, and economic structures, population, space, belonging, subjective and collective memory and identities exist. In this context, the questions such as: What are the changing and persisting effects of the new political borders on communities residing in the border regions? How can everyday cross border communal visits, consumer behavior and other forms of mobility be defined as a continuation of past experiences? How have these social, political, cultural, and economic daily movements, which locals had regarded as their legitimate rights and natural ways of life, all at once transformed into denominations of illegality or smuggling? How have acts of smuggling come to be described as severe criminal impositions within the state discourse and politics? When did the phenomenon of smuggling commence and what is its significance in local history? How is social memory along with histories of border tribes, religious orders, and families shaped after the emergence of political borders and what are the (dis)continuities? In spite of developing literature in recent years on border and borderland studies in Turkey, many vital questions remain to be answered and may only be viable through extensive ethnographic research projects. The urgent need for such studies not only springs from a lack of substantial works but also newly emerging patterns and transforming relationships with neighboring states in throughout unstable political, economic, and social circumstances of the Turkish political borders, especially concerning fluctuating global, regional, and local dynamics taking place in recent years. For instance, the ongoing events on and beyond the Turkish southeastern borders (the Syrian civil war which resulted in massacres, destruction of settlements, displacement, flow of refugees, illicit smuggling, human and drug trafficking, other political controversies, etc.) have once again transformed this border into

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ANTHROPOLOGY OF BORDERS AND BORDERLANDS …

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a catastrophic zone and causing the region plunge into immensely precarious conditions and ambiguities. Here, I argue that the enduring discussions on diverse impacts of political borders on the lives of the people living or forced to live in the borderlands and the debate over its impacts on different forms of identities1 are some of the crucial questions that actually were primarily overlooked within academe in Turkey until recent years. The revival of awareness around ethnic, religious, ideological, and cultural aspects of belonging and identities alongside the parallel to the emergence of political and nationalist movements has fueled arguments over disputed geographical mappings and political boundaries in Turkey and moreover in the Middle East in recent decades. In other words, as stated earlier, the impacts of “…globalization, neoliberalism, neo-imperialism, late modern capitalism and supranationalism” added to issues of “new liberties, new movements, new mobilities, new identities, new citizenship and new forms of capital, labor and consumption”2 took center stage as subjects of critical debates among scholars of border studies. Thus, the multi-faceted sources involved in the making of political boundaries have brought about deeper debates around the additional existence of ethnic, religious, and cultural boundaries as well. The border is not only a geopolitical one, it is an ontological perception or a fictional and epistemological one as well. In this context, the question of how multiple ruptures, changes, transformations, and partitions impacting peoples, spaces, everyday life, memory, history, and politics on the borders and borderland regions is of greater importance in this present day. Historically, the subject matters of political borders and territories, protracted regional and interstate wars, the rise of ethnic and religious conflicts as well as the subsequent inception of nation-state projects in the twentieth century have fueled more controversies. Later on, the multilayered influences of globalization along with economic, cultural, social, and political developments and dizzying developments in transportation and communication technologies redirected thinkers and researchers to reconsider the phenomena of space (de)territorialization of the state, political border, border security, state-controlled territories and what in fact the border is.3 Actually, debates around the conception of place and space in throughout Western philosophical history dates back to much earlier times. For instance, in his work, Edward Casey documents a genealogical exploration of these debates with a particular focus on early Greek philosophers Plato and Aristotle followed by thinkers of medieval eras

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and later modern thinkers such as Foucault, Derrida, Deleuze, and Guattari emphasizing the diversifying character of arguments from past to the present.4 In general, impacts of the waves of globalization and the processes of migration, the ethnic, nationalist and religious and sectarian conflicts on the nature, structure and security policies of the political borders have been observed and documented through various studies. Furthermore, recently, it may be observed that the concept of border security transforms into a concept which transcends nation-based geography and operates beyond frameworks of national political borders. Therefore, phenomena of transnationalism, ethnic, racial, religious, sectarian and ideological identities,5 borderless nationalities, and borderlessness6 are also discussed in relation to conceptions of borders as a technology, institution, or a “social process.”7 In this process, we observe the transformation of the sense of belonging linked with history, memory, places, and geography and in what regard such perceptions of the homeland have gained newfound meanings. Social and cultural anthropologists have also made significant contributions to this area of research and particularly in the field of studies on border identities, nation, state, border regions, and border cities8 in parallel with evident intensification of problems and disputes within border issues.9 The discourse which prevailed throughout the events of the fall of the Berlin Wall, the revival and expansion of the European Union project and phenomenon of globalization empowered the notion of a globalized world in which political borders were losing their legitimacy and gradually becoming ambiguous and blurred. However, on the contrary, billions of dollars had been invested into the erection of miles of impenetrable barbed wired fences and concrete walls as part of fortifying political borders in the countries like the United States, India, and Israel.10 The erection of such barbed wire fences, walls, and other supplementary apparatuses to human mobility was justified through legitimizing discourses and policies of a “war on terror,” illegal migration, human trafficking, and smuggling. Later, they were effectively transformed into legitimizing instruments for the protection of national political identities, state sovereignty, and nation-state territories.11 Today, many countries are struggling for the determining, maintaining, and protecting of political territorial borders in encounter response to waves of immigration, an influx of refugees, smuggling, dissident transnational political movements, and international terror networks.

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Many studies on illegal immigration, border security, militarization of borders, cross-border drug trade, terrorism, smuggling, and human trafficking have pointed to ensuing economic, political, and social traumas in the lives of those living in these regions.12 For instance, nationstate projects based on mono-ethnic or mono-religious identities and an adherence to strict exclusive border policies have deeply affected resident populations of transformed borderlands as observed in the case of symbolic, psychological, and physical impacts of violent Israeli border sneaking through occupied Palestinian lands.13 Similarly, borderlands cases amidst Estonia, Latvia, Russia,14 and border disputes in the Spanish Basque region are good signifiers of the partition and separateness of shared histories, cultures, and communities which at times resulted in the emergence of diverse ambiguities and complexities.15 In her comprehensive ethnographic study on the marginalities in the Greek-Albanian border region, Sarah Green identifies the Balkan concept as an ideological concept or an area which blurs Balkan geography as a boundary between East and West.16 According to Green, the ambiguity of the region threatens open and modernist differences, some individuals and places are found in difficult crossroads with multiculturalism.17 In this context, the TurkishSyrian border similarly presents a good example of the ambiguity of borderlines which separate relative families, villager communities, tribes, and religious orders. Today, the rise of barbed wire fence constructions and security walls has altered level and frame of the discussions and analysis among scholars of border studies. Therefore, recent literature on political borders and borderlands debates political boundaries in view of the concepts of sovereignty, citizenship, the body, biodiversity, state transnational terrorism, and cross-border terror of political movements, which points to the new politics of governance and control mechanisms of ruling state power.18 In the following segments of this chapter, I will attempt a response to the question of how studies on borders and borderlands that were conducted by researchers of varying disciplinary backgrounds have begun to emerge in Turkey. Perhaps, this chapter will serve as a useful compendium of issues on political borders and borderlands in need further articulation and research in Turkey.

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2.1 Studies on Borders and Borderlands in Turkey Contrary to the immense existing literature on border and borderland studies in the Western academe body, there has not yet been a sufficient amount of researches and comprehensive analytical and critical studies within the humanities and social sciences circles in Turkey. Uncoincidentally, pioneering anthropological and historical studies on the Kurdish inhabited border regions were conducted at several institutions abroad. In this context, some early anthropological studies on social, cultural, economic, and political structures and networks of Kurdish inhabited nationstate cross-border regions between Turkey, Iran, Iraq, and Syria,19 and the differentiating character of state-tribe relations and identity politics in the Kurdish border cities20 affected the directions and frameworks of a series of studies in the later periods of the development of Kurdish studies in Turkey.21 The historical aspects of these border regions and transformation of them into battlegrounds were defined by forceful power shifts throughout long periods of the Ottoman Empire and its neighboring competing power Iran who existed under Safavid rule and the Qajar dynasties in the later times. Researchers have scrutinized the Kurdish emirates and tribal networks along Ottoman-Persian borders with a focus also on the ethno-religious conflicts of these borderlands. In these studies, researchers have eloquently documented and examined boundary disputes, continued shifts and negotiations between these two powers as well as their impacts on the lives of inhabitants (Kurds, Nestorians, Armenians, Assyrians, etc.). These studies respond to the question of how local Kurdish emirates and tribes countered and adopted those policies of rival Empires with a particular focus on Ottoman-Kurdish histories and the Ottoman Kurdistan.22 Following the fall of the Ottoman Empire during World War I and the consequent established foundation of the Turkish nation-state, territories left behind by the Empire were synthetically incorporated into state boundaries without any given attention to prevailing cultural, ethnic, religious, and economic foundations as well as century-old patterns of life in what became a series of partitioned and deeply fragmented lands.23 As a result, local communities were merely arbitrarily separated and enclosed within the newly founded nation-states and mandates by European colonial powers, Great Britain and France. In the later decades, the impacts

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of war, poverty and scarcity of economic sustainability, obliteration of historical, social, cultural, demographic, ethnic and religious structures, networks and patterns of life and many other related issues were ignored in a large extent. In this context, when looking at the history of studies on Turkish borders and borderlands, the vast majority of early works could be classified into three different categories and mainly defined by perspectives and disciplines. Early studies by Turkish scholars illustrate certain conventional approaches rather than a critical one in engaging with fragmentations, ruptures, detachments, challenges, and the diverse forms of violence which ontologically and epistemologically characterize the phenomenon of political borders. The first category consists of studies on developments and problems in the context of economic activities, trade relations, and the management of border gates in border towns and cities. The second category consists of research conducted in the context of border management and state security issues with particular focus in utilizing political science and international relation methodologies and frameworks. The third category of literature focuses on community, history, identity, sense of belonging and memory, the role of which will be scrutinized more closely in addressing the shortcomings and limitedness of these works in the development of literature. Here, it is worth noting that the majority of these studies have remained limited to Turkish territorial borders as opposed to territorial waters and airspace.24 Here, it can be argued that the number of studies on borders and border regions has increased as a result of two fundamental developments in the 2000s. The first was the rapid establishment of a number of state universities during which public universities were founded in all major cities including border cities as well. In this process, diverse issues, problems and questions on borders and at border regions caught the attention of many scholars of various fields of humanities and social sciences working at those universities.25 Secondly, the profound impacts of the occurrences of major political events and developments which had been experienced in Turkey’s neighboring border countries and regions should be addressed. For instance, the disintegration of the USSR in 1990 and its aftermath saw the emergence of new neighboring countries such as Georgia and Armenia. The boundaries of Bulgaria and Greece marked the end of the European Union periphery with Turkey along with other local and global changes, crises, conflicts, and wars in the Middle East. This was particularly true in the case of conflicts in Iraq and the civil war in Syria which

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raised an awareness around the miscellaneous impacts of these events in borders and borderlands. On the other hand, various forms of globalization (economic, social, political and cultural) and diversifying strategies of Turkish foreign policies under the rule of AK Party governments were other factors motivating mobility patterns on the Turkish borders. The fact that Turkey had engaged in political, economic, cultural, technological cooperation and at times, conflict with its neighboring countries has recently amplified miscellaneous forms of mobilities and new border policies in the border regions which increased significance of the subject matter at local, national, regional, and global levels. 2.1.1

Economy and Trade in the Turkish Border Regions

Despite constant official attempts of securing Turkish political borders, cross-border cultural, social, political, and economic networks and patterns of life between geopolitically separated families, tribes, religious groups, and communities persisted and continued to find ways to flourish through legal and illegal means. In the context of continuity and discontinuity of life patterns, economic networks and trade forms were the most devastating of issues for the local people deprived of economic sources. The changing and diversifying characters of different Turkish political borders are closely tied in connection with Turkey’s historical and political relations with each of its neighboring countries. Unsurprisingly, the first academic researches on the borders and borderlands are directed to the focal subject of the border economies, trade, and the politics around development of these underdeveloped border regions. In the late 1980s, the political and commercial relations between Turkey and the Soviet Union in addition to their impact on local communities caught attention of some researchers in the region. With the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, cross-border trade and economic cooperation and the tourism industry began to see significant growth along Turkey’s northeastern borders. Turkey experienced considerable flow of trade by way of ordinary citizens of the Soviet Union and particular one’s from Georgia by the end of the 1980s and the early 1990s. One of the first primary works gave a particular focus on the functions of the Sarp border gate with Georgia and the effects of the suitcase trading (bavul ticareti)26 with the city of Trabzon in 1988. While examining the effects of the tourists arriving from the Soviet Union and their trade in the local commercial market, Kenan Çelik emphasizes the growth of the border

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and coastal trade agreement signed by both countries.27 In these studies, the effects of border and coastal trade on the economic structure and relations in the local markets were addressed and new regulations and policies to be made by official channels (the state) were urgently advised in order to prevent emergence of illegal trade networks in the region.28 New political developments along with Georgia and Armenia’s acquisition of independence in the region led to the emergence of new initiatives, which attracted the attention of some researchers in the eastern Turkish border region. While the border gates with Georgia29 had been very active and also functioned as opening gates with Caucasia and other Turkic countries in central Asia, the Turkish border gates with Armenia remained closed30 following the eruption of political crisis between Armenia and Azerbaijan in 1993 resulting in some serious commercial losses in the region. In this context, some researchers addressed the importance of the Turkey-Armenia border region in terms of development and trade while also emphasizing potential roles of both public and private sectors at the cross border trade through the border gate at Kars-Ardahan-I˘gdır triangle.31 In their economic perspectives on the Turkish-Armenian border, a group of researchers illustrated and discussed how and to what extent the border gates could affect local economic structures in light of narratives and statements provided by ordinary people living in the region including the local traders.32 On the other hand, in her investigation on “the effects of cross-border cooperation as a tool for local and regional development of underdeveloped border regions,” Defne Dursun argued that “intensive economic relations do not always provide for the establishment of cross-border cooperation, but that it can only be developed with supportive policies nurtured by the participation of transnational actors.”33 It’s noticeable that the 2000s was an increase in the number of academic studies investigating the border trade and the effects of this trade on the economic development of border towns and cities in Turkey. Early studies on diverse issues such as the market value of neighboring countries,34 the contribution of cross-border trade to the economy development of both the border cities and the country,35 the importance of border gates,36 smuggling,37 and cross-border trade with the Balkan countries38 (Atay, 2005) were carried out by researchers from different institutions. On the other hand, as a result of constructive and peaceful Turkish foreign policies with neighboring countries toward the end of the 2000s,

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cross-border tourism industry and economic relations augmented on the border regions. As a result, recent studies on Turkish-Syrian border have addressed the international trade problems and solution proposals, local economic structures and dynamics, security, border gates, globalization, taxation, businesses and companies, banks, free trade agreements, foreign capital, e-commerce, competition, and human trafficking were shared and discussed between researchers from both countries.39 In the context of the political economy of borders and border regions, cross-border smuggling seems to be of the most prevalent mobility patterns of border people which caught attention of many researchers and remains as one of the enduring research subjects matters in the literature. Among numerous kinds of products (food, clothes, animals, guns, tobacco, cigarettes, drugs, etc.), oil has been one of the most expensive and hazardously smuggled products causing losses and severe injuries. One of the early anthropological studies on illegal oil trade at the eastern (Iran) and southeastern (Iraq) Turkish borders was conducted by Fırat Bozcalı in which he draws attention to the social, political, and economic dimensions of the oil smuggling in eastern and southeastern Turkish borders.40 In his later research within the frame of legal anthropology, Bozcalı tries to document how the Turkish officials deal with the issue of smuggling through court processes.41 In the same vein, the Turkish western territorial borders with Greece and Bulgaria saw intense networks of human mobility and cross-border trade in recent years as a result of waves of neoliberalism, globalization, and EU geopolitical enlargement policies. The cross-border economic activities, tourism, daily visits, co-operation, and trade dynamics have been argued and it has been claimed that the local economy can be developed with the support of central and local authorities.42 As a result of an increasing rate of social, cultural, political and most importantly, economic developments in national, regional, and global levels have led to the proliferation and stimulation of cross-border diverse networks in Turkish border regions with neighboring countries. With a particular focus on the permeability of political territorial borders, some recent comprehensive studies on Turkish borders have looked to cross-border trade, cooperation, and emergent security policies of European Union countries and their impacts at border regions. Based on their ethnographic and quantitative data, these researchers address the importance of the parallel emergence of new social and spatial network structures, relationalities, and identities in the border regions.43

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In reviewing studies on economic and cross-border trade relations in border regions, it is observed that researchers have had a cohesive voice in emphasizing the necessity of political steps that ought to be taken for the economic, social, and cultural development of border regions by introducing new organizational and administrative models. In these studies, it is presented that cross-border trade relations will affect the local economy in a positive way and at the same time will strengthen social and political contacts.44 The rapid rise in the volume of cross-border trade occurred in the 2000s as a result of AK Party government’s dialogical and liberal foreign policies with neighboring countries along with the impacts of globalization, the rise of multinational corporations in the region and integration into the regional and global economic system. 2.1.2

Border Determination, Management, and Security

When and how were the political borders of the Republic of Turkey determined? How much were the historical, sociocultural, economic and political structures and textures of the regions taken into consideration in the processes of demarcation of political borders? What kind of historical and political dynamics were observable in the border and border regions during the transition from the Ottoman to the Republican era? How was the state administration of the border gates and at which standard does the Turkish border security and border management stand? These questions as well as similar ones addressed in academic research on border and border regions seem to be specifically addressed by scholars in various disciplines of humanities and social sciences however not that much in terms of social and cultural anthropology. The question of borders and borderlands has gained a great importance among contemporary Turkish and other historians, some of which mentioned before. Based on archival sources, historians have given particular focus to the historical development of border regimes, changes and its impacts on the relationships between the state authorities and the local population, tribes. For instance, the Ottoman-Iran border determined by the Kasr-ı Sirin ¸ Treaty (1639) affected local Kurdish and other tribes moving throughout the regions as a part of their natural nomadic lifestyles and patterns. For instance, in her research based on archives, Zuhal Özba¸s analyzes how these tribes resisted, adopted, or negotiated state-imposed rules and regimes on the border with a particular focus on

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the mobility of patterns of the Caf Tribe toward the end of the nineteenth century.45 The fact that a large percentage of the tribe population, part of which remained on the Turkish side and parts of which continued to lead life on the Iranian side and had used plateaus for herding, resulted in their subjecting to legal and illegal border crossings. These events would become widely seen and experienced occurrences with the emergence of new nation-states and new border control policies that devastated nomadic and semi-nomadic tribes all around the world. As it is going to be witnessed through life stories of Kurdish people partitioned by the Turkish-Syrian border as well, the Caf tribe’s increasing “border violations” were due to their historical, economic, sociocultural, and political roots in both countries causing their struggle to persist throughout the centuries. In terms of the matter of determination, management, and security of Turkish borders, the first academic studies on the histories of political debates and negotiations on border demarcation during World War I and after 1923 appeared in the 1990s.46 In the early studies, Turkey’s relations with its neighbors and in a larger context with the Middle East have always been evaluated within the frame of importance of state security and economic stability.47 The first studies that questioned the concept of the political border appeared in the 2000s when the literature on border studies started to flourish.48 Political scientists have addressed the emergence of borders between different societies in the context of creating a local culture, a control in the course of history and having highlighted how the phenomenon of globalization has altered perceptions of the space and borders in the twenty-first century.49 The political and economic crisis and the European Union accession process experienced in recent years deeply affected Turkey’s relations with neighboring regions and intensified arguments and research on the economic and political-administrative aspects of border management.50 It can be predicted that early discussions in the literature in Turkey on the use of new technologies (such as use of biometric data on passports and at customs, new EU new border regimes, new forms of border security police and including army initiatives) in border management and security have increased and paralleled political developments in the MENA region, the EU, and the world in general.51 Migration and deportation of foreigners in the context of border management and security constitute one of the important areas of study

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which are often left unaddressed and less covered in the literature. However, the question of political borders and deportations of foreigners have been recently discussed and examined by researchers of different disciplines with a particular focus on the legal, theoretical, and practical aspects of the issue.52 Recently, a large number of border violations taking place in Turkey’s territories and waters53 include human trafficking, illegal entry, immigration, and deportation applications rendered these questions and scholarship on these discussions more important than ever. Another debate with regard to Turkey’s borders is the issue of land border management. While the needs of the existing infrastructure at territorial border gates are insufficient at the point of easy reception, according to Fatma Gökçen Ongun, an urgent modernization is required to increase the service standards given at the border gates and to shorten the transit times.54 The social, political, and economic problems that have arisen due to how the borders of nation-states and modern state structures were been determined in the past are an area worthy of research within the field. In particular, the provision of border management and security have become the most controversial and vital of permanent problems. The question of which conditions and criteria determine the borders has constituted the character of the situations, disputes, and problems experienced in the later periods. In this context, while thinking on the Turkish-Iraqi border, Ahmet Davuto˘glu evaluates political borders in two categories. The first category being that “borders have a more stable character based on permanent and basic elements due to their geographical and historical backgrounds; and secondly, that borders that are conjunctural qualification.”55 According to Davuto˘glu to set a permanent political border, it must fulfill at least three important conditions. These include; “(1) the creation of a geopolitically-unified area, (2) the creation of an internal geo-economically-unified area, and (3) to have an internal geo-culturalunity.”56 He argues that “these three preconditions make a border stable one with a feature of historical continuity. Conversely, if borders divide geo-political basins, do not have a geo-economic unity in terms of geoeconomic transmission lines, and do not have an internal unity carry a potential to become a source of serious instability.”57 In light of his arguments, when the roots of the problems in Turkey’s eastern and southern borders are examined, it can be seen that there is a failure to comply with the basic principles that Davuto˘glu stated. In particular, the ongoing civil war in Syria that generated a crisis in security and management of the

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Turkish-Syrian border confirms Davutoglu’s argument. This is portrayed in the recently erected Turkish security wall on the Syrian border which not only engenders troubles within local communities but also deepens the ongoing political crisis in the region. For these reasons, there is an urgent need for more comprehensive ethnographic studies on the ongoing crisis of management and security and other social, cultural, political, and economic matters occurring as a result of geopolitical, geo-economic, and geo-cultural fragmentations from the past to the present day. 2.1.3

Society, History, and Memory

What can political borders and border people tell us? How do people living on the borderline and in border regions, perceive political borders? What kinds of reactions and relations have developed toward the borders? What is the effect of political borders in the construction of gender identities in border societies and what are the male and female discussions in this context telling us?58 How do political borders play a role in the process of the formation of time, space, and memory?59 Ethnographic investigations in different border regions around the world have sought to answer these kinds of pressing questions. In Turkey, although Turkish political borders have always been sites and venues of legal and illegal border crossings since the early years of the Republic, local peoples, international migrants, borders and border regions were neglected subjects of Turkish academic body in Turkey. Therefore, the first sociological and anthropological studies which appeared in the first half of the 2000s focused on cross-border migration, citizenship, and immigration. It can be claimed that the early ethnographic researches on Turkish political borders were carried out in the early 2000s along the Syrian, Iraqi, and Iranian borders by sociologist Ne¸se Özgen. In her works on eastern and southeastern borders, she mainly focused on social, political, and economic structures, citizenship, border identities, memory, smuggling and the official discourse of political borders with a historical perspective as well.60 As valuable contributions to the field of sociology of borders and border towns in Turkey, her studies question issues of formation of local border identities and memories, tribal structures, and crossborder trade with a sociological perspective. In spite of some methodological setbacks in her studies,61 while interrogating the notions of “border sense,” “perception of border,” and “social-cultural and economic effects

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of the border,” Özgen addressed neglected questions on the political borders and thus paved new routes for upcoming future researchers. Furthermore, ongoing events at the Turkish western territorial borders captured the attention of other researchers in the same period. When tenthousands of Bulgarian Turkish immigrants began to arrive in Turkey in 1989, politics of immigration, time, otherness, border crossings, law, and the state were scrutinized by some ethnographers. In her early anthropological studies on the Bulgarian-Turkish border, Ay¸se Parla emphasizes the different reasons behind mobility patterns of Bulgarian Turkish migrants between Turkey and Bulgaria and how cross-border activities embrace diversifying and changing meanings through time. In light of cross-border travel stories of Bulgarian immigrants, she demonstrates how immigrants are influenced by the state’s border management practices.62 In these studies, different experiences of “working women” on both sides of the border are questioned and analyzed in a relation to how the economic/job-based conflicts were turned into one based on gender roles between working women and locals. According to Parla, the experiences of Bulgarian migrant chronic women workers in Turkey showed how these conflicts entailed the longing and remembrance of the Communist Bulgarian gender and business practices and the Communist legacy.63 In the nearly last two decades, there has been an increasing academic interest in border and border regions among young researchers in disciplines of sociology and sociocultural Anthropology in Turkey. Here, it is possible to claim that the increase in the number of studies on Kurdish inhabited borderlands (Turkey’s eastern and southeastern borderlands) is closely related to development of Kurdish studies in the same period. In this emerging literature, the subjects of tribe, tribal structures, kinship, state-tribe relations, marriage, etc. seem to be most popularly studied issues in early classical anthropological studies on Islam and Muslims as well. In this context, the Hakkari border region in Turkey-Iran and Iraq triangle has seen some of the most interesting fieldwork area due to its geopolitical character. Ferhat Tekin, who conducted his research in 2012, discusses how the territorial borders that emerged with the nation-state structure in Turkey have been transformed into epistemological and cultural borders over time. As an insider (native) ethnographer, he reviews how Kurdish tribal structures, border trade, sociocultural relations have

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been established across-borders with a particular focus on the HakkariDerecik border region.64 Tekin’s familiarity with the knowledge and culture of the local Kurdish community and ability to speak the native language of his interlocutors enhance the value of his sociological analyses on tribes, kinship, marriage, trade, customs, and local people’s perception of political border. On the other hand, while working on the issues of kinship, agnation, tribalism, and ethnicity by means of kinship organiza¸ tions (marriage) through a medical anthropological perspective,65 Sükrü Nar does not ask the question of how political border might have influenced social and cultural structures in the border regions of Reyhanlı and Akçakale in the western part of Turkish-Syrian border. Turkish eastern and southeastern borders have been home to Kurdish cross-border political activism, transnationalism, secessionist activities and practices based on the idea of a “united Kurds” or “Kurdistan” as a cartographic imagination. In this context, in her anthropological study in the Nisêbîn border region, Ay¸se Yıldırım analyzes the phenomenon of the Turkish political borders around three important contexts.66 Yıldırım examines the historical context of Kurdish nationalism with its ethnogeographical and ethno-demographic extensions and further analyzes the inter-ethnic relations of two border cities, namely Qami¸slo (Syria) and Nisêbîn (Turkey), on the basis of the effects of the political border. While analyzing citizenship practices of Kurds in both Turkish and Syrian states in light of these two cities’ practices, she addresses diversifying citizenship practices of Kurds in both countries and how they go beyond the statist narratives through shared Kurdish common history, culture, language, memory, and ethnic awareness.67 As it can be seen in these early works, the question of ethnicity, nationalism, and economy in the border regions has been explored without a deep concern with gender issue and with lack of foci on diversifying experiences of men and women. However, Latife Akyüz’s research on ethnicity and gender dynamics at northeastern borders of Turkey with Georgia shed some lights on this subject. Based on her ethnographic research in Hopa, Akyüz questions and analyzes how border economy shapes intraand inter-group relations of ethnic and gender groups.68 Akyüz interrogates the economic and social mobility through Sarp border gate and how it affected local Laz and Hem¸sin communities in Hopa following the collapse of the Soviet Union. She focuses on the exclusionist and marginalization policies, the roles of local and migrant women, conflicts, and the deepened inequalities in these communities resulting from the developing

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economic activities at the border.69 The collapse of the Soviet Union not only deeply affected global political, economic and social dynamics, it also afflicted dynamics in the region and in the neighboring border countries in the 1990s. For this reason, the task of explaining social, cultural, and economic changes and fluctuations along with immigration and suitcase trade in the Eastern Black Sea region remains a valuable research subject. How political borders and border regions are treated in the Turkish literature of folklore, popular culture and art studies as research subjects? In his work on phenomena of hybridity, heterotopias, and arabesque, ethnomusicologist Martin Stokes pursues to describe arabesque music as a cultural form in the border city of Hatay on the Turkish-Syrian border. Stokes claims that arabesque music is not only a popular cultural text, but also a discourse that opens the way of imagining and questioning someone’s relations with others in various ways. According to Stokes, Arabesque which have spread throughout Turkey and continues to be produced can be defined as one of the forms of critical thinking of diversity, hierarchy, political borders, and ethnic differences as well.70 The performance of arabesque music in the daily lives of Arabs and Turks living in the Hatay border region reveals ambiguities, (dis)connectedness, sense of belonging and other hybrid forms of life where Arabness and Turkishness appear as fluid and intermingling processes rather that a fixed entity. Turkey’s Kurdish inhabited borders and border regions and rich content of life stories of border people gained the attention of scholars working on Kurdish cinema and music not only in Turkey but also in Iran, Iraq, and Syria as well. The arts of cinema and music have been used as a powerful instruments and space—particularly the cinematographic works of Yılmaz Güney and Bahman Ghobadi and some famous songs of grief by Sivan ¸ Perwer71 —through which catastrophic consequences and uncertainties of political borders have been portrayed along with struggle of local subjects. In her work on Kurdish cinema, Müjde Aslan reveals an important analysis of how the political borders are handled in the Kurdish cinema through analysis of some selected works of certain film directors who featured border issues in their artworks.72 In relation to this, Wendelmoet Hamelink and Hanifi Barı¸s’s work on Kurdish oral traditions document how the notions of the house, political border, and the state are depicted and perceived in the Kurdish society’s oral history and culture with a particular focus on dengbêj songs. According to both writers, dengbêj songs portray political borders as foreign interventions in the Kurdish geography. These widely performed songs or lamentations also

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inform us of how the Kurdish lands were turned into the frontiers of the modern nation-states and how these events deeply affected the lives of people resulting in loss, yearning, and struggle.73 When looking into studies on the border and the border regions in Turkey, it is generally observed that a significant number of researchers are working to study the Kurdish people are having a large number. This is of course relating to the fact that the Kurdish inhabited lands were divided into four parts by political borders of the nation-states which emerged after the fall of the Ottoman Empire. Although political borders began to be the subject of work in different dimensions in the 1990s in the western academia,74 the subject caught attention of only a few academics in Turkey only a decade later. In sum, sociological and particularly anthropological ethnographic researches that are based on long-term fieldwork provide better analyses and understanding of diverse forms and dimensions of social, cultural, political, historical, and economic problems and developments that have been generated by political borders of the modern Turkish nation-state. In conclusion, recent regional political, social, and economic developments have intensified the anthropological and sociological interest in the field of studies on political borders and border regions in Turkey. Research subjects such as histories of borders, perception of borders and place/space, memory, identity, sense of belonging, border crossings, smuggling, trade, trauma, violence, daily life, migration, refugees, citizenship, border security, changes, and transformation of economic, political, and social structures in the border regions, changing political relations between neighboring countries seek to be further investigated. The ongoing breakouts, conflicts, and new political developments in the border regions will continue to fuel more discussions, conflicts, and thereby further research. The political borders can be defined as artificial and external interventions which divide the history, society, and the culture of the geographies. We are in possession of very limited knowledge around the destructive historical impacts of the Turkish political borders on the local social fabric and how these disruptions were brought about in the historical process as some early studies have pointed out. As Metin Yüksel illustrated through the story of Kurdish rebellious leader Ferzende and his wife Besra on the Turkish-Iranian borders during and after the Mount Ararat revolt (1927–1930), Kurds residing on the borderlands went through devastating struggles while dealing with political borders.75 The fact that “Besra

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went mad”76 at the end of the story presented by Yüksel illustrates the political borders as “maddening interventions” of the nation-states. Political borders not only have reconstructed and shaped border regions but also produced new forms of economies, relations, structures, politics, and agencies. Despite all state security measures not limited to, but including physical and psychological “marginalization” policies, social, cultural, political, and economic ties and relations continued legally and illegally in different forms at local level. This also indicates that traces of the historical, social, and geographical perception inherited from the Ottoman period survived subjectively and collectively. In sum, the past and recent political developments on the peripheries of Turkey—concerning the ongoing civil war in Syria and the construction of Turkish security wall—necessitates comprehensive studies and discussions around the existing and thickening of Turkish political borders. The situation of hundreds of thousands of Syrian Arab, Kurdish, and Turkmen refugees flocking to Turkey since the eruption of the war in Syria in 2011 has invigorated past traumas produced by the political borders in the past. Many Syrian people took shelter with their relatives on the Turkish side, and this reality of divided kinship in both sides shows us again traumatic effects of the political borders. This research claims that the traces of a multi-religious, multilingual and multicultural social structure, inherited from the Ottoman Empire, continues today through social and cultural forms of kinship, tribal and religious bonds, economic networks and sense of belonging to shared past and memory. Furthermore, it argues that legal and illegal forms of border crossings and trade in fact exemplify the forms of challenge, denial, and adoption of the nature and structure of the nation-state’s political borders as “marginalizing and destroying” entities. For these reasons, ethnographic research on political borders and border regions has the potential to make important contributions to understanding, analysis and mitigating the often-irreversible rupture found in the social, political, and economic fabrics of the border communities.

Notes 1. Oscar J. Martinez, Border People: Life and Society in the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands (Tucson: The University of Arizona, 1994); Wilson and Donnan, Border Identities. 2. Thomas M. Wilson and Hastings Donnan, eds. A Companion to Border Studies (Wiley-Blackwell, 2012), 1.

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3. Etienne Balibar, “World Borders, Political Borders,” PMLA Journal 117, no. 1 (January 2002): 68–78. 4. Edward Casey, The Fate of Place: A Philosophical History. (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998). 5. Anthony P. Cohen, ed. Signifying Identities: Anthropological Perspectives on Boundaries and Contested Values (New York: Routledge, 1999). 6. John Agnew, “No Borders, No Nations: Making Greece in Macedonia,” Annals of the Association of American Geographers 97, no. 2 (2007): 398– 422. 7. Anssi Paasi, “Boundaries as Social Processes: Territoriality in the World of Flows,” Geopolitics 3, no. 1 (1998): 69–88. 8. Thomas Wilson and Hastings Donnan, Border Identities —Nation and State at International Frontiers. (Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1998); Hastings Donnan and Thomas Wilson, Borders: Frontiers of Identity, Nation and State. (Oxford: Berg, 1999); Hastings Donnan, Borders and Borderlands: An Anthropological Perspective, Special Issue of Ethnologia Europea (Musuem Tusculanum, 2000); Daniel Arreola and James Roberto Curtis, The Mexican Border Cities: Landscape Anatomy and Place Personality (Tucson: The University of Arizona, 1993); Hassan Afrakhteh, “The Problems of Regional Development and Border Cities: A Case Study of Zahedan, Iran,” Cities 23, no. 6 (2006): 423–432. 9. Robert R. Alvarez, “The Mexican-US Border: The Making of an Anthropology of Borderlands,” Annual Review of Anthropology 24 (October 1995): 447–470; James Anderson and Liam O’Dowd, “Borders, Border Regions and Territoriality: Contradictory Meanings, Changing Significance,” Regional Studies 33, no. 7 (1999): 593–604; Thomas M. Wilson, James Anderson and Liam O’Dowd, eds. Culture and Cooperation in Europe’s Borderlands (European Studies 19) (New York: Rodopi, 2003); Warwick Armstrong, “Culture, Continuity and Identity in the SloveneItalian Border Region,” in Culture and Cooperation in Europe’s Borderland (European Studies 19), ed. Thomas M. Wilson, James Anderson and Liam O’Dowd (New York: Rodopi, 2003), 145–169. 10. Reece Jones, (2012). Border Walls: Security and the War on Terror in the United States, India and Israel (New York: Zed Books, 2012), 1– 2; Wendy Brown, Walled States, Waning Sovereignty (New York: Zone Books, 2010). 11. Jones, Border Walls, 2. 12. Peter Andreas, Smuggler Nation: How Illicit trade made America (New York: Oxford University, 2013); Border Games: Policing the U.S.-Mexico Divide (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2000); Peter Andreas and Timothy Snyder, The Wall around the West: State Borders and Immigration Controls in North America and Europe (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 2000); Stephen Grant Baines and Stephen Nugent, “Photo-Essay:

2

13.

14.

15.

16.

17. 18.

19. 20. 21.

22.

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Makuxi and Wapishana Indians on the Brazil- Guyana Border,” Critique of Anthropology, 23, no. 4 (2003): 339–348; Robert L. Bateman, “Iraq and the Problem of Border Security,” The SAIS Review of International Relations 26, no. 1 (2006): 41–47. Avram S. Bornstein, “Border Enforcement in Daily Life: Palestinian Day Laborers and Entrepreneurs Crossing the Green Line,” Human Organization 60, no. 3 (2001): 298–307; Dawn Chatty and Gillian Lewando Hundt, eds. Children of Palestine: Experiencing Forced Migration in the Middle East (New York: Berghahn Books, 2005). Laura Assmuth, “Nation Building and Everyday Life in the Borderlands between Estonia, Latvia and Russia,” European Journal of Anthropology 41 (2003): 59–69; Tanya Abdallah and Khaled Swaileh, “Effects of the Israeli Segregation Wall on Biodiversity and Environmental Sustainable Development in the West Bank, Palestine,” International Journal of Environmental Studies 68, no. 4 (2011): 543–555; Elisa Farinacci, “The IsraeliPalestinian Separation Wall and the Assemblage Theory: The Case of the Weekly Rosary at the Icon of Our Lady of the Wall,” Journal of Ethnology and Folkloristics 11, no. 1 (2017): 83–110. Jan Mansvelt Beck, “Has the Basque Borderland Become more Basque after Opening the Franco-Spanish Border?” National Identities 10, Nsao. 4 (2008): 373–388. Sarah Green, Notes from the Balkans: Locating Marginality and Ambiguity on the Greek-Albanian Border (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2005). Green, Notes from the Balkans, 1. Mark B. Salter, “When the Exception Becomes the Rule: Borders, Sovereignty and Citizenship,” Citizenship Studies 12, no. 4 (2008): 365– 380, “The Global Visa Regime and the Political Technologies of International Self: Borders, Bodies and Biopolitics,” Alternatives: Global, Local, Political 31, no. 2 (2006): 167–189. Martin Van Bruinessen, Agha, Shaikh and State: The Social and Political Structures of Kurdistan (New Jersey: Zed Books, 1992). Lale Yalcin-Heckmann, Tribe and Kinship among the Kurds (Peter Lang GmbH, 1991). Ramazan Aras, “The Politics of the State and the Kurds as the Subject of the Research: An Analysis of Development of the Kurdish Studies in Turkey,” in Wiener Jahrbuch für Kurdologie (2) -Kurdology and Kurdish Studies: Object of Research and the History of the Subject, eds. Ferdinand Hennerbichler, Thomas Schmidinger, Maria A. Six-Hohenbalken and Christoph Osztovics (Vienna: Wiener Verlag Publications, 2014), 97– 139. ˙ Nejat Abdulla, Imparatorluk, Sınır ve A¸siret: Kürdistan ve 1843–1932 Türk-Fars Sınır Çatı¸sması [Empire, Border and Tribe: Kurdistan and

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23.

24.

25.

26.

27.

28.

the Turkish-Persian Border Conflict 1843–1932], trans. Mustafa Aslan ˙ (Istanbul: Avesta 2010); Janet Klein, The Margins of Empire: Kurdish Militias in the Ottoman Tribal Zone (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2011); Sabri Ate¸s, The Ottoman-Iranian Borderlands: Making a Boundary 1843–1914 (Cambridge University Press, 2013); Metin Atmaca, “Politics of Alliance and Rivalry on the Ottoman-Iranian Frontier: The Babans 1500–1851” (PhD diss., Albert Ludwig University of Freiburg, 2013); ˙ Zuhal Özba¸s, “19. Yüzyıl Osmanlı-Iran Sınır Diplomasisinde Caf A¸sireti” [The Caf Tribe in the Ottoman-Iranian Border Diplomacy in the 19th Century] (MA Thesis, Marmara Üniversitesi, 2014). ˙ The Turkish-Bulgarian border was determined in 1913 at Istanbul Treaty while the Turkish-Soviet border was determined in 1921 under the Treaty of Kars, Turkish-Greek and Turkish-Syrian borders were demarcated in 1923 at Lozan Treaty, Turkish-Iraqi border was determined in 1926 and the Turkish-Iranian border was re-determined in 1932 after Kurdish rebellions in the border province of A˘grı. Turkish territorial waters and airspace have not gained the attention of many researchers. However, the existing literature on these borders consists of works by scholars from the field of law, political science, and international relations. See; Gökhan Ak, “Ege’deki Hayalet: Türk-Yunan Deniz Sınırı, Durum ve Etkiler” [Ghost in the Aegean: Turkish-Greek Maritime Boundary, Situation and Impacts], Cumhuriyet Tarihi Ara¸stırmaları Dergisi 10, no. 20 (2014): 255–288; Gökay Bulut, “Ege Hava Sahası Sorunları: Çözülmü¸s Olanlar ve Sorunların Gelece˘gi” [The Aegean Airspace Disputes, the Ones Already Resolved and the Future], Güvenlik Stratejileri 8, no. 16 (2012): 115–147. I also can be considered as one of those academics whose interest in border studies was not only prompted due to family histories and other personal reasons but also as a result of having been employed in one of the newly founded state universities located in the border regions. Thousands of ordinary individuals were transporting various kinds of goods (sports equipment, furniture, clothes, etc.) in their very large suitcases which is why this form of trade was named as “bavul ticareti” (suitcase trading). They were selling their goods in the local bazaars which were named “Rus pazarları” (Russian bazaars) by local Turkish people as well. Although male and female traders were arriving from differing former Soviet countries and diverse ethnic backgrounds, they had all been named and classified “Rus” (Russian) by Turks in the region. Kenan Çelik, “Sarp Sınır Kapısının Fonksiyonları ve Ula¸stırma Sektörüne Etkileri” [The Functions of Sarp Border Gate and Its Impacts on Transportation Sector] (MA thesis, Karadeniz Teknik Üniversitesi, 1988). Muammer Sönmez, Sınır ve Kıyı Ticareti [Border and Coastal Trade] (Erzurum: Yaylacık, 1995); Sinasi ¸ Seçen, “Dünyada ve Ülkemizde Sınır ve

2

29. 30. 31.

32.

33.

34.

35.

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Kıyı Ticareti” [Border and Coastal Trade in the World and in Our Country] Hazine ve Dı¸s Ticaret Dergisi, 47, 318 (Eylül 1993). See also Sedat Güner, “Türkiye’de Sigara Sektöründe Kaçakçılı˘gın Yeri,” [The Role of Smuggling in Tobacco Sector in Turkey], Gümrük Dünyası 48 (Kı¸s 2006); Nurettin Öztürk, “Türkiye’de Sınır Ticaretinin Geli¸simi, Ekonomik Etkileri, Kar¸sıla¸sılan Sorunlar Ve Çözüm Önerileri,” [Development of Border Trade in Turkey: Economic Impacts, Encountred Problems and Proposed Solutions], Zonguldak Karaelmas Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Dergisi 2, no. 3 (2006). There are three active border gates (Sarp, Dilucu and Akta¸s) on the Turkish-Georgian border. Turkey’s two borders gates with Armenia are Alican (highway) and Akkaya (railway) border gates. Kerem Karabulut, Do˘gu’da Yakalanan Kalkınma Fırsatı: Ticaret [Caught Opportunity of Development in the East] (Istanbul: Nobel Yayın Da˘gıtım, 2005); “Türkiye-Ermenistan Sınır Kapılarını Açmak veya Açmamak: ‘Siyasi ve Ekonomik Bir De˘gerlendirme” [Opening or Not the Turkish-Armenian Border Gates: A Political and Economic Evaluation], Yeni Türkiye 60 (2014): 1–11; “1990 Sonrası Geli¸smelerle Kars-Ardahan- I˘gdır Üçgeni” [The Triangle of Kars-Ardahan-I˘gdır after Developments in the post˙ ˙ 1990s], Iktisadi ve Idari Bilimler Dergisi, Cilt 19, Sayı 1 (2005): 133– 150. Kerem Karabulut et al., Türkiye-Ermenistan Sınır Kapıları Sorunsalı: Ekonomik Analiz [The Problem of Turkish-Armenian Border Gates: An Economic Analysis] (Ankara: Nobel, 2011). Defne Dursun, “Cross-Border Co-Operation as a Tool to Enhance Regional Development: The Case of Hopa-Batumi Region” (MA thesis, METU, Ankara, 2007), vi. Rıfat Barı¸s Tekin, Türkiye’nin Kom¸su ve Çevre Ülkelerle Sınır A¸san Ticaretinin Geli¸stirilmesine Yönelik Bir Strateji Denemesi [A Strategic Study on Development of Cross-border Trade between Turkey and Its Neighbour˙ ˙ ˙ ing Countries] (Istanbul: ITO Yayınları, 2005); Istanbul Ticaret Odası (Istanbul Trade Chamber), Türkiye’de Sınır Ticaretinin Geli¸simi ve Mevcut Durumu [Development of Border Trade and Its Present Condition in ˙ ˙ Turkey] (Istanbul: Istanbul Ticaret Odası, 2008). Haluk Yergin. “Orta Do˘gu Sınır Ticaretinin Türkiye’nin Do˘gu Anadolu Bölgesi Ekonomisine Etkileri” [The Impacts of Middle Eastern Border Trade on Economy of Eastern Anatolian Region in Turkey] (MA thesis, Marmara Üniversitesi, 2001); Mehmet Kara, “Ekonomik Etkileri Açısından Türkiye’deki Sınır Ticaretinin De˘gerlendirilmesi” [An Evaluation of Economic Impacts of Border Trade in Turkey], Dokuz Eylül

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36.

37.

38.

39.

40. 41.

42.

Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Enstitüsü Dergisi Vol. 7, no. 3. (2005): 60– 79; U˘gur Güllülü, Burcu Candan, Sükrü ¸ Yapraklı, and Kerem Karabulut, “Gürbulak, Dilucu ve Türközü Sınır Kapılarından Geçi¸s Yapan ˙ Ki¸silerin Bu Kapılardan Gerçekle¸stirilen Ticaretin Boyutu ile Ilgili Bilgi Dü¸sünce ve Tutum Ara¸stırması” [A Research on People who used Gürbulak, Dilucu ve Türközü Border Gates and their Knowledge, Thought and ˙ Perception about Dimensions of this Trade], Atatürk Üniversitesi Iktisadi ˙ ve Idari Bilimler Dergisi 20, no. 2 (2006), 387–404. Nurhan Yılmaz, “Cilvegözü Sınır Kapısının Ortado˘gu’daki Önemi” [The Importance of Cilvegözü Border Gate in the Middle East] (MA thesis, Marmara Üniversitesi, 2003). Sedat Güner. “Türkiye Sigara Sektöründe Kaçakçılı˘gın Yeri” [The Role of Smuggling in Tobacco Sector in Turkey], Gümrük Dünyası, Kı¸s 48 (2006). Erhan Atay, “Türkiye ve Balkan Ülkeleri Arasında Sınır ve Sınır Ötesi Ticaret Üzerine Bir Uygulama” [A Research on Border and Cross-Border ˙ Trade between Turkey and Balkan Countries] (PhD diss., Istanbul Üniversitesi, 2005). Events like “The International Border Trade Conference” organized by Kilis 17 December University and University of Aleppo on Turkish crossborder trade on 4–6 November in 2010 at the border city of Kilis can be defined as one positive aspect of these developments in the region. The meeting program and pdf version of conference proceedings can be accessed from following the link: http://iibf.kilis.edu.tr/bordertrade/ files/Kongre_kitapcigi.pdf (accessed on January 18, 2019). In the context of studies on Kilis border region, see Hatice Pınar Seno˘ ¸ guz, “Demarcating Kilis as a Border Town: Community, Belonging and Social Mobility among Socio-Economic Strata on the Syrian Border of Turkey” (PhD diss., METU, 2014), Community, Change and Border Towns (London: Routledge, 2018). In her ethnographic research, she endeavors to respond the question of power, politics of inclusion and exclusion, practices of hierarchy and social stratification and the patterns of change in particular locality of Kilis. Fırat Bozçalı, “The Illegal Oil Trade Along Turkey’s Borders,” Middle East Report 261 (Winter 2011): 24–29. Fırat Bozcalı, “Hukuki-Maddi Bir Kategori Olarak Sınır: Türkiye-Iran Sınırında Kaçakçılık, Mahkeme Süreçleri ve Sınırın ‘Resmi’ Temsilleri” [Border as a Legal-Material Category: Smuggling in the Turkish-Iranian Border, Legal Processes, and ‘Official’ Figures of Borders], Toplum ve Bilim 131 (2014): 135–162. Sezgin Ervin and Gülden Erkut, “Cross Border Cooperation in EdirneKırklareli Border Region: New Institutionalist Perspectives,” ITU Journal of Faculty of Architecture Vol. 12, no. 3 (November 2015): 267–283;

2

43.

44.

45.

46.

47.

48.

49.

50.

51.

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Güliz G. U. Ergenler, “Sınır Bölgelerinde Giri¸simcilik ve Yerel Geli¸sme: Ke¸san Örne˘gi” [Entrepreneurship and Local Development in Border Regions: A Case Study in Ke¸san] (MA thesis, Istanbul Technical University, 2012). Cigdem Varol and Emrah Söylemez, “Border Permeability and Drivers of Cross-Border Cooperation in the Turkish and EU Border Region,” EBEEC Conference Proceedings, The Economies of Balkan and Eastern Europe Countries in the Changed World, KnE Social Sciences (2017): 87–98; “Socio-spatial Network Structures in Border Regions: West and East Borders of Turkey,” in Cities as Spatial and Social Networks: Human Dynamics in Smart Cities, eds. Xinyue Ye and Xingjian Liu (New York: Springer, 2019), 207–225; Füsun Özerdem, “Turkey’s EU Cross Border Cooperation Experiences: From Western Borders to Eastern Borders,” European Perspectives: Journal of European Perspectives of the Western Balkans 3, no. 2 (5) (October 2011): 75–103. Osman Z. Orhan, Sınır Ticaretinin Türkiye Ekonomisine Etkileri [The ˙ Impacts of Border Trade on Turkish Economy] (Istanbul: Istanbul Geli¸sim Üniversitesi Yayınları, 2000). ˙ Zuhal Özba¸s, “19. Yüzyıl Osmanlı-Iran Sınır Diplomasisinde Caf A¸sireti” [The Caf Tribe in the Ottoman-Iranian Border Diplomacy in the 19th Century] (MA thesis, Marmara Üniversitesi, 2014). Necat Özdemir, “Türk-Yunan Sınır Münasebetleri 1829–1923” [TurkishGreek Border Relations 1829–1923] (MA thesis, Ankara Üniversitesi, 1993); Mehmet Ali Kocaba¸s, “Türkiye-Suriye Sınır Tespiti ve Tartı¸smalar 1918–1923” [The Turkish-Syrian Border Demarcation and Disputes 1918–1923] (MA thesis, Marmara Üniversitesi, 1997). ˙ skileri Turel Yılmaz, “Türkiye’nin Ortado˘gu’daki Sınır Kom¸suları ile Ili¸ 1970–1997” [The Relations between Turkey and Its Border Neighbors in the Middle East 1970–1997] (PhD diss., Gazi Üniversitesi, 1997). Mesut Özcan, “Border Concept and the Middle Eastern Borders: The Case of Iraq” (MA thesis, Marmara Üniversitesi, 2002); Sorunlu Miras Irak [Problematical Legacy Iraq] (Istanbul: Küre Yayınları, 2003). Gökhan Dönmez. “21. Yüzyılda De˘gi¸sen Sınır Algısı” [The Changing Perception of Border in the 21st Century] (PhD diss., Istanbul Üniversitesi, 2010). Fatih Altunyuva, “Türkiye’nin Sınır Yönetiminin Avrupa Birli˘gi’ne Uyumu” [The Integration Turkish Border Management into EU] (MA thesis, Polis Akademisi, 2008). Bahattin Sahin, ¸ “Biyometrik Verilerin Pasaport ve Sınır Kapılarında Uygulanması ve Bir Model Önerisi” [The Application of Biometric Data on Passport at Border Gates: Proposal of a Model] (MA thesis, Beykent Üniversitesi, 2012); Elçin Doru, “The Role of Europeanization on the ˙ Establishment of the Future Turkish Border Guard” (MA thesis, Izmir

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52.

53.

54.

55. 56. 57. 58.

59.

60.

˙ University of Economics, 2012); Ibrahim U˘gur Sava¸seri, “AB Entegre Sınır Yönetiminin Türkiye’nin Sınır Güvenli˘gine Etkisi ve Yeniden Yapılandırma Çalı¸smaları” [The Impacts of EU Border Integration Management on Turkish Border Security and Reconstruction Efforts] (MA thesis, Harp Akademileri Komutanlı˘gı Stratejik Ara¸stırmalar Enstitüsü, 2014). ˙ Didem Danı¸s and Ibrahim Soysüren, Sınır ve Sınırdı¸sı: Türkiye’de Yabancılar, Göç, ve Devlete Disiplinlerarası Bakı¸slar [Border and Deportation: Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Immigrants, Migration and State] (Istanbul: Nota Bene, 2014). The security of Turkish waters has grown more critical following immense number of Syrian refugees attempting to arrive at the European territories through illegal sea routes. For more details on the issue of management of Turkish waters, see Adem Kılıç, “The Effects of Turkey’s Integrated Border Management Process upon Security of Maritime Domains on the Road to European Union” (MA thesis, Ufuk University, 2013). ˙ slet Devret Fatma Gökçen Ongun, “Türkiye Kara Sınır Kapılarının Yap I¸ Modeli ile Modernizasyonu” [The Modernization of Territorial Border Gates via Build-Operate-Transfer Model] (MA thesis, Kırıkkale Üniversitesi, 2009). Mesut Özcan, Sorunlu, v. Özcan, Sorunlu, v–vi. Özcan, Sorunlu, vi. For detailed arguments on these issues see Sharon Navarro, “Border Narratives: The Politics of Identity and Mobilization,” Latin American Politics and Society 45, no. 3 (2003): 129–139; Vicki L. Ruiz, Las Obreras: Chicana Politics of Work and Family (Los Angeles: UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center, 2000); Miriam C. Y. Louie, Sweatshop Warriors: Immigrant Women Workers Take on The Global Factory (Boston: South End Press, 2001); Sonia Saldívar-Hull, Feminism on the Border: Chicana Gender Politics and Literature (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000); Pablo Vila, Crossing Borders, Reinforcing Borders: Social Categories, Metaphors, and Narrative Identities on the US-Mexico Frontier (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2000). Jonathan Boyarin, ed. “Space, Time and the Politics of Memory.” In Remapping Memory: The Politics of TimeSpace (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1994), 1–38. Ne¸se Özgen, Toplumsal Hafızanın Hatırlama ve Unutma Biçimleri: VanÖzalp ve 33 Kur¸sun Hadisesi [The Patterns of Remembering and Forgetting in Social Memory: The Event of Van-Özalp and 33 Bullets] (Istan˙ bul: TÜSTAV Yayınları, 2003); “Sınırın Iktisadi Antropolojisi; Suriye ve ˙ Kasaba” [Economic Anthropology of Border: Two Irak Sınırlarında Iki Towns on Syrian and Iraqi Border], in Gelenekten Gelece˘ge Antropoloji,

2

61.

62.

63. 64.

65.

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47

eds. Belkis Kümbetoglu and Hande Birkalan-Gedik (Epsilon Yayınları, 2005), 100–129; “Sınır, Devlet, A¸siret: A¸siretin Etnik Bir Kimlik Olarak ˙ sası” [Border, State, Tribe: The Reconstruction of Tribe as an Yeniden In¸ Ethnic Identity], Toplum ve Bilim 108 (2007): 239–261. The basic problem in Özgen’s research methodology seems to be her inability to learn and converse in the Kurdish (Kurmanjî dialect) which was the native language of her interlocutors. This methodological problem has been a chronic one among Turkish scholars in Turkey who study diverse issues in the Kurdish society in Turkey. For a detailed argument see Ramazan Aras, “Antropolojinin Yeni Öznesi Olarak Kürtler” [Kurds as the New Subject of Anthropology], in Türkiye’de Sosyo-Kültürel Antropoloji ve Disiplinlerarası Yakla¸sımlar [Socio-Cultural Anthropology and Interdisciplinary Approaches in Turkey], ed. Ramazan Aras (Konya: Çizgi Kitabevi, 2014), 145–172. For further theoretical arguments on ethnographic and methodological questions see Pablo Vila, Ethnography at the Border, ed. P. Villa. (Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press, 2003); James Clifford and George E. Marcus, Writing Culture: The Poetics and Politics of Ethnography (California: University of California Press, 1986); Victor W. Turner and Edward M. Bruner, The Anthropology of Experience (Urbana: University of Illinois, 1986); James Clifford, The Predicament of Culture (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1988); Renato Rosaldo, Culture and Truth: The Remaking of Social Analysis (Boston: Beacon Press, 1993). Ay¸se Parla, “Marking Time Along the Bulgarian-Turkish Border,” Ethnography 4, no. 4 (2003): 561–575; “Remembering Across the Border: Postsocialist nostalgia among Turkish immigrants from Bulgaria,” American Ethnologist 36, no. 4 (2009): 750–767. See also Zeynep Ka¸sli and Ay¸se Parla, “Broken Lines of II/Legality and the Reproduction of State Sovereignty: The Impact of Visa Policies on Immigrants to Turkey from Bulgaria,” Alternatives: Global, Local and Political Vol. 34, no. 2 (AprilJune 2009), 203–227. Ay¸se Parla, “Labor Migration, Ethnic Kinship, and the Conundrum of Citizenship in Turkey,” Citizenship Studies 15, no. 3–4 (2011): 457–470. Ferhat Tekin, Sınırın Sosyolojisi: Ulus, Devlet ve Sınır Insanları [Sociology of Border: Nation, State and Border People] (Istanbul: Açılım Kitap, 2014). In the context of Turkish-Iranian-Iraqi border, see also, Ömer Özcan, “Yüksekova’da Sınır Deneyimleri: Bir ‘Sınır Kaçakçılı˘gı’ Hikayesi ve Barı¸s Süreci” [Border Experiences in Yüksekova: A Story of ‘Smuggling’ and the Peace Process], Toplum ve Bilim 131 (2014): 162–186; Bilal Görenta¸s, “Nation, Bordering and Identity on the Border Between Turkey and Iraq” (PhD diss., University of Southampton, 2017). Mehmet Sükrü ¸ Nar, “Kültürel Örgütlenmenin Antropolojik Temelleri: Akçakale ve Reyhanlı ilçeleri Sınır Köylerinin Sosyal Antropolojik açıdan

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66.

67. 68.

69. 70.

71.

72.

73.

74. 75.

76.

Kar¸sıla¸stırmalı Analizi” [Anthropological Bases of Cultural Organization: A Comparative Anthropological Analysis of Border Villages of Akçakale and Reyhanlı] (PhD., Ankara Üniversitesi, 2012). Ay¸se Yıldırım, “Devlet, Sınır, A¸siret: Nusaybin Örne˘gi” [State, Border, Tribe: The Case of Nusaybin] (PhD diss., Hacettepe Üniversitesi, 2013); “From Gun Barrel to Passport: Smuggling on the Turkish-Syrian Border,” Sociology and Anthropology 5, no. 11 (2017): 941–953. Yıldırım, “Devlet,” 2013. Latife Akyüz, “Ethnicity and Gender Dynamics of Living in Borderlands: The Case of Hopa-Turkey” (PhD diss., Middle East Technical University, 2013). Akyüz, “Ethicity,” vii. Martin Stokes, “Hybridity, Heterotopias, Arabesk on the Turkish-Syrian Border,” In Border Identities: Nation and State at International Frontiers, ed. Thomas M. Wilson and Hastings Donnan (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), 283–285. Famous Kurdish singer Sivan ¸ Perwer’s albüm named Helebçe (Pel Records, 1988) includes many songs of grief addressing that Kurdish cartographic imagination that goes beyond the political borders of nationstates. Aslan analyzes some of Yılmaz Güney’s works from Turkey, Bahman Ghobadi from Iran and Hiner Saleem from Iraq. For more details see Müjde Aslan, Kürt Sineması: Yurtsuzluk, Sınır ve Ölüm [Kurdish Cinema: Rootlessness, Border and Death] (Istanbul: Agora Kitaplı˘gı, 2009). Wendelmoet Hamelink and Hanifi Barı¸s, “Dengbêjs on Borderlands: Borders and the State as Seen through the Eyes of Kurdish Singerpoets,” Kurdish Studies 2, no. 1 (2014): 34–60. Hastings Donnan and Thomas M. Wilson. Borders: Frontiers of Identity, Nation and State (Oxford: Berg Press, 1999), xiii–xiv. Metin Yüksel, “On the Borders of the Turkish and Iranian Nation-states: The Story of Ferzende and Besra,” Middle Eastern Studies 52, no. 4 (2016): 656–676. Yüksel, “On the Borders,” 668.

CHAPTER 3

The Making

A genealogical investigation on the history of the Turkish-Syrian border leads us to the question of the making process of the border since the early years of the Turkish Republic. After the fall of the Ottoman Empire and during the World War I, Ottoman-ruled territories were shrunk to a certain level which was defined by the state authorities of the time as “milli sınırlar” (national borders). The first territorial map was declared by leaders of war of independence in 1918. However, the boundaries of newly founded Turkish Republic were determined by an agreement with the French and Turkish authorities in Ankara Treaty in 1921 and later confirmed at the treaty of Lausanne in 1923 except Hatay which later joined Turkey in 1939. Here, it is essential to mention that the TurkishSyrian border was shaped by political events and changes occurred in the later periods between both nation-states, the Soviets backed Syria and the US backed Turkey and their other allies in the region. What is the meaning of political borders? Why do they exist? Territorial borders have existed from past to the present during which their forms, meaning, and formations changed in diverse ways vis-a-vis transformation of the states. Malcolm Anderson who used the concept of “frontiers” instead of political borders and described these borders as “frontiers of the nation-states” interprets political borders as “institutions and processes.”1 According to Anderson, frontiers as processes are not only “instruments of state policy” but also “markers of identity.” They are used as a control mechanism over the frontiers and it is also “a term of discourse.” The frontiers as institutions delimit both the “sovereign authority and © The Author(s) 2020 R. Aras, The Wall, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-45654-2_3

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the identity of individuals (claims to nationality and exercise of rights of citizenship).”2 Political borders as one of the fundamental apparatuses of the state power have been employed as crucial instruments in the process of formation of “national identity.”3 At the end of 1990s, scholars working on borders were arguing that “borders no longer function as they once did, or at least not in every respect. Globalization of culture, the internationalization of economics and politics, and the decline of Cold War superpower and satellite hostilities have apparently resulted in the opening of borders, goods, capital and ideas.”4 The hope and dreams which anticipated that social, political, economic, and cultural globalized developments will lose tightened political borders, huge transformation, and even removal of physical barriers as seen during the expansion of EU came true partially but today the world is going to a reverse direction. After nearly twenty years of these uttered and written discourses and analysis, the world, today, is witnessing erection of numerous security fences, wires, and walls in different parts of the world. The modern nation-states have begun to thicken their borders by implementation of high technologies. Today, many European countries started to fence their internal borders with their neighbors but with a particular concentration on fencing the frontiers of the EU territories. Political borders have been places of performances of the state power and control through diverse forms of security mechanisms. The fabrication of official discourses and ideologies implemented through laws, principles, and education is accompanied by construction of physical barriers such as border markers, wires, watchtowers, landmines, police stations, border gates, fences, and the walls as diverse forms of mechanisms of exclusion. However, geopolitical, physical, military, and ideological interventions of new nation-state along with attempt of forming a new cartographic national memory on disputed and controversial borderlands immediately led to new forms of sociopolitical events. In this chapter, the making process of Turkish-Syrian border will be documented and analyzed in light of life stories and testimonies of local people. In this chapter, the agencies of the state and its actors in relation to local people and non-human agents are being scrutinized. It aims to reveal how the intensification of physical measures on the borderline evolve together with the increasing voices and discourses for the security of the nation and control of borders from past to the present.

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3.1 Political Borders in Turkish State Discourses After the foundation of the Turkish state in 1923, territorial political borders were constantly defined as not only geopolitical lines but also social, cultural, and economic borders of the newly founded state and “imagined Turkish nation” in the state discourses. In other words, the territorial national borders were perceived as sacred entities and given a high value. As such, the security and protection of these borders also have been given a great importance as is constantly in the political discourses of the state authorities. The Turkish saying or slogan “Hudut Namustur!” (The Border is Honor) is one such crystallized discourse of the state officials and army members in the context of protection and sustaining the security of the borders. Under the heavy influence of nationalist discourses, desires and rhetoric of fraternity, the millions of citizens (men) are made ready to die and kill on the way of achieving that task.5 Going beyond cartographic imagination of the homeland, the nation or the state, ülke (country), vatan (homeland), or devlet (state) is also imagined as a female body.6 Here, there is need to explain equation of the act of protection of the borders with the protection of namûs which can be translated to English as honor. As it is stated by other anthropologists, the concept of namûs is “borrowed from Arabic to Kurdish, Farsi, Turkish, and related languages (an equivalent of ‘ird in Arabic). The notion of namûs is almost always translated ‘honor’ when rendered in English,”7 and it is widely perceived and practiced notion in many communities in many southeastern Mediterranean regions, Middle Eastern countries, and in Central and South Asia as well. So, in the statist discourse, the task of protection of the security of the borders is given to the Turkish soldiers (army) as in the case of honor of women where not only women but also the men (fathers, husbands, brothers, sons) in the family are also considered as the guards for the woman’s honor.8 In her analysis on “the discursive production of vatan as a female body” in the case of Iranian state, Afsaneh Najmabadi states that “Iranian men, as a brotherhood of patriots, were concerned over the penetrability of the porous borders of Iran’s geo-body, much as they displayed anxiety over who penetrated the orifices of the bodies of their female possessions.”9 In a similar vein, Diane King also observes similar ideological constructions in the discourses of Iraqi Kurdish officials in the context of Kurdish perception of the Iraqi Kurdistan. King claims that “the

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Iraqi Kurdish homeland had become, as had Iran before it, a metaphorical woman who needed protection against ‘alien designs, intrusion, and penetration,’ and where ‘men, as a brotherhood of patriots, were concerned over the penetrability of the porous borders’ much ‘as they displayed anxiety over who penetrated the orifices of the bodies of their female possessions.’”10 As seen in the cases of Iran, Iraq and the nationalist discourses of other nation-states, although the state’s geopolitical body is perceived as “a beloved female,” it generally considered and imagined as a “mother” which is coined in the Turkish case as “anavatan” (the motherland).11 So, “the desire and necessity to care for and defend the mother, in particular her bodily integrity” was adopted into nationalist and statist popular rhetorics and discourses which is expressed in Turkish as “vatanın bölünmez bütünlü˘gü” (unitary integrity of the homeland). The Turkish slogan “Hudut Namustur” has been inscribed on the walls and rooftops of army buildings and other visible surface areas of watchtowers at the army bases in the border cities and towns particularly in the eastern and southeastern borders. In the discourses, the territorial Turkish political borders are defined as such entity that must be protected from illegal infiltrations or tecavüz (transgression) by any means necessary which initially led to the construction of physical and military countermeasures step by step. As Najmabadi eloquently summarized “the modern state as the collective body of men charged with protecting the feminine homeland became progressively more masculinized symbolically as well.”12 In the Turkish case, the territorial state or vatan (homeland) was imagined as a feminine body and as mother, the nation (Turks) as a family and Mustafa Kemal as “the Father.” In her work on Turkish national myths and Self-Na(rra)tions, Hülya Adak claims that “this paternal role was underscored in 1934 when Mustafa Kemal instigated the ‘Last Name Law,’ whereby all Turkish citizens had to take last names, and claimed the name of Atatürk, which literally meant the ‘Father of the Turk,’ for himself.” The descendants of the “Father of the Turks/Atatürk” were the Turkish youth.13 So, Turkish political borders augmented with the esteem of namûs (honor) to shield this newly born Turkish nation, from any forms of external threats. During the Turkish state-building, state authorities’ strong emphasis on security of national borders is also related to perception of the Turkish state as a piece of land left from the great vast expanse of the Ottoman Empire. In other words, “the trauma of the rapid territorial decline that marked the fall of the Ottoman Empire, and especially the experience of

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the WWI during which the Ottoman Empire allied with Germany and the Central Powers, continued to haunt the Turkish political imagination even after the founding of the Republic.”14 It is why what is left is considered as the last castle, a small land remained of the previous, has to be protected by any means necessary. In the process of creation of an imagined Turkish nation within territorial boundaries of newly founded state, political borders were constructed to physically exclude any threats for the nation, and meanwhile, they were seen protective mechanisms to help to facilitate the process of homogenizing the internal population in light of Turkish nationalist, modernist/western, secularist and then Kemalist principles.15 All these considered, an investigation of how the state-sponsored physical and psychological measures and discourses took place gradually in the border region and how these policies have affected the “everyday lives”16 of ordinary people residing in the region becomes the ultimate task of this work. During World War I and in fall of the Ottoman Empire, the Turkish authorities were involved in numerous disputes with European powers who invaded most regions of the Empire. These bargains and disputes evolved into certain official treaties with these hegemonic powers in the later years, but meanwhile the leaders of the Turkish Independence war (Kurtulu¸s Sava¸sı) were disputing potential political borders of liberated lands. While trying to organize masses for a resistance at certain cities in Anatolia, Mustafa Kemal and other leading figures were talking about political borders of the lands left from the great territories of the Ottoman Empire at Erzurum congress days (July 23–August 7) and Sivas congress (4–11 September) in 1919. Based on the state achieves, we see the first statements on Turkish border determination in one of the speeches of Mustafa Kemal (1881–1938), the commander-in-chief of the Turkish Army in the Independence and the first president of the Turkish Republic. Retrieved from the records of the Turkish Parliament, he described the new political territorial borders in his talk on 24 April in 1920. He stated: Herewith the congress has drawn this border. In order to peacefully preserve this national boundary, it has been asserted that the border drawn on October 30, 1918 when the armistice was signed, will be ours. Perhaps we have friends amongst us who don’t know this border in detail. As I do not wish to go over the particularities of the subject once again, I

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will suffice myself by giving the following account: image the eastern border as to include the three districts (elviye-i selâse).17 The western border passes through Edirne as we know. The greatest changes took place on the southern border, which starts from the south of Iskenderun. A line that starts from between Aleppo and Katıma stretching to the Jarablus bridge and on the eastern part the province of Mosul, a line that connects the surroundings of Kirkuk and Sulaymaniyah. Gentlemen, this boundary was not drawn with mere military considerations. It was determined to make the national boundary.18

What Mustafa Kemal described during these meetings and at the last term of the Ottoman Parliament was borders known as Misak-ı Milli (National Pact/Oath) borders that was a larger map of Turkey which was including other territories to the desired Turkish map. The decision was made at the parliament on January 28, 1920. As also stated by Bülent Batuman, Misak-ı Milli was passed in the period “between the ceasefire after the WWI and before the signing of the Treaty of Sevres. The six-item resolution declared the territories which were unoccupied by the time of the ceasefire in 1918 as the homeland of Turks and demanded plebiscites for the Arab-inhabited territories and Western Thrace. Although the resolution did not provide definite borders, it was the major reference of the nationalists pursuing the War of Independence in 1919-1922.”19 Similar to the cartographic imagination of Mustafa Kemal which did not come true, the current President of Turkey has presented his desire for the unity of the territories of Misak-ı Milli in one of his recent speeches. In his neoOttomanist discourse, he stated that “Our physical borders are different from borders of our heart… We do respect physical borders but we cannot draw borders in our heart and will not allow this.” Erdo˘gan claimed that “…Turkey is not just Turkey. Apart from its 79 million citizens, it is also responsible to the hundreds of millions of our brothers in the geographical area to which we are connected by historical and cultural ties…Certain historians believe that the borders set by the National Contract, in addition to current Turkish border, include Cyprus, Aleppo, Mosul, Erbil, Kirkuk, Batumi, Thessaloniki, Kardzhali, Varna and the islands of the Aegean.”20 The map of the National Contract is widely circulated and visible not only in the popular statist discourses and cartographic imaginations but also in the discourses of radical nationalist groups. According to Batuman, “this historic document became a reference point for the

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appropriated maps produced by Turkish nationalists creating and circulating them. It is crucial to note that these irredentist maps by no means represent the claims of the National Contract document; yet they construct their validity with reference to this document. In other words, they do not claim to represent an existing geopolitical situation but put forward a political claim supported by the distorted representation of a historical document.”21 However, through many negotiations, disputes, foreign policy decisions, and treaties between Ankara government and the European powers, the modern territorial map of Turkey was demarcated mostly at the Lausanne Treaty in 1923 except the Hatay province which joined the country after referendum in 1939. However, the accession of Hatay to Turkey, “motherland,” has never been acknowledged by the Syrian state who show the Hatay province within its territorial borders on certain political maps of the Syria.22 As it is also explained by Martin Stokes in his work at the Hatay province, “the Syrian state which emerged from the remaining French mandate in 1946 saw the annexation of the Hatay as an act of treachery on the part of the French, and aggressive territorial expansion on the part of the Turks, and Syrian nationalists have not entirely given up their claims on this area to this day.”23 The borders of new Turkish state that were determined at the Lausanne Treaty would become the fundamental signifiers of Turkish nation-building process in ˙ the later periods. On the other hand, as described by Ahmet Içduygu and Özlem Kaygusuz, the new national borders also played a great role in determining the politics of citizenship of new Turkish state. They state that: In the Sivas Declaration and the National Pact, during the London Conference and in the Ankara Agreement, the Ankara government fully agreed to recognize the internationally accepted standards and rules about minority rights. However, at Lausanne, the Turkish delegation opposed strongly the definition of Muslim communities of non-Turkish origin as official minorities. Therefore, the Lausanne Treaty was the international ratification of the Turkish thesis that there were no separate ethnic, cultural, and/or religious communities in Turkey which needed special protection.24

In the history of Turkish-Syrian political border, the Ankara treaty in October 20, 1921, which was signed by the Turkish government and French authorities play a key role. The treaty not only ended the war between both sides but also left today’s Syrian territories to the

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French mandate during which political border was also demarcated and later ratified again at the Lausanne Treaty in 1923. The disputes over the province of Hatay were also concluded when the authorities of the province decided to join by a referendum to Turkey in 1939.25 In later periods, there have been other social, political, and economic developments that effected the construction process of the Turkish-Syrian border and development of the Turkish-Syrian relations as well. Those fundamental events were: the foundation of Israel in 1948, the Arab-Israel war of 1967, Cold War era during which Turkey moved toward a proAmerican policy and the Syria followed a pro-Soviet policy, the foundation of Baghdad Pact in 1955, and the crisis of 1957, the spread of Baas Arab nationalism during the early 1960s, the support of Syrian regime for the Marxist Kurdish movement PKK (Kurdish Workers’ Party) which started at the early 1980s and lastly the water dispute over the Euphrates river. The cartographic perception of Turkish nation-state which has been disseminated through diverse state-sponsored apparatuses and discourses in public space has played a great role in the acceleration of awareness about the Turkish political borders. In his analysis on the production of Turkish nationalist sentiments by instrumentalization of political maps, Batuman claims that “National maps have been major tools in constructing a particular image of the nation with geopolitical implications. During the Cold War, the maps included in Turkish school textbooks, which were the products of official cartography, presented a country surrounded by hostile neighbors on all sides.”26 That fabricated image and perception of the Turkish state surrounded by “made” enemies fueled not only statist Turkish nationalist discourse but also an image of territorial independent Turkish state with its fixed borders. The dissemination of these nationalist emotions that were felt for the Turkish homeland under threat fueled a desire and eagerness to kill and die for it. In the process of founding the nation-state, the state authorities attempted to establish their hegemony over two crucial constituents of a state. The first one is the territory (the geopolitical territories demarcated by borders) and the second one is people (citizens) who inhabit those territories. In the process of creating the Turkish nation-state, the ultimate aim was to assimilate and integrate all people living within the frame of territorial borders under the umbrella of Turkishness (Türklük) as a united homogenous entity. Achieving that task would require not only

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protection and maintenance of security of political borders but also prevention and elimination of illegal border crossings that would facilitate the process of cutting social, cultural, political, historical, and economic ties between relative (ethnic and religious) communities in both sides step by step. Thus, the labor of assimilation and integrating non-Turkish ethnic groups would be easier in that state-sponsored social-engineering project. In this stage, the institution of the law was also employed in which new laws and rules were operated for having a better management and governing system of the borders. One of fundamental requisites of the modern nation-state is having obedient citizens. This has been one of the dominant components in the discourses of the Turkish state in the context of security of the political borders. While local people were continuing their diverse forms of life patterns in the border regions, the Turkish state authorities in Ankara formed and declared a new law numbered 1126 and named the law of Preventing and Control of Smuggling (Kaçakçılı˘gın Men-i ve Takibi Hakkında Kanunu) on December 10, 1927. Later, this law was revised in opting for a more efficient one first in 1929 and then in 1932. The main purpose of this law was to support and develop the national economy during which to prevent any form of illegal trade and economic activity on the borders. As a result, centuries-old social, cultural, and economic patterns of life and networks were cut off and named as an “illegal act,” smuggling (in Turkish kaçakçılık and in Kurdish qaçaxî). According to official and international law, while the “act of trade” is being described as a “legal” economic practice, the local people’s practice of carrying products randomly across border for exchange or trade was declared “illegal” and re-named as “smuggling”27 because all forms of economic activities have to registered through official border gates, customs. This occurrence can be interpreted as an intervention of an external power (the state) into a place or a people’s lives by the introduction of new rules and laws into that society. It is the state as a sovereign and hegemonic power who decides on what is legal or what is illegal without giving any consideration to the history, culture, and memory of the people, its citizens.28 On February 1935, the committee of ministers made a new regulation related to the Charter of Duties of Border Organizations and Customs Enforcement Organization’s in Preventing and Controlling Smuggling and Explaining their Responsibilities for Governors at the Border Regions29 was declared and published on the 12th of March in 1935 in the Official Gazette (Resmi Gazete) of the Republic of Turkey.30 In later

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periods, state regulations of border were revised and updated in relation to legal and illegal happenings along the border. These events were stated in the official discourses and reported officially for further measures to be taken. In 2007, the Research Center of Ministry of Interior prepared a Border Duty Guide for local governors and officials at the border region. According to this official guide, the frequently observed illegal events at the border regions were: (1)Illegal border crossings—illegal migration; (2) intentional or unintended violations of border crossings by humans; (3) intentional or unintended violations of border crossings by animals; (4) murder, injury, and other acts of violations; (5) robbery, hijacking, and burglary; (6) smuggling; (7) arson; (8) violation of airspace border; (9) altering border markers and damaging and destruction of them; (10) gunfire on the Syrian side of the border; (11) attempts of new constructions that may alter the stream beds which are accepted as official borderlines; (12) fishing during the nights at the streams that are accepted as borderlines; (13) dismantling landmines and destruction of railways; (14) exploitation of sea and undersea natural resources of from the other side without permission; (15) herding animals without shepherds in forbidden zone and near areas; (16) unauthorized communications (talks, body language, threat, provocation, and insult) between people on both sides of the border; (17) taking pictures of the other side, intentionally lighting the other with private lightening instruments; (18) doing political propaganda to individuals living on the other side…31

Although border security laws were declared in the late 1920s and in the early 1930s alongside constant appearances of state discourses of territorial unity, local people were not touched by these regulations and discourses in the early decades of the Republic. Local people residing in the border region continued to perform their diverse forms of mobility practices without any firm preventive measures until the early 1950s. The lack of security and strict control on the borders in the pre-1950s can be interpreted in terms of newly founded Turkish state’s suffering of human, economic and political power during and after the World War I. As a new state formation, the majority of state institutions were reconstructed and continued to undergo changes in the early decades of the Republic. The geographical distance of the Turkish-Syrian border as one of the peripheries of the state can also be interpreted as another reason for weak and inconsistent control mechanisms of the state in the border regions.

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The question of border security and particularly the security of eastern and southeastern borders due to terror attacks of the PKK since 1984 has been a great concern and the most critical issue on the agenda of Turkish state authorities. The leaders and foreign ministers of both countries started to meet more frequently to discuss the border security-related issues including water (the Euphrates River) disputes.32 For instance, the Turkish media sources were talking about the meeting between Syrian minister of foreign affairs Faruq El-Shara and Turkish foreign minister Vahit Halefo˘glu during UN Meeting in New York on September 1, 1985 to discuss and solve these both issues.33 During one of the visits of the ˙ Turkish minister of interior Ismet Sezgin to Damascus on April 3, 1992, the newspapers captions “There is PKK and Water in Sezgin’s bag”34 because the Turkish authorities believed that the leader of the PKK was living in Damascus and from there running the guerilla camp in Beqaa Valley which was under the control of Lebanon. As it can be seen in this two-short news from the Turkish media, a short survey on the border security issue on the Turkish mainstream media sources will easily provide us how the border security has been one of the troubling problems for all Turkish governments from past to the present. The fact that certain parts of Syria and Iraq have been homes to the PKK members in the later periods increased tensions between Turkey and these countries in different times.35 Besides, it turned the question of security of borders as one of the constantly repeated discourses of the state. The state’s discourses of security and fabricated fear of the PKK as a “separatist and terrorist” movement deeply determined the statesponsored border making policies, strategies, and physical preventive measures which dramatically effected the history and patterns of social, cultural, political, and economic relations between kin communities residing on both sides of the border. In this context, it is possible to periodize the history of the border in a parallel to diverse forms of developments and changes in the region. According to oral accounts of the local people, the first period can be initiated from the late 1920s (1927–1928) to early 1950s. This period can be defined as “the period of border markers” during which local people just witnessed the placement of border markers on borderline and random patrols of security guards (soldiers) during the days at certain times. The second period can be named as “the period of landmines” which began in the early 1950s. This is the period when the border security measures turned the border zone as a killing mechanism due to landmine

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detonations, armed conflicts between the security forces and smugglers along with events of interrogations, torture, and incarcerations carried out by the state forces. The state’s use of landmines in different parts of the created security zone (mined zone) resulted in catastrophic traumas which left thousands of injured, maimed, and dead.36 In addition to border markers, wires, and landmines, stations for security guards, watchtowers, patrols on foot, patrols on mounted troops, and later patrols with military vehicles, and opening of official border gates in 1953 were other constructed preventive measures taken by the Turkish state for the security of borders. The cross-border trade and relations with the Syrian side started to change and develop when the Turgut Özal (1927–1993) era began in 198337 after the coup d’état of 1980 during which hundreds of people lost and thousands were interrogated, stigmatized, and arrested. However, the eruption of terror attacks of the PKK in 1984 diminished the effects of this liberal turn which ended by sudden death of Özal in 1993. The third period is “the period of intense armed conflicts” between the PKK and the state forces in the region and can be framed from 1984 to the late 1990s. In this period, more than 40 thousand people lost their lives; thousands of people were tortured and arrested; and nearly 3500 villages were burned and evacuated for security reasons.38 The event of arrest of the leader of the PKK, Abdullah Öcalan who was forced to leave Syria, being arrested in Kenya and later imprisoned in Turkey in 1999 has been seen as a breaking point in the history of movement.39 In spite the fact that the leader of the PKK was arrested, the movement have not lost its power and its terror attacks have continued until today. The state discourse of the security of political borders did not change in spite of the changing governments throughout decades in the history of the country. The final phase at the history of Turkish-Syrian border can be started with the rule of Justice and Development Party (AK Party) governments which started in 2002 and continues in the present. However, the lowintensity conflicts continued until the peace negations started between the state, through AK Party governments, and the PKK through pro-Kurdish party HDP (the People’s Democratic Party) on March 221, 2013.40 The negotiations failed without any resolutions in 2015 and that failure was very closely related to Turkey’s border security concerns which totally rejects any forms of Kurdish autonomy in the northern Syria. One of the fundamental events in this period has been Turkey’s concerns for the security of the country and political borders during which construction of

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a security wall on the Syrian border has been seen as an inevitable precaution for the state authorities. The construction of the “Turkish Security Wall” was initiated in different parts of the Turkish-Syrian border after the outbreak of the war in Syria and has been completed in 2018. The Turkish security wall has been the most recent and concrete signifier of the security concerns of Turkish state who has tried to control its borders and prevent illegal infiltrations of members of terrorist groups, refugees, smugglers, and ordinary people. To conclude, the question of security of borders and nation has been always one of the dominant components of the state discourse. The fabricated fears of separatist movements, the discourses of the internal and external enemies, and threats for the Turkish state have been certain legitimizing tools in the use of diverse forms of violence toward its own citizens living in the border regions as well. I do agree with Henk van Houtum who argued that “as states still are important territorial dividers in our daily world, but still, in my view the concept of borders is broader than the markers of states only and the dividers of borderlanders… The philosophy and practices of b/ordering and othering, of fixing of territorial (id)entities, of purification of access as well as of scale transgressions, need not be restricted to the entity of states alone, but are valuable for theorizing and studying in their own right.”41 The making of the political borders has turned into a task of determining ideological, religious (at times sectarian), ethnic, and economic borders which become a space for performing the hegemonic power of the state. The border making as a form of intervention onto geographical lands is supported by nationalist, religious, and ideological discourses and presented as legitimate, rational and righteous acts. This work not only documents the Turkish state practices of fixing the territorial borders but also epistemological and ontological aspects of the making of the Turkish-Syrian border.

3.2

The First Signifiers: Border Markers

Kêlikê sipî weke yê tirba hebun u bi wan hudud nî¸sankiribun… (There were white stone markers like tombstones which used for marking the borderline) Border People

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Border markers can be interpreted as the substantial and visible signifiers of the border or boundary making process that are erected on line between two divided places.42 The border markers are basic symbolic entities that geopolitically divide and distinguish one political, social, cultural, religious, or economic unity from the other based on certain sets of rules, agreements, and treaties between two or more agents, groups, communities, political powers, or the states. However, the border markers as proof of the political borderlines could be contested by neighboring people and communities for diverse reasons. International geopolitical divisions are generally carried out to prevent eruption of any ethnic, religious, ideological, and economic conflicts between different rival groups or societies who have mutual enmity, and thus for good intentions. However, the interventions of political powers on territories do not always manifest good motivations and territorial divisions are mostly conducted and legitimized through the fabrication of particular fears and discourses of threats. In general, particular regions that have been home to societies who lived together for centuries in the historical process are divided into different geopolitical parts via border markers, wires, fences, mines, walls, and other physical precautions. In the context of diverse forms of partitions, it is stated that “partitions are intended to regulate or resolve national, ethnic or communal conflicts. They may be distinguished by whether they partition national or multinational polities; whether they are external or internal; by the agents promoting, supporting and implementing them; and by the political status of the partitioned entities.”43 The partition of India and Pakistan; Ireland and Northern Ireland; Northern and Southern Cyprus; the Bask Region between Spain and French; Palestine (Gaza and West Bank); and Kurdish region between Turkey, Iran, Iraq, and Syria can be seen as some examples these arbitrary geopolitical divisions. While these interventions are generally articulated by local native people as violation of their rights and partition of their homelands, on the other hand, these are seen as required steps that have to be taken for the security of imagined nation by the state authorities. In other words, “territoriality thus became one of the first conditions of the state’s existence, and the sine qua non of its border.”44 The border markers as the first step of geopolitical, epistemological, and ontological partition of communities not only mark and divide the territory into “ours lands” and “their lands” in an exclusionist manner. The border markers also have become punctuating instruments for the

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other side as an unwanted and dangerous entity. They represent the ontological existence of the state power on land where citizens are turned into submissive subjects whose mobility patterns are controlled and determined. One aim of these regulations of territories includes the permanent setting of nomadic and semi-nomadic people (tribes) and thus granting a full control over these mobile populations. Sedentarization has been one prevailing strategy of control for modern nation-states but actually applied during the era of Empires as well. Similar policies can be seen in the late period of the Ottoman Empire during which “deportation” of populations was also used as another operational strategy.45 As stated also by some scholars, as one of the effective control mechanisms of modern state, the Ottoman sedentarization policies also aimed to control non-sedentary populations by use of mediation and mostly coercion without any concern for ethnic and religious (sectarian) differences among tribes.46 In the early years of Republican period, policies of control, homogenization, and security moved toward what Erol Ülker called “geographical nationalization.” According to Ülker, “the Turkish government’s population homogenizing measures and security policies in the Settlement Law of 1934”47 strongly indicates security concerns of the state which “aimed at changing the demographic structure of certain strategic areas in favor of the Muslim-Turkish population.”48 Therefore, border markers became signs for determining territorial boundaries of Turkishness as one of ideological discourses of the state that was supported by many other Turkification policies.49 Border markers were also drawing the linguistic boundaries of the “imagined Turkish nation” which was aimed to be achieved through the state-sponsored campaign of the “Vatanda¸s, Türkçe Konu¸s!” (Citizen, Speak Turkish!).50 In other words, these efforts of the state can be described as “state’s attempts of make a society legible, to arrange the population in ways that simplified the classic state functions of taxation, conscription and prevention of rebellion.”51 To start the detour, how did the Turkish state progressively get a handle on its subjects and their environment in the southeastern border? What are the main characteristics of the period of the border markers as the first phase or the first effort in the long-run labor of making of Turkish-Syrian border? How do local people remember and narrate the first interventions of the state on their land? As we learn from the article 8 of Ankara Treaty which was signed by Turkish and colonialist French authorities, both sides decided to form a commission together and to

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demarcate the borderline on the territory in the following one month. Then, according to the article 13, local and semi-nomadic people living on the both sides of the border (those Turkish citizens who are having properties in the Syrian side and those French mandate Syrian citizens who are having properties in the Turkish side) were allowed to use pastures, cultivate their lands on either side. These people were allowed to transfer their animals, machines, seeds, plants without paying any taxes. They had to pay their taxes in their home countries.52 In the following years, these articles were re-regulated and local people were given a permission document for border crossings named paswan (in Turkish pasavan). However, the status of those border people in both sides holding paswan papers was also many times regulated and revised by Turkish and colonialist French authorities and thus became a crisis in the following decades.53 Ne¸se Özgen, one of the researchers on the border studies in Turkey, claims that the first border determining efforts of the state began in 1928.54 Özgen frames this period by dates from 1928 to 1954 and describes it as the most “ambiguous period”55 due to lack or weakness of state control. That means, local people’s daily social, cultural, economic, and other activities were left largely uninterrupted. Based on her ethnographic data, Özgen states: The kinship mechanism was continuing as usual and trade (goods exchange and other transactions) was made mostly between relatives on both sides in this period. The border was just determined by setting just one metal wire and farmers were crossing the border to do their work in their fields in the other side daily by using the official papers called pasavan for crossing border until 1936. The permissions for border crossings were given by soldiers at gendarmerie stations (in Turkish karakol ) which were built wide apart on the border.56

Here, it is important to note that in what I learned from my interlocutors, the majority of border people did not use those official papers, paswan, while crossing the border in daily basis. During the fieldwork, life stories and narratives of some of my interlocutors in their late 80s did not indicate any clue on the use of the official papers in their relations with their neighbors and relatives that were fallen apart to the other side. Although Özgen mention the existence of a one-line wire on the border based on her ethnographic data, my interlocutors from Nisêbîn and

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surrounding border villages did not make any statement about it. The differentiating narratives can be understood as a sign of the fact that the one-line-barbed wire was not implemented in the whole borderline but just in certain parts complementing stone-like border markers. The narrative of “sporadically erected border markers (stones) in a line” was frequently repeated during the interviews concerning this period. The time of recalling the barbed wire is generally coincided with the time when the landmines were deployed in the created zone along the border. Here, it is also important to note that daily activities of people in this period are narrated as usual practices rather than naming them as “cross-border activities” or “smuggling.” Both the lack of epistemological understanding of the political official border and its ontological existence signify the continuity of local memory and perception of the land as a shared one not a politically divided one. Concerning the border markers that were deployed in a certain system, the Research Center of Ministry of the Interior prepared a Guide of Border Duty (management) for Local Governors in those years. In this guide, the border markers are named as “border stones” (in Turkish sınır ta¸sları). It indicates that “the border stones on the Syrian border were numbered from 1 to 480 between Çobanbey-Akdeniz in 1926, from Çobanbey to Cizre as 481-1620. When Hatay joined the country in 1939, the border stones between Tahtaköprü (Meydanı Ekbez)-PayasAkdeniz - from 313 to 480 – were canceled. Instead, new border stones were added and re-numbered as from 1 to 462 from Tahtaköprü to Akdeniz all along the city of Hatay.”57 According to this official guide, the area of responsible for the governor of Mardin province starts from border stone numbered 1043 to the border stone with the number of 1397. It denotes that the total number of the border stones on the borderline of Mardin province is 354.58 Regarding the borderline of Nisêbîn, it states that “the area of responsibility of Nisêbîn governor (kaymakam) starts from 1172 numbered stone to 1397 numbered one and in total it is 225 border stone and its administrative correspondent is the administrator of Kamı¸slı (Qami¸slo) region (Syria).”59 The life stories and personal narratives display how the first interferences and governing mechanisms of the state were differently perceived by local people. It appears that both physical and territorial interventions of the state along with its supplementary discourses and legislative sanctions were not acknowledged by local people. On the contrary, local people ignored border making efforts of the state authorities in this early period. Based on her ethnographic research, Ne¸se Özgen asserts that:

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In this period, a deep anxiety surface in the villages which were remained in the Syrian side or happen to remain [while deploying border stones]. They said ‘we did yes or no’. In some villages, villagers did referendums. One of the former border guide (in Kurdish rêzan) Asaf agha from the village of Katran near Cizre said It was my father’s time; the commander tells my father that they are determining the border line so if they (my father) move to Turkish side till evening it is fine otherwise they will remain in the other side. Immediately, my father start to move to the Turkish side. When these two different narratives are merged with other similar narratives of villagers, it shows that villagers were also active and intervening into border determining processes…On the Syrian border, a woman in her 80s in Alakamı¸s blames her daughters-in-law when they complain about daily house works: ‘Have you ever carried water from the counter state! [Syria]’. According to story, the water-well of the village remained in the other side. This short story is interesting in two ways; indicating accustomed mundaneness of the daily activities between both sides and showing consciousness of being a citizenship of a particular country.60

The border markers as the first signifiers of the state power on the borderline were named in the local Kurdish community as “kêlikên hudud” (markers of the border) and “kêlikên xetê” (markers of the line).61 While being asked about this period, elders generally describe their daily activities with the other side without any respect to the borderline. In their sentences, such as “I went to the neighbor village,” “Our neighbors came and did this or that,” “When we visited our relatives in the village X or Y,” these villages are those in the other side, in the Syrian side actually but they did not mention it. In other words, there are not two different nation-states and their determined political borders in the cartographic imaginations, perceptions, and memories of these Kurdish elders, and they do not affiliate themselves with both. Nearly 90-year-old Seyyîd Mihemed, who was from one of the border villages near Nisêbîn, recalls the days when his parents would send him to neighboring villages for errand running. Without seeing or perceiving any precautions on the borderline except the border stones, he talked about ordinariness of the life and mobility patterns in their lives. He narrated: …there were white, gravestone like stones. The border line was marked by them. There were not any wires. The border was just open. Our sheep were crossing and grazing in the Syrian side. I remember, once, a man from the neighboring village Bawerdê fell asleep while grazing his sheep.

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His animals went to the other side. The soldiers in the other side took his sheep. He did not get afraid and continued to look and ask for his sheep going to the other side and complaining. At the end, he found his sheep. I mean, there was not any wire, there were just those white stones… The border was demarcated by those stones as high as the height of a man…There were stones, no landmines. There were not soldiers like today, as well62

It is interesting that many elders described border markers in comparison with gravestones. Today, those border markers do not exist anymore. Most probably, these concrete-made markers were broken or crumbled over time. According to some narratives, these markers were sometimes whitewash with lime or painted and thereby resembled gravestones. According to Seyyîd Mihemed, what distinguished from the first period from the second one was the emergence of the notion of “illegality” into their life which can be described as a starting point for a new era. Whatever they have been doing for decades and whatever they have learned from their parents and grandparents as routinized tasks and mobility patterns were redefined as illegal and named as “smuggling” by the state. Daily trade, exchange of goods, and other daily visits in the region were frequently narrated by elders who lived in that period. One of my key informants Faysal, in his 70s, talked about those days when he was 9– 10-year-old living with his family in the border village of Gundê Semho. According to him, the railway that had passed through the village constituted the borderline at the same time.63 He described how they would go for shopping to the bazaar in the Syrian city of Amûdê which was nearby their village. It seems Faysal’s childhood overlaps with the 1940s and World War II era which was marked by scarcity of food and poverty in the country that was felt more in the rural areas. He narrated that “in those times, there was nothing in Turkey. No jackets, no vests, no fabric, none of these. These kinds of things have been produced in recent decades. Syria was rich and very beautiful country.”64 Faysal stated that the majority of his relatives are still living in the other side (binxetê),65 in Amûdê, and then continued “there were border stones. No wires and landmines but there were sometimes patrols of soldiers (sometimes on foot and sometimes mounted) on the borderline. They were not preventing us from going to the other side.” When being asked about the border markers, Faysal said that “the railway was the marker in the area of our village. There were border stones in the side of Nisêbîn. They were

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like gravestones. There were two, one for the Turkish side and the other for the Syrian side, conjointly placed. They were deployed as signs over there.66 While the majority of interlocutors talked about border stones as markers, there were also some elders who remembered “plowing the soil” as another mechanism of the marking the borderline by the state authorities. According to narratives of the elders, soldiers were plowing the soil in the forbidden border zone order to see if any humans crossed the border by checking for footsteps on the plowed area. This practice of plowing was done by the use of cattle or horse and then with tractors in the later periods. Seyfedîn narrated how they did it: The pathways that soldiers were patrolling were soil. When they were returning to their stations in the evening in the same path, they would plow the soil in order to check in the morning whether anyone crossed the border or not. The next morning, they were coming back and check the path. The soil was very soft and thus you could even easily see the footprints of a rabbit. When they found any human footsteps in any area, they would accuse people of the nearest village and punish them. At times, they would burn those villages…67

As can be seen from these diversifying memories of the period of border markers, the state authorities at local regions applied different strategies to deter illegal borders crossings in this period. The life stories and personal narratives of elders lived in the border region document diverse aspects of history of border making process that can be understood as counter-state narratives and official historiography of the border region. Sehrîban ¸ or what her grandchildren called her Sehrê ¸ is one of my female interlocutors in her late 80s living in one of the border villages near Nisêbîn. Sehrîban’s ¸ life story not only shed light on this period of border making but also on the history of ethno-religious relations and conflicts in the border region. Sehrîban ¸ started to narrate her life story by giving an account of story of her family. According to the story, her family was from the ancient Christian village of Marine (in Turkish Eskihisar) which was known as one of the Assyrian/Syriac settlements in the region. Her family migrates from the village due to massacres and events of 1915 during the World War I and resettles in one of the Christian Assyrian/Syriac villages which would become a border village after the treaty in 1921. Born and raised as a Christian Assyrian, her life extremely

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changed when she was kidnapped at the age of 18 or 20 by her neighbor, a Muslim Kurdish man in early 1950s.68 She married the Muslim Kurdish young man and did not go back although both the Christian community and her family asked her to return back home. She prefers to stay with her husband. According to story by Sehrîban, ¸ as a result of the spread of gossips that she was actually also willing to marry that Muslim young man and did not resist while being kidnapped, her family and the local Christian community severed ties with her. When asked about her life during the childhood and before marriage, she narrated nostalgic stories of those years. She narrated their daily visits, mobility patterns, and their relations with relatives and neighbors in surrounding villages. She talked about how her family would send her weekly to exchange goods (their eggs with other goods such as soap) and buy other things in the neighboring village located on the Syrian side. During those daily visits between neighboring villages in both sides of the border, Sehrîban ¸ describes the first time she was caught by patrolling soldiers and being questioned. In Sehrîban’s ¸ words: One day, my older brother send me to the neighboring village to buy some tobacco for him. It was cold, my headscarf was not on and I did have shoes. Today’s people are very comfortable, they have everything. I was around 19 years-old. The wind was blowing hard. I went to the that village, bought the tobacco and then started to walk back home. While I was approaching the border line (stones), foot patrol officers (soldiers) cut my way and stopped me. I asked ‘what is the matter?’ and they asked me in response ‘where do you come from?’. I spoke in Turkish but mixed with Kurdish. I told them that I had come from the neighboring village and was sister of Sîno. ¸ Then, soldiers ask ‘Who is Sîno?’. ¸ I told them that he is at home and then I started to cry. Then, I picked up a stone and yelled ‘I will beat you!’ Then, told me ‘come on, pass… come on, pass…pass’ (in Turkish hadi, geç…geç…). I run home…69

Sehrîban’s ¸ narrative documents how the borderline that was marked by stones and was controlled on a daily basis by soldiers troubled locals and shook all the life and mobility patterns in the early 1940s. The presence of markers and soldiers as alien beings in the world of local people would be resisted but also adopted slowly in the following decades. Furthermore, the presence of border markers and soldiers as initial signifiers and formidable representations of the state power would gradually develop a consciousness ensuring the territorial and political partition that happened

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in the lands of their ancestors among local people. Here, it is important to note that local people addressed the Turkish state controls and preventions of border crossings of local people between both sides rather than the soldiers or any other representatives of the Syrian state. While talking about diverse events in those years, she did not use expressions like “I went to Syria or someone came from Syria.” Instead, she used expressions such as “ez çûme gundê cîranan” (I went to the village of neighbors) or “ez çûme binxetê” (I went to down the line, the other side). In Sehrîban’s ¸ world, the geographical locations were determined by her religious and kinship ties with both local Christian and Muslim communities. Therefore, the territorial world of Sehrîban ¸ was demarcated by ethno-religious networks including sectarian (Orthodox, Catholic, Protestant Assyrian, or Sunni Kurdish) and tribal ones in that particular locality. As I argued earlier, the cartographic perception and imagination of local people does not resonate the one imposed in diverse forms by the state in this early period. What the state implied and desired would start to transpire predominantly after the deployment of landmines and other border making—state making–strategies. However, it can be claimed that some local people, particularly elders even today, do not have that state-imposed cartographic imagination. In the later periods, after her marriage, the main reason for Sehrîban ¸ to cross to borderline would be her brother who was living on the other side. According to narrated story, he escaped and took refuge among relatives and in the Assyrian/Syriac Christian community on the other side in order to evade mandatory army service in the Turkish army. The widely circulated rumors that Turkish citizen Christians were negatively and badly treated during their army service in those years were discouraging many Christian young male citizens to serve, and therefore, they were trying to find a way to escape. However, those who lived in Turkey had to serve sooner or later.70 During the nostalgic talks on memories of the period of border markers with Sehrîban ¸ and other interlocutors, narratives and stories of poverty and famine in Turkish side also frequently came to surface and consisted a large amount of their repertoire. The famine and poverty that was severely felt in the 1940s and during the World War II in Turkey enormously triggered cross-border mobility of people living in the Turkish side of borderlands.71 Contrary to the devastating desperation in Turkish side, people remembered the other side, the French mandate Syria as prosperous one.

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According to narratives and stories, thousands of people living in the border regions and near cities were traveling and visiting their relatives and friends in the Syrian side in order to receive financial aid (food, grains, and other livelihoods) to survive. The repeated narrative of “nanê ceyî jî tunebû” (there was not even a bread made of barley) to survive indicates the level of scarcity in the region. Many narrations included accounts of how many girls were married to a relative or someone from the Syrian side of the border which could be interpreted as a strategy of strengthening kin ties with relatives from the other side. Furthermore, the intensifying relations and kinship in those years would also play an immense role in augmentation of number of legal and mostly illegal border crossings and diverse forms of other relations between people dwelling in both sides of the border. Therefore, in those years, “going to the other side” as the only strategy for local people to survive was not only a violation of Turkish state regulation of the bordering but more importantly a starting move toward early formation of “smuggling” as a new pattern of life and mobility in the history of region. After World War II, the emergence of the Cold War era at the end of 1940s and during the early 1950s would deeply effect the Turkish state efforts of making and securing the political borders. The starting of the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union which resulted in support of the other countries for either United States or Soviets transformed this geopolitical tension into a globally felt and experienced one. The fact that the Turkish state approached the United States and the support of the Syrian state which gained its independence in 1946 for the Soviet bloc eventually effected relations between two neighboring countries. In this context, in addition, it can be argued that the revival of the Kurdish nationalist movement Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) lead by Mullah Mustafa Barzanî (1903–1979) and its steady expansion toward Kurdish inhabited areas strongly among conservative Kurdish groups in Iran, Syria, and Turkey was another concern for Turkish authorities. Therefore, the state ventures and novel bordering strategies of by creating a gory and wasting mechanism on its Eastern and Southeastern borders can be read as an attempt to barricade the waves of Kurdish nationalist sentiments of Barzanî Movement which erupted in early 1940s.72 As a result of global and regional political developments, the Turkish-Syrian border and borderland consequently become a frontier for geopolitical tensions and thus distressing lives of local people in both sides. Ultimately, the early 1950s become a starting of a new era

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in the history of the Turkish-Syrian border and region. In addition to deep impacts of Cold War politics, the intention of the state authorities to consolidate and control economic relations in the region would convince state officials to thicken the border. For this purpose, landmines were seen the only effective available technology of the time and thus decision to deploy landmines and barbed wires in a created forbidden zone along the borderline in the Turkish side was taken by the Turkish Army.

3.3

Barbed Wire

What do we know about the history of barbed wire as an object which played a great role in the development of diverse forms of cultural, economic, and political practices and institutions around the globe? In a simple definition, barbed wire was invented as an instrument to “control animals by inflicting pain.”73 In the early years, this was documented in newspapers and magazines and how it was initially used for inflicting pain and injury on human body in the context of preventing accidents around a city reservoir in 1876 or protection of a hardware store in 1882.74 When, why, how, and by whom the barbed wire was invented? In spite of the fact that some other farmers designed certain forms of barbed wire and applied to patent it, it was Joseph Glidden—an American farmer in Illinois—who granted “Patent No. 157,124 for what would prove to be the most celebrated of barbed wire inventions” on November 24, 1874.75 Barbed wire has been broadly manufactured in different varieties and used basically for control of livestock, protection of crops, determination of territorial boundaries, and dissection of space for agricultural purposes and personal property determinations of lands in America.76 As was stated by researchers, “the tool was created to control animals by inflicting pain on them. The enormous sweep of barbed wire through history - ranging from agriculture to warfare and human repression, encompassing the globe - is due to the simple and unchanging equation of flesh and iron. The first must yield to the second, followed by the inevitability of pain. The history of violence and pain crosses species, and so, as a consequence, did the history of modernity.”77 In their labor of investigating the meaning of barbed wire and how those meaning(s) change over time, Lyn Ellen Bennett and Scott Abbott argues that the meaning of barbed wire depends on context in diverse ways one which is “shaping the nation.”78 In other words, it is an efficient physical and psychological controlling

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mechanism that might be used for controlling the citizens at both individual and collective levels. The early works on the cultural history of barbed wire claim that “barbed wire’s simplicity of concept and ease of realization belies the critical role it has played in the modern experience: territorial expansion and settlement, regional and international conflicts, incarceration and extermination.”79 However, barbed wire is not only an object, a tool, and a mechanism but also a commodity which has a social and political life. In this context, I follow Arjun Appadurai’s argument of “the social life of things” in the context of commodities and the politics of value where he underscored how “commodities, like persons, have social lives.”80 On the other hand, by applying George Marcus’s concept of “multi-sited ethnography,”81 it will be easier to anthropologically analyze the story or history of barbed wire and its transformation from a livestock controlling mechanism to an apparatus of securing the nations and the modern states. The journey of barbed wire which started in the late nineteenth century in the United States and soon spread to all around the world explicitly display how certain things, invented or not, can determine, change, and transform diverse aspects of life. While writing on the political history of barbed wire, Olivier Razac states that “for over a century, iron barbed wire has been used almost everywhere; around fields and pastures in the country, in the city, on the walls or fences of factories, around military barracks and even private residences. It is also found along national frontiers, on battlefields, and for holding people – to protect them, expel them, or kill them.”82 In his analysis on the impacts of barbed wire on Native American populations, Olivier Razac documents how the native people were violently incarcerated in their own lands. He states that: Barbed wire affected the Indians in two ways. On the one hand, once the barbed wire closed off their lands, the white man could occupy and exploit them. On the other, by the end of century, barbed wire was used to parcel off the few remaining Indian lands. It chopped space into little bits and broke up the communal structure of Indian society. Barbed wire made the Indian’s geographical and social environment hostile to them, so that it became a foreign territory where the tribal way of life was unimaginable and where nomadic wandering and hunting were impossible. In short, it created the conditions for the physical and cultural disappearance of the Indian.83

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The political histories of barbed wire or fence in the West show us fast development of use of this very simple but efficient technology that has been used during the making of political borders around the world. Fencing through barbed wire and use of electrified barbed wire was widely seen for securing prisons, concentration camps, and army bases. Besides, it has been used for controlling and confining illegal border crossings, prevention of unwanted immigrants and refugees, illegal trade (smuggling), and for ensuring national security against international terror networks. In short, “it prevents the ‘ins’ from being ‘outs’; and the ‘outs’ from being ‘ins’. Who should be in? Who should be out?”84 In this context, Olivier Razac documents the political use of barbed wire not only during the creation of the American prairie that resulted in ethnocide of native Americans, but also in World War I trenches led to loss of masses and at the Nazi concentration camps that became platforms of genocides of both Jewish and Gypsy communities.85 The first question on the use of barbed wire for political purposes came to my mind when I saw the scene of concentration camps of Libyan people surrounded by barbed wire while watching the movie Lion of the Desert86 as undergraduate student of sociology in late 1990s. During Omar Mukhtar (1861–1931)-led resistance movement against Italian colonial occupation, Italian officials decide to imprison local people in surveilled concentration camps surrounded by barbed wires. While writing on the history of Libya, Bukola A. Oyeniyi documents that: While Omar’s resistance lasted, Italy constructed a barbed wire fence from the Mediterranean to the oasis of Al-Jaghbub, a measure aimed at curbing resistance by cutting off lines critical to the Libyans. Besides the Frontier Wire, as the barbed wire fence was called, the Italians also commenced a deportation program that was aimed at the wholesale deportation of Libyans from the Jebel Akhdar region to concentration camps… A conservative estimate of Libyans who died in the 15 Italian concentration camps across Libya was about 80.000 – about one-third of the Cyrenaican population…Besides, many sources also estimated that between 1928 and 1932, the Italian army using starvation and torture, also killed half the Bedouin population.87

The agency of barbed wire and its impacts on human life as an effective, dangerous, and economical object dramatically escalated during and after World War I at the hands of colonial powers during the colonization periods as indicated above. Furthermore, after the world wars, the effective

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use of barbed wire by modern nation-states during their labor of walling and fencing the national political borders, the construction of camps and prisons turned it into an indispensable political material subject. In the later periods, the function of barbed wire transformed into a widely used mechanism for political purposes in the context of making of political borders, camps, and prisons at the hands of state authorities. In his analysis on the use of barbed wire fences in the camps, Razac points out how barbed wire “became an almost universal symbol of the camps and, more generally, of fascist and totalitarian violence, because of its function and its powerful evocative capacity. Its form illustrates its function. It is a line which demarcates space, locks it up, and, like prison bars, immediately invokes loss of liberty.”88 What do we know about the history of barbed wire in Turkey? The earliest information that I found on the use of barbed wire in Turkey is found in an announcement of a tender notice by the Turkish army offi˙ cials, office of quartermaster general in Istanbul, for purchasing 300.000 meters barbed wire from private sector that appeared on national newspaper Milliyet on January 30, 1951.89 However, what the testimonials of border people in Nisêbîn illustrate how the barbed wire were used as a barrier or fence demarking the landmined zone and thus excluding anyone aiming to in or pass through. Concerning the use of barbed wires on the Turkish-Syrian border, local people remember barbed wire fencing for the use of creation of the mined zone as an in-between space under surveillance of the Turkish army. Although Ne¸se Özgen claims that there was just one-strand barbed wire on the borderline,90 my interlocutors do not mention the existence of deployed barbed wire fencing before the period of landmines which started in the early 1950s. For instance, while visiting her older married sister in one of the Kurdish villages in the Syrian side in the early 1940s through the Nisêbîn border region with her family at the age of 12 or 13, Emîna narrates her story of passing through border markers without any references to the barbed wires.91 Therefore, both versions of the narratives on the existence of one strand of barbed wire on the borderline might be true due to changing and arbitrary policies of the state in the context of border security. The state authorities might use the barbed wire in some parts of the borderline but not on the whole borderline of between Turkey and Syria in those years. In the life stories and other narratives, barbed wire was generally mentioned with landmines. For instance, it has also been narrated by my former smugglers that they were cutting the barbed line by using pliers and

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then dismantling landmine and thereby creating gates to pass their animals for selling and also animals such as donkeys, mules, and horses as crucial carriers of goods. However, the mined zone as a kind of no-man’s land would not only become a minefield but also a zone of dead people and pieces of corpses of smugglers and illegal border-crossers in the 1950s. The use of the barbed wires and wire fences would intensify in the later decades as one of the most visible state apparatuses for political management of the Turkish-Syrian borderland. As a control mechanism, it becomes a powerful indication of sovereignty of the Turkish state and its power performance in the border region. Overall, it becomes a powerful register in the world of local people and as an effective tool it is still being used not only at the by the Turkish state but also by many other modern states around the world. Although some researchers were talking about disappearance of barbed wire from the frontiers of the European Union in the early 2000s,92 today, the world witnesses the rise of various forms of barbed wire fences at European frontiers to control and to confine illegal human traffic on their borders particularly after the eruption of the war in Syria in 2011. Today, like many Southern and East-European countries, modern states have intensified deployment of barbed-wire fences on their political borders due to waves of millions of refugees and immigrants which can be interpreted as revival of power of the “Devil’s Rope”93 as a political and containing entity. The fact that the barbed wire strands were not efficient for controlling civilians in the early 1950s would convince the Turkish state authorities to move to the next stage, deploying anti-personal landmines along with intensification of barbed wire fences.

3.4

Landmines

The wish “No one should have to feel their next step might be their last”94 has not come true form many people for centuries. It is the fact that the invention of explosive weapons dates back to the thirteenth century in China; however, the landmine was first used in the nineteenth century in North America.95 It is claimed that it “didn’t take its modern form as a metal container rigged with gunpowder, a fuse and a detonation cap until the American Civil War…”96 Later, this insidious and petrifying military tool was shortly distributed and “the use of the devices was widespread throughout WWI and WWII, and in regional conflicts that occurred during the Cold War. By the 1990s, more than 26,000 people were victims of landmines each year.”97 Concerning the early use of

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anti-personnel mines, Matthew Bolton claims that “victim-activated landmines first emerged during the US Civil War, but came into their own as a weapon in WWII desert tank battles in North Africa. During the Vietnam War, the United States innovated methods for scattering thousands of mines from the air and then these techniques were mirrored by the USSR during its war in Afghanistan.”98 The landmines were used first during the wars but then to control a territory and civilian populations by both insurgents and governments as well. Subsequently, antipersonnel and anti-tank mines were widely used as extremely influential military mechanism on the borderlands for the control of the imagined nation and the security of modern state as a sovereign power. Today, how do we interpret conversion of the lands of ordinary people including their cultivated areas into a forbidden zone full of deployed antipersonal landmines? How and why does a state authority desire to transform one’s land of cultivation into a field of death? The simple answers to these questions would be the security of the state or the nation and quest for preventing and controlling illegal border crossings and trade. However, it is hard to answer to the questions of what happened and what happens in the border regions and in the lives of local people after the arrival of the landmines into their world. To start the whole story from an earlier point, we can ask when and how the landmine was invented and how has become widely used on the political borders? The mined zone as a no man’s land is actually a zone of exception in which human rights are violated and “the law is suspended.”99 The Turkish state made mined zone as a buffer zone between both countries was barricaded with barbed wire fences. Besides, different red danger signs with or without skull symbol stating “Dikkat Mayın Girilmez!” or just “Mayın” (Caution, Mine, Do Not Enter, or Mine) were strung on the barbed wire fences in order to deter any attempts of human subjects. Anyone who enters this zone without official permission was subjected to interrogation or death by security guards (soldiers). How do we learn about the history of deployment of landmines in the Turkish-Syrian border region? Due to difficulty of access to the Army archives, the only available sources that could assist in delineating the history of landmines in the region are some written official, other secondary sources, and archives of some national newspapers. However, in this research, the primary sources are oral history sources that inform us about deployment process of landmines in the border region.

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As the second stage of border making process, what life stories and personal accounts of local people tell us about the history of landmines is that this period began in the early 1950s. In this era, the borders were transformed into a killing mechanism by placement of the landmines and also appearances of the security forces with the authorization to prevent border crossings. Detentions and murders by security guards during daily patrols became everyday routines in the lives of local people in that era. Explosions of landmines and armed conflicts between security guards and smugglers were some of the most catastrophic events after the planting of landmines resulting in loss of thousands of smugglers and civilians and those who were injured and maimed.100 Before going to this thread of the argument, there is need to document what kind of mines were deployed by the Turkish army members and how local people met and able to differentiate anti-personal mines from the anti-tank mines. According to Canadian landmine foundation, mine is “a munition designed to be placed under, on or near the ground or other surface area and to be exploded by the presence, proximity or contact of a person or a vehicle.”101 In the same source, the anti-personnel mine is described as “a mine designed to be exploded by the presence, proximity or contact of a person and that will incapacitate injure or kill one or more persons. Mines designed to be detonated by the presence, proximity or contact of a vehicle as opposed to a person, that are equipped with anti-handling devices, are not considered anti-personnel mines as a result of being so equipped.”102 On the other hand, the Booklet of Landmine Clearance Standards on the Syrian Border that was prepared by Ministry of Defense on January 31, 2012, provides a similar definition of the anti-personnel mine as the Canadian Landmine Foundation.103 During ethnographic research of this work, the borderline and implemented preventive mechanisms were scrutinized before the erection of the Turkish security wall whose construction started in 2016. On the borderline, the intense barbed wires were seen as the first structure on the front from the Turkish side. Then, lays out the zone, fields of landmines, whose wideness varies from 300 meters to 750 meters in different parts of the borderline. Later, there was a second barbed wire fence in the Syrian side in order to prevent violations of borderline from the Syrian side. Behind the second line of fences, there was a road parallel to the mined zone where border security guards (soldiers) have their daily patrols on foot and by army vehicles. In that area, the Turkish authorities start to build a security wall in 2016 and completed in 2018, which is

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going to be examined and discussed in the fifth chapter. In this area, the watchtowers also can be seen at certain intervals on the border. After that road, there was a third fence of barbed wire and then the Syrian territories began. Turkish state deployed landmines in different times on the Syrian border since early 1950 until late 1990s. There have been some negotiations between Turkish authorities and international organizations and communities during which some commitments were made and some treaties were concluded. However, the report delivered by Association of Turkish Medical Doctors in July 7, 2009, documents that the Turkish state has not been following the regulations of international treaties which is a part of it. This report states that: Turkey has signed the Ottawa Treaty104 in 2003 and has been a contracting state of the Treaty in 2004. According to agreements, Turkey was expected to annihilate its stock s of mines, till March 1, 2008, de-mine and clean mined zone until 2014 and to take certain steps for providing compensations for victims. However, now, Turkey is one of three countries who have not annihilated its stock of mine. By the end of the 2007, there were 2 Million 616 thousand and 770 landmines in Turkish state stocks. Turkey has declared that that have taken detonator of all mines in the stocks in June 2008…. It has been declared that there are 982 thousand and 777 mine exist in Turkish territories by the end of 2007. 818 thousand and 220 of these mines are antipersonnel and 164 thousand and 497 mines are anti-tank mines.105

Concerning the situation of landmines in the Turkish borderlands, some Turkish media sources has reported in May 2018 that 50 million square meter has cleaned and will be used for agriculture. Thereby, 214 million square meters mined zone declined to 164 square meters.106 In the same vein, the 2018 Report of Landmine and Cluster Munition Monitor also states that: State Party Turkey reported 164 km2 of contamination across 3,061 confirmed hazardous areas, with a further 701 suspected hazardous areas, for which no estimate of size is available. The majority of contamination is along the border with Syria and some sections of the borders with Armenia, Iran, Iraq, and Azerbaijan. Mines have also been laid inside the country around military installations, while improvised mines and other IEDs have been used by non-state armed groups. In 2017, Turkey completed

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Phase 1 of the European Union Eastern Border Mine Clearance Project on the eastern border with Iran, with clearance conducted by commercial company MECHEM. The Turkish armed forces also conducted land release along the borders with Iran and Syria, including to support the construction of the Border Security Surveillance System along the Syrian border.107

In Turkey, the general public start to learn about the history of landmined zone at the Syrian border region in 2002 when the news about clearance of landmines popped up. The Turkish government made a procurement notice, and then, the counter-voices escalated in the public debate when people heard that Israeli companies might win the procurement and rent the mined zone from Turkey for organic farming after demining process. The procurement notices were renewed in 2004, in 2007, and then in 2011.108 Turkish state officials have been trying to demine the region in different times but there is not an accurate number about how much of the land remains mined. Today, in a recent source, it was estimated that the extent of anti-personnel and anti-tank mine contamination in Turkey is more than 100 km2 as one of the states having large areas of mined zones on its political border although Turkey has gradually cleaning the mines.109 The 2018 Report of Landmine Monitor addresses the recorded casualties of children, de-miners, and other antipersonnel casualties and also clearance of 26.381 anti-personnel mines in 2017.110 According to the report by Landmine and Cluster Munition Monitor, 1269 people were killed and 5091 people were injured from 1984 to 2010. Besides, 98 people were killed and 306 people were injured from 2011 to 2017 although the total number of casualties since 1950s is unknown in Turkey.111 Going beyond these official and international documents, there is need to ask how do local people remember landmines and what they tell us about the history of landmines in the border region? While talking about the early years and the arguments on the mines in the border region, some of my interlocutors confirmed that the state started to deploy landmines in 1954.112 While some other documents claim that the fortification of wires and landmines was carried out in 1956, one of the news that appeared in the Milliyet newspaper on October 13, 1955, contradicts that date. The news reports that:

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Syrian government has invited the Turkish acting ambassador in Damascus and gave a protestation note. In this diplomatic note given by Abdulvahhab, undersecretary of Ministry of Interior, it has been stated how two Syrian soldiers died at the Turkish border due to landmines deployed by Turkish authorities to prevent smuggling. The Turkish acting ambassador responds clearly that they will not accept any responsibility due to the fact that they have informed the Syrian authorities about deployed landmines on the border.113

In another similar news in Milliyet in November 12, 1955, which was derived from Associated Press, the death of a Syrian shepherd is being reported. According to the news, he wrongly stepped on one of the antipersonnel mines while grazing his animals at the border region.114 The news on mine explosions and human casualties start to augment steadily in the following years and popping up on the national newspapers. It has been difficult to clarify the ambiguity of the exact dates in which fortification of wire fences and deployment of landmines on the Syrian border occurred. During the disputes on the issues of clearance of mines and use of this zone for farming that amplified again in 1999, it was claimed that: In the 1950s, two employees of customs were killed during an armed conflict with smugglers. As a result of this event, the prime minister of the time Adnan Menderes call the governor of Mardin Kamuran Çuhruk115 to Ankara and gave an order to deploy landmines on the Syrian border. With this order, the entire Syrian border was secured with landmines in 1956. An area with the wideness ranging from 300 meters to 750 meters and it has 700 km length that is 3,5 million square meters is transformed into a field of mines. Excluding the mined areas, there are other permanent security zones whose size ranges from 5 to 10 km which are very fertile lands but are empty. Staying with the same plan of deployment of landmines, agricultural lands in the cities of Sırnak, ¸ Mardin, Sanlıurfa, ¸ Kilis, Hatay and other border settlements were mined. There were two different kinds of mines varying in explosive power, small and big. It is why when they explode they cause sometimes small injuries and sometimes death.116

The fact that Kamuran Çuhruk was governor of Mardin in the period of 1955–1956 confirms the claims on the date of 1955 as one of the dates for starting of the deployment of mines.117 However, as it said earlier, there is a possibility that the army might deploy mines earlier times in various areas. What we learn from some other sources that the state

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authorities began to actively urge the army and local governors to intensify security and to initiate strict border control measures in these years. In addition to narratives and memories of local people, the national newspapers of the time also present those escalated security discourses of the state officials to prevent illegal trade, smuggling. For instance, a news on the Milliyet newspaper declares why security measures must be taken. It states, “recently, the fact that there has been smuggling of animals beyond measures on the southern borders (Hatay, Gaziantep, Urfa and Mardin provinces) between us and the neighboring border countries has convinced the government and the Ministry of Trade and Economy to take these precautions.” In the same page, it describes the following, “On the other hand, there have been preparation to fortify our borders with wire fences and fields of landmines in order to prevent smuggling.”118 These kinds of news that appeared in mainstream Turkish media in the early 1950s indicate the timing period of deployment of barbed wire fences and creation of mined zone particularly on the Turkish-Syrian border. Two days later, on the front page of the same newspaper published on 3rd of September, it is stated that “by its declarations, Ministry of economy has taken strict precautions in order to prevent smuggling on our southern borders. Local people residing on the border must provide a declaration about the quantity of goods that they hold latest in one week.”119 The question of when the landmines were deployed was responded differently by former smugglers and other local people. One of my key informants Naîf claimed that the landmines were deployed in 1954 in certain parts in Nisêbîn borderland.120 Naîf who is in his 80s was one of the best rêzanan (guides)121 in the smuggling labor in the past in Nisêbîn. The name rêzan was given to the job of guidance for smugglers which emerged in the 1950s as a respected position and job in the local community. These individuals were known as experts of finding safe routes for smuggling who could also negotiate between carriers (hemalan),122 proprietors (local headmen, aghas, and wealthy families), soldiers for border security soldiers (askeran), and local army commanders (komutanan). They were also known as brave and skilled experts for demining for creating safe smuggling tracks through mined zone. Although guides were generally hired, it was narrated that at times they were also doing their own business in trading goods between both sides. During the interview, 66-year-old Silêman, who was a well-known guide and carrier and who worked for smugglers for many years, started to talk about why the majority of people in the region involved in the

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labor of smuggling. He narrated how his father and grandfather were also smugglers and a story of one of his brothers who lost his life during smuggling due to landmine. He wanted to mention poverty and armed conflicts between soldiers and smugglers in the old days. When asked of what he remembered of the landmines, he continued: Sometimes, when smugglers were arrested by the chief commander he would tie them to a rope and drag them with his vehicle till they die. When arrested, smugglers were sometimes receiving 5-10 years of imprisonment. If a smuggling route was open, it meant the local commander and soldiers were given bribe. There were mines all around the border. They were deployed during the time of Menderes [the prime-minister of Turkey in the 1950]. The Russian border does not have any mines but the Kurdish border is full of mines. People were dying at this border like chickens. I mean, the value of life of humans was that cheap…123

While local people, particularly elders, were asked about the time period of deployment of landmines, they generally recalled certain events related to mines and thus narrating them. The story of 62-year-old Ahmed who worked both as a guide and a porter in the job of smuggling shed light on traumatic aspects of period of landmines. He stated that he lost his 17 friends due to mines. I met Ahmed in his house through my contact people in one of the border villages near Nisêbîn. He had spent the most of his life in that village. During the interview, when I asked him “when did you see mines first time in your life?”. He responded: I was young. I was 12 or 13 years old when they came and lay mines, here. I remember, one of the soldiers killed his sergeant with his gun in that night when they were laying mines in the border line in our village. Soldier’s name was Serafedîn ¸ and sergeant’s name was Hiseyîn [Hüseyin]. They buried sergeant in this village. That night they came for laying mines. Over there (pointing a spot in the village), my uncle had 100 acres of land. They (soldiers) set up their tents all over that land. We thought they came for that killed sergeant and were very scared. My uncle was headman (muhtar) of the village. He went there and asked them why they are here. They told him that they came for deployment of mines.124

The arrival of landmines into the region creates a sharp rupture not only in the social, cultural, and economic history of the region but also in the subjective and collective memories of the community. The life stories

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and narratives of Seyyîd Mihemed, Serafedîn, ¸ and other elder interlocutors display how local people make a periodization and divide this era as “berî mayînan” (before the landmines) and “pi¸stî mayînan” (after the landmines). While the former was a time of uncertainties, unawareness, and endurances of routines in everyday life, the latter was a time of consciousness and recognition thickening of the border that began to harvest death, loss, pain, conflicts, and struggle in the local community. While comparing both periods, Seyyîd Mihemed states that “the closure of the border began when they deployed the landmines. We thought we will not be able to see the other side anymore.” Then, he adds “Bi mayînan re mirin hat ” (the death came with the landmines).125 When asked about whether they remember the history of landmines, Faysal remembers how he first time heard about the rumors that landmines are going to be deployed when he was 14- or 15-year-old. When I asked him about whether they, the villagers, did know about what was the landmine, he immediately responded and said “no, we did not know. We thought something being placed within the wires and if anyone enter that area it would explode. We were kids, we did not understand…”126 Faysal recalled how the soldiers came and lay mines in their village Tilkitepe which was located on the borderline. In his words: There were no mines until 1950s. There were soldiers doing daily patrols. One day, we just saw soldiers come to our village. First, they pot barbed wire fences on the whole border. They used stakes to surround them and then behind the wires they started to deploy mines.127

When asked whether he recalled the exact date or not, he replied “we were watching them. I remember, it was year of 1957 when the mines were deployed. I was 14 or 15 years old. We had a watermelon field over there. When they deployed the mines, half of our field was mined and the other side remained in this side (the side of their village).”128 One of the point that come to surface in the narratives was the feeling of anger that they expressed for losing their fertile agriculture fields that were confiscated by the state and turned into a minefield. Transformation of grain fields to the fields of landmines would shortly become the fields of death in which local people would witness the death of their beloved ones, brothers, sisters, fathers, uncles, and husbands. These fields would become a killing mechanism from which villagers would collect not grains but the body parts of their beloved ones after the explosions of landmines.

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In other words, they would learn how to live with landmines by inventing novel strategies and new ways of survival. Besides, they would soon recognize the reality that they would not be able to continue and practice their social, cultural, economic life, and mobility patterns as it was before the landmines. While talking with my interlocutors, they constantly mentioned the task of demining by guides and other smugglers that raised initially my curiosity about how they were doing. Where and how did they learn to remove mines, and defuse them? How did they look like and what kind of mechanism did they have? How were they deployed? Furthermore, how did these people know about demining? I was informed that majority of them learned about the mines while doing their army service. Others had learned about mines from experienced smugglers and guides who were known as experts among the community. In addition, some of them claimed that smugglers were learning about defusing of landmines from soldiers in the region. Ahmed who was a smuggler for a long time provided more details about the mechanism of deployed mines in the border: The first strand of wire was placed as a fence to prevent crossings of people and animals into the mined zone. There is a second strand of wire on the other side. The mined area begins after 15 steps in from both sides (Turkish and Syrian sides). In other words, there are not any mines 15 steps into the second strand of wire in Syrian side and 15 steps after from the Turkish side. The landmines are deployed in a triangle shape. All of them are placed in the same way. Deployment of mines was done in a triangle shape and there are three meters between each triangle. The width of the area is 60 meters and 30 meters are mined. From both sides, the first 15 steps are mine-free but the area in between is full of them.129

Despite extreme danger and death risks of demining during which many people lost their lives, smugglers and their guides continue to do it for decades. The fact that you might be a well-known skilled and experienced smuggler and guide does not guarantee your survival. According to their narratives, very small accidents resulted in deaths of many guides and smugglers in the region. While talking about mines during the interview, 67-year-old Omer, one of the famous smugglers of his days who started smuggling at the age of 16 or 17, gave another account about mechanism of landmines in the border region. He narrated:

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Look…landmines are deployed in six lines; I mean mines are deployed in six rows. It is like that; three are in this side and three are on the other side aligned. They are confusing. They are deployed in a way where you go there is possibility of stepping on. The big ones are anti-tank landmines but the small ones are anti-personal mines. There is a string between mines. Three of them are under the string and three of them are above the string. Of the six lines, two are anti-tank mines and the other four are anti-personal mines. When you find one of them, because there is 2,5 meters between them, then you have to move 2,5 meters and that one also is 2,5 meters away from the other. Thus, you can find all by following this tactic. This is how it is this task…130

Today, former smugglers and guides proudly narrate stories of their fearful adventures, braveries, and success from old days in addition to pain, fear, death, and loss of many relatives and friends in doing that job. In this period, the landmines were becoming of the most influential agents of fear in the lives of people and in the history of region. Landmines were not just perceived as passive metal objects but rather as insidious active subjects as it is perceived in similar vein by Korean farmers. In her anthropological work on the Korean demilitarized zone, Eleana J. Kim asks how mines and humans cohabite and coconstitutive a shared ecology. Kim documents how local farmers perceived the mines “as actants whose agency could be anticipated and even overcome.” On the other hand, Kim points out how farmers described them as “lying in wait” which she interpreted it as landmines having an “agency as predators seeking to ambush their human targets.”131 She addresses “the volatile materiality of mines and their heterogeneous natural, cultural, technical, and political entanglements, which can generate unexpected agencies and affects among the humans they exist alongside.”132 In a similar vein, in the Nisêbîn borderland, the anthropomorphic perception of mines could be seen in the discourses of local people. The widely uttered sayings of “pê li mayînê kir û mir” (he/she stepped on the mine and die) and “mayînê ew kû¸st ” (mine killed him/her) would become repeatedly heard dictums in everyday life effecting almost every single household in the border region. The life stories of those who died due to stepping on the landmines and armed conflicts with soldiers during their attempts of crossing the border would be narrated widely in the local community and transferred from one generation to the other in the following decades. Some of these stories were dangerous due to their “illegal” content and therefore were whispered from one house to the other, from one village to

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the other. Through time, emotion of fear and death caused by landmines would become one of the prosaic event in the everyday lives of border people. When some details in the stories and narratives of landmines are scrutinized, it appears how fear of wrongly stepping on mines was widely and deeply felt emotion among local people. When I asked about any of his experiences of landmines, former smuggler Seyyîd Mihemed talked about how he started to work with smugglers in the year when “mihên sor” (red sheep)133 were brought by traders from the Eastern part of the country and crossed to the Syrian side for selling. Then, he narrated what he heard from the other smugglers who had experiences: There were many people who became maimed due to wrongly stepping on mines but the majority were dying. While exploding, it was breaking to pieces. When you step on it, first you hear the click (he pronounced the voice as ‘tizzz’ ). When you lift up your foot, ‘bang’, it explodes. There were skilled men. When they heard the click, they stepped on it more and then jumping quickly to the other side and thus saved. I was not that brave to jump that quickly over landmine. On the route, we shuddered by any small voice.134

As can be seen in these stories, memories and narratives of landmines are very dominant in the life stories of smugglers and other local people. The brutality of landmine and its effect on human body was such an event that local people never seen before in their lives. As an unspeakable and unbearable way of dying, local people were witnessing that brutality sometimes at small ages. In the 1970s, when he was 15-yearold, M. Brahîmê Dorikî whose house is very close to the mined zone in one of the districts of Nisêbîn remembers the death of a mason in the zone. He did not want to tell the details but just narrated that the mason was trying to going to the other side through mined zone in order to buy things needed for the coming eid (religious celebration). While walking through save path, he wrongly stepped on a mine and his body broke into pieces.135 Likewise, Brahîm and his mother Alîya narrated many stories and testimonies of events that occurred at the mined zone due to the fact that their neighborhood with the mined zone. There is a very narrow path between their house and the wire fence. People use the shadow of trees that grew behind the wire fences in order to rest. One of the cafeterias across the path places their tables under these big trees and

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serves tea to their customers. It was interesting to see how Alîya opened a door through wire fences and created a space within mined zone and transformed it into a vegetable garden. I was shocked at the sight and I asked her immediately how she did that in a forbidden mined zone. She responded laugh and said that she got permission from the commander in the near police station.136 The story of Alîya and her experiences will be documented and analyzed in the following chapter. Let us now, return to our talk with her son Brahîm. We sit at one of the tables of cafeteria located under shadow of trees in the mined zone and just next to the barbed wire fence. Our tea was being served. While sipping my tea, I looked to the scenery of Syrian city of Qami¸slo which was just on the side of the border and thought about the irony of separateness of local community. While talking about the danger of landmines, Brahîm wanted to narrate how he had ignored that as a teenager. He went on to explain how once with some friends they crossed the border and but being stuck there. He narrated: In those days, if you could make an arrangement by giving bribe to sergeants and soldiers you could cross the border easily. I know, many of them were gaining a lot here and returning to their homes as rich people when their army service ended…On one occasion, without any permission, we passed through these wires (pointing to the barbed wire fence next to us) and landmines via a safe path and then went to Qami¸slo to play table soccer. I have good time there. Later, on the way back home, we came to a certain point but there was a military vehicle and soldiers were driving for daily patrol. They saw us and we step back (to the Syrian side). We were so scared and were not able to come. We just stuck behind that small soil hill…I remember we had a neighbor commander and commissioner. The commissioner saw me from distant and pointed out the border gate for me to come there. I went to the gate. So, he helped me to pass through the gate. My mother had good relations with our neighbors and she was helping them and their families in their daily chores. That is why they helped me. Two of my friends also passed with me but the others remained there until evening. Later, they came back through illegal path…137

Although the ultimate mission and function of the landmines are to deteriorate border crossing along with other agents such as barbed wire fences and soldiers, local people continue to violate this security mechanism sometimes with the support of supposed security agents. In other words, particular security mechanisms are being defied by some other

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agents within the controlling mechanism. In the story of Brahîm, the agency of landmines, barbed wire fences, watchtowers, and soldiers is invalidated temporarily by other two agents, commissioner, and border gate. The arguments on the accurate starting date of deployment of landmines on the Turkish-Syrian border do not come in consensus but address the early 1950s as the starting date of death in the mined zone. Since the 1950s, the Turkish state army members have been deploying landmines in different times until recently years. Deployment of mines was repeated at certain places on the border in the case where existing mines were either destroyed by smugglers, exploded or moved by flood. As stated earlier, landmine can be interpreted as a breaking point in the history of region and border due to its catastrophic and traumatic effect on the local communities residing on both sides. It is why people made a periodization in their memories with reference to landmines by uttering phrases of “before the landmines” and “after the landmines.” The state-deployed landmines have killed thousands of people and more than that amputations in the region along with its psychological effects and thus shattered social, cultural, economic, and historical life patterns and structures in the region. The major concern of this chapter has been documentation of the state’s policies of deploying landmines, its legitimizing discourses, and first experiences and testimonies of border people about this making process. In this part, the history of mining on the Turkish-Syrian is much explored rather than pursuing an answer for the question of how we, as anthropologists, “might be able to enhance our understanding of the explosive remnants of war and how they affect people’s lives in ways that could enable us to contribute to a safer world.”138 In the following chapter, “the posthuman performativity of mines as actants in human-nonhuman networks”139 and diverse forms of coexistence of landmines with human subjects will be documented in light of personal experiences of survivor, stories of victims, and narratives of their relatives in the region.

3.5

Watchtowers

How do a watchtower function for the state, individual, and community, separately? The history of watchtowers dates back to ancient Empires and kingdoms and being fortified at certain territorial places and locations as landmarks and signs of their domination and also protecting mechanism

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against enemies at the frontiers.140 They have always been useful architectural apparatus for defense constructed in various forms at the frontiers in the past to the present. Watchtowers can be interpreted as one of the explicit signs of militarization and markers of spatial separation. It can be claimed that the idea of watchtower was revitalized in the modern era through Jeremy Bentham’s idea of panopticon and his architectural plan of penitentiary. Bentham’s idea of “panopticon or the inspection house” which was proposed in his letters written in Russia and sent to a friend in England in 1787. Bentham’s architectural design of panopticon prison was mostly based on “the apparent omnipresence of the inspector (if divines will allow me the expression,) combined with the extreme facility of his real presence.”141 While describing his plan for a penitentiary inspection house, Bentham states, The building is circular. The apartments of the prisoners occupy the circumference. You may call them, if you please, the cells. These cells are divided from one another, and the prisoners by that means secluded from all communication with each other, by partitions in the form of radii issuing from the circumference towards the center, and extending as many feet as shall be thought necessary to form the largest dimension of the cell. The apartment of the inspector occupies the center; you may call it if you please the inspector’s lodge.142

Therefore, this surveillance architecture was designed to produce an ontological and epistemological conception among prisoners in which omnipresence of inspector sustains perfect discipline in the panopticon which deters the prisoners from misbehaving. With the birth of modern prisons that were inspired by Bentham’s plan of panopticon, the state’s desire to control and discipline its subjects within a spatio-political architectural went beyond this scale. Furthermore, the idea of the constant state of surveillance of life and death of human subjects would become one of the indispensable quests of the modern state in maintaining its power and control. Later, Michel Foucault would become the most influential thinkers who revitalized this idea of panopticon in the 1970s and then he “extends this site analysis - no longer medical alone but fully historical and political - to entire institutional settings, including the architecture of these settings.”143 In his arguments on the use of political power by “the police” which is defined as an institution and as one of the state apparatuses, Foucault states that “this power had to be given

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the instrument of permanent, exhaustive, omnipresent surveillance, capable of making all visible, as long as it could itself remain invisible. It had to be like a faceless gaze that transformed the whole social body into a field of perception: thousands of eyes posted everywhere, mobile attentions ever on the alert, a long, hierarchized network…”144 The application of the idea of panopticon through use of watchtowers on the political borders for the control is another architectural design of modern state who aims to disseminate the idea and instigate the feeling of omnipresence of the state power and its controlling mechanisms on the border. In other words, Bentham’s thought that “the persons to be inspected should always feel as if under inspection” is taking into play. As Edward Casey eloquently explained earlier, “the aim is not to realize constant inspection as such but to induce in the inmates the sense that they may be under scrutiny at any given moment.”145 In his work on drugs, immigration, and homeland security at the US-Mexican border in mid-2000s, Tony Payan follows Bentham’s idea of panopticon prison and Foucault’s analyses on surveillance and control mechanism of the state. In his analysis, Payan is coining the concept of “panopticon border” in order to analyze security mechanisms of the US government. By addressing the militarization of political borders, he states that “the U. S. government has undertaken the colossal task of increasing its surveillance and control over it by exercising the powers of the police state” and then continues: The force of the state, with all its resources, quasi-military operations, timetables, and drills, and so on, has come down on the border to “regain control” of it. Any visitor to the border can see the new technologies being deployed on the border, including cameras, sensors, night goggles, X-ray machines, helicopters, Humvee-style vehicles, etc. The increase in the number of Border Patrol agents, the watchful human eyes, is also quite evident. All of these are at the disposal of the state to create the panopticon border of the twenty-first century, where everyone is under surveillance at all times, where everyone is tracked in every move, where everyone can be brought under the swift control of the government.146

The use of diverse forms of violence through the applied mechanisms mentioned above has reached another level by fortification of concrete walls first on the occupied lands of Palestinians by Israel, and then in other parts of the world, Turkey is the latest one. The watchtowers as one of those surveillance mechanisms have been widely utilized for the

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border security in contemporary era. On the cover of photographic work on the British watchtowers in Northern Ireland, it is pointed out that: Observation, whether by the human eye or the eye of a surveillance camera, requires an architectural structure that elevates the viewer into a position of advantage. The system of Iron Age hill forts, built across Britain from around 500 B.C., used natural promontories to survey the surrounding landscape; 2000 years later the British army used a similar system of watchtowers to survey the occupied territories of Northern Ireland. These high-tech towers, constructed in the mid 1980s, primarily in the mountainous border region of South Armagh, were landmarks in a 30-year conflict in and over Northern Ireland, euphemistically called “The Troubles.” The Towers were finally demolished between 2003 and 2007 as part of the British government’s “demilitarization” program for Northern Ireland.147

The recurrence of watchtowers during the efforts of modern state in controlling of the spatio-political frontiers was seen on the Turkish-Syrian border in the 1970s. The Turkish watchtowers with their low technology were constructed as a supplementary military apparatus to secure and control the borders. According to Ne¸se Özgen, certain parts of the mined zone were remained due to constant demining efforts of local people and smugglers; barbed wire fences were thickened; and military watchtowers were constructed at regular intervals of 50 meters.148 The Turkish watchtowers were constructed on firedogs around 5 meters high on top which there is platform and a hut. Soldiers doing their military service as border security guards climbed the stairs to their hut with its very narrow terrace all around where soldiers use their binoculars to observe remote distances. The hut has glass-windows in each direction as well. The Turkish watchtowers with their low technology have been replaced in the last three years with new ones that have a very high technology which is elaborated in the final chapter. It is understood from the narratives of the local people and former smugglers that the construction of watchtowers increased feeling of anxiety among local people. It can be argued that the watchtower deepened the perception of omnipresence of state power through which a constant state of fear and being observed was created. It was narrated that due to this state of surveillance, smugglers particularly crossed the border not during the day but during moonless nights. The narratives of smugglers also indicate the fact that the Turkish border security forces did not have night glasses in those years. The low technology of border security was

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used as an advantage by smugglers who easily conduct their illegal trade and border crossings until recent years. According to local testimonials, the soldiers who stood guard at these watchtowers were changed at certain periods during the day. Patrolling soldiers were given authority to stop, arrest, shot, and kill any illegal crossers within the forbidden mined zone as required. Stories about the gendarmerie stations where people were dragged to, beaten, tortured, arrested by soldiers are very dominant among local people. Faysal remembers many anecdotes from his village Tilkitepe which is a few meters away from the mined zone and the borderline. He recalls his memories from the age of 12 or 13 and said “there were soldier patrols during the nights sometimes and one night, when my uncle tried to cross the border, they shot and killed him. There were no technological instruments like cameras in that time. There were just soldiers. They were patrolling…” He talked about how parents warned their children to stay away from the soldiers who stood guard at the towers and were patrolling on foot. On the other hand, Hasan talked of their relations with soldiers at the watchtowers and those patrolling on the border in the 1970s from his childhood period. He narrated: There were four watch towers near our village. When we crossed the wire, they would chase us and we would escape. When they were back at their place, we would enter the mined zone again. Sometimes, we carried food to them from our houses. They were also buying smuggled goods. I remember, they sometimes entrusted their bought goods in our house till the end of their military service. Many children were playing around the mined zone. There were not any houses on the other side of the railway which was considered as a border line. There was a pond near here and we would go there for fishing with friends. I was 13 or 14 years old. There were deployed anti-tank mines. The anti-personnel mines were not deployed yet or they were demined by smugglers. That was why we would enter the mined zone and play there.149

In light of narratives of border people, it can be claimed that watchtowers were very effective during the day rather than during the nights due to the lack of lightening mechanism on the border. It was why smugglers mostly preferred the nights to do their jobs and that was why the Turkish security forces were carrying ambushes in order to catch them. It was narrated by many that soldiers were ambuscading particularly at passageways (streambeds, shores of rivers, valleys between monticules, etc.)

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of smugglers. Overall, the watchtowers emerged as another preventive strategy of the state authorities during their continued labor of controlling the borders. The watchtower as an ancient surveillance apparatus was reformulated in relation to the inspection house or prison in the modern era and is implemented on the national political borders for control and security. What makes the watchtowers more threatening architectural structure is the existence of guards (soldiers) equipped with binoculars and guns. Now, it generates the idea that you might be seen even from a far distance and being fired. Therefore, gendarmerie stations and soldiers incited fear and thus became two other influential subject whose agency amplify validity of the watchtowers on the border region. The watchtower that aims to maintain a continues surveillance and control of illegal border crossings can be interpreted as also another site for the performance of the state power.

3.6

Gendarmerie Stations and Soldiers

Localizing gendarmerie stations and security guards posted at watchtowers on the borderline was the following step of hardening the security measures of the Turkish authorities in the region. The formation of the network of state apparatuses—border marker, barbed wire, and landmine—was thickened and impermeable with implementation of watchtower, gendarmerie station, and soldier in the following decades. The presence of the gendarmerie station and soldier as visible complementary agents and new representatives of state power in the border region was constantly fabricating fear of the state. They were repetitively addressed as deterring fearsome subjects during interviews conducted with local people in their memories. In Turkey, even today, the state does not have official special forces for the border security and all security guards are chosen from the ordinary soldiers carrying out their obligatory military service which has been an applied regulation from past to the present. Memories of the events such as insult, beating, interrogation, arrest, torture, and incarceration that took place at the gendarmerie stations are still alive today. Border people’s diverse forms of relations and confrontations with local members of the army (soldiers, sergeants, and commanders) are very intense in the life stories. In childhood memories, these state actors are generally remembered with fear and various forms of acts of violence. In this context, Faysal recalled how he and other children were afraid of the soldiers. He stated that “today, people do not afraid

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that much from the soldiers and the state. In those days, people were too much afraid. There was a place named Qitubê. Two people crossed the border from that point. It was a snowy day. The soldiers went after them and caught them in a cave with their horses. One of them was killed and the other was arrested with his horse.”150 In the discourses of border people, the soldiers are remembered not only as ferocious agents but also as collaborative and negotiable characters as well. The armed soldier appears as a violent being in the world of children and narrated stories about soldiers often contained fragments of violence, torture, and murder. Faysal narrated one of these stories from his childhood: We were in Tilkitepe and I was 12 or 13 years old. We were a group of two or three girls and two or three of boys including one or two men. We were buying and selling goods in both sides. One evening, while returning from the Syrian side we stopped and discussed whether to cross the border or not. Some friends insisted to cross but I told them that we have to wait because there might be patrolling soldiers on the border. They were 7-8 people and all they agreed to cross except me. They started to walk and I had follow them, of course. There were tents of soldiers on the border zone (probably soldiers who were there for mining). One of the soldiers saw us while crossing the border zone. He suddenly shouted ‘Dur!’ (Stop!). They caught all of us and took us to the gendarmerie station at Tilkitepe. They took us to Hemdûnê from that station. They said ‘tomorrow is weekend’. So, we stayed there. Soldiers were pitilessly beating the two men with us. They were holding their heads and then banging heads together. Soldiers did not beat us that much because we were children but they beat the two men. I guess, one of corporals (whose name was Aslan) was killed during conflicts by smugglers in those days at the border. They informed us that regiment commander will come. They lined us and then he came. He asked ‘who arrested these?’ One of sergeants replied ‘I arrested them’. Then, the regiment commander asked angrily ‘why did not you killed them?… Don’t you remember corporal Aslan?…’151

The gendarmerie stations appear as places of disciplining smugglers and other local people at diverse age though infliction of corporeal and psychological pain. One of the stories narrated by former smuggler Omer not only documents those ongoing harrowing events but also competition and spying system among smugglers in the region. He narrated: One day, they spied on me that I had crossed 500 sheep to the other side. There was no such thing. I was arrested. We were four people. They took

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us to the gendarmerie station. At 12 o’clock at midnight, they took all of our clothes of and put us in a pool and then took us outside where the cold wind was blowing. We were trembling like a leaf… Our teeth were clicking. That night, they kept us at the Qanter gendarmerie station. In the following day, they took us to Bawerdê station. They tortured us there, too. Then, they took us to the station in Tilêber and from there to Bazirtê. ˙ Then, they took us to Hezex (Idil) and from there to Cizîrê (Cizre). There was a big battalion, there. We were around 45 people there. They took us to bathroom. One night, three lorry coal came and they divided us to 15 people and ordered us to dump load of coal from each lorry. The weather outside was icy. They came and told me to stand up and start to work. I told them that I cannot because I was sick. They said it does not matter you must work. When, I resisted they slapped my face. Then, I told them that I am sick and I have heart problem and cannot do that heavy job. There was another friend, Yusiv who was sick as well. They put our names on a piece of paper. Next morning, our names were called. Soldiers and arrested civilians were line against each other outside. The commander of battalion shouted ‘those who did not work last night, come to the front!’ Me and Yusiv went forward two steps. Then, he told me to go forward one more step and then asked ‘why did not you work? Are you a rowdy?’ I said ‘no, I am not. I am just an inmate, here? I am sick and that is why I did not dump the load of coal.’ He went and pick up a blackjack and started to beat me. The weather was so cold and he continued to beat me with blackjack… My face became black and blue all over…152

These memories of local people are strong indications of the state apparatuses to prevent illegal border crossings and smuggling. Why the torture was constantly applied as a technique for decades in those gendarmerie stations at the border region? While writing on torture, Foucault explains the nature of this influential technique and how the perpetrators use it consciously in the human history: Torture is a technique; it is not an extreme expression of lawless rage. To be torture, punishment must obey three principal criteria: first, it must produce a certain degree of pain, which may be measured exactly, or at least calculated, compared and hierarchized; death is a torture in so far as it is not simply a withdrawal of the right to live, but is the occasion and the culmination of a calculated gradation of pain: from decapitation (which reduces all pain to a single gesture, performed in a single moment - the zero. Degree of torture), through hanging, the stake and the wheel (all of which prolong the agony), to quartering, which carries pain almost to

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infinity; death-torture is the art of maintaining life in pain, by subdividing it into a ‘thousand deaths’, by achieving before life ceases ‘the most exquisite agonies’153

As it can be seen in many narratives like the story of Omer narrated above, the theatrical torture in front of children, men, and women inside and outside gendarmerie stations was a necessary display of power of the state and its local apparatuses. The use of torture for social and political control of citizens by the hegemonic state and its apparatuses has been a commonly seen act of policing in Turkey until the last decade. However, as Talal Asad also confirmed, Foucault’s “central concern was not with ‘torture’ but with ‘power,’ and consequently with a contrast between sovereign power (which exhibits itself through theatrical displays of tortured bodies) and disciplinary power (which works through the normalization of bodies in everyday behavior).”154 Then, one might ask how these acts of beating, arrest, torture, and killing were carried out and legitimized by state actors in the border region in the early years of the Republic? In the Turkish the Law of Protection and Security of Territorial Borders which was delivered on July 16, 1956, revised on March 10, 1983, and then finalized in 1988, the 2nd article states that “the duty of protecting and securing territorial borders is given to Ground Forces Commandership and it is carried out through border army troops” who are responsible: (1) for protecting the border and providing security in their area of responsibility; (2) for preventing illegal border crossings at the border gate and any criminal acts within the forbidden military zone (including mined zone), and to arrest criminals; to follow and then arrest criminals who entered the first forbidden zone and then the second military forbidden zone; to launch obligatory legal actions against criminals, to deliver criminals and criminal evidences to related local security forces and officials.155

In the following, the sub-article 3rd, it states that “border troops are given the rights and authority that have also given to security forces including the authority to shoot while carrying out the duties they are assigned by this law.”156 Under this authority and legislation, border security forces constantly used their guns toward smugglers and those entering forbidden mined zone. However, there is not any statements on

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the misuse of this authority. Besides, there are not any preventive articles or sub-articles about misuse and abuse of power/authority or any statements about violation of human rights in the context of acts of beating, insult, and torture by the security forces inside and outside gendarmerie stations. Therefore, it seems that the Turkish state authorities ruled and controlled the border region under a “the state of exception”157 during which the laws of protecting dignity, rights, and life of its own citizens were suspended. The intensity of various forms of violence conducted by border security forces is very implicit in the life stories of border people. Former smuggler Omer sadly narrated how villagers possessed a profound fear of humiliation, torture, and incarceration. He remembered some of these violent misconducts that were experienced almost daily in the border villages: Villagers were having enormous problems. They would drag all villagers to the gendarmerie station and beat all of them if there was even a single footprint on the border line close to their village. Sometimes, they would burn villages. Villagers were so scared. They would complain that ‘others smuggle and we are paying for’. Sometimes, we were spied on by some villagers. That was why we always crossed the border secretly during the night in order to not to be seen by anyone and thus be seen at home in the mornings… If people did not see you around in the mornings, they would think that you were smuggling during the night and then would spy on you…158

These narratives document in actually how the gendarmerie stations and soldiers were influential in the region but at the same time that their agency surmounted by smugglers. These stories indicate involvement of border villagers and sometimes their inevitable victimhood during the conflicts between smugglers and the state border security forces. Those villagers who did not involve in the act of smuggling talked about their suffering due to persecutions of the security guards, soldiers, which they described as “being caught between two fires.” Landmines, gendarmerie stations, commanders, sergeants, and soldiers were the most repeated concepts and agents which could be seen as an indication of networks and collaborations between local people, smugglers, and these state officials. In this context, Omer narrated:

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I remember, one time, around 190 carriers carried goods. We hired three lorries, went to the border and loaded them. Of course, we had an agreement. There was a master-sergeant, two sergeants, and four soldiers with us. We convinced them and for sure we gave them their shares. Why would not they want? Everything was run by money. It was like today; all politicians get their shares when they arrange tenders for their kin and friends. It was like that. Those soldiers were coming to here as poor and going back home with a truck-loaded goods. The business was carried on like that…159

Although the gendarmerie station and soldiers were perceived as overriding symbols of violence and fear in general in the region, the prevalence of various narratives similar to the one above indicates changing conditions, pragmatist adoption, and circumstantial perception of the same agents in differing contexts in everyday life. In some narratives, army members were represented as collaborators during smuggling and also good friends and neighbors who were doing exchange of food and other needs during their patrols. 75-years-old Alîya whose house was a few meters close to the mined zone talked about her and her family’s relations with soldiers at the nearby army station. Alîya as a strong woman with a dominant personality narrated: One day, again there were two watchman soldiers at the watch tower here, across our house. It was winter and there was snow. In front of my house there were that brushwood (qir¸sik)160 which I collected to use at floor furnace (tanur). I had recognized that someone took some of them. Then, I saw one of those watchman soldiers make a fire and sleeping next to it. I saw my brushwood next to the fire. I slowly and sneakily approached, took his gun and then jumped from the wall. His comrade soldier was not there and I guess he was watching around. He run after me and start to beg; ‘Aunty, for Allah’s sake give my gun back to me!’ He was bagging tearfully. I was angry. I told him ‘A normal human being would take just a few, but you almost took all of my brushwood. Do you know how I collect and carry them on my back with such difficulties? And, you took them without asking for permission.’ He replied; ‘I will collect and carry as much as you want as long as you give my gun back’. I said ‘go, take that brushwood to your mother, son of dog. I will report you to the commander.’ Then, I start to walk toward station to complain but his friend, the other soldier, came and both started to beg. Then, my son Brahîm came and told me ‘Mum, give his gun back, they have been crying since morning’ I rejected and said ‘I will give it back if they collect brushwood as much as they took

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from me and do so now’ [she was giggling in her narration]. Then, my son Brahîm said ‘Mum, please give his gun back otherwise the commander will kill these unfortunates if he hears about this’. Then, I was convinced and told them never to do it again. One of them returned and said ‘Aunty, we are so sorry, excuse us. There was snow and we felt very cold. That was why we took it.’ I answered, ‘It is fine to take some but you almost took all of it and burned’. They replied ‘you are right, aunty’.161

The violation of mined border zone by local people during everyday life transformed the forbidden zone into an ambiguous one at certain places and times. Relations between the state agents and the local people could sometimes become very complex as it can be seen in this story. Despite the fact that army members were only protectors of the border at all costs, their collaborations for pecuniary advantages indicate the new role of the border as a profitable entity. In other words, soldiers were hoping to get profit through their networks and partnerships with smugglers and locals. According to narratives, soldiers were had been in touch with locals particularly in Sundays which was their weekly holiday. Soldiers would leave the army base and roam the town center, shopping and in the meantime developing new relations with the locals. In certain cases, commanders would make agreements with smugglers via mediators and never getting in touch with smugglers directly. For instance, former smuggler Ahmed talks about how his agreement with lieutenant Cemal went on for three years, without him and never having met him face-to-face. There were always mediators—his men—between smugglers and lieutenant. Former smugglers also mention that all of their border crossings were not under certain agreements. They would often cross the border without any agreements with security forces during which armed conflict between them and the soldiers were occurring. In their narratives, they spoke of real trust between both sides during which many soldiers consigned their earned money to some trustable smugglers or other locals. When their army service ended and the time to return their homes came, they would come and pick their money and other goods that they bought from the smugglers or the bazaar of smuggled products.162 Some of the border people also talked about the occurrences of love affairs between soldiers and local girls. The story of 58-year-old commander Necmettin of Istanbul is one of them.163 As a former army member, Necmettin talked about his army service as a border security guard and his struggles with smugglers from 1981 to 1987 before his retirement. During the interview

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in his cafeteria at the town center, he talked about how army members and local people named him “deli komutan” (mad commander) or “deli Necmettin” (mad Necmettin) due to his bravery and intrepid spirit in his fight against smugglers. According to story, he was married before and marries a second wife, the daughter of one of his men in Nisêbîn. Then, he decides to live in the town where he also learns Kurdish. Before and after the interview, I also recognized that local people still called him with these kinds of nicknames. By the end of 1970s and in the early 1980s, the border security became one of the most frustrating task for the state officials due to increasing conflicts between radical leftist and other groups in the country which ended with 1980 coup d’état when the Turkish army took control of the country. It is interesting to observe thorough life stories how the sociopolitical events occurring at the heart of the state were being felt at the peripheries of the country. Former smuggler Ahmed talked about how the 1980 coup d’état on September 12 and the declaration of a state of emergency afterward deeply affected their smuggling. He talked about how they were smuggling around 50 gunny bags of goods almost every night across the border, doing a kind of shuttling between both sides. Ahmed points to how people started to use the official border gate as a new way for smuggling during which the custom officials were given bribe. Thus, he talked about collaborations and interest-based networks not only between smugglers and the army members but also between smugglers and custom officials as well. Ahmed claimed that he worked around 40 years in the smuggling and narrated his story of the night of coup d’état: That night, I took carriers to the border. We crossed the border around midnight. Of course, the commander of nearby gendarmerie station was informed. He warned us and said ‘if I see any reinforcing units from other stations, I will fire one or two warning shoot and you have to immediately return back. When the reinforcing unit is gone, I will turn on the beams of the car toward the Syrian side and then fire two warning shots and thus you cross the border’. This is how it was in those days, we used certain signs… Before crossing to the other side, I left one of my cousins on the border as a watcher. When we returned, we saw him sleeping on the ground. May Allah forgive him [he is laughing here, during the interview] …The other friends asked him whether he heard any gunshots or not but replied that he did not. We later learned later that the commander did warning shots but our watcher was sleeping and thus did not hear them. There were 87

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carriers (hemal ) with me. I left them in the Syrian side as a precaution and asked one of them to come with me. I told the others ‘we two, are going to check and see if there is any danger. Otherwise, if we all cross together and if they fire, most of us will die.’ I and the other friend came close to the border but we recognized that there are soldiers at the watch tower. There was a coat of one of the soldiers hanging in the terrace of the tower. We returned and warned other carriers that something is wrong. If you start to cross in the dark through tall grass in the zone, birds living among grass start to fly and other animals run away, too. Thus, soldiers start to be suspicious as well. However, when we start to walk none of that happened. I told my friend that some people before us probably were here. He replied to me and said that it is okay and we should move forward. However, when we start to walk, soldiers started a fire on us. I was shot nine times. My friend escaped. I also escaped to the Syrian side. I remained seven days in Syrian side and then brought to the Turkish side. I wanted to get medical treatment in Turkish side. So, I was carried through the border gate and taken to the army base (battalion) in Nisêbîn.164

Ahmed talked of the commander who was collaborating with him and how he tried to help him later and prevented his arrest. According to the story, Ahmed made a statement at the court that he was shot by Syrian soldiers not the Turkish soldiers. Later, he talked about how it took almost a year at the hospital in Mardin to recover. Like many other stories, Ahmed’s story also documents collaborations and foundation of networks of interest between smugglers and army members in different ways. However, there had always been loyal commanders unwilling to collaborate and thereby perpetuating that fear of the state. Ahmed recalled how he once tried to convince one of the commanders to collaborate but was unsuccessful: It was summer and I was on the house roof resting.165 Suddenly, I saw a soldier on the roof. He took me to the gendarmerie station at the neighboring village. I was suspected. The commander offered me tea. He looked my face and then started to talk: ‘Ahmed, I want to tell you something.’ I said ‘please, I am listening’. He continued ‘I have been here for one year and I did not involve in smuggling. I have rejected collaborations as well. And I am going to be here for more one year. Please, promise me not to cross through the border territory assigned to me. Where ever you want to cross the border, you can but not through the part under my control. Even, if you’d like, I can help you with my army vehicle when you do business at other parts of the border.’ I replied ‘okay, but you also promise

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me if you have any intentions to collaborate in smuggling please let me know first!’. He said ‘okay, I promise, I will let you know.’ He did not call me for collaboration and I did not pass through the border zone in his responsibility until he left the region…166

In border stories and particularly in the narratives of smuggling, the dominancy of male figures is distinct. However, there are various stories of female smugglers and illegal crossings of ordinary women as well. In the business of smuggling, smugglers most times assisted ordinary people—generally women, elders, and children—who wanted to cross the border for family visits and other issues whilst charging for their guidance and help. In these narratives of female subjects, the fear of gendarmerie station and soldiers appears more and stronger. The story of Halîme (died in 1993) who was visiting her married daughter many times in one of the Kurdish village in the Syrian side near the border in the early 1940s documents the powerful presence of that fear among women. According to narrated story, Halîme was not only visiting her daughter but also she was carrying many goods (grains like wheat and lentils) to bring to her family living in the Turkish side. During one of these visits, Halîme and her other female friends were caught by soldiers while crossing the border with their goods. Halîme’s story is being narrated by her daughter Emîna: My mother say goodbye to my older sister and left the village with her donkey and load of goods. She met her friends at certain point on the way and they all headed toward the border on foot. In their group, there were three other Muslim women and also three Christian Assyrian men from our village. It was spring. They arrived near the border at night in an utter darkness, it was raining. While crossing the border, soldiers caught them and dragged them to the nearby customs. Their goods and donkeys were seized by officials at the customs. They were kept there until morning and then released. My mother came home and get some money and then returned to buy her goods and donkey from the customs in Nisêbîn. Later, we received a court notification in May and my mother received prison sentence of four months. She was taken to the prison in Estelê, Midyatê. With my mother, the other Muslim women and three of our neighbor Christian Assyrian men were also arrested.167

Emîna narrated many other stories of female smugglers and illegal border crossers from her mother who met in them in the prison. After her

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release, Halîme continues to travel to the Syrian side and visit her daughter and relatives. According to stories, she was taking grape molasses, raisin, dried layers of fruit pulp, and many other goods that were scarcely found in the Syrian side. In return, she brought grains and other goods that were needed in Turkish side. As it stated by other border people, the fear of soldiers and being dragged to the gendarmerie stations was deeper than the fear of landmines and death among local women. In the local community, presence of women in gendarmerie stations and incarceration were seen as a violation of honor of women due to suspicion that they might be sexually abused or attacked by soldiers. This was the main reason for women not to involve in smuggling and border crossing as much as possible. That is why border crossings of women were accompanied by men whether it was the husband, brother, son, relative or reliable male neighbor. On the other hand, the state practices of physical and psychological violence toward local people through agency of gendarmerie stations and army members resulted in a constant production of a perception of these two subjects as formidable and terrorizing entities. In a similar vein and in connection to that negative perception, the image of Turkish soldier has been used by mothers as a ghostly entity to threaten their children for misbehaving in everyday life. In those cases, mothers would shout to their little one ‘I will call soldiers to take you away if you do not do this or that!’ In later decades, that negative image of the Turkish soldiers was consolidated particularly during the terror and violence in the 1990s in the Kurdish region during which local people suffered from the terror and violence of both the state and the PKK. The foundation of the PKK in Syria and its first terror attack in 1984 toward civilians in the Turkish side can be seen as one of the breaking points in the history of Turkish-Syrian border as well. The infiltrations of members of the PKK and guerillas through border would become one of the threatening incidents that the border security forces would wage war with it along with smugglers and other illegal border crossings. In these years, smuggling of guns, human trafficking,168 and drug trafficking grew very intense and continued until recently. In this era, the role of gendarmerie stations and soldiers turned to be a very critical one in the labor of border security. While speaking of this period, people also mention the increase of prices at the bazaar in Nisêbîn due to decrease of number of goods smuggled from Syria. They recall the rising price of the Sri Lankan tea which was locally named as “çaya qaçaxî” (smuggled tea, in Turkish kaçak çay), and this naming was used widely in all around the country.

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What made the gendarmerie station as a place of cruelty and violence is much related to agency of army members as perpetrators. Therefore, the soldiers were seen as both enemies and collaborators which will be more scrutinized in the following chapter. Nevertheless, the instrumentalization of force, fear, and violence by state actors would become one of the essential and prevailing facets of the state power. It has been stated that the role of border gates increased in the 1980s as a new regime of controlling the border. While talking about this period, Brahîmê Dorikî’s statement “o eski ba¸sıbo¸sluk kalmamı¸stı” (there was not anymore that old disorderliness) clearly explains the changing security dynamics in the border region. The border gates become new faces of the modern nationstates where “one is neither citizen nor foreigner in the face of the agent of customs, which we must take in both meanings.”169

3.7

Border Gates

The border gates can be described as state-sponsored control mechanism for traffic of human subjects and all other objects including animals. In the same time, the border gates are geopolitical constructions that emphasize the power of the state on a certain geography and people. As one of the facets of the state, they became a place through which official ideology, language, culture, and sometimes ethnic, religious or secular characteristics of the state are represented. While writing on the border gates (customs), visa regulations, body and body politics, Mark Salter analyzes how the modern states and governments limit human mobility by utilization of political borders visa regimes. He focuses on the North American border management strategies and practices by coining the concept of “biopower” and argues that the ultimate aim of the modern state is to achieve a full-confession of citizens as obedient subjects.170 In spite of the huge gap between the border technologies and control apparatuses in the North America and Turkey, there are very similar patterns between border regulations and their effects on local levels. An exploration of the history of territorial borders and border gates in Turkey in comparison with developed countries reveals that physical, technological, and administrative conditions and regulations in Turkey have seen delay in spite of ongoing modernization process in recent years. In this context, the conditions and administrative regulations at the Eastern and Southeastern borders seems to be weaker and more underdeveloped comparing to the western borders of the country. In this context, my first

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experience and observations on the conditions of Turkish territorial border gates came to existence while I decided to visit my aunt living in one of the villages near Qami¸slo in Syria in the fall of 2010. On that day, I started to notice a chaos and disorder while observing the poor physical conditions and disputes between officials and people who wanted to pass the other side. While experiencing the border gate of Nisêbîn, I became curious about the conditions of other Turkish border gates in other parts of the country. During my literature review on the general status of border gates in Turkey, it has appeared that actually the others were not very different from the one in Nisêbîn. Although studies on the roles of territorial border gates on local and national economy and trade, physical and technological incapability at these borders, existing security, and other problems and their possible solutions were addressed by many researchers as addressed in the previous chapter, the Turkish governments did not take any initiatives until recent years. The practices of Turkish modern nation-states on the Turkish-Syrian borderlands indicate the interconnectedness of local, regional, national and global social, economic, and political developments. The construction of border gates and the making of laws, regulations, and policies about them influence not only the home country but also the neighboring states and their populations residing in borderlands as well. In her ethnographic research on the Silopi-Habur border gate on the Iraqi border and the Nisêbîn-Girmeli border gate on the Syrian border Ne¸se Özgen documents how both border towns, Silopî and Nisêbîn were transformed in diverse ways. She also points to the interrelations between local dynamics and the policy-making procedures in the capital of the country in Ankara and how central political changes and transformations influenced the local networks and structures.171 In this context, an investigation of the history of Turkish-Syrian border reveals how the border region and its administration was under heavy influence of remittent relations between the Turkish and Syrian states during both the French mandate era (1920–1946) and independence era (1946–present).172 On the other hand, the ethnographic data of this research documents occasional narratives of border gates in the life stories and personal narratives in the pre-1980 era due to the fact that the majority of border crossings were not taking place though the border gate. Due to lack of official papers that required time and money, the limited permission of trading goods, and limited time frames for passing at the customs, the majority of local people preferred to use illegal paths in border crossing.

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“A county without secured borders would have a restricted security” is one of the mottos of the Bureau of Border Administration at the Ministry of Interior. At one of the documents posted on their official Web site, it is stated that Nisêbîn (Nusaybin) territorial border gate was opened on September 4, 1953, by 4/1407 numbered decision that was given by the Committee of Ministers. The main function of the border gate is explained for its regulation and control of border crossings between both countries.173 After this date, local people were required to use the official papers named paswan (pasavan) in border crossings through customs. However, the use of paswan and then passports increase in the 1980s due to very strict security measures on the border. With the start of the Özal era in 1983, cross-border mobility through border gates grew easier due to liberal policies in the Turkish interior and international affairs. According to local narratives and testimonials, people were more comfortably doing suitcase trading (in Turkish bavul ticareti) as a new form of smuggling through customs. Omer narrates: When Özal came to power, border-crossings between both sides become easier. It was forbidden to foreign currency with you while passing through customs. We would go to Diyarbakır, to the government bank and buy foreign currency with our passports and thereby go to Syria. Sometimes, we were having visa. This was with the arrival of Özal. We would go to Aleppo. I remember, we smuggled a car through the border gate. I took that car to Batman. I went to Gayrettepe in Istanbul twice to get a passport. I would bring all goods that were stated on passport through customs legally. Then, there was not a need for smuggling.174

The act of profiteering at the border gates would become one of the routines in the following years that was also addressed by other researchers.175 In her ethnographic research at the border town of Kilis, Hatice Pınar Seno˘ ¸ guz addresses the perception of border gate (in Turkish sınır kapısı) among her interlocutors and states that “Kapı (the door) in Turkish figurative speech also means ekmek kapısı (literally, the door to bread), the place where one can earn income or living. Thus, when the border dwellers suggest that the border gate is their place of earning a living, they often make strong claim that no one should mess with their bread. They consider the smuggling as business, and being smuggler as job.”176

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The impacts of the cold war era deeply influenced the relationships between Turkey and Syrian states and thus the formation process of Turkish-Syrian border and borderland until the early 1990s. Although the border gate of Nisêbîn was constructed in 1953, it was not becoming that much active until 1980s. Ne¸se Özgen states that “the first passports were taken out by the end of 1970s and thus the border gate and customs started to appear as new categories.”177 However, as stated earlier, the state efforts of controlling smuggling and cross-border mobility via border gate and customs at Nisêbîn were not efficient until 1980s. The coup d’état of 1980 and the eruption of terror and violence of the PKK in 1984 dramatically shapes and transforms the local dynamic at the border and borderland. These political developments pushed the state officials to carry out severe and radical security measures at the border region. The border gate gains more importance and human mobility is canalized toward the gate in this process but on the other hand smuggling through customs step by step was being “legalized” and “normalized” act. This is the era when the arms trafficking was being intensified that was closely related to the rise of power of the PKK in the Kurdish region. The border gates and customs as a process of bureaucratizing the control mechanism pushed the local people into the world of illegality in different ways. In short, the border gates appeared as one of the controlling technologies of the borders that turned into an assemblage of security apparatuses and also a means of living for officials, traders, and other local people at the customs.

Notes 1. Malcolm Anderson, Frontiers: Territory and State Formation in the Modern World (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1996), 1–2. 2. Anderson, Frontiers, 1–2. 3. Hastings Donnan and Thomas M. Wilson, Borders: Frontiers of Identity, Nation and State (Oxford: Berg Press, 1999), 5. 4. Donnan and Wilson, Borders: Frontiers, 3. 5. Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (London: Verso, 2006), 7. 6. The concept of namûs in general is equated with “woman’s chastity or virginity” that has to be protected till the marriage. 7. Diane E. King, “The Personal Is Patrilineal: Namus as Sovereignty.” Identities 15, no. 3 (2008): 319.

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8. Afsaneh Najmabadi, “The Erotic Vatan [Homeland] as Beloved and Mother: To Love, to Possess, and to Protect,” Comparative Studies in Society and History 39, no. 3 (1997): 442–467. 9. Najmabadi, “The Erotic Vatan,” 445. 10. Najmabadi, “The Erotic Vatan,” 445, cited in King, “The Personal,” 334. 11. The Turkish word “ana” is a shortened version of the word “anne” which means “mother” in Turkish. In this context, it is worth to remember how the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus is defined as “yavru vatan” (child homeland) in the Turkish state discourse. 12. Najmabadi, “The Erotic Vatan,” 466. 13. Hülya Adak, “National Myths and Self-Na(rra)tions: Mustafa Kemal’s Nutuk and Halide Edip’s Memoirs and The Turkish Ordeal,” The South Atlantic Quarterly 102, no. 2/2 (Spring/Summer 2003): 517. 14. Bülent Batuman, “The Shape of the Nation: Visual Production of Nationalism Through Maps in Turkey,” Political Geography 29 (2010): 223. 15. See also, Ne¸se Özgen, “Sınır Ticareti ve Sırnak’ta ¸ Etkileri” [Border Trade and Its Impacts on Sırnak], ¸ in Uluslararası S¸ ırnak ve Çevresi Sempozyumu Bildirileri, ed. Nesim Doru (Sırnak: ¸ Sırnak ¸ Üniversitesi Yayınları, 2010). 16. Laura Assmuth, “Nation Building and Everyday Life in the Borderlands Between Estonia, Latvia and Russia,” European Journal of Anthropology 41(2003): 59–69. 17. Elviye-i Selase was the name given to the Eastern provinces of Kars, Ardahan (Turkey), and Batum (Georgia) the Ottoman era. 18. Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, Atatürk’ün Söylev ve Demeçleri I-III [Ataturk’s Discourses and Speeches I-III] (Ankara: Divan Yayıncılık, 2006), 24. The full speech of Mustafa Kemal in Turkish reads as follows: “… ˙ ste kongre bu hududu çizmi¸stir. Bu hududu milliyi suhuletle ibka için I¸ demi¸stir ki; mütarekenamenin imza olundu˘gu 30 Te¸srinievvel 1334 tarihinde çizdi˘gi hudut, hududumuz olacaktır. Vatanımızın hududu olacak bu hududu ihtimal teferruatiyle bilmiyen arkada¸slarımız vardır. Yeniden fazla teferruata girmek istemedi˘gim için s¸u suretle izahat verece˘gim: Sark ¸ hududuna elviye-i selâseyi dâhil ederek tasavvur buyurunuz. Garp hududu Edirne’den bildi˘gimiz gibi geçiyor. En büyük tebeddü- lât cenup ˙ hududunda olmu¸stur. Cenup hududu Iskenderun cenubundan ba¸slar. Halep’le Katıma arasından Cerablus köprü- süne müntehi olur bir hat ve Sark ¸ parçasında da Musul vilâyeti Süleymaniye ve Kerkük havalisi ve bu iki mıntakayı yekdi˘gerine kalbeden hat. Efendiler, bu hudut sırf askerî mülâhazat ile çizilmi¸s bir hudut de˘gildir, hududu millîdir. Hududu millî olmak üzere tesbit edilmi¸stir…”. 19. Batuman, “The Shape,” 230.

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20. Burak Bekdil, “The Borders Set by the Turkey’s National Contract Include Cyprus, Aleppo, Mosul, Batumi…,” October 16, 2016, accessed March 5, 2019, https://horizonweekly.ca/am/95060-2/. “Türkiye Sadece Türkiye De˘gildir” [Turkey Is Not Only Turkey], Hürriyet Newspaper, October 16, 2016, accessed March 6, 2019, http://www.hurriyet. com.tr/gundem/erdogan-turkiye-sadece-turkiye-degildir-40250602. 21. Batuman, “Shape of the Nation,” 230–231. 22. Stokes, “Hybridity,” 265. 23. Stokes, “Hybridity,” 265. ˙ 24. Ahmet Içduygu and Özlem Kaygusuz, “The Politics of Citizenship by Drawing Borders: Foreign Policy and the Construction of National Citizenship Identity in Turkey,” Middle Eastern Studies 40, no. 6 (November 2004), 41. 25. For more details, see Yücel Güçlü, The Question of the Sanjak of Alexandretta: A Study in Turkish-French-Syrian Relations (Ankara: Türk Tarih kurumu, 2001). 26. Batuman, “Shape of the Nation,” 233. 27. Trond Thuen, “The Significance of Borders in the East European Transition,” International Journal of Urban and Regional Research 23, no. 4 (1999): 741. 28. Bettina Bruns and Judith Miggelbrink, eds., Subverting Borders: Doing Research on Smuggling and Small-Scale Trade (New York: Springer, 2012), 11. 29. The Turkish name of the regulation is: Hudut Te¸skilatlarının Vazifelerine ve Gümrük Muhafaza Te¸skilatının Kaçakçılı˘gı Men ve Takibi Hususunda Mıntıkalarındaki Valilerle Vazife Münasebetlerine Dair Nizamname. ˙ 30. Yılmaz Kurt and Mustafa Çö˘ggün, Mülki Idare Amirleri Sınır Görevi Rehberi [Border Duty Guide for Governors at the Border Regions] ˙ sleri Bakanlı˘gı Ara¸stırma ve Etütler Merkezi [AREM], 2007), (Ankara: Içi¸ 51. ˙ 31. Kurt and Çö˘ggün, “Mülki Idare,” 51. 32. The dispute on the amount of water at the Euphrates River that Turkey leaves for the Syria has always been a problem due to dam constructions by the Turkish state as well. 33. “Türkiye-Suriye Sınırındaki Anla¸smazlıklar Gideriliyor,” Cumhuriyet Newspaper, September 1, 1985, accessed March 3, 2019. 34. “Sezgin’ in Çantasında PKK ve Su Var,” Cumhuriyet Newspaper, April 3, 1992, accessed March 3, 2019. 35. According to Martin van Bruinessen, “the PKK was not exclusively dependent on Syria but had successfully diversified its foreign sponsors. It has had camps in northern Iraq as well as in northwestern Iran since the early 1980s. In the 1990s it significantly stepped up its presence there, moving more people from Syria and Lebanon to guerrilla camps

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36. 37.

38. 39.

40. 41. 42.

43. 44.

45. 46.

47. 48.

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in the zones controlled by Masud Barzani’s Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and Jalal Talabani’s Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) as well as across the Iranian border. Turkey has carried out numerous raids and a number of major invasions (with tens of thousands of troops and heavy material) into northern Iraq but never succeeded in destroying the PKK’s presence there”, Martin van Bruinessen, “Turkey, Europe and the Kurds After the Capture of Abdullah Öcalan,” in Kurdish Ethnonationalism Versus Nation-Building States, ed. Martin van Bruinessen (Istanbul: The ISIS Press, 2000), 3. In Turkey, there are no official existing reports or statistics about injured, maimed, and killed victims by mines from the 1950s to the present. Ziya Öni¸s, “Turgut Özal and His Economic Legacy: Turkish NeoLiberalism in Critical Perspective,” Middle Eastern Studies 40, no. 4 (July 2004): 113–134; Muhittin Ataman, “Leadership Change: Özal Leadership and Restructuring in Turkish Foreign Policy,” Turkish Journal of International Relations 1, no. 1 (Spring 2012): 120–153. Ramazan Aras, The Formation of Kurdishness in Turkey: Political Violence, Fear and Pain (New York: Routledge, 2013). For a more detailed history of the PKK, see Ali Kemal Özcan, Turkey’s Kurds: A Theoretical Analysis of the PKK and Abdullah Ocalan (New York: Routledge, 2012); Cengiz Güne¸s, The Kurdish National Movement in Turkey: From Protest to Resistance (New York: Routledge, 2012). Burak Bilgehan Özpek, The Peace Process Between Turkey and the Kurds: Anatomy of a Failure (New York: Routledge, 2017). Henk van Houtum, “The Geopolitics of Borders and Boundaries,” Geopolitics 10 (2005), 674. The border markers are also named as border stones, boundary markers, or boundary stones which vary in shape, size, design, and material (rock/stone, concrete, or mixture of others). Brendan O’Leary, “Partition,” in A Companion to Border Studies, ed. T. M. Wilson and H. Donnan (Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2012), 31. Thomas M. Wilson and Hastings Donnan, eds., Border Identities: Nation and State at International Frontiers (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), 9. U˘gur Ümit Üngör, The Making of Modern Turkey: Nation and State in Eastern Anatolia 1913–1950 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011). Yonca Köksal, “Coercion and Mediation: Centralization and Sedentarization of Tribes in the Ottoman Empire,” Middle Eastern Studies 42, no. 3 (2006): 469–491. The Settlement Law of 2510 was issued on June 14, 1934. Erol Ülker, “Assimilation, Security and Geographical Nationalization in Interwar Turkey: The Settlement Law of 1934,” European Journal of

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49.

50.

51.

52.

53.

54.

55.

56. 57.

58. 59. 60. 61.

62. 63.

Turkish Studies, Thematic Issue No. 7, Demographic Engineering—Part I (2008). Gavin D. Brockett, How Happy to Call Oneself A Turk: Provincial Newspapers and The Negotiation of a Muslim National Identity (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2011). Soner Ça˘gaptay, “Race, Assimilation and Kemalism: Turkish Nationalism and the Minorities in the 1930s,” Middle Eastern Studies 40, no. 3 (May 2004): 86–101. James C. Scott, Seeing Like a State: How Certain Schemes to Improve the Human Condition Have Failed (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998), 2. Ayhan Öztürk, “Milletlerarası Antla¸smalar ve Türk-Fransız Antla¸smaları ˙ Siyasi Zaferi)” [International (TBMM Hükümetinin Tanınması ve Ilk Treaties and Turkish-French Treaties (The Recognition of Turkish Parliament and Its First Victory)], Erciyes Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Enstitüsü Dergisi 5 (1994): 113–134. Tahir Ö˘güt and Erhan Akka¸s, “Suriye Toprak Reformunun Türkiye’ye Yansımaları: Pasavan Rejimi Krizi” [The Impacts of Syrian Land Reformation on Turkey: Pasavan Regime Crisis], Sosyal Siyaset Konferansları Dergisi 71, no. 2 (201): 127–163. Ne¸se Özgen, “Sınır Ticareti ve Sırnak’ta ¸ Etkileri” [Border Trade and Its Impacts on Sırnak], ¸ in Uluslararası S¸ ırnak ve Çevresi Sempozyumu Bildirileri, ed. Nesim Doru (Sırnak: ¸ Sırnak ¸ Üniversitesi Yayınları, 2010). Ne¸se Özgen, “Sınırda Kaçakçı Olmanın Antropolojik Tarihi” [Anthropological History of Being Smuggler at the Border]. NTV History Magazine, December 2011: 1–7. Özgen, “Sınır Ticareti,” 1010–1011. ˙ Yılmaz Kurt and Mustafa Çö˘ggün, Mülki Idare, 34. The statement in Turkish follows as; “Suriye sınırındaki sınır ta¸sları; 1926 yılında Çobanbey-Akdeniz arası 1-480, Çobanbey-Cizre arası ise 481-1620 olarak numaralandırılmı¸stır. 1939 yılında Hatay’ın katılması nedeniyle, Tahtaköprü (Meydan-ı Ekbez)-Payas-Akdeniz arasında kalan sınır ta¸sları (313-480) iptal olmu¸s, bunun yerine Tahtaköprü’den Hatay ili boyunca Akdeniz’e kadar 1-462 olarak yeni hudut ta¸sları ilave edilmi¸stir.” ˙ Kurt and Çö˘ggün, Mülki Idare, 37. ˙ Kurt and Çö˘ggün, Mülki Idare, 36. Özgen, “Sınır Ticareti,” 1010–1011. In Kurmancî dialect of Kurdish, kêlik means marker or sign but commonly stone-made. The same Kurdish word is also used for naming gravestones. Personal interview with Seyyîd Mihemed in Nisêbîn, in June 2013. The name of the village is Tilkitepe in Turkish. All non-Turkish (Kurdish, Aramaic/Syriac, Armenian, Greek, Arabic, etc.) names of settlements and places in the region and all around the country were erased

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64. 65. 66. 67. 68.

69. 70.

71.

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and renamed with Turkish names during assimilation, ethnic homogenization, and Turkification processes. State authorities step by step made these changes since the early decades of the Turkish Republic but particularly in the 1940s and mostly in the East, Southeast, and Eastern Black Sea regions. However, local people continued to use the authentic names in most cases along with the Turkish one until today. In most cases, illiterate elders above the age of 80s do not know those Turkish names. For more details on this subject please, see Kerem Öktem, “The Nation’s Imprint: Demographic Engineering and the Change of Toponymes in Republican Turkey,” European Journal of Turkish Studies, Thematic Issue, no. 7, Part I (2008). Personal interview with Faysal in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. The Kurdish word binxet is the combination of two words bin (down, under) and xet (line). So, binxet means down the line. Personal interview with Faysal in Nisêbîn city center, in April 2014. Personal interview with Seyfedîn in Nisêbîn city center, in 2014. Like the majority of elders and other interlocutors, Sehrîban ¸ also was not sure of her age and how old she was married. It was the fact that many local people were not officially registered due to mobility patterns between both sides of the border and semi-nomadic life styles. Personal interview with Sehrîban ¸ in her village near Nisêbîn, in 2014. Ramazan Aras, “Migration and Memory: Assyrian Identity in Mardin Kerboran/Dargecit 1910–1980” (MA thesis, Bo˘gaziçi University, 2005):168, 171–173, 184. I heard similar stories during my early research on migration of Assyrian/Syriac Christians in Sweden from Christian elders who migrated from Dargeçit (Kerboran), Mardin to Germany in the 1960s and 1970s and to Sweden. During my ethnographic oral history research in Norrköping in Sweden in 2005, one of my inter˙ locutors Iskender (1940–) narrated how his father and himself did their army service. He stated that he did not have any problems in spite of the fact that many Christian men did while doing his army service in 1960 in Isparta. However, he narrated that the Christian men were not given guns during their training and during the whole military service although all Muslim men were carrying guns. In our personal talks, later, he stated that for him, that was a derogatory treatment, a sign of mistrust that questioned also his manhood. For more data about the life and economic conditions during World War ˙ II in Turkey, please look at Murat Metinsoy, Ikinci Dünya Sava¸sı’nda Türkiye: Sava¸s ve Gündelik Ya¸sam [Turkey in the Second World War: War and Everyday Life] (Istanbul: Homer Kitabevi, 2007); Bülent Duru, “1941: Kıtlık Yılında Milli Korunma Kanunu Uygulamaları” [1941: National Protection Law in Scarcity Year], in Açıklamalı Yönetim Zamandizini 1940–1949, ed. Birgül A. Güler et al. (Ankara: Ankara

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˙ Üniversitesi Basımevi, 2008); Sabit Dokuyan, “Ikinci Dünya Sava¸sı Sırasında Ya¸sanan Gıda Sıkıntısı ve Ekmek Karnesi Uygulaması” [Food Shortage and Pass in Bread During the World War II], Turkish Studies 8, no. 5 (Spring 2013). For more details about the history and impacts of the Barzanî movement, see Martin van Bruinessen, Agha, Shaikh and State (New York: Zed Books, 1992); Hamit Bozarslan, Violence in the Middle East: From Political Struggle to Self-Sacrifice (Princeton: Markus Wiener Publishers, 2004); Wadie Jwaideh, Kürt Milliyetçili˘ginin Tarihi: Kökenleri ve Geli¸simi [History of Kurdish Nationalism: Its Roots and Development] ˙ sim, 2009). See also Özgen, “Sınır Ticareti,” 1011. (Istanbul: Ileti¸ Lyn Ellen Bennett and Scott Abbott, The Perfect Fence: Untangling the Meaning of Barbed Wire (Austin: Texas A & M University Press, 2017), 21. Bennett and Abbott, The Perfect Fence, 34. Olivier Razac, Barbed Wire: A Political History (New York: The New Press, 2002), 5; Alan Krell, The Devil’s Rope: A Cultural History of Barbed Wire (London: Reaction Books, 2002), 24. Bennett and Abbott, The Perfect Fence, 3–50. Reviel Netz, Barbed Wire: An Ecology of Modernity (Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2004), xiii. Bennett and Abbott, The Perfect Fence, 204. Alan Krell, The Devil’s Rope: A Cultural History of Barbed Wire (London: Reaction Books, 2002), 7. Arjun Appadurai, ed., The Social Life of Things: Commodities in Cultural Perspective (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986), 3. George E. Marcus, “Ethnography in/of the World System: The Emergence of Multi-Sited Ethnography,” Annual Review of Anthropology 24, no. 1 (1995): 95–117. Razac, Barbed Wire, ix. Razac, Barbed Wire, 22. Bennett and Abbott, The Perfect Fence, 215. Razac, Barbed Wire, 3–4. The movie Lion of the Desert which was directed and produced by Moustapha Akkad (1930–2005) in 1980 and released one year later in 1981 is an epic story of resistance movement of Libyan people against colonial occupation of Italy. Bukola A. Oyeniyi, The History of Libya (Santa Barbara, CA: Greenwood, 2019), 50. Razac, Barbed Wire, 66. ˙ ˙ Istanbul Levazım Amirli˘ginden verilen Askeri Kıtaat Ilanı, Milliyet Gazetesi, 23 Ocak 1951 sayısı (accessed through the newspaper archive on 30 March 2019), http://gazetearsivi.milliyet.com.tr/Ara. aspx?araKelime=dikenli%20tel&isAdv=false.

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90. Ne¸se Özgen, “Sınırda Kaçakçı Olmanın Antropolojik Tarihi” [Anthropological History of Being Smuggler at the Border]. NTV History Magazine, December 2011: 1–7. 91. Personal interview with Emîna (1932–) in Kerboran/Dargeçit, Mardin, in April 2014. 92. Razac, Barbed Wire, 102. 93. Alan Krell, The Devil’s Rope: A Cultural History of Barbed Wire (London: Reaction Books, 2002). 94. Matthew B. Bolton, Foreign Aid and Landmine Clearance: Governance, Politics and Security in Afghanistan, Bosnia and Sudan (London: I.B. Tauris, 2010), 1. 95. Leon V. Sigal, Negotiating Minefields: The Landmine Ban in American Politics (New York: Routledge, 2006). 96. “The Historic Innovation of Land Mines—And Why We’ve Struggled to Get Rid of Them,” accessed April 11, 2019, https://www. smithsonianmag.com/innovation/historic-innovation-land-minesandwhy-weve-struggled-get-rid-them-180962276/. 97. “The Historic.” 98. Bolton, Foreign Aid, 4. 99. Giorgio Agamben, State of Exception (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005). 100. For instance, the Landmine Monitor Report of 2002 documents that 49 casualties were reported in 2002. In the same report, it is stated that “in Turkey, a new center for prosthetics and rehabilitation was opened at Dicle University, near the mine-affected areas.” Landmine Monitor Report 2002: 48, http://www.the-monitor.org/media/1754486/ lm2002execsum-txt.pdf. 101. “A Brief History of Landmines Part I,” accessed April 5, 2019, http://canadianlandmine.org/a-brief-history-of-landmines-part-ipre-modern-uses-traps-spikes-and-caltrops. 102. “A Brief History of Landmines.” 103. SSMTS (2012), 8. Accessed February 7, 2015, http://www. mineactionstandards.org/fileadmin/MAS/documents/nmas-nationalstandards/turkey/Turkey_mine_action_standards.pdf. 104. “On December 3–4, 1997, representatives from 122 sovereign nations gathered in Ottawa, Canada to sign a Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of Antipersonnel Mines and on Their Destruction—the Ottawa Convention for short.” Leon V. Sigal, Negotiating Minefields, 3. For more information about the history of politics of landmine bans in North America and at international level please look at also, Louis Maresca and Stuart Maslen, eds., The Banning of Anti-personnel Landmines (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004); Frank Faulkner, Moral Entrepreneurs and the Campaign

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112. 113. 114. 115. 116. 117.

118. 119.

to Ban Landmines (New York: Rodopi, 2007). “The Ottawa Treaty or the Mine Ban Treaty, formally the Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of Anti-Personnel Mines and on their Destruction, bans completely all anti-personnel landmines (APmines) around the world. To date, there are 161 States Parties to the treaty and 36 United Nations states not party.” The website has been accessed March 5, 2019, http://canadianlandmine.org/the-issues/thetreaty. The Report of Association of Turkish Medical Doctors (TTB), accessed February 2015, http://www.ttb.org.tr/index.php/Haberler/ mayin-1633.html. “Sınırdaki Mayınlı Araziler Temizleniyor! 50 Milyon m2 Tarıma Açılıyor” [Landmined Zones on the Border are Cleaned: 50 Milyon m2 is opened for Agriculture], accessed April 7, 2019, https://www.haberturk.com/ sinirdaki-mayinli-araziler-temizleniyor-50-milyon-m2-tarima-aciliyor2207524. Landmine Monitor, 44. “Mayın Bilmecesi” [Puzzle of Mines], accessed April 6, 2019, https:// www.haberturk.com/ekonomi/makro-ekonomi/haber/631909-mayinbilmecesi. The Report of Landmine Monitor of 2018 by The International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL), accessed April 5, 2019, http://www. the-monitor.org/en-gb/reports/2018/landmine-monitor-2018.aspx. The Report of Landmine Monitor of 2018. Landmine and Cluster Munition Monitor Report, November 9, 2018, accessed May 28, 2019, http://www.the-monitor.org/en-gb/reports/ 2019/turkey/casualties.aspx. Özgen, “Sınır Ticareti,” 1011. Milliyet, October 13, 1955, accessed February 17, 2015. Milliyet, November 12, 1955, accessed February 17, 2015. Kamuran Çuhruk (1906–?) was governor of Mardin in the period of 1955–1956. Ha¸sim Söylemez, “Mayınlı Topraklar Zorunlu Nadasta” [Mined Lands Are Under Forced Fallowing], Aksiyon Magazine, July 24, 1999. One of the Reports of the Turkish parliament in 1958 mentions Kamuran Çuhruk’s governorship in Mardin and acknowledge his efforts to prevent smuggling, accessed April, 2019, https://www.tbmm.gov.tr/tutanaklar/ TUTANAK/TBMM/d11/c006/b014/tbmm110060140137.pdf. Milliyet newspaper archive, September 1, 1955, accessed February 17, 2015. Milliyet, September 1, 1955, 7. In the same news, the goods that their quantity is being asked are aligned as “cattle, sheep or goats (live or slaughtered), animal fat, animal skins, pistachio, walnut, almond, peanut,

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122. 123. 124. 125. 126. 127. 128. 129. 130. 131.

132. 133.

134. 135.

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trees and lumber, copper and copper products, wood coal, agricultural crops (including broken, grounded, expurgated one)”. Personal interview with Naîf in Nisêbîn, in 2014. The word rêzan is combination of two words in Kurdish, rê means road and zan—which is derived from the word zanîn (know)—means know about. Rêzan is singular form and rêzanan is the plural form of the word. People sometimes used the synonym rêber (guide) as well. In Kurdish hemal (singular), hemalan (plural). Personal interview with Silêman in Nisêbîn, in May 2013. Personal interview with Ahmed in Nisêbîn, in March 2014. Personal interview with Seyyîd Mihemed in Nisêbîn, in June 2013. Personal interview with Faysal in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. Personal interview with Faysal in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. Personal interview with Faysal in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. Personal interview with Ahmed in Nisêbîn, in March 2014. Personal interview with Omer in Nisêbîn, in March 2014. Eleana J. Kim, “Toward an Anthropology of Landmines: Rogue Infrastructure and Military Waste in the Korean DMZ,” Cultural Anthropology 31, no. 2 (2016): 163. Kim, “Toward,” 163. In many life stories, former smugglers talk about those herds of red color sheep that were brought by traders from the Botan region (today, the region that includes Mu¸s, Bitlis, Bingöl, Van, and their vicinity) to Nisêbîn to cross them to the Syrian side. The fact that local people never seen red sheep—that strain of sheep—before raises the memorability of this event. In her research, Ne¸se Özgen also mentions the story of red sheep and states that “The period of 1950s is also named as the period of red sheep. There was not enough sheep at the border villages to sell to the other side. Therefore, they expand their domain to Mara¸s, Van and Geva¸s; buying Karaman type sheep from the north and crossed through border.” See, Özgen, “Sınır Ticareti,” 1011. Personal interview with Seyyîd Mihemed in Nisêbîn, in June 2013. Personal interview with M. Brahîmê Dorikî in Nisêbîn, in June 2014. M. Brahîmê Dorikî works at one of the local primary schools as a teacher. He preferred to use his tribal name as last name rather than the official one. Dorikî means “from the tribe of Dorika” which is one of the local Kurdish tribes in the Midyat and Nisêbîn region. For more information about the history of local tribes and ethnic structures, see Suavi Aydın, Süha Ünsal, Kudret Emiro˘glu, and Oktay Özel, Mardin: A¸siret, Cemaat, Devlet [Mardin: Tribe, Society, State] (Istanbul: Türkiye Ekonomik ve Toplumsal Tarih Vakfı, 2000); Altan Tan, Turabidinden Beriyye’ye-A¸siretler, Dinler, Diller, Kültürler [From Turabidin to Beriyye:

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136. 137. 138. 139. 140.

141. 142. 143. 144. 145. 146.

147. 148. 149. 150. 151. 152. 153. 154. 155.

156. 157. 158. 159. 160.

Tribes, Religions, Languages, Cultures] (Istanbul: Nubihar Yayınları, 2013). Personal interview with Alîya in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. Personal interview with M. Brahîmê Dorikî in Nisêbîn, in June 2014. David Henig, “Iron in the Soil: Living with Military Waste in BosniaHerzegovina,” Anthropology Today 28, no. 1 (February 2012), 21. Kim, “Toward,” 164. Claudia Glatz and Roger Matthews, “Anthropology of a Frontier Zone: Hittite-Kaska Relations in Late Bronze Age North-Central Anatolia,” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research, no. 339 (August 2005): 47–65. Jeremy Bentham, The Panopticon Writings, ed. and Introduced by Miran Bozovic (New York, NY: Verso, 1995), 45. Bentham, The Panopticon, 35. Edward S. Casey, The Fate of Place: A Philosophical History (Berkeley: University of California Press), 184. Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison (New York: Vintage Books, 1995), 214. Casey, The Fate, 185. Tony Payan, The Three U.S.—Mexico Border Wars: Drugs, Immigration, and Homeland Security (London: Praeger Security International, 2006), 114. Donovon Wylie, British Watchtowers (Göttingen: Steidl, 2007). Özgen, “Sınır Ticareti,” 1014. Personal interview with Hasan in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. Personal interview with Faysal in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. Personal interview with Faysal in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. Personal interview with Omer in Nisêbîn, in March 2014. Foucault, Discipline and Punish, 33–34. Talal Asad, Formation of the Secular: Christianity, Islam and Modernity (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2003), 104. Turkish Ministry of Interior, Bureau of Border Administration, Border Legislation, the Law no. 3497, the Law of Protection and Security of Territorial Borders, accessed April 15, 2019, http://www. mevzuat.gov.tr/Metin1.Aspx?MevzuatKod=1.5.3497&MevzuatIliski= 0&sourceXmlSearch=&Tur=1&Tertip=5&No=3497. Turkish Ministry of Interior, Border Legislation. Agamben, State. Personal interview with Omer in Nisêbîn, in March 2014. Personal interview with Omer in Nisêbîn, in March 2014. The brushwood is named in Kurdish qir¸sik is commonly collected from the fields and being used to heat the floor furnace for making bread in Nisêbîn and in its vicinity in the plateau. In the settlements and cities

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161. 162.

163. 164. 165.

166. 167. 168.

169.

170. 171. 172.

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like Nisêbîn and Kızıltepe that are located in the plateau which is a very fruitful agricultural region trees are hardly found. That is why brushwood is widely used for heating and the wood is bought from the mountainous region and from the eastern part of the city of Mardin. Personal interview with Alîya in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. There has been a bazaar (a passage of many shops) of smuggled goods named in Kurdish “çar¸sîya qaçaxçîya” (the market of smugglers) until recent decade in Nisêbîn. In all of the border cities and towns, there have been such bazaars which were famous in the local communities. People bought diverse smuggled products (tea, coffee, sugar, tobacco, clothes, fabrics, soap, perfumes, dates, cosmetics, henna, guns, and many other things). Personal interview with Necmettin in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. Personal interview with Ahmed in Nisêbîn, in March 2014. In rural part of the region, people use the plain roofs of their houses as a kind of terrace where they eat, take a rest, and sleep as well because the roofs as open spaces are cooler than the inside of the houses where they did not have air conditioners. Today, many people continue that tradition in spite of existence of air conditioners at their houses. Personal interview with Ahmed in Nisêbîn, in March 2014. Personal interview with Emîna (1932–) in Kerboran/Dargeçit, Mardin, in April 2014. PKK also kidnapped hundreds of children in the Kurdish region and took them to their camps in Syria at the end of 1980s. Kidnaping children and their brainwashing from age of 12–13 to 17–18 would become a regular policy of the PKK until recent years. For more details, see Aras, The Formation of Kurdishness, 90–94. Mark B. Salter, “The Global Visa Regime and the Political Technologies of the International Self: Borders, Bodies, Biopolitics,” Alternatives 31, no. 2 (April–June 2006), 169. Salter, “The Global”. Özgen, “Sınır Ticareti,” 1008–1009. Serif ¸ Demir, “Dünden Bugüne Türkiye’nin Suriye ve Ortado˘gu Politikası” [Turkey’s Policies of Syria and Middle East from Past to the Present], Turkish Studies 6 (3) (Summer 2011): 691–713. http://syb.icisleri.gov.tr/default_B0.aspx?content=384The Web site above was accessed in 2014. Later, the Bureau of Border Administration (Sınır Yünetimi Bürosu) was closed, and its duties were transferred to ˙ a new institution Directorate of General Governorship of Cities (Iller ˙ Idaresi Genel Müdürlü˘gü) in March 20, 2015 which can be accessed via the link below https://www.icisleri.gov.tr/illeridaresi/sinir-yonetimiburosu-illeri-idaresi-bunyesinde-calismalarina-basladi.

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174. 175. 176. 177.

Personal interview with Omer in Nisêbîn, in March 2014. Seno˘ ¸ guz, “Demarcating Kilis,” 202–204. Seno˘ ¸ guz, “Demarcating Kilis,” 173. Özgen, “Sınır Ticareti,” 1014.

CHAPTER 4

The Unmaking

The political borders as exclusive, violent and marginalizing constructions, mechanisms and processes were reacted in diverse ways by the local people whose lives catastrophically changed during and after the construction of border security apparatuses. As representations of hegemony of the state and distinct manifestations of state power on the border, border markers, barbed wires, landmines, watchtowers, fences, gendarmerie stations, soldiers (security guards), gates, and lastly the walls radically shaped, changed, and transformed both the landscape and worlds of the people dwelling in territories which were rendered into frontiers. In this chapter, the ways in which political borders and their different apparatuses influenced lives of local people will be analyzed in light of life stories and testimonies of border people. What do we know of the Turkish-Syrian political border that has been inscribed into the minds and hearts of people and executed on the local culture and places in which people expressed and practiced diverse forms of resistance, resilience, and adaptation? Broadly speaking, political borders given a near sacred meaning by the state were perceived as violent interventions of the state into the lives of the people. During the transformation of political border from an ambiguous, permeable and flexible entity into thick, impenetrable, and deadly mechanism throughout history manufactured various life patterns and practices at the social, cultural, economic, and political levels. In his ethnographic research on Turkish-Iraqi border in the province of Hakkari in the eastern part of country, Ferhat Tekin documents intersectionality of social, cultural, historical, and economic patterns of local © The Author(s) 2020 R. Aras, The Wall, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-45654-2_4

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Kurdish community which was partitioned by the Turkish, Iranian and Iraqi nation-states. Kurdish sociologist Tekin argues how the majority of nation-states impose a particular perception of culture and identity upon citizens through instrumentalization of national territorial political borders. I do agree with Tekin’s view that the political borders not only shape geopolitical landscape but also the minds of people. Based on his observations in the Hakkari borderland, he points to how territorial borders may be ineffective to a large extent and might not have a correspondence on minds and cultures of the local people in that particular region but very much dreadful and bloody.1 In other words, the borders including the landmined zone steadily turn into a battleground between the state actors, agents, and the local people who constantly involved in unmaking practices of the same border. In this chapter, the unmaking practices of the local people will be analyzed in two different categories. The first category consists of diverse acts of illegal border crossings and forms of smuggling that basically target to penetrate the border security zone and reach the other side. The illegal mobility patterns of human subjects across the border between were not only for economic reasons but also for social, cultural, religious, and political reasons as well. For instance, the Naqshbandi order of Khaznavis which emerged from the village of Khazna and then centered in town of Tel-Maruf near the city of Qami¸slo attracted ten thousands of people from the Turkish side for decades. The fact that the Sheik Ahmed Khaznavi (1887–1950) was a native of the Kurdish region in Turkey but living on the Syrian side resulted in legal and illegal border crossings of his followers (murids ) in Turkish side. Later, these mobility patterns of murids continued for his successors after his death.2 Going beyond economic bases of border crossings, the fundamental base of motivation of these murids was the spiritual dynamics, the love of their sheikh for whom they were risking their lives and crossing through landmined zone many times. One of the narratives that popped up during the interviews was that at times, border security guards (soldiers) were tolerant to the murids during their border crossings. The second category of unmaking practices consists of local people’s (men, women, children, and elders) relations, attachments, and detachments to the state implemented security apparatuses such as border markers, barbed wire fences, landmines, forbidden zone, soldiers, border gate, and the recently erected security wall in everyday life, respectively. Despite

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all physical, psychological and ideological maneuvers, strategies and apparatuses of the state activated gradually on the border, local people’s perception of the border diversified from the statist one. They learned how to resist and deal with the border and its all components though at times the costs were high. In this regard, herding in the mined zone, de-mining and selling of mines for profit, collecting the caper,3 collecting grass for their animals, using the mined zone not only as a playing ground but also as a picnic place during the spring were the main activities of the local people. All of these performances of violating laws that prohibits any entrance to the mined security zone were sometimes motivated by economic reasons and also as a result of seeking a place for leisure and entertainment. Although the border security guards were not tolerant of such violations, local people constantly violated the laws and entered the zone despite the high danger. The penetrations of the secured mined zone which soon became routines can be defined and interpreted in two ways, as an act of resistance and challenge against impositions of the state and as an act of despair due to poverty that many times ended in injury, arrest, disability, and loss. The mobility patterns of local people are generally related to the metanarrative of poverty as an explanation for the motivation of smugglers and other border crossers. The narratives of smuggling as an indispensable act were sometimes uttered by smugglers. Nevertheless, this rhetoric seemed to be a legitimizing discourse for their illegal trade rather than an explanation for the real nature of mobility patterns in the region. Yet, as stated earlier, the mobility patterns of local people are based on social, cultural, religious, historical, and economic ties and networks dating back to the pre-Republican era as well. Therefore, as one of the main arguments, it is claimed that fluid and transitional mobility patterns of local people including semi-nomadic lifestyles possess older and deeper histories in relation to the land. Local people’s epistemological and ontological ties to the land were cut, and their memories and local knowledge were troubled with the advent of political borders of new nation-states.

4.1

Local Knowledge and Landscape

One of the crucial aspects of the political borders of modern nationstates was to fabricate and construct the dichotomy of “us” and “them” in which the borders played a great role in the formation of national identity, sense of belonging, and national consciousness (in Turkish milli

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bilinç). At the same time, the political borders were not only operations for national security, integrity, and economic sustainability, they were also implemented in the process of crystallizing the official cartographic imagination. During this labor, the land and places were renamed and reimagined within statist discourses and ordinary citizens were expected to acknowledge and favor these new vocabularies, perceptions, and imaginations. As one of the fundamental aspirations of the Turkish nation-state project, Turkification (Türkle¸stirme) and thus homogenization of all population residing within the territorial political borders was ultimate goal of Kemalist regime. In way of achieving this mission, political borders served the role of assimilation and integration during which they were expected to prevent any kind of infiltration and shield all kinds of ideological or religious entities aiming to breach the newly created Turkish Kemalist secular domain. How then, do local people living on the margins of the state, the discontents of the Kemalist secular regime, responded this statesponsored engineering project and its diverse vocabularies and discourses? The question of partitioned communities by the territorial political borders in different parts of the world has been taken into consideration by many anthropologists and other scholars. In their alike arguments, many explore how these communities retained their ties. In general, societies with a shared history, language, religion (sect), ethnicity, land, sociocultural, and economic life patterns but separated by political borders resist and struggle in maintaining those ties. As it can be seen in the case of Kurds, researchers have addressed to the cases of Flanders, Catalans, Basques, Northern Irelanders, and many other separated ethnic groups and their persistence of diverse forms of ties with their kin communities residing on the other side of the borders that ambiguates borders and transform them into permeable apparatuses.4 As a result, local knowledge, perception, and memories were continuously reproduced and transferred from one generation to the other. In the Kurdish case on the Turkish-Syrian border, kin, tribal, and religious ties appear as the most remarkable connections with the other side of the border in addition to the ethnic (Kurdish) identity in a larger context. In this research, the collected ethnographic data documents diversifying cartographic imagination, perception, and memory of local people about the land and place contrary to the state projected one. The living places of relatives, tribal, and religious communities are dominant markers in their cartographic imagination rather that state imposed boundaries. In

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this context, Michiel Baud and Willem van Schendel eloquently explain that; National borders are political constructs, imagined projections of territorial power. Although they appear on maps in deceptively precise forms, they reflect, at least initially, merely the mental images of politicians, lawyers, and intellectuals. Their practical consequences are often quite different. No matter how clearly borders are drawn on official maps, how many customs officials are appointed, or how many watchtowers are built, people will ignore borders whenever it suits them. In doing so, they challenge the political status quo of which borders are the ultimate symbol.5

The indications address by Baud and Schendel clearly re-documented by Tekin’s work on Hakkari border region. In his particular research at the border town of Derecik in Hakkari at the Turkish-Iraqi border, Tekin describes how members of the partitioned Kurdish Gerdî tribe, half residing on the Turkish side and the other half residing in the Iraqi side, narrate their trouble and struggle that continues for decades. One of his interlocutors narrates: We are relatives living in the other side of the border, we are from the same tribe. There was not something called border here 80-90 years ego. Brits [British colonial power] came and they separated us for the sake of their interest. Some of us remained in this side (Turkey) and some of us remained in the other side (Iraq). However, we did not diverge, we continued to keep our ties and still visit each other. First of all, we are kin with people in the other side. Our traditions, customs, culture is the same. We intermarry with each other. We feel closer to the other side comparing with Yüksekova and Hakkari [neighboring cities in the Turkish side] …6

In the flowing parts, Tekin documents how the Kurdish Gerdî and Herkî tribes who reside on both sides of border resolved their disputes and disagreements between their members under the guidance of leading tribal figures. In other words, the committee consisting of elders within the tribes was operating as a court mechanism until recently. Rather than referring to official state courts, local people favored the decisionmaking authorities of their tribes which were located on the Iraqi side.7 The ethnographic researches on the Turkish eastern and southern border which are the Kurdish inhabited territories clearly indicate how the nation-states (Turkey, Iran, Iraq, and Syria) constructed dichotomy of

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“us” and “them” which has not sustained as these nation-states have anticipated. They also display how the state policies of marginalization of their “half” living in Iraqi side as the unwanted “the other” were destined to fail. Similar to the narratives of local people as indicated above, other oral narrative genres such as the recital songs and laments performed by dengbêjan (oral performers) address to the local knowledge and perception of Kurdish people about political borders. They express how political borders are turned into ambiguous constructions during continuous unmaking practices of local people. In their investigation on the ways in which the borders and the state were seen and described by the Kurdish singerpoets, Wendelmoet Hamelink and Hanefi Barı¸s argue that; The songs demonstrate that many Kurds perceived the political geography of the state they officially belonged to as foreign and not as a legitimate part of Kurdish socio- political reality. The Kurdish political geography created in the songs exists in small-scale local structures and alliances, and there is mostly no reference to a common Kurdish cause. Borders are presented as foreign interference in the Kurdish landscape.8

In their analysis of songs (kilams ), Hamelink and Barı¸s state that “the place names and physical marks in the landscape,” in the local geography, are mentioned during the performance and the audience is provided a cartographic imagination of Kurdish lands that totally negates the official one imposed by the nation-states.9 As this research indicated, oral traditions and narrative genres (legends, stories, songs, laments, jokes, lullabies, etc.) in the Kurdish oral culture also confirm the existence and continuation of Kurdish cartographic imagination, perception, and memory of their land (geography) which date back to the pre-Republican period. These studies have also indicated the prevailing roles of kin, religion, history, memory, and culture in shaping one’s perception of the land and geography and how that counter-narrative and perception could surpass ones imposed by the state. In his philosophical arguments on the notion of place, Edward Casey explores the issue of mastering the matrix where he describes the matrix as “a place or medium in which something is bred, produced, or developed” and “a place or point of origin and growth.”10 Following Casey’s arguments, we born into a place, a geography which is dominated by kin, tribal structures, religion, and other social, cultural, economic, and political conditions that shape our sense of belonging, identity, life patterns, and perceptions.

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In the case of Nisêbîn borderland, similar arguments can be developed due to distinctiveness of local people’s understanding, memory and discourses of the land, place, and the political border. It has been observed that local people have developed their own narratives, descriptions, and tactics of resistance during the state making of the border. The diversifying and distinct patterns were more implicit and prevalent particularly in the memories and narratives of the elders. The boundaries of the map in the minds and memories of my interlocutors were determined by their kin (tribal), ethnic (Kurdish), religious (tariqa) affiliations, and economic relations and networks rather than the official narratives of the state based on Turkish ethnicity, language, and history. For instance, when recalling an event that took place in the other side or about someone residing on the other side in the early decades—before the 1950s—they commonly addressed the place by using the concept of “neighboring village” or “the village of X or W” as opposed to the words “Syria” (Surî) or “Syrian state” (devleta Surî). However, the use of the words of “Surî” (Syria) or “devleta Surî” (the Syrian state) and “Tirkî” (Turkey) or “devleta Tirkî” (the Turkish state) was multiplying while talking about the later decades that coincide with the period of amplification of security measures on the border. These diversifying local perceptions of both nation-states can be also read as signs of locals’ sense of belonging to their land as a legacy of their ancestors rather the modern nation-state itself. Furthermore, their discourses signify how border people distance themselves from the state as an epistemological, ontological, and political entity in a larger base. In the context of local knowledge of the border, it is interesting to observe the use of the word xet which means “the line” in Kurdish in naming the border rather than using the other word “hudud” (border) or “sînor” (Kurdish accent of the Turkish word sınır as border). In spite of the fact that all interviews were conducted in Kurmanci dialect of Kurdish except one in Turkish, people did not prefer the word “hudud” (border) then mostly used the word xet. In their stories and narratives, the Syrian side was named as binxet (down the line) and the Turkish side was named as serxet (up the line) by people. While narrating their stories of smuggling, former smugglers, carriers, and guides (rêzanan) talked of border crossings, carrying goods and guiding people to cross the other side, generally with the local vocabularies. They were frequently used expressions such as “me wan serxet dikir” (we were taking them to up to the line) or “me wan binxet dikir” (we were taking them down the line). One of the other notable expressions was “min li xetê da” (I hit the line) or “me li

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xetê da” (we hit the line) in which the line is perceived as an entity to be breached or penetrated. Similar to Tekin’s arguments in the case of border region of Hakkari which mentioned earlier, people of Nisêbîn also feel close and attached to the people (relatives, friends, neighbors, etc.) living in the Syrian side. Needless to say, kinship (including tribal ties) and religion (same affiliations to the same religious order—tariqa) play a great role in continuation of that proximity which invalidated the constraints of the political borders to a certain extent. Despite the Turkish nation-state’s policy of renaming the settlements (villages, towns, counties, cities), places (squares, streets, districts, etc.), landscapes (mountains, rivers, etc.) in its Turkification period in which all non-Turkish (Kurdish, Armenian, Assyrian, and Arabic) names were erased and replaced with Turkish ones. However, what the state officials anticipated did not happen at the local level that much and in the most cases people continue to use the former (original) names in everyday life. The use of official one by local people only took place during official procedures and at the official places such as schools, hospitals, and other governmental institutions.

4.2

Border Crossings

Crossing the border for various reasons is the most recurrent mobility pattern in the border region. The frequency of that mobility pattern varies depending on the climate (season), the level of the security measures and the possibility of forming a good network with inclusion of army members or other state officials at the customs. In additions to (il)legal trade and smuggling, daily visits of relatives on both sides for diverse reasons; eids, traditional festivals, husbandry in both sides, marriages and abduction of girls, taking refuge, and other forms of migration were other forms of mobility of people residing on borderlands of both states. Although the intensity of mobility of people was very high in the early decades on the border, it saw a steady decrease particularly after the mid-1950s when the landmines were implemented. The study of the history of the Turkish-Syrian border—which was agreed in Ankara Treaty in 1921, confirmed at the treaty of Lausanne in 1923 and fixed in 1939 when Hatay joined Turkey—discloses also stories of migration of different ethno-religious groups. Migration stories of Armenian groups after during and after 1915, Assyrian/Syriac and Kurdish families, and also Jewish families after 1948 were counted in different

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ways during the interviews. According to narratives, many Armenian individuals and families who survived after 1915 took refuge in Syrian side. Similar stories were narrated about Assyrian/Syriac (in Turkish Süryani) families and politically oppositional Kurds like intellectuals, imams, and sheiks who escaped to the Syrian side during the single-party regime from 1923 to 1950. The fact that non-Muslim communities were not treated well that much after 1915 accelerated that mobility pattern and forced people to seek new places to continue their lives. In other words, Syrian border was an opening gate to the other parts of the world for many people who did not want to live in Turkey. Contrary to the flow of human subjects toward Syria from Turkey in the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s, people also began to observe the flow of Syrian Jewish families after 1948 to Turkish side. According to some of my interlocutors, Jewish families living in Syria and in Nisêbîn start to migrate to occupied Palestinian lands, to Israel, in later periods. The Syrian Jews were crossing the border and coming to Nisêbîn and from there to Mersin, the coastal Turkish city at the Mediterranean coast. They were migrating to Israel by sea road from Mersin. During the interviews, some of the elders talked about Nisêbînian Jews who lived in the town until 1950s. Concerning the ancient history of Jewish community in Nisêbîn which dates back to the first century, it is claimed that “at the close of the 19th century, according to Obermayer, there were approximately 200 miserable clay houses in the town, half of which belonged to Jews.”11 It has been claimed that the Arab-Israeli war in 1967 boosted the legal and illegal border crossings of Jewish migrants through Nisêbîn to Israel and other parts of the world. While talking about the Jewish people and those few families remaining in Nisêbîn in the 1960s with Alîya and her son Hesan who was in his late 40s, a confusion about the name of Jews popped up between Hesan and his mother. Hesan mentioned one family and said; “Mala Gurcê Yahudî bû” (Gurcê family was Yehuda), but Alîya hesitantly replied “Ma ewna ne cihû bûn?” (Weren’t they Jew?).12 Then, her son Hesan got angry and said; “Yadê, Yahudî Cihûne” (Mom, Yehuda means Jew).13 Later, they hardly remember the story of that Jewish family who migrated to Mersin in the early 1970s. In these narratives, Qami¸slo (Syria)-Nisêbîn-Mersin-Israel route was mentioned as a migration path of Jewish migrants. The history of border also uncovers various stories of marriages and abduction of girls between diverse ethno-religious communities (Kurdish, Armenian, Assyrian, and Arab) living in both sides. Marriages were

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another way for local people to keep strong ties and maintain good relations with relatives living in different sides. As a result, cross-border marriages became another form of violating the political border. As it was seen among Muslims communities, Christian communities residing in both sides were also doing cross-border marriages. Alîya remembered one of those events. She narrated the story of a Christian bride who was traveling from Midyat, Mardin and going to Qami¸slo, the other side of the border. While we were sitting in front of Alîya’s house on chairs and watching the city of Qami¸slo which was a few hundred meters away from us, she became emotional and narrated: There was a bride with a group of people and they were heading the other side through landmined zone. There was a disgraceful lieutenant. The girl was very beautiful and he abducted her. He dragged her to behind that small hill, you see over there close to that dark spot [she pointed with her finger and tried to show me a point that was seen from our vantage point] and, excuse me, raped her. Then, he killed her… She was weeping the whole night till she died. Poor girl, the whole night she cried. She was wailing and saying “yumaaa, yumaaa…” Later, her father came and made a complain about that lieutenant at the battalion. Many things happened due do that event…14

To this day, Alîya’s house remains next to the border zone. It was why she was witnessed many horrible events that were going on at the border zone. Later, Alîya remembered other details from this event and mentioned that the relatives of the bride gave certain amount of money as bribe to that lieutenant in order to help them for crossing the border. According to the story, the bribe was given and the bride was supposed to cross the border without any problem. However, it is said that the beauty of the girl altered the mind of the lieutenant and that was why he lusted after her. The bride’s relatives and the guide with them had a big fight and struggle to prevent, but they say they could not stop him. The guide was injured during the fight with that rapist lieutenant. According to the story, the Christian community of Midyat made a complain about him, he was charged at the court and then sent to exile from Nisêbîn.15 Naîma was also one of those girls married someone from the Syrian side of the border in 1941 or 1942. According to her story, it was an arranged marriage and actually she did not want to although her husband was very nice to her. In her late 80s, Naîma talked of her marriage as a kind of state of living in exile due to the fact that she did not want to

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live away from the rest of her family. She talked how she escaped many times to the Turkish side to see her family which stopped after having her first and second child. The most supportive person around her was her mother-in-law who was an Armenian woman originally from Bursa, Turkey and was kidnapped and forced to convert to Islam by her Muslim Kurdish husband. According to her mother-in-law, she was a woman with two kids who lost her husband and other family members during the deportations of Armenians from Bursa to Syria during the events of 1915 to the other Ottoman lands of the time. Her two kids were taken from her and she was forced to marry that Kurdish man, the father-in-law of Naîma.16 Naima stated how actually she was visited many times by her family members every year. During one of these visits, her younger sister Emîna talked about what happened her when she was returning home, serxet (Turkey). She was commended to a group of people consisting of Muslims and Christians returning Turkey in the late 1940s. Emîna narrated: We were very close to the border. Those tall border markers were in sight. It was nearly sunset. We had a break in one of the villages close to the border before crossing the border. I was commended to Necmê, the wife of our Christian neighbor Gorgîs in Kerboran (Dargeçit). While crossing the border, three men with guns from binxet (down the line, from Syrian side) approached us. They pointed me and asked Necmê “give this girl”. I started to scream and cry. Necmê hold my hands and she said them “I swear on the bible of Jesus and on the blood of Messiah, you have to kill me before taking her!” Meanwhile, some of the people who were working in their field around heard our voices and screams. They approached us and condemned those men and said “how could you do such a thing!” Then, we started to run towards serxet (up the line, the Turkish side of the border line). There was a sheep herd being grazed on the border going toward the Turkish side. We stayed with the sheep herd and started to walk on our knees. When we passed the border line, we got up and continue to walk. That night, we stayed in the house of one of the relatives in one of the border villages. Next day, we continue to walk till we arrive in Midyatê…17

Stories similar to Emina’s indicate diverse motivations behind border crossings in the region. As it is seen in this story and other stories, people living at the interior parts of the region, outside of the borderland, were also traveling across border.

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Another form of border crossing was abduction of girls by their lovers with or without consent of the girls. Taking refuge at the other side of the border—whether escaping from Syrian side to Turkish side or vice versa—was commonly seen strategy of both lovers and abductors. The lovers who could not get an approval for their marriage escaped to the other side of the border. In other cases, many girls were abducted without their consent to the other side as well. While the stories of escaping lovers and abducted girls through the mined zone were widely narrated among local community, these events also appeared in national newspapers when escapes ended in misfortune. For instance, the news of two lovers who were escaping from Syrian side to the Turkish side was reported on January 27, 1961, on the pages of Milliyet as one of the mainstream national newspapers in the country. It states “Two lovers could not pass through mined field. The girl died immediately and the boy is severely injured.” The details of the news are provided below: One young girl died next to her lover due to explosion of landmine. 25year-old Kato Aslan from the village of Kolikan (Syria) and 19 years-old his lover from the village of Telhat (Syria) were escaping to Turkey. However, they strayed away and stepped on a landmine. As a result of the explosion, the man was seriously wounded and the girl died.18

Similar to the case of lovers and abducted girls, both sides of the border were seen and used a refuge for many oppositional religious figures, political activists and criminals in the later periods as well. Anyone having a serious problem with a neighbor, tribal mechanism or the state would take refuge in the other side of the border and thus contributing the fluidity and intensity of mobility patterns across the border. In the early years of the Republic, the Syrian side under the French mandate was a place of escape for Kurdish feudal leaders and sheikhs who supported the Kurdish political movement of Sheik Said in 1925. As a result of prohibition of Sufi lodges and the madrasa education system in the early years of the Republic, various Sufi (tariqa) leaders crossed the other side of the border.19 During the Kurdish rebellions in the 1920s, and in the 1930s, many supporters escaped to the other side of the Turkish borders and took refuge in Iran, Iraq, and Syria when the rebellions were violently suppressed by the Turkish state forces. These patterns of political mobility were intensified after the eruption of the armed conflicts between the PKK and the Turkish forces in 1984.20 The fact that these people had

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relatives and friends in both sides of the border facilitated these escapes as well. During the fieldwork, many interlocutors talked about individuals and families who escaped to the other side and did not come back to Turkey. They started a new life among relatives in the Syrian side of the border. It is why there are thousands of Kurds who are actually Turkish citizens but living in Syria. While some of these people managed to guarantee their dual-citizenship in the later periods, some were left neither Turkish citizenship nor Syrian citizenship until recent years. The life story of convict and political prisoner Koçero that appeared on Milliyet newspaper in November in 1962 can be illustrated as one of the examples of these ongoing events on the border region. Like many other convicts and political prisoners, his case grew unresolvable between Turkish and Syrian border security authorities. It is stated in the newspaper that: Koçero who murdered the housekeeper at the town of Silvan at the Diyarbakır province in 1953 escaped to the mountains to hide. He had armed conflicts many times with soldiers who tried to capture him. During these conflicts, he killed one sergeant and injured another one. It has been recognized that the bandit was involving in political activities and thus was honored as lieutenant by Barzani.21

In the news, Turkish state authorities announced his escape to the Syrian side and therefore requested his capture by Syrian authorities. This case illustrates how the Kurdish nationalist movement led by Mullah Mustafa Barzanî in Iraq became more influential in other Kurdish regions in Iran, Syria, and Turkey where mobility and interactions of supporters augmented across the borders of these nation-states. In addition to cross-border political mobility patterns of Kurdish subjects, daily visits for diverse reasons including condolence, engagement, wedding, and visitation were other forms of border crossings which gradually became very difficult to practice during hardening security measures on the border. While the state authorities recoded all these kinds of border crossings as “illegal” acts and violations of law by declarations of new legislations, local people saw it as their natural rights. Diversifying and counter local perception of the land and border was one of the main reasons for the continuation of these mobility patterns despite their deadly consequences. One might ask why people did not prefer to use the pasavan and passports and pass through the border gate (customs) legally and

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instead preferred the “illegal” ways? The first answer would be that the use of the border gate was not seen as an efficient way due to its timely limits and distance. People were more willing to cross the border whenever and wherever they want instead of traveling to the Nisêbîn city center to pass through border gate within determined working hours. They were using the paths on the border that were close to their routes and villages. Secondly, it was not easy to get a pasavan and a passport for many ordinary people living in the border region. This required certain payments and travels to the centers like Mardin, Gaziantep, or capital city Ankara to get a passport and the majority of people were unable to afford those requirements and conditions. Thirdly, people were not allowed to pass and trade the goods as their liberty. There were limits, regulations, and laws for the kinds and amounts of the products allowed to pass through customs. This third factor seems to be the most influential one for local people’s preference of not using the border gate, customs and thus resulting in augmentation of smuggling as the most dominant and widely seen practice on the border. 4.2.1

Smuggling

“Bi mayînan re mirin hat…” (The death came with mines…) Seyîd Mihemed

What is smuggling? How and when do an act or job gain the status of illegality? Who is being described as smuggler? What are the main characteristics of a smuggler? Why do people smuggle in spite of high possibility of mortal consequences, disability, torture, and incarceration in this task? During the process of militarization and bureaucratization of borders, small-scale trade patterns of local people and large-scale forms of smuggling are seen as daily practiced phenomenon at almost all borders around the world. As it is stated in the literature on border trade and smuggling, the “border trade through customs” is defined as legal act and any other forms of trade or mobility of goods across the border is described as illegal and thereby “smuggling.” In a general definition, “trade is the legal and smuggling is the illegal means of moving items from one side of the border to the other.”22 On the other hand, it should be noted that “the phenomenon of cross-border small-scale trade and smuggling are

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very multi-faceted. This is reflected in their different labeling, e.g. ‘contraband’, ‘suitcase trade’, ‘shuttle trade’, or ‘trading tourism’. Despite the diversity of cross-border small-scale trade/smuggling and its wide dispersion, not only in Europe, its reception within social sciences is relatively low.”23 In short, legality and illegality are state-made constructions determined and practices through certain laws and regulations and then are imposed through border management and control. Michiel Baud and Willem van Schendel have eloquently described the act of smuggling and stated that “smuggling is a typical economic activity on the border in which the political and the economic come together. It develops whenever a state tries to impose restrictions on border trade that are not acceptable to (some of) those living in the borderland and that cannot be enforced.”24 In this context, border regulations and management policies in Nisêbîn border region show how state authorities have tried to control and secure the region through diverse assimilative recoding, renaming and re-determining relations, mobility patterns, and trade networks and the landscape which resonate colonialist policies elsewhere. Any form of relations and acts that were not within the frame of official declarations were announced as “qeçax” (fugitive, illegal) and the action was named as “qeçaxî” (smuggling). It is interesting that local people were also using the same word—pronounced in Kurdish as qeçaxî—for their cross-border labor, trade. Although this concept is not visible in the narratives of elders on the early decades of history of the border, the use of the word qeçaxî is frequently seen in the narratives related to later periods, particularly after 1950s. In other words, the official statist discourse of renaming acts of border crossings is dominating the local discourses and narratives through time. In the common Kurdish narrative, the concept of qeça˘gî is used for both illegal trade, smuggling and also for any form of border crossings. For instance, the saying “ez çûme rexêdî bi qeçaxî” (I went to other side illegally) in the cases of border crossings is often expressed. In the case of illegal trade and smuggling as a job the saying “ew qeçaxî dikê” (he is doing smuggling) is pronounced. The life stories and narratives of border people indicate that the era of illegality or smuggling mostly began after the implementation of landmines, barbed wires, watchtowers, gendarmerie stations, and border gates that were initiated steadily starting in the mid-1950s. Who were the smugglers? What do we know about the general profiles of the people involved in this job that has fatal consequences? As stated by other researchers, “smuggling always involves some members of

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borderland society and, depending on its profitability, often state officials and nonlocal entrepreneurs as well.”25 According to many of my interlocutors, the majority of people smuggling were poor, lower-middle or middle class people in spite of the fact that many times the owners of the large load of goods were wealthy people. In general, wealthy people were doing other businesses (agriculture, livestock, legal trade, etc.) and not doing smuggling due to catastrophic results of that business. However, sometimes they were also doing illegal trade/smuggling by hiring certain men and therefore being involved (in)directly. In the labor or job of smuggling there were different tasks done by different individuals. In this network, the first group of people were carriers (hemalan) who hailed poor families. The age of carriers could be from 11–12 to 50 or 60 but mostly men. The payment to carriers was determined within the market of smugglers and varying according to difficulty of conditions (the route, the number of goods, etc.). In general, carriers were piggybacking all goods at one point in the Syrian side and carrying them across the border on foot or with mules to a certain point in the Turkish side according to agreements with the directions of guides. At that point, all goods were loaded on a vehicle (car, tractor, truck, etc.), taken to a store or someone’s house and later to the bazaar of smugglers or to the bazaars in neighboring towns and cities. The second group of people whose number was less were route guides (rêzanan) who were generally experienced, wise, handyman, and experts of mines as well. The route guides were respected figure in the local community and having higher status comparing to carriers. However, one person could be both a carrier and guide at the same time and it seems that all guides involved in this labor as carriers first but later shifted to the status of a guide. The history of Turkish-Syrian border in light of local narratives and testimonies document the evolving of various businesses networks in the region. As was stated earlier, people take advantage of the political borders in diverse ways and the borders provide new opportunities and sources of income for local people in spite of its all catastrophic impacts. In other words, the former networks of labor and mobility are being more complicated throughout incorporation of new economic relations, institutions, actors, and statuses in the border region. In her ethnographic researches on political borders in Turkey where she addresses the economic structures of borders with an emphasis on the class issue, Ne¸se Özgen asserts that “it is very crucial to examine what is transferred and when it is transferred across the border.” She claims that:

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It will be possible to see when the ethnic ties with the other side were replaced with economic ties; how the feudal relations were supported by economic bourgeois in the local region; what kind of goods were transferred most and at which part of the border these transfers occurred; how the relations between both neighboring countries influenced the local dynamics of local trade at the border and how the border creates such an economic accumulation.26

As stated earlier, although different aspects of the legal and illegal border trade (smuggling) on Turkish political borders have been addressed by various scholars with different background in social sciences, the social and cultural aspects of the border issue have been neglected. One of the fundamental factors that make the act of smuggling as the most powerful one is the fact that it is conducted by a large number of people with different ages, gender, ethnicity, class, and religious background for a long time and at the all Turkish border zones. For this concern, as the most influential unmaking practice of political border, the labor of smuggling is scrutinized in this work with three main standpoints. First of all, I will try to respond the question of how phenomenon of smuggling emerged as one of the fundamental signifiers in the process of formation of identity and subjectivity of male individuals. How did it transform into a ritual within family circles and in the larger local community? Secondly, I will analyze how this dangerous and complicated job was being carried out through construction of assured networks. In the last part, I will focus on three phenomena, the emotion of fear, death and the perception of fate or destiny (qader) that powerfully came to surface while listening many stories of smuggling. The relations between these widespread phenomena will be analyzed in light of testimonies and personal narratives of survivors, former smugglers, and their family members. 4.2.2

Rite of Passage

“Ez weke serkarê qeçaxçîyan Mehmûdê Zêro bûm…” (I was like the king of smugglers, Mehmûdê Zêro…) Seyîd Mihemed

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Is there a relationship between the status of being a smuggler and phenomenon of manhood to whom adjectives like bravery, honesty, trustiness, and virility are attached? Is it possible to define smuggling as a prestige obtaining practice and job that is mostly practiced by men? In other words, can the phenomenon of smuggling be described as a rite of passage 27 among people in border communities? Anthropologists, folklorist, and ethnographers who conducted research in different parts of the world tried to define diverse cultural forms, patterns, symbols, and rituals related to birth, circumcision, adolescence, marriage, pregnancy, graduation, pilgrimage, funerals, death, and many other ceremonies in order to understand, describe, and analyze these communities and their cultures. Arnold van Gennep’s distinctive work on rituals had great impact on anthropological scholarship where he divides the rites of passage into three stages and describes them as “life-crisis” rituals. He affirms that “I propose to call the rites of separation from a previous world, preliminal rites, those executed during the transitional stage liminal (or threshold) rites, and the ceremonies of incorporation into the new world postliminal rites.”28 Later, anthropologist Victor Turner borrowed the concept and utilized it in his work on pilgrimage rituals in different religions. By coining the concept of “communitas,” Turner argues that: Although van Gennep himself seems to have intended that his term ‘rite of passage’ should be used both for rituals accompanying an individual’s or a cohort of individual’s change in social status, and for those associated with seasonal changes for an entire society…He distinguishes three phases in a rite of passage: separation, transition, and incorporation… The first phase of separation clearly demarcates sacred space and time from profane or secular space and time… During the intervening phase of transition, the ritual subjects pass through a period and area of ambiguity, a sort of social limbo which has few of the attributes of either the preceding or subsequent profane social statutes (rule) or cultural states…The third phase called by van Gennep, ‘reaggregation’ or ‘incorporation’ includes symbolic phenomena and actions which represent the return of the subjects to their new, relatively stable, well-defined position in the total society.29

While writing on the territorial passage, van Gennep argues that “the prohibition against entering a given territory is therefore intrinsically magico-religious.” Following van Gennep’s theoretical arguments, it can be argued that the mined zone along with the borderline as a prohibited territory is being challenged by the smugglers. The idea of interpreting

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the act of smuggling as a kind of rite of passage came to my mind when I recognized that almost all male children of every single family in the border region were kind of encouraged to involve in smuggling. All of the former smugglers that I interviewed talked of their journey that started at the ages of 12, 13, or 14. Former smugglers and other interlocutors’ statements about how adolescent boys involved in smuggling one way or another were strong indications of ceremonial aspect of the act or job of smuggling in the local community. One of the most fundamental proofs of this was the fact that almost in every family there at least one person who died, disabled, or survived in the business of smuggling whether as a carrier, guide owner of goods or border crosser for evident motives. As a well-known reality in the region, the majority of members of the community—both male and female—at least once crossed the border legally or illegally for certain reasons. Smuggling appears as a way of living for men with a great emphasis on its masculine, dangerous and rebellious nature despite the existence of few women smugglers as well. In this context, smuggling can be interpreted as a space in which masculinities and femininities are being constructed and reshaped in the local community. In general, smuggling was described as a manly job due to interactions with soldiers and high risk of detention, torture, incarceration, and death. The dangerous nature of the job was an additional reason for exclusion of women in doing smuggling. Besides, the physical difficulties—concerning carrying of heavy goods for a long distance—and geographical circumstances were other stated reasons for exclusion of female subjects. While concerning the status of Muslim women in the Muslim society in connection to mahremiyet (intimacy) and traveling alone, the mainstream religious authorities have argued that a Muslim woman should not travel alone without accompany of a male member of her family such as husband, father, brother, or son.30 Although there are counter arguments from other religious authorities who give consent for traveling alone, the common faith in the region that women should not travel alone without a related man can be also seen as another factor that deterred women’s involvement in smuggling. What was the exact age for starting smuggling? When we examine the life stories and personal accounts of former smugglers and other family members, it appears that starting period for this job often began at the age 12 to the early 20s. Many narrated how they started after completion of their obligatory army service that starts at the age of 19 and ends in

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one or two years depending on the regulations of obligatory army service that varies in different time periods in Turkey. Stories of smuggling and border strongly indicate how smuggling was seen as a kind of test that measured the strength, patience, loyalty and courage of a person in the border region. Generally, 12–14 years old boys as carriers were passing through landmined zone and crossing the other side of the border by escorting older smugglers. While the consent for initiation of smuggling was given by the parents in general, there were many cases of involvement without consent from the family as well since being a smuggler was seen as a high status and the most challenging contest among youth. The most visible proofs of that perception were observed during the interviews and analysis of transcriptions. In the local discourses on smuggling, statements like “the best smuggler was X,” “the best guide (rêzan) was Z,” “I or he was like the King (Shah) of smugglers, Omer!”, “he was a very nimble and skillful smuggler!”, “the best master of mines was Y,” “nobody could reach his speed!”, and “I was one of the best smugglers!” were strong signs of rivalry, passion, jealousy, and enmity among smugglers. The tea houses were the main places where smugglers (carriers, guides, owners of goods, mine experts, etc.) met and shared their experiences both implicitly and explicitly. Meanwhile, these discourses imply the value of smuggling as a prestige and good status gaining practice in the local community. The fact that boys curiously listened to the bravery stories of smugglers in family settings many times during days and nights from their parents and guests can be interpreted as a psychological process of affinity for smuggling as a job. Seventy-two-year-old former smuggler Naîf talked about his journey of becoming a smuggler at the age of 15 or 16. He recalled about the nights during which how his smuggler father and his smuggler friends talked about events on the border and smuggling. Sometimes, these smugglers slept over in their house. He remembers himself sitting in a corner away from their sight in the living room secretly listening their stories. Later, when his father gets older, his older brother substitutes. He talked about how he joined smugglers at a young age as a carrier in early 1950s and emphasized the difficulty of carrying the bar (load). However, Naîf did not forget to point out how he also became one of the well-known smugglers and guides in the region in the later periods. The widely circulated narratives and legendary stories of smugglers in the local community were kind of promoting this illegal act and job and psychologically preparing those children with wondering eyes for a similar

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fate. Silêman, whose grandfather and father were both smugglers, recalled how he also started to involve in smuggling at the age of ten. The life story of Silêman documents how smuggling has become a culture and way of life in the borderlands.31 While interviewing former smuggler Yusiv and his 84 years old father who was also a smuggler before, Yusiv narrated how he started to work with his father at the age of 10 or 12. He also talked about his marriage story and how he married to the daughter of one of the famous smugglers from Kurtalan in Batman province which actually a little far from the border. He narrated some stories of famous smugglers: There were armed conflicts between smugglers and soldiers. For instance, I remember, it was 1969, my father-in-law who would later become my father-in-law. He was called Xalidê Mala Hesanka (Xalid from the Hesan Family). They were from Kurtalan. They were very famous smugglers. Soldiers also knew about their fame. Even, they say soldiers were afraid of them. They were crossing the border from here. They were horsemen with guns. They were generally smuggling (trading) sheep. They were crossing herds in which the number of sheep varied from 500 to 1500. They were selling them in binxete (down the line, at the other side of the border). They scarred the soldiers with their brutal force.32

The process of gaining of smuggler status consists of certain stages and ritual-like manners which can be defined as a rite to passage for manhood among border communities. For young volunteer and recruited individuals, the time they start off is not only the rite of separation from home and family but also from their world of childhood and innocence. They enter into an illegal territory, a death zone, no-man’s-land which is ruled by the state of exception where the law is lifted. While separating from existing social body and world in becoming future smugglers, they know that they might either step on a mine and die brutally or be shot by soldiers in that deadly zone. After entering the forbidden dangerous territories, newly recruited smuggler passes through transitional stage, the threshold, where he is cut off from his social and family interactions. This reminds us Michael Taussig’s argument on “space of death” where he claims that “space of death is important in the creation of meaning and consciousness, nowhere more so than in societies where torture is endemic and where the culture of terror flourishes. We may think of the space of death as a threshold that allows for illumination as well as extinction. Sometimes a person goes through it and returns to us, to tell the tale.”33

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In the other side of the border during which the person gains a status of fugitive and illegal trans-passer in a foreign territory with no records and papers that he left in his previous world. The fact that smugglers always prefer to cross the border during the dark nights reinforce ontological ambiguity and hiddenness of the smuggler who could find himself in the middle of nowhere, unknown territories. This reminds Turner’s statement that “in many societies the liminal intiands are often considered to be dark, invisible, like the sun or moon in eclipse or the moon between phases, at the ‘dark of the moon’; they are stripped of names and clothing, smeared with the common earth rendered indistinguishable from animals.”34 In this liminal stage, the young individual’s preliminal status is destroyed and a new status is gained. Sometimes, smugglers are not able to return in time according to their schedule due to security measures on the border and in these kinds of situations they are stranded in the Syrian side for days and weeks which results in extension of liminal period. This status of confinement can be interpreted as a “state of being lost” or “being locked” in the liminal period. The young smuggler passes the first test by crossing the border but he has to repeat that test by taking same risks in return to home, the Turkish side. When the security conditions become available, the smugglers follow similar paths and return home. The last phase is incorporation during which young individual return with a new position in his community as new smuggler. The valued of the act of smuggling as a rite of passage from puberty to maturity in the local community can be seen as one of the major promoting factors in the process of continuance of smuggling as a widely performed act and job alongside its fostering networks in the local community. The discourses, experiences, and perceptions of former smugglers reveal how being a good smuggler became the expectation of many parents for their sons who entered the stage of puberty. Because, this stage was also understood as a process of becoming a man who could earn a livelihood, afford forming a family and thus marry. For achieving this, boys took huge risks in that bravery test that could result in disability, torture, arrest, incarceration, and a bad death. The boys, young smugglers, who passed successfully through all stages in the rite passage enjoyed respect which demonstrates their ability as men able to marry as well. However, sometimes, being smugglers could totally destroy the future plans of these men for marriage. It has been also narrated how some young wives of smugglers tried to change the minds of their husbands

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and turn them from smuggling due to its dangerous and mortal character. For sure, being widowed with or without children was not something any young women would want. That was why many young smugglers quit this job and started a new one whether in Nisêbîn area or in the other parts of the country. In this context, some former smugglers laughed while talking about their numerous quarrels and disagreements with their wives during those years. One of the most repeated deterrent discourse of women whether the wife or the mother of the smugglers was “ez haqê xwe lite helal nakim eger tu herê qeçaxîyê” (I will not give my blessings to you if you go for smuggling, or I will not forgive you if you smuggle). For some women, smugglers were adventurous figures rather than a settled one who cares for his wife and children and unadventurous. Therefore, it was stated how young girls endured difficulty of making their choices between marrying to a smuggler or marrying to a man with a stable and more secure job. Overall, smuggling can be defined not only as an act or job but also as a way of life that has been transferred as a kind of learned ritual from one generation to the other until recent years. Beyond its economic base, smuggling should be understood as psychological process and personal transformation with its social and cultural aspects. As a rite of passage to manhood, smuggling is not only a way of earning one’s livelihood, but also a way of gaining status and self-esteem. The culture of smuggling that is manufactured and maintained within the family setting expands across community. As an ontological, economic, and political form of being, it has made great contributions to development of social, cultural, economic, and political life patterns and institutions while generating diverse experiences of violence, pain, and loss as well. 4.2.3

Networks

In general, the act of smuggling is based on cooperation of different actors and partnership that includes both local agents and the state officials. As stated earlier by researchers working on cross-border trade, “smuggling would not be possible without the connivance of some state officials, if not their active cooperation. The very existence of smuggling undermines the image of the state as a unitary organization enforcing law and order within a clearly defined territory. This is exactly why the study of smuggling can shed light on the complexities and limitations of the state.”35 The constant violation and disregard of laws and regulations by

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some of the army members and the officials at the customs as representatives of state authority at the border region are strong indications of that limitation of state by its own agents. In this context, the emerging disputes and conflicts between those collaborators and those loyal to the laws and the state should be noted here. In this collaborative work of various agents on the Turkish-Syrian border, the network mechanism of smuggling was designed at both sides of the border. In the Syrian side, the network consisted of Turkish owners of goods, carriers, Syrian customers in general and Syrian officials at customs. However, it became more complex with inclusion of other partners in the Turkish side where the network of smuggling was constructed by main two groups of people. In the first group, there were owners of goods with inclusion of carriers, guides, and mine experts, separately. However, sometimes, one of the carriers could be the guide and mine expert at the same time, or the guide could be a mine expert at the same. The second group of people in this network were soldiers (border security guards), sergeants, other high-ranked army members. As the third group, the officials at the customs also became key figures in this network in the case of occurrence of smuggling through official border gates. In this trade network, the owners of goods were the leading figure because they were the ones paying for all other partners. It has been stated by many smugglers that the owner has to pay soldiers or other firsthand army members per carrier or per the load. They also stated that sometimes the owners would do agreements with patrolling or guarding soldiers without informing their chiefs or as stated earlier he would get his own share. When the carriers were animals (donkey, mule, or horse), the owner has to pay per animals. The common agreement for payments was on the basis of the number of loads without questioning the substance and amount of the goods in general. In one of his stories of smuggling, Omer narrated the story of third-lieutenant E¸sref who struggled greatly with smugglers. Omer laughed and said “we were cleaning the mines to create a path and he would re-mine those paths. Therefore, we had to change our routes.”36 Smugglers in agreements with soldiers (security guards) had stable paths and their routes were unchanged. Omer narrated one of their struggles with the soldiers: Smuggling is full of fear and danger. Once, I and two friends, we bought some animals to sell in the other side. We decided to create a path for ourselves by cleaning the mines. One night, we went to the border zone

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but someone fired us from the nearby village. I just recognized it was a soldier and heard his voice telling the commander “Sir, I hear crackles over there!” There was a ruined mosque over there. We hid inside. There was a panzer. It approached the mosque and its headlights were on the mosque. There were Kalashnikovs (Kele¸s ) at our hands. If we kill a soldier, they would destroy (burn) the village nearby. One of us climb the fig tree over there. The other two of us lie on the ground in the corner inside the mosque. That was how we escaped that night. There were hundreds of similar happenings. I forgot many, it was 30-40 years ago. Smuggling consists of fear.37

In principle, the smugglers were not willing to have armed conflict with soldiers and they were avoiding as much as possible. As stated above, any village near the conflict point where a soldier was injured or killed by the smugglers was regarded as responsible for what happened. As a result, villagers from that particular village were all punished, tortured, and in many cases the village was evacuated or burned by the state security forces. The state authorities were aware of the fact that the majority of carriers were generally recruited from the border villages and in the most cases they were informed by local collaborators, spies. As one of the fundamental actors of smuggling, carriers were generally young men including children and youth (12–18 years old) coming from poor families. Children were recruited for carrying large but not heavy loads accompanying other older carriers. In the following years, some of these carriers became very skilled and experienced guides and deminers. During the armed conflicts and intense hunts between security forces and smugglers, the loss of carriers was frequently seen event in the region. The acts of being reported, spying and betrayal were also repeatedly seen experiences in the world of smugglers. These events were seen when there was not an agreement or collaboration between both sides and if there was an enmity or rivalry between certain smugglers. In other words, there were conflicts of interest on the border and therefore spying or betrayal could transpire in the cases of disagreement or violation of agreements between the soldiers and the smugglers. The disagreements often ended with armed conflicts that led to loss of both smugglers and soldiers. As one of my key informants, Omer talked about how he got married at the age of 22 but then continued to do smuggle for more 12 years. He talked about 18 years of smuggling during which he worked not only as a carrier and as a guide but also as an owner of the goods within the networks of

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smuggling. He sadly mentioned the loss of around 20 of his friends and narrated: One day, we brought around 190 carriers. We waited at the border until moonset. We were planning to cross the border after it get darker. One of our men was checking around and making sure that were not any soldiers around. While coming back towards us he stepped on a mine. I was lolling against the little hill with my Kalashnikov in my hands. With the explosion, my face was covered with dust. I thought, my friend fell down and his gun was fired. I screamed “you covered me with dust!” but at the same time I heard his voice “I am gone, mom!”. I did not think about the mine. I approached him. I told him “do not worry, you will be okay”, but his head fell down. I recognized that his left foot was cut off. He died, there. After that, everyone started to run back. We left his there. Later, people came to scout and took his body. In the village, the local headman look at the corpse and said “where is his other foot?” In the evening, we searched for his foot but while the soldiers were shooting us. We found his foot in the other side of the border and buried in the village of Tırbespîye… We buried his body in this side and his severed foot in the other side…38

The brutal death of smugglers due to landmines and armed conflicts with soldiers was counted a lot during the interviews. In similar stories to the one above, the Turkish authorities did not allow the burial of smugglers who died or killed at the border zone or in the other side. As a result, people held funerals in the Syrian side. When there were not kin of dead person, villagers would just bury his body to the cemetery of the village. The life story of Seyyîd Evdillah is one of those stories. 1969 born Seyyîd Evdillah talked about the loss of his father when he was just 6 months. He was given the name Azad but after loss of his father he was renamed with his father’s name, Seyyîd Evdillah. He talked about loss of his father in 1970 on the border zone and how it became possible for him to visit his father’s grave in the Syrian side 33 years later in 2003. He narrated: According to story, my father, uncle and a few villagers try to cross a herd of animals to the other side. It was winter, March. They are caught and they start to have armed conflict with soldiers. My father wants to take the herd back from the mud but meanwhile a sergeant saw him and fires. Of course, villagers tell this story to my family later. The sergeant comes and tell the villagers that “I have killed someone. Go, and look who is?” When the Turkish soldiers do not allow villagers to bring the body, they inform relatives in the Syrian side to come to the border zone and pick the body

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of my father. Our relatives in the Syrian side take care of his funeral and bury him in their village. I visited my father’s grave with my mother in 2003.39

Seyyîd Evdillah talked about how his mother had many difficulties while raising him and his five other sisters and brothers and wished to could see and talk to his father at least once. The story of death of father of Seyyîd Evdillah during smuggling of animals reveals how animals were seem to be the most expensive and widely seen goods and thus consisting a large portion of illegal border economy. During the cross-border trading and smuggling of animals, the majority of herds were brought from the Botan region (Kurdish inhabited eastern parts of Turkey), crossed the border and sold in the larger Syrian territories to the Beirut region. The news about cross-border trade of animals was frequently seen on the pages of national newspapers as well. For instance, on December 1960, it was reported on the Milliyet newspaper that a herd of 850 sheep were caught by Turkish soldiers near the border village of Qanter (in Turkish Kantar) in Nisêbîn. The soldiers were awarded a premium of 63 Turkish Liras.40 In other similar news, it is reported that there was an armed conflict that continued for five hours between soldiers and smugglers near the village of Aznavurê (in Turkish Sınırtepe) near Nisêbîn where smugglers were trying to cross around 1500 sheep to the Syrian side. Because of the fact that all animals were captured by the soldiers, the smugglers attacked the gendarmerie station but later escaped to the Syrian side. The sheep were delivered to the customs administration in Nisêbîn.41 In the cross-border trade networks, there were sometimes very large herds and loads that were carried by more than a hundred carriers. According to Omer, this trade network was constructed all along from Van to Beirut. He narrated: Concerning the Syrian side, traders were bringing goods from Aleppo. On the other hand, they were getting animals from Eruh-Van (eastern part of the country) region. One day, we brought six trucks loaded with sheep from Eruh, Siirt and transferred them to somewhere near the border, near the bridge. At nights, we were crossing these animals to other side and selling them to traders coming from Aleppo. Those traders were also selling us goods from Damascus, Beirut and Aleppo such as tea, watches, henna, desk clocks, fabrics, perfumes, tobacco paper. We were buying from them and selling in the bazaars in Nisêbîn, Mardin and sometimes at bazaars in the Botan region (Kurdish inhabited eastern part of Turkey).42

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The smuggled goods were generally delivered to those agreed buyers in the other side of the border. Sometimes the goods were delivered to certain places (stores, or someone’s house or basement) till the owner finds a customer. Then, they were delivered to agreed customers because the market (bazaar) was also under the control of the state at certain extent and the goods were not just delivered to the bazaar explicitly and not during the days. Smugglers talked about how many times their goods in the trucks or cars were captured by the soldiers on the way to the city of or other destinations. They talked about appearances of checkpoints by soldiers or police on the ways to Nisêbîn and other cities and how it was difficult to deliver the goods to their final destinations. After the arrival of goods to the bazaar, the soldiers were not able to interfere. After crossing the border, those traders coming from far cities such as Diyarbakır, Lice, Siirt, Van, Kurtalan, Batman, or Bitlis were carrying their goods with donkeys, mules, and horses and having more difficulties in protecting their goods not only from state officials but also bandits and robbers on the way. The scope of networks and collaborations between those smugglers who were doing big trade and the state officials including soldiers was very wide which could be seen in any part of the Turkish-Syrian borderline. The fact that Alîya’s house was just few meters from the border zone allowed her to become a very active observer of many events happening on the border. On the other hand, she talked about how her house was used by many smugglers as a store where to hide their goods and to rest many times. It was not just smugglers but also sometimes some soldiers were entrusting their goods which they bought or confiscated from smugglers at her house till the end of their obligatory army service. As it can be seen from previous narratives, Alîya was not just a passive observer, she was also actively joining these networks in one way or another and having her own share. She narrated one of those stories: There was a soldier. He was Kurdish, too. When he and his other friends captured smugglers, they confiscated around 20-30 pieces of fabrics from them. Sometimes, confiscating other things. I remember, he had his suitcase in our house and it was full of pieces of fabrics. When it was the time of receiving his discharge papers, he came to our house to take his suitcase. I took one of the fabrics, closed the suitcase and gave to him. I never breach trust.43

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In the border stories, collaboration with soldiers rather than with their chiefs seems to be easier and convenient for those smugglers carrying out small-scale trade. Former smuggler Ahmed talked about this issue and stated that: We were not doing that much collaborations with the commander of the gendarmerie stations. Usually, we were collaborating with soldiers who were guarding and patrolling. Soldiers were coming to the villages for deals and then going back to their spots. Their chiefs were aware of these collaborations and they were also receiving commissions in exchange for keeping things undercover. When there were uncompromising chiefs the situation was getting harder. For instance, collaborated soldiers were opening a path for us but these chiefs were intervening and closing those paths immediately. Then, we would have to agreed strategy with soldiers. We would send two-three smugglers to an opposite direction and tell them to fire. Thus, while the chief and other soldiers were heading that direction we were smoothly passing through the opened path.44

Misleading strategies against uncompromising soldiers and chiefs were usually applied by smugglers during their struggle for crossing the border. Smuggling and crossing the border were seen a kind of playing a deadly game for smugglers. During these collaborations, soldiers not only gave permissions but sometimes went beyond that and helped smugglers in carrying and loading smuggled goods as well. One of those events was narrated by Ahmed who talked about how the soldiers helped his team on September 12, 1980, at the night of coup d’état.45 According to story, he and his team brought animals (sheep and cattle) loaded a few trucks from Mardin to Nisêbîn where the animals were transferred from the trucks with the help of soldiers guarding at that point of the border. Due to elevated security measures as a result of ongoing event of the coup d’état at that night, they could not pass the animals through the border. They had to wait for three months and meanwhile feed all those animals in one of the border villages. After around three months, he narrated with a great enthusiasm how he called up one of the experts of landmines from Midyat to demine and clean around 300 meters wide mined zone and thus create a secure path and how they ultimately crossed them to the other side. Next day, while returning home from the Syrian side with his team, he observes the border by using his binoculars and discovers how all villagers were being detained at the front yard of the gendarmerie station due to what happened one night before. They find a way to cross

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the border and he returns to his village but the soldiers come and arrest him. Under detention, he refuses the accusations of smuggling and due to the fact that soldiers could not find any proof he was then released.46 The narrative of smugglers documents the complexity of relationships between smugglers and the army members in the border region. Ahmed stated that he was interrogated while under arrest by the brigadier general Veli Küçük47 who was serving in Nisêbîn and would later become a famous army profile in the country. Ahmed recalled the dialog that occurred between him and Küçük. He narrated: Before releasing me, he said “you should leave this region (Nisêbîn) otherwise you will be killed. I started to think about what he said. He continued “what do you think?” I replied “Sir, I do not have enough money to migrate from her with my family. I smuggle but I earn on daily basis.” Then, he checked his back pocket and gave me 50 Turkish liras. In those times, the travel fare to Adana was 7 Turkish liras. He told me “take this and go to the western part of the country. Go and do even cleaning as long as you support your family and feed your children. If you stay here they will kill you.” He continued, “do you promise?” I said “Yes”. I gave a promise and I migrated. We lived for 12 years in the west and did not come back until recent years.48

One of the aspects of the relationships between smuggler and army members was spying in addition to interest (money) based agreements and collaborations. The act of denunciation, spying, and betrayal was frequent fearful occurrences for smugglers. Not only rival smugglers but also villagers who wanted their share were also many times reporting smugglers. Sometimes, when some partners of collaboration were not happy for their share or for insufficient payments, they would also report. So, villagers or leading figures of the village took part in collaborations and agreements and when they were not satisfied conflicts and tension were increasing between parts. The most powerful discourse of villagers was that if smugglers use the border region of their village, they have to pay for this. According to them, smugglers were transpassing their territories and jeopardizing their security because soldiers were interrogating them for what happened. There were volunteer reporters who were secretly working for the state officials and there were those who were forced to report during interrogations. Spying and reporting were seen as kinds of jobs and another way of making a living. Sometimes, smugglers were reported for very tragicomic and trivial reasons. One of the former smugglers laughed

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while talking about how his brother reported him due to the reason that he did not bring beautiful slippers for him from Syria but brought for others in the family. Smuggling was described by many smugglers as a form of gambling. In a general argument, the wide network of smugglers and the participation of diverse actors made this job a very complicated and dangerous one. In that locally constructed network of vested interest, in addition to the payments for carriers, guides, mine experts, soldiers, and their chiefs, they also at times would pay those villagers who could report them and those officials who could help them for their release from detention centers of the state. The networks of smuggling not only revealed new forms of power relations, collaborations, and conflict of interests, they also generated new forms of jobs and socioeconomic life patterns on and around political borders. 4.2.4

Fear, Death, and Destiny

Fear is one of the most dominant emotions that individually and collectively felt in human history. There are diverse fears in our lives that are also felt at different levels. The most “fearsome is the ubiquity of fears; they may leak out of any nook or cranny of our homes and our planet.”49 While writing on the state of fear as a way of life, Linda Green points to the fact that fear is not just a simple “response to danger” but how it “penetrates the social memory.” Green claims that “fear destabilizes social relations by driving a wedge of distrust between family members, neighbors, friends. Fear divides communities by creating suspicion and apprehension not only of strangers but of each other.”50 In her work on the modern history of emotions, Joanna Bourke argues that “fear is about encounters - successful ones as well as the torment of failed ones. Emotion-displays of fear are exercises of power: who becomes frightened and what is the outcome of their displays? Fear is about relations of power and resistance.”51 The political borders are sites of encounters of state agents and the local subjects and they are grounds of performance of the state power where diverse forms of conflicts erupt. As dangerous places, political borders constantly produce and circulate emotions fear and death and generate perception of state agents as fearful subjects in different forms. Living with a dreadful fear and brutal ways of death, local people took refuge in their religious belief, a certain form of destiny (qader)

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that helped them while trying to cope with traumatic facets of constantly befalling events in their everyday lives. The legal and illegal mobilities of human subjects along with trade networks on the political borders intrinsically transform them into places where banality of fear and death is widely seen and experienced in everyday life. In other words, border stories and narratives are shaped and coded with emotions of fear and death. Both emotions are manipulated by the state actors as controlling instruments during their labor of sheltering the border and preventing all forms of illegal border crossings. Therefore, the question of what causes of fear on the Turkish-Syrian border can be answered by addressing the consequences and effects of the border making strategies of the state. In general, the fear of being beat up, taken into custody, torture, incarceration, death, mines, and soldiers are very dominant among smugglers and their families left behind each time and other people crossing the borders illegally in any parts of the world.52 As Emily Hicks stated long time ago “border culture includes a deep fear, the fear of being seen/caught/asked for identification. It also creates a space for resistance to this fear.”53 The emotion of fear was very evident in the world of smugglers and border people. Narratives of fear always revealed in listening their stories and memories of smuggling and illegal border crossings. Smugglers always talked of the fear they felt which was derived from the ideas that they might be killed and arrested. Besides, there was always a danger of stepping on mines and thus dying or being disabled (amputation) because of walking in the dark were smugglers could stray away from the demined path. While smugglers and other illegal border crossers tried to cope with their fears, their loved one left behind (mothers, fathers, wives, sisters, children) were struggling with their own fears that something might happen to their beloved one. Mothers and wives talked about how they were desperately waiting with a great fear, anxiety, and unrest for hours, days, and sometimes weeks for their beloved one to safely return home. The fact that almost every night something bad was happening on the border—mine explosions, armed conflicts, arrests, beating, and torture at the gendarmerie stations or on the borders by army members—triggered those fears and showing banality of those events in the border region. Moreover, the circulation of the stories and narratives of severe death events along with other occurrences was augmenting their effects within larger community circles. Third-generation smuggler Silêman narrated one of these events of bad death:

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Mihemed – one of the smugglers – was killed near Ra¸sîd’s house which was very close to the border. He died there and the street dogs were eating his body. His mother could not bear this and secretly entered the barbed wired zone and brought (carried) his body. When soldiers heard about that they raided her house. According to story, when she hears about them, she immediately hid his body in very large caldron and put on fire as if she is cooking food. Soldiers search the whole house but could not find anything. After they left, she took parts of his body and calls her relatives and neighbors to bury her son. This event happened around 40-45 years ago.54

Narratives of the catastrophic events like this fueled anger and hate toward state authorities not only in the past but also in the present. In the meantime, these traumatic narratives deepened the fear and anxiety among people. The dead or injured bodies left behind or trapped in the barbed wired and mined zone were under threat by wild animals because in most cases the soldiers would not allow relatives or friends to enter the zone. Those cases where people were not allowed and able to bury their beloved one caused more pain and trauma for family members left behind. When the deceased was not buried according to religious and traditional funeral ceremonies, it was causing more pain and generating continuous lamentations within families. The fear of being seen by patrolling and guarding soldiers was very powerful because in those cases soldiers would immediately start a fire on smugglers. The fact that smugglers were also carrying and using guns to protect themselves from soldiers, bandits, and thieves always resulted in armed conflicts during which many soldiers and smugglers died. M. Brahîmê Dorikî talked about how these conflicts were continuing sometimes for hours during the nights. He remembered them as frightening events but also as ordinary events in his childhood period that continued later.55 On the other hand, Ahmed talked about his first experience of crossing border as a child and the incident of incarceration of his father in those years. Ahmed narrated: There were very strict security measures in those times. I remember, Seyyîds56 of Xerpmênî were doing smuggling. There was the wedding of my cousin Shexmus. I was 8 or 9 years old. That day, smugglers brought ceft 57 to cross the border. Then, soldiers busted the village. They arrested the village headman who was my uncle and some other villagers including the whole family of Hacî Ahmed. My father was also among them. I

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remember, I was crying and holding my father’s hand and not letting him go. There was a sergeant named Zekeriya and he ordered my father to take me back home and come back to the gendarmerie station. My father took me home and I was still insisting. My uncle Hacî Hesan and the others were transferred to Nêrgizle. They tortured them by hooking them together and forcing them to walk on thorns. The others were beaten brutally at the gendarmerie station and then released but they could not walk due to torture they endured. They were mounted on the donkeys, mules and brought to their homes. Many people were killed on this border. I know around 100 men being killed. I was injured once. They took nine bullets from my body.58

In spite of deep fear on the border, the ceft that was produced by villagers in the mountainous parts of the southeast part of Turkey has to be carried in gunny bags and transferred to the Syrian side as it was one of the essential material for making the butter churn in the other side. People living in the Syrian side of border were dependent on that mixture for making their butter churn because trees that were providing the main ingredients for the ceft did not grow on their side. One way or another, the villagers have to get that mixture from the Turkish side. The story of ceft appeared randomly in one of the stories of smugglers. It can be interpreted not only as a strong indication of historical social-economic and cultural ties, but also as one the signs of endurance of interdependency among people in the region. Like anthropologist Sidney Mintz’s reading of history of colonialism and capitalism through the social and economic history of sugar,59 the history of Turkish-Syrian political border also can be read through an investigation of history of smugglers, barbed wires, landmines, watchtowers, ceft, or any other subjects in the border region. Another form of fear was driven from traps that were set by the soldiers on the paths and routes of smuggling. Although owners were hiring the best mine experts and guides for their large cross-border trade, there was always the possibility of betrayal of soldiers or their chiefs including rival smugglers. The paths and the route were demined and cleaned before the move but they had to check and ensure that there has not been any re-mining. Sometimes, it could be very hard to recognize those traps of mines on impenetrably dark nights. As we learn from the smugglers, they always preferred nights without moonlight. Omer narrated his deep fears in one of those dark nights on the border:

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It was very dark and there were knee-high grass and thorns around. There were tall iron bars (bist ) at our hands. We were using them to check our pathways and detect mines. When we see a mine, we would check all around and see whether it is connected to the others or not. We were checking whether there was a trap or not. We also learned these things. Later, they started to set those trap mines. While walking, I just felt that I fell into a trap. My body was on the mine but my friend Brahîm was more scared than I. I gave him my Kalashnikov and told him to stay away. Then, I cut the wire that was connecting four mines together. I destroyed two. While trying to destroy the third one, I suddenly recognized that its wire was going underground. Then, I recognized that there is another trap. I cut that wire and thus disengaged it but did not destroy it. I told Brahîm to go through the path that I cleaned from the mines. He replied “Okay, I will go but how I will come back, I am afraid of being lost.” I told him “If you stay there, the soldiers will come and kill you. We are together. If I die you will die too.”. I demined another two mines but left the other two. When we come back from the other side in the morning early, we saw soldiers on the border. They were talking with each other “No one is going to come by now…” We were very close to them but of course hiding. When they left, we immediately get out of our hiding place and went home…60

Differently set traps and ambushes by soldiers were the biggest fears of smugglers due to their ambiguity and omnipresence. When there were not any agreements and collaborations between both sides, soldiers were actively patrolling on the border zone. Furthermore, they were laying ambushes on the pathways of smugglers, at the stream beds, riversides, hillier, and defiles and thus doing no-knock raids on smugglers. Hesîna, in her late 50s, talked about loss of her husband who was a carrier in one of those ambushes 32 years ago. When her husband was killed by the soldiers, she was left behind as a pregnant widow with three little kids. She started to talk about the poverty she survived and her other struggles in raising her four children. According to the story, her husband worked as a carrier for two years. She heard the news of the death of her husband in an autumn day. During her narration, Hesîna never calls him as “my husband” and always referring him “he.” In traditional family culture in the Kurdish community women usually do not call their husbands with their names in front of others. Any behavior of showing of love and attachment to the wife or husband in the presence of foreigners and elders is not approved commonly. In a hesitant manner, Hesîna narrated:

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He was preparing again for the smuggling and I told him, “do not go, stay at home because plasterers are going to come, tomorrow.” He said “do not worry, I will go and just come back”. He went but could not come back for two days. Meanwhile, plasterers came and finished their job at our house. When he returned home they already finished it. He said “we could not cross the border, that was why we were late”. At that day, I was not at home and went to collect brushwood. I came back and told him “do not go”. He replied “my friends are calling, I am going. Then, I said “you are very tired; your hands are ruined”. He did not listen to me and went that night. After he left, I could not sleep. According to the story which was told to me later, he was injured after being shot and alive when he was dragged into the gendarmerie station by soldiers. They ask him “do not you have any kin?” He replies “I just have a sick old mother (she was actually his aunt who raised him because he was an orphan] and three kids [she does not mention herself]. They transfer him to Mardin. His older brother was also in hospital and he died at that day. He was also carried to the same hospital and he also died at the same day with his brother. I mean, both brothers died one after another. I was at home. My co-sister-in-law came to our house and informed us that her husband passed away. When she said that my heart start to pound. Their aunt told me “my little daughter, do not worry, probably something happened on the border and again they could not cross.” I replied “no aunty, something bad must happened. He is either killed or arrested.” I felt it, something was wrong. We went to the funeral of my brother-in-law and buried him at the cemetery. In their house, I recognized all men were gathering in and talking about something. I was pregnant and did not want to go up to them. I asked my sister-in-law to go and learn what they are talking about. She went and then came and told me “They say Be¸sîr has been killed. He is now in Mardin.” [Hesîna started to cry at that moment during the interview]. I knew, something bad happened. A car came and took us to Mardin. We were taken to the battalion. I was very hurt and do not remember how we went and how we came back…His uncle came with us, we brought his body from Mardin to here…61

Hesîna talked about her fears for two years. Each time waited with prays and fears till he goes and comes back home safely. She also talked about how she grew used to that fear like all mothers, wives, and children of smugglers and how it became a part of their lives. Hesîna’s statement “each time, my heart was in my boots. I was waiting with great fear for him. At the end, they killed him, there is no fear anymore…” shows her ongoing sorrow, mourning, regret, and anger. In the night that her

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husband was killed, there was an agreement between parties—the owner, the carriers, the guide, and the soldiers—and nobody had expected any problem. However, there was an ambush and the guide and other carriers managed to escape. She learns the details of that night later from those who survived. According to narrated story, soldiers patrolling in that night were not satisfied with their share or bribe (in Kurdish bertîl ) and therefore betrayed. She continued to narrate what happened that night: There was a man named Mihemed Nurî. In the downtown, soldiers were visiting one of the tailors to repair their clothes. The tailor told Mihemed Nurî that one of the soldiers who was in his shop told that “soldiers were not happy with their share in the previous case. This time they planned to betray.” In the previous occasion, smuggler hired carriers from the other district of Nisêbîn crossed the border. In this time, they did not want to go, so owner came and hired smugglers from our district. They hired almost everybody. Of course, they were not forced, it was volunteer. He also went. He brought a cassette-player that time. While returned on the border, half of the carriers stepped on the barbed wire and cross. My man (husband) also tends to cross but suddenly a hail of bullets erupts. He was shot and injured. There was his friend Hiseyîn next to him. He asks Hiseyîn to take him out from behind the fences. Meanwhile, soldiers approach and then he tells his friend to leave him behind and rescue himself. Hiseyîn run away towards Syrian side. They told these stories to my brother-in-law and I heard from him.62

The mined border zone worked as a death machine killing humans, animals such as donkeys, mules, and horses that were used by smugglers as carriers and other smuggled animals. In this zone of death, smugglers were sometimes dying together with their collaborators. The news on Milliyet newspaper on October 16, 1958, reports an event happened in Mardin border region and states that: On our southern borders, one sergeant and one smuggler died due to mine explosion. The sergeant was helping the smuggler to cross the border through mined zone. While passing through the smuggler steps on a mine and both were fly to pieces with the explosion. The identities of both have not been confirmed.63

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These kinds of accounts indicate how the fear of death that might cause by smugglers or landmines was also strong among soldiers as there was always a danger of wrongly stepping on mines during their fight, struggle, and collaborations with smugglers. Border people addressed how soldiers were also dying sometimes during regular re-mining of those parts and paths that were cleaned by smugglers in the mined zone. Living with the fear of death on daily basis was a common experience of the majority of people residing on the borderland. Omer who worked for many years as a carrier talked about how he had a close brush with death twice. He narrated what happened one night: It was again, a summer night. I was very thirsty. We had our burdens and started to walk with friends towards the border. I told them “you go slowly, I will grab some food for you.” I did not have any food since last evening and I was very thirsty, too. On the way, I was lost. I came to Girebîya. I was confused. I could not remember which direction the village is. I put my hand into the stream nearby and tried to understand the direction of the flow of water. Then, I understood that the village was left down the stream. I continued walking. There was a small kind of a tower or castle near the village. I have heard the existence of jinns 64 there, before. There was a mill there and entered inside. I was thinking and saying “they say there are jinss, where are they?” As soon as I said that, I saw something in front of me. It looked like a fox to me. There were its children as well. They circle around me. I was so scared and my hair stand on end. It was very dark. Then, they went through the water and disappeared. I continued to walk towards the village. There was another mill on the way. Near that mill on the road, I saw enshrouded dead body. I thought it was a murdered person thrown there. I approached and wanted to check it with my foot. However, the dead body suddenly rose. When it was rising, I felt dizzy, fell down. I fainted. When I woke up later I was still trembling. After recovering a little, I started to walk towards the village. When I arrived to the village, I recognized that all my friends were worried about me and waiting for me. They run towards me when they saw me and asked “where have you been? What happened to you?” I told them that I do not feel good and that they should leave me. I did not tell them what happened. I came back home. They covered me with very thick quilts but still I was feeling cold in the middle of the summer. I could not get out of the bed for 12 days.65

Omer’s story documents the strong belief of jinns among the Muslim local community and that the jinns have their community around Nisêbîn

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as well. As this story indicates, jinns were another fearsome entity during the nights in the world of smugglers. Omer mentioned how people recited versus from the Qur’an and performed other prays as a way of protection from bad jinns during the nights. Although fear, danger, anxiety, betrayal, torture, and death have been the main features of the labor of smuggling, people have continued to practice that work. How do we explain the continuity of that labor in spite of lethal and traumatic consequences? Can we just address the existence of poverty as the main factor and motivation for this labor? When smugglers were asked during the interviews about other jobs aside from smuggling, their responses were generally related to poverty and poor conditions of the region, rare economic investments, and scarce supports of the state for the people of region. Omer’s response resembled the other answers. He stated: There were no other jobs. Some of us were smugglers, carriers. We were poor. We had nothing else to do. During the season of agriculture, we were cultivating wheat and barley. There were those who were hoeing for land owners. In those years, just those jobs were available. Some were doing livestock and some others were hiring fields from their owners for agriculture.66

The major reasons behind the labor of smuggling are generally associated with economic circumstances and poverty and that has turned into a meta-narrative. However, the same smugglers have stated other narratives that address other diverse reasons which played a role in continuation of that mobility. For instance, Omer talked about the job offer in a company to him in the western part of the country and how he rejected and preferred smuggling. Omer’s preference for smuggling was not only based on economic reasons but also on other sociocultural and psychological ones. He narrated: Nobody was minding the border. People were poor and they were obliged to. That was why they did not take the border seriously. If they tell me to cross the border again, now, I will not dare to do it. However, in those times, we were bored at night if we were not crossing the border. What I mean, we were addicted [he laughs, here]. We did not care much for fear also. We made our living out of that and we had to. Don’t you think the drivers of the lorries are the same, today. They have accidents, they have many difficulties but they are obliged to. When people do not find

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a job, they even do drug trafficking. They know, it is something bad and dangerous but they do not have anything else to do…67

Narratives of smugglers not only document their awareness of the line between legality and illegality but also the banality of fear and death on the border. Furthermore, these widely repeated narratives by smugglers can be read as legitimizing discourses of their illegal acts, smuggling of diverse goods including guns and drugs from the Syrian side. Besides, these narratives indicate their perception of fear and how they lived with that fear which gradually became “a way of life”68 on the borderland. Stories of smugglers also show the ways in which how they tried to cope with the emotion of fear and tragic aspects of the death on the border as daily experiences in their lives. Ahmed who worked as a smuggler around 40 years asserts that “Ê ku dibêje ez ne ditirsîyam viran dikê” (Those who say they were not afraid of are lying) and thus explains the fearful nature of the job of smuggling. He stated that if you do smuggling you have to find a way to deal with your fears. He explained how they started to feel that fear at the moment they left their houses and while walking toward the border. The fear was in their hearts until they returned home safely. They always lived with an ambiguity that they might die and not return home without any injury. Although earning a living was the main motivation for them, centuries old social, cultural, religious, and political ties and networks were other motivations for many people who were risking their lives and crossing the border. Furthermore, as it is stated earlier during the analysis of smuggling as a rite of passage, people attached new meanings and symbols to the border crossings. Attachments of these new meanings and symbols can be interpreted as new ways of coping with that fear and death and certain forms of resistance as well. In a similar vein, phenomenon of rivalry or competition attached with bravery, courage, and loyalty also transpired emotions that facilitated their struggle with that fear. In other words, the motivations behind the acts of smuggling were not only economic but also social and cultural. Smuggling created a new space in which men were able to show and perform their abilities, skills, and good aspects of their character. Smuggling gained new functions, meanings, and symbolism among people in the historical process. It provided not only new means of support but also new statuses for men in their social and cultural environment. During the interviews, recurrent narratives about rivalry, bravery, praising

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oneself or someone else demonstrated these kinds of talks among owners, carriers, guides, and mine experts who met at those tea houses at the downtown or someone’s house in the town. Ahmed narrated: Around 27 people who worked with me were injured. These were the men I worked with. I was also injured and had nine bullets. Many of guides who were my friends were killed. Alhamdulillah (thanks to Allah), I survived. Me and Naîfo [addressing another famous smuggler who was in the room during the interview] remained. We were both very stubborn and probably that is why we did not die [he is laughing]. But, I have to admit, Naîfo was the best guide among us.69

For 40 years, Ahmed risked his life numerous times and lived with those fears like many other smugglers and border transpassers. He emphasized his own success and skills but always addressed the help and protection of Allah. While his statement “we were both very stubborn and probably that is why we did not die” can be seen as a strong indication of his personal success, his following statement “Naîfo was the best guide among us” indicates competition and rivalry among smugglers. On the other hand, Seyîd Mihemed’s statement “I was like the king of smugglers, Mehmûdê Zêro…” displays success-based status differences among smugglers. Competition, rivalry, ambition, and success were emotions that helped smugglers to acknowledge and take those risks, fears, and dangers as tolerable ones. These emotions were being amalgamated with the perception of the border as a target and an entity that has to be challenged and penetrated. “Being a good smuggler” was an accredited and respected status in the local community that facilitated the process of getting used to those fears. Moreover, this status was a desired one with envy by many others as well. Ahmed remembers one of his experiences that display the aspiration of local people for successful and respected smugglers. He narrated: At one occasion, we carried our goods across the border and transfer them to Girê Mîra [in the Turkish side]. Of course, we had an agreement with the soldiers on the border. There were around 260 carriers who were carrying goods. Two trucks came and took our goods from Girê Mîra. While returning to Syrian side, the soldiers who collaborated with us said “while passing try to mess up and shoot around. That way, we can tell our chiefs in the morning that we had a conflict with them but could not stop them.” We did what they said to us. Of course, they were also shooting the sky.

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Then, we destroyed the water channel and directed the water towards our path in order to erase our footprints. In the early morning, we crossed the border and took a minibus at Girê Mîra to go home. I had a smuggler friend, his name was Hemre¸s. I saw him also in the bus. He was not with us last night. Someone from the bus asked him “there was much gun fire last night, was it you?” He replied, “yes, we devastated each other”. He was not with us but that was what he said. I whispered ear of my friend, “Well, he is going to be arrested today. He buried himself to our grave” and laughed quietly. We evaded ourselves but he was arrested that day. They captured him at the tea house. So, I mean, some people were boasting of something that they have not done. That was a kind of source of satisfaction of their desires to be known.70

Being a good and respected smuggler with courage was something gained through devotedness to his job. In this context, smugglers defined smuggling as an inalienable habit and an addiction. Ahmed explained that addictiveness by stating that “weke kû kurm dikete la¸sê mihov” (it is like having worms in your blood, it is like to get stuck into it), and “weke kû mihov cixarê bik¸sînê” (it was like smoking addiction that you could not quit). He claimed “smoking and smuggling are the most famous addictions, here. There is good money in smuggling and if I could, I would do it now, again.” These narratives indicate how smuggling was seen not only just an economic activity but also how it has transformed into a life style. The local Islamic perception of destiny (qadêr) was playing a great role during the labor of coping with their traumas, fears, and death. The widely circulated saying “çi li pê¸sîya mihov be ew tê serê mihov” (whatever waits for you happens to you, there is not escape) was a crystallized expression of that fate. The common faith that “everything happens under the control of Allah and if he does not give any consent, anything will not happen to you” made the whole process of smuggling easier for people. As it is going to be documented and discussed in the following sections, this form of faith is very dominant in the narratives of women as well. They have always demonstrated their tendency to explain the deaths of their beloved ones with this faith. While the state, the soldiers and the border were accused of being the causes very commonly, they would end by saying “what can be done? His destiny was like that.” When I asked Alîya’s whether she was scared or not while entering the mined zone, her answer not only clarified her own point but also summarized the local perception of destiny. She affirmed that “no, I was not scared. Allah give

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this life to me and it him to take it back. Everything happens with the will (permission) of Allah. If Allah wants he will keep you alive, if not he will end your life. When the time of your death comes, it does not matter wherever you are, you will die.”71 The local people’s Islamic belief of destiny and their thought about death reminds the discussions on the concepts of free will and particular will within the Islamic circles. How much our acts are our own with a free will rather than happening with intervention of God (Allah)? In his ˙ arguments on free will and the faith of destiny, Ilhami Güler interprets the common understanding of destiny in Turkey as “an opium (drug) like faith that helps to cope with the pain.” Güler argues that Muslims in Turkey have a wrong theologically understanding of destiny.72 While ending the narration of his life story, Hiseyîn confirmed Güler’s argument on diversifying perception of religion among different groups of people in the larger community. In spite of the critical arguments of Muslim theologians and religious thinkers, local people have their own understanding of the religious principles and beliefs. They utilize religious codes and regulations based on their needs, desires, and wishes. Hiseyîn who lost one of his leg stated “It was my destiny. Some died there, some died here. Some were flying into pieces. Thanks to Allah, at least I am among my kids. At least I am able to give them advice, today…” and then continued whimpering “in short, it is destiny, destiny…What can you do?”73 On the other hand, his wife Fatma also talked in the same vein by stating that “those whose time of death came were stepping on mines. Actually, there were stone markers for the mined parts to warn people.”74 People’s tendency to interpret bad events in their lives as something happened by the will of Allah helps them to acknowledge and thereby relieve their burden and pain. On the other hand, the idea or faith that anything happens in our lives is determined by will of God also give allows people not to take any precautions. “If it written for you by Allah, you cannot change it. It is going to happen. You cannot change your destiny. It is not written; nothing will happen to you” is a commonly shared belief that played a crucial role in continuity of smuggling and other illegal acts that were transferred from one generation to the other. People, sometimes, took refuge in this faith in order to deny or escape from their own responsibilities and guilt as well. Is smuggling a choice or an obligatory task as the destiny of border people? Or, is it a tradition, a sociocultural life pattern, and an economic network in the region which dates back to the

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Ottoman era? Although these questions will be explored as much as possible in this work, the future researchers might want to deal with similar questions and investigate divers reasons behind the politics of exclusions and inclusions on various issues at the border region.

4.3

Women, Mined Zone, and Daily Life

The life stories and narratives of women on the borderland document very critical aspects of life and reveal them as influential subjects. In the local community, women generally appear as the one who is waiting and caring for their beloved one who works in a very dangerous job. While stories of men were generally full of narratives of bravery, success, manhood, collaborations, conflicts, betrayal, etc., women stories were dominated by accounts of waiting, praying, pain, suffering, widowhood, motherhood, lamenting, children, and the struggle for life. However, sometimes, women were also seen in other spaces as smugglers and collaborators and thus contributing to the processes of unmaking of the border. Furthermore, women were seen as active subjects violating the law and entering into the mined zone for various reasons and thus having conflicts many times with the guarding soldiers. Like Halîme who was mentioned earlier in the previous chapter, Alîya was one of those local women who engage in smuggling at certain levels and collaborate with smugglers and soldiers. Alîya’s agency was generated not only by her strong character and willingness but also by the location of her house which was few meters away from the mined zone. Alîya was married at the age of 13 and came to Nisêbîn with her husband without knowing anyone in the town and stated that “we did not know anyone except Allah in this town.” As a settler of 60 years in Nisêbîn, Alîya talked about various social, cultural, economic ethnic and religious events and developments that shaped the history of this big town. Like hundreds of other migrant families coming to Nisêbîn from the surrounding villages and towns, she also migrated from one of the villages near Midyat to Nisêbîn in the mid-1950s. It seems that the growing border economy through border gate, trade facilities, smuggling and agricultural jobs in its vicinity attracted many young couples and other job-seeking individuals to migrate for earning a living in those years. The flow of migrants from rural areas in those years transformed Nisêbîn steadily into a crowded city and resulted in nearly 90 thousand population, today.

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Alîya talked about economic, ethnic, and class-based frictions and conflicts in the town. As someone from a rural area, she highlighted the tensions and conflicts on the daily basis between the newcomers who were defined as “gundî” (villagers) and the local people who were defined as “bajarî” (townie). The newcomers and particularly those villagers coming to Nisêbîn for selling their products (milk, yogurt, cheese, fruits, vegetables, animals, etc.) were badly treated. As a woman with manly manners and with her strong physical appearance, she talked about how the women villagers were sexually assaulted and abused many times during their visits at the town. She narrated: The local men were so bad. Female villagers who were travelling to Nisêbîn daily in the early mornings to sell their home-made products were mistreated. Those men would buy their products and tell them to drop it to their houses. While doing that, they were abusing them. Those women who were able to escape were just orally assaulted but those who could not escape would be sexually abused. They were very bad. Those doing these bad things were local urban men. They also tried to send us away, the villagers who were newly settled in the town.75

As a dominant personality, Alîya talked of her daily talks, disputes, and relations with officials and guarding soldiers near her house. During her talk, she was adding Turkish words into her narratives in Kurdish. Therefore, I asked her whether she went to school or not. She looked at me in the eyes and replied “‘bülbül oldum dilim yok, ate¸s oldum külüm yok’ (I became nightingale without a tongue, I became fire without ashes). No, no schooling. There was not. I learned Turkish from the family members of those Turkish officials and administrators that sometimes I was doing their cleaning and house works.”76 In her late 70s, Alîya was almost everyday taking her chair to the front of her house and chatting with people passing on the street and gazing at Syrian side where the city of Qami¸slo could be seen. The other most interesting fact about Alîya was her small garden that she created within the mined zone where we had our second interview. It was strange to see it because getting official permission for such intervention into the mined zone was not something casual for ordinary people. Her garden was a demined space in the mined zone surrounded by the barbed wires. The entrance to the garden was from the street side where she made a wooden door. In her garden, she grew vegetables such as tomato, pepper, eggplant. She talked about the fact that

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she was almost every day around the border zone and also inside. When I asked how she was allowed to do it, she laughed and indicated how she named herself for a long time as “sınırın silahsız bekçisi” (the border guard without gun). Although local army authorities did not allow her to do that at the beginning and destroyed her garden, she talked about how she convinced them and rebuilt it. She narrated: One day, the battalion commander came and looked at my small garden and ordered soldiers to close my gate and destroy my garden. I was in the mined zone, in my little garden. He asked me “what are you doing here, it is forbidden”. I replied “I am breeding my lambs and I am also the guard of the border without a gun.” I said “I do not let anyone to enter the border zone” [she laughs here]. When I talked like that he turned to his soldiers and told them “Okay, do not close this part. Leave it as it is. This aunty is the guard”. From that day, my garden stays and its door is open.77

While creating the space for her garden, she remembered how once she almost died due to a landmine. She narrated that “I covered it [mine] with a 2-3 meters long a fabric, poured gasoline, lit a fire and then run away. I came near my house and then it exploded. Explosion sprinkled green grass everywhere and I was also covered with that grass. It was near sunset.”78 In the context of smuggling and border crossing, women were also very active. They were generally accompanying men or joining a group of people for crossing the border. Alîya talked about a small number of women who were also smuggling in those years. However, she claimed that the major reason for limited involvement of women in smuggling was their deep fear of being arrested and thus the possibility of being sexually assaulted or tortured by soldiers. She asserted that: There were patrolling soldiers on the border and they were arresting whoever was crossing the border, men, women, children and elders. Women were arrested, too. Personally, I did not want to become a subject of gossip.79 I guess, their fathers, husband or brothers were not preventing those women. If I did it, my husband and father would kill me.80

As stated earlier, diverse violations of the border zone by women can be interpreted as unmaking practices and life patterns in the borderland. One of these counter activities were carried by female smugglers. Like male

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smugglers, female smugglers were also carrying loads many they could. These women were carrying goods that were not available in the other side such as wood, varieties of nuts, grape(vine) leaves, and cardoon to sell. On the other side, they were buying tea, coffee, clothes, fabrics, olive oil, cosmetics, dates, grains, henna, etc. Secondly, women appear as widely seen violators of law of the protection of the border zone due to their frequently seen entrances into the landmined zone for different reasons. Women coming from very poor families entered the zone in order to collect brushwood for daily use. Nisêbîn is located in an agricultural plateau without any trees and this is necessitating local people to buy wood which was not cheap in nearby cities in the mountainous region. Otherwise, those who could not afford to buy wood were collecting brushwood for free from harvested fields, particularly the cotton straws from the cotton fields and the brushwood from the landmined zone. The dried cow dung was also another collected fuel material by poor families inhabiting in the plateau. The collected brushwood (dried grass, plants and trash of harvested grains, etc.) for daily use (floor furnace or tandoori) and for the heating during short but cold winter as well. The landmined zone as a noman’s-land was full of grass and other wild plants that would dry during the summer and be collected in the fall. Therefore, it was more convenient for those women to enter the zone by opening a hole in barbed wire fences and collect as much as they need. Although people were aware of the fact that certain parts of the landmined zone were cleaned by smugglers, they could not know exactly which parts there. Therefore, the cost of that penetration was at times very high where women could be arrested by soldiers or be killed by a mine. Alîya also talked about occurring daily tags between those women entering the forbidden mined zone and soldiers most of which ended with arrest. She confessed that she was also doing that. She narrated an event that happened in their early days in the town. She migrated to Nisêbîn with her husband and settled in another part of the town before moving to her current house next to the border. She narrated: May Allah, convince you, there were around 100 women in our neighbor Yahya’s backyard. However, just 20–30 of them were coming with me to enter the zone. The others were so afraid. We were entering the zone in order to collect brushwood for tandoor. I was placing my knife in my belt and going. One day, that woman named Meryem who was our neighbor, went without me with Mihalmies (local Arabs).81 Before going to collect

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brushwood, I would always prepare breakfast for my children, clean the house and dishes and then go. When I arrived Ofis, I began to hear the cries of a woman shrieking “Alîyaaa, Alîyaaa, help me!” The soldier was mocking her “come here, there is brushwood here, come and take it” There were two Kurdish soldiers from Elazı˘g province. These two were warning the other soldier not to mock her. However, the soldier did not stop. He had his own way. Then, I left aside my rope that used for binding brushwood. I was wearing those “gizlewête Midyadê” (black plastic shoes from Midyat). I took my shoes off and started to run towards her. I beat soldier’s breast forcibly over there where there was a small water canal. Believe me, he fell down to the ground. He fell on cotton straw. The other two soldiers became happy when they saw me beating him. They said “May Allah be pleased with you, mother. We wish you were our mother or sister.” Then, they started to speak in Kurdish with me. I replied them “we are sisters and brothers. We are mothers and sons. Who is this son of dog?” They respond “whoever he is. You relived our hearts. That is enough for us.” Then, I and Meryem, we collected our brushwood. I was very quick and faster than most of the women. I made my burden of brushwood and started to walk quickly towards home. When we arrived home, I told to my husband and other neighbors what happened. Her husband got angry and said “I cannot accept this. I am going to kill that soldier with my own hands”. We went again to the same place 15 days later and these two Kurdish soldiers talked about how they beat him later, as well. They ask that soldier why he did that and he replies “she was beautiful and that was why I did it”. The Kurdish soldiers tell him “son of a dog. She is beautiful for her husband. How dare you do such thing?” Yeah, the life was like that.82

Alîya was proud of her bravery and hardworking personality. She talked about how she was stronger than many men in those days and pronounced the famous Kurdish proverb “¸Sêr ¸sêre, çi jine çi mêre” (Lion is a lion regardless of its maleness and femaleness) in order to explain her standpoint. She talked about how the whole system, mobility patterns, and life were dramatically provoked and changed when the mining process started in the mid-1950s. For many local people including Alîya, the death rate grew steadily due to lack of knowledge about landmines in the forbidden zone among women and children. She stated: They did mining in front of people and that was why some people were placing certain signs for those spots. They were placing cans in order to mark those mined spots. However, kids did not understand and that was

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why they were dying more compared to older people. Elders were not stepping on mines as easily because they knew where the mines were.83

Stories of women and children due to landmines were a good portion of the traumatic repertoire of border people. They narrated painful stories of many events occurring on daily basis. Besides, they talked about many tragicomic events as well. Omer remembered one of these stories that took place in the 1960s. He laughed while narrating: One day, seven men from the village of Busidê near Midyat brought three cows to transfer to the other side. They took shares in cows. While transferring them, one of the cows escaped from the clutches. Then, some of them run after the cow to catch it. But, the cow went into the mined parts of the zone. These seven men were after the cow trying to capture it. However, we had already warned them if that happens they should not go after the cows. But, they did not listen to us. Can you believe it, four of those men died and three were injured just for a cow?

Omer’s testimony of this tragicomic event documents the level of poverty and people’s struggle for earning a living in the borderland. He had such a personality where he saw humor in all these tragedies. He took a breath and continue to narrate another tragicomic event that occurred in one of those dreadful nights: Once again, we were transferring around 900 sheep across the border. A friend of mine gave me two of his lambs to sell. Generally, when sheep know each other they do not baa. However, these two lambs started to baa when they saw the other sheep while crossing the border. Of course, soldiers heard their voices and they came after us. A panzer came and directed its headlights on us. Immediately, I took up a position and started shooting the panzer but of course my bullets were not effective. Then, when it directed its anti-aircraft gun towards me, I straightway jumped into hollow which was around two meters deep. When it started fire, many kilos of soil were falling down on me. I was trying to distract soldiers to see my friends. There were 40-50 meters between me and the panzer. I was in the mined zone and could not move. The panzer was still looking for me with its headlights. They were looking for me. I heard their voices, yelling each other “olmuyor, olmuyor…” (it does not work, it does not work).84

The death of children in the landmined zone was another phenomenon that many interlocutors addressed but particularly women. According to

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stories, collecting mines and selling them to waste collectors as iron material was another source of money that children practiced with or without consent of their parents. In addition to smugglers, guides, carriers, mine experts, soldiers, other border crossing men and women and those who enter the mined zone for other reasons, children consist another category of victims of landmines. As a result, the landmine explosions were routines in the border region in everyday life and people were getting used to these explosions knowing that someone else has died of those explosions. Many of these explosions took place during the day when women and children were entered the forbidden mined zone. The fact that the narratives of women were dominated by emotion of fear, anxiety, and suffering was a consequence of all bad things and explosions happening on daily basis. The frequency of funerals of smugglers along with other male and female victims including children was perpetuating that fear in everyday life. As stated earlier, the limited and unwanted involvement of women in smuggling was closely related to the local people’s perception of namûs (honor). The idea that something unpleasant might happen to women including harsh physical conditions and other difficulties were discouraging women and thus preventing their involvement. Nevertheless, local narratives document how many women involved in illegality by entering the forbidden zone for economy based reasons. As vigorous actors with children, their activities can be interpreted as unmaking practices on political border of the nation-state as well. Economic interest-based relations of women and children with the border zone and their daily practices document active involvement of almost every single person with illegality which can be described as diverse forms of resistance to the border making strategies of the state. In short, the agency and practices of women and children were contributing to the transformation of border as an ambiguous and permeable entity.

4.4

Landmine and the Body

“Pi¸stî ku mayin danîn, tirbê xelkên jî danîn…” (With the mining, they also dig graves for people…) Hiseyîn

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What makes the landmines as a dreadful war instrument with a high capability of destruction and brisance? The use of landmines by state authorities as a killing and damaging defense mechanism during the war and for the protection of military bases, political borders and other places made the history of landmines as horrific and bloody one. In the context of anti-personnel landmines, the picture became a nastier one due to severe damage that they cause on human body. In the history Turkish-Syrian border, the agency of anti-personnel landmines is very dominant in the lives of people and history of the region. Numerous stories of survivors and the members of the families of victims reveal large-scale rates of permanent disability and brutal death caused by mines that indicate the role of mines in social, cultural, and economic history of local community. The landmines as critical actors have deeply affected people’s relations with the land which consequently shaped subjective and collective memories. Then, one might ask why do border people continue to have deadly relations with the landmines which resulted in the loss of thousands of people including women and children for decades? In the following part, I will try to answer this question in light of life stories and narratives of local people but reminding that such questions remain on the table provoking new ideas for future researchers. In the history Turkish-Syrian border, there has been always a demining process by local people in spite of the fact that state officials were always in efforts of re-mine the forbidden border zone. There were three ways in which local people were getting in touch with landmines. The first one was demining activities of local people which can be interpreted as one of the tactics in the process of unmaking of the border. The first reason behind demining was to create a secure path for smugglers and other people through mined zone. Smugglers are the first and the most dominant group of people who aimed to clean the path for themselves and their animals. Various stories of corporeal disabilities and death during the process of mine clearance were narrated in spite of the fact that smugglers always hired local mine experts. As stated earlier, the extra traps set by soldiers and very small distractions during mining process were causing casualties. For instance, former smuggler Ahmed talked about some famous mine ˙ experts Miradkê Sebê ¸ (Murat from Sebe, ¸ Idil), Omerkê Sebexê ¸ (Omer from Sebex), ¸ and Elîyê Eynikê (Eynikê’s son Ali) and stated how Miradkê Sebê ¸ died while demining. According to the narrated story, Miradkê Sebê ¸ wrongly stepped on another mine that he could not recognized and lost his life.85

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The second reason for demining was an economic profit. Both mine experts and children were involved in collecting dismantled mines in order to sell them as iron material to waste collectors. Ahmed talked about how these dismantled mines were sold at different prices in the Syrian side. The anti-tank mines were sold for 20 Turkish liras and the anti-personnel mines were sold for 10 Turkish liras. Besides, it has been stated that mine experts were taking powder within the mines and selling it for use of fishing in the nearby rivers.86 Then, one might ask how these local men learned to demine? It was stated that many young men learned how to dismantle the mines during their obligatory army services at the early age. When they returned home, some of them were involving the job of dismantling mines as a source of income. Alîya remembered how one of their neighbors was collecting mines. She narrated: It was night and the moon light was gone. I heard someone calling me, “Sister Alîya, sister Alîya!” I went and saw our neighbor there. He was asking for help. He had dismantled and collected many mines. He dug a hole in the ground and placed all mines in it. He covered the hollow with soil and some stones. I helped him. He was going to uncover and sell them later.

Contrary to the stories of men above, women, elders, and children were getting in touch with landmines while violating rules and entering the forbidden mined zone. It has been documented how border people entered the zone for diverse purposes such as for herding, collecting landmines, brushwood, grass, the plant of caper, having picnics in the spring and for games. Lastly, local people sometimes tried to create small secure spaces within the zone for other purposes. As it has been seen in the accounts of Alîya, these spaces were used as a kind of barns for animals and for plantation. When all these are considered, people’s labor of demining fabricated various miserable stories of death along with calamitous stories of loss of certain parts of the human body like eyes, legs, and hands. The arrival of landmines to the region can be interpreted as a breaking point in their history. Diversifying memories of landmines in the region was summarized by 75 years old Hiseyîn who lost his right leg during a mine explosion. He stated: Before the mines, it was very easy to cross the border. There were no strict measures. When a person who crossed, the border was being arrested by

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soldiers, he or she would be slapped on face, beaten or kept in detention at gendarmerie station for 2-3 days. That was all. However, when they implemented mines, they also dig graves for people.87

Hiseyîn’s narrative points out the reality of border zone that has transformed into a killing machine and a field of death for local people. According to his story, he was earning his living in his shop and also smuggling in the early decades of his life. During the interview, he talked about difficulties of smuggling and emphasized how many people died during that labor. He remembered how once ten Mihalmî (Arab) smugglers died in the mined zone while trying to cross the border and how local people loaded their dead bodies into a tractor to be send to their home towns. Hiseyîn talked about how he started to raise sheep and sell them when he got older and was not be able to do any other jobs. With a lamenting manner, he talked about how he lost his leg while herding his sheep near the forbidden mined zone. Hiseyîn’s second wife Fatma in her late 50s who married to Hiseyîn after the death of his first wife talked about what happened that day in the late 1980s: I had a baby-son in those days. He was just three days-old and I was in the bed. My older son run into the room and screamed “Mom, a mine exploded!”. I said “Inshaallah, it exploded on animals not humans.” You know, animals were also stepping on mines and dying a lot. We did not want humans to die like that. However, my son went back and then returned shortly and said “Mom, a mine exploded.” I replied “I know my son, you have already told me” But, he said “Mom, but it exploded on my dad!” Allah is my witness; this is what he said. I lost myself.88

According to narrated story, Hiseyîn was herding his sheep as usual. After a while, three of them enter through a hole in yielding barbed wired fence into the mined zone. He went after them to bring them back because sometimes animals could go to the Syrian side if luckily not step on any mines. While trying to direct them outside, he steps on the mine. The sheep in front him flew to pieces in the sky. Meanwhile, Fatma also talked about one of her neighbors who had three goats and how her goats went to the other side and how she went after them and brought them back. Fatma uttered about how her neighbor was lucky that nothing happened to her. The mined zone was a wasteland and that is why there was decent grass for animals there. For this reason, people were herding their sheep

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and goats sometimes there in spite of constant warning of patrolling and guarding soldiers. Incidences of death and corporeal damages caused by mines were not only among local people but also among the army members as well. The army members were constantly re-mining the spots and paths that have been cleaned by smugglers and other local people and during these remining undertakings many soldiers died of mine explosions. While these events were narrated by border people along with other stories, the news about death of soldiers at the border zone was being reported in the mainstream national newspapers as well. For example, one such news appeared on the front page of Milliyet newspaper on May 6, 1959, was an exemplary news for many others. It states that “Our two military officers were martyred in a mine explosion!” In details, it is reported that it was recognized that around 600 mines in the mined zone were dismantled by smugglers in one spot near the gendarmerie station in the border region of village of Kemaliye in Mardin province. For this reason, the army officials decided to re-mine that route by assigning some officers. It is stated that two officers lost their lives during re-mining process.89 The death of animals and particularly bovines such as donkeys, mules, horses, cows, and sheep by landmines was very commonly observed and their stories were also widely narrated in the local community. Furthermore, there were stories of use of animals for cleaning and securing a path for smuggling. The fact that donkeys were cheap in the region resulted in use of them by smugglers as an object in the mined zone where the donkey would be forced to walk ahead and smugglers would walk after. So, the donkey would dye first if there was an overlooked mine or a trap. In other cases, the smugglers generally would force their mules to walk ahead as a tactic. Omer remembered one of these tragicomic stories. He narrated: We were frequently collecting mines. There were placed with an interspace of two by two and half-meters. Their explosions were incredible. Of course, we were just dismantling those anti-personnel mines. There was a friend of us named Serîfo. ¸ His mule was ahead of him and he had his own load as well. While crossing the mined zone, his mule stepped on a mine and the mine exploded creating a deafening noise. The mine had a such an explosive force which broke everything to pieces. The intestines of mule were all over Serîfo ¸ and he was screaming with a great fear “my intestines are all around, help me!”. We were laughing at him. We told him “how could

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you talk if your intestines are all around?” He kept saying “look, look, they are here, they are here!” He had just small injuries in the explosion. Yeah, this kind of things happened in those times.90

The stories of injuries, disabilities shattered bodies and death of both animals and human beings document traumatic and painful consequences of interactions with the landmines. The large number of survivors who lost one or more parts of their bodies as disabled individuals in their families and in the larger community indicate the size of that continuing trauma that effects whole society. As seen in the case of Hiseyîn, his disability resulted in social and economic problems in his family where all family members had to struggle with poverty. On the other hand, being an incapable man might result in psychological problems as well. Without any support from the state and with very limited support from some relatives and neighbors, the only solution and hope for families with a disabled father or a widow mother was their children who would grow, work, and help. In short, these survivors were struggled with their disabilities and poverty at the same time. The stories of shattered bodies of smugglers, other ordinary people and children who were buried without certain parts revealed the continuity of traumas in those families. While talking about these events some of which happened 30–40 years ago, some of my interlocutors were getting emotional and crying during the interviews. While some were accused the state for implementation of the landmines and became angry, others lapsed into silence. Mahbûba who lost her brother Habîb at the age 24 in the early 1970s did not want to talk about what happened to her brother. Although I insisted two-three times, she resisted. Then, her 26 years old son Adnan narrated the story of his uncle who left a widow and four kids behind. He narrated: Actually, my parents did not talk about all the details of the event in the family. I just know certain parts of the story. As I learned, my uncle and his friends were trying to cross the border with their loads. However, they fell into the soldiers’ trap. During the armed conflict with the soldiers my uncle was injured. He did not die; he was injured first. Later, soldiers came and shot him numerous times. They say his body was not recognizable due to many shootings. They diagnose him from a kind of birth mark on his foot.91

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The story of Habîb like numerous other stories in the border region reveals his death as a bad one due to the damage done to his body. The fact that almost every single family in the border region has a similar story of death or injury and disability in the history of their families indicates the communal aspect of that pain and trauma that prolongs for decades. What makes these deaths bad ones is closely related to Islamic belief and strict rule of not harming the bodies of dead person whatever his/her crime or sin. The body of dead should be respected and buried according to Islamic religious rituals. However, the landmines and armed conflicts had always ruined that religious perception and tradition by destroying expectations of local people for having a good funeral for their loved ones. The expectation of burying the body as a whole was not fulfilled and the bodies were buried with missing parts in many cases. The stories of the dead human bodies with missing parts of and amputations signify destructive and catastrophic aspects of political borders surrounded with anti-personnel landmines. “They collected my brother’s body parts but could not find his head. We buried him without his head”92 were the words of Fehîma in her 60s who lost her brother to smuggling years ago. Her unending mourning for her brother is closely associated with an incomplete burial of her brother who stepped on a mine and brutally died. While talking about these devastating testimonies, my interlocutors mostly felt very anxious and troubled. Some of them tried to escape narrating the details of these kinds of events. Faysal also narrated one of those horrible stories: Once again, we were coming back from the binxet (down the line, Syrian side). We arrived near the main road, we saw people crossing a herd of sheep and a calf to the other side. We came home and while unloading our goods we heard a big explosion. Those smugglers were going to the other side via our path. The man was controlling his calf with a rope in its neck, but it seems he could not. The calf stepped on a mine and it exploded. With the blast of mine a huge hollow occurred and many of sheep fell into. The face of the owner of calf was damaged. His dead body remained there for many days because no one wanted to get it and bury. The soldiers were scared to take it and asked villagers to take it. The villagers in the binxet also did not want to take the body. I remember, at that evening of explosion, he was wailing and begging for help till night but no one did it. Everybody was afraid of the state and no one laid a claim to the dead man. People went there and saw him but could not dare to help.93

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Description of death as a bad or good one is generally associated with the ways in which the person dies and the age of that person as well. A bad death is defined with pain and a sudden one due to accidents, armed conflicts or shootings in which the body is damaged. These ways of death are described in Kurdish as “mirina bê star” (a death without any safety) or “mirina neba¸s ” (not a good death or a bad death).94 Besides, dying at a young age is not something wanted and expected and people generally expect the death of elders. This situation is described as an expected form of death and uttered in Kurdish “mirina bi dorê” or in Turkish “sıralı ölüm” (arrival of death based on the age). On the other hand, a good death is described as “mirineke bi star” (a safe death) or “mirineke xwe¸sik” (a good death) where there is no pain, suffering, and damage to the dead person. A good death is the one that comes to elders and happens serenely without pain. In these funerals, people talk about the dead person and say “he/she was kind of sleeping” and thus address the beauty and peace on his/her face. In short, definition and perception of death as a good and bad one explain not only some aspects of death culture but also various dimensions of the traumas in the local border community. The stories of interactions between landmines and human body have documented how human bodies can store not only remnants of mines and bullets but also the memories of these horrendous events.95 In other words, the damaged bodies of victims and the injured bodies of survivors can be read as certain texts that registered counter-narratives on the history of Turkish-Syrian political border. The disabled bodies of survivors are concrete confirmations of that history and accordingly playing a role in transferring these traumatic memories and historical accounts from one generation to the other.96

4.5

Caper Plant: Healing or Slaying?

Caper is a widely seen plant in the Mediterranean region. It is being produced and sold in large quantities by many Mediterranean countries including Turkey and Syria. It is used in many areas and in pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, and agriculture.97 This plant can be seen sometimes on roadsides, cascading down from the walls or at uncultivated areas in the southeast and Mediterranean region in Turkey. In the context of biodiversity in Syria, the booklet on caper harvesting in Syria documents large trade of caper plant and states that it “is a valuable commodity and

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resource for poor nomadic communities living in the Syrian desert. Collected during the summer months and sold to traders from neighboring countries (mainly from Turkey), the collectors are primarily women and children (7-14 years old). This ‘hidden trade’ provides an additional source of income for these resource poor communities.”98 In Turkey, while the buds of caper are called in the border region in Kurdish as berik (berries or buds) and in Turkish as gebre otu (caper plant) or kapari, “this shrub is known as caper in English, kabbar in Arab, alcaparro in Spanish, câpre in French), cappero in Italian and gollaro in Urdu.”99 What do people in Turkey know about this plant? A report on import and export of caper plant by Istanbul chamber of commerce which was published in 2014 stated that: In the public and in different parts of our country, this brushwood like plant is named very differently such as kapari, gebere otu, kapara, devedikeni, gebre, gebere, geber otu, gevil, bubu, kebere, karga kavunu, yılan ka- ba˘gı, yumuk, bugo, kepekçiçek, beri kemeri, menginik, keper, kepere, kedi tırna˘gı, s¸eballah, hint hıyarı, gavur bostanı. Although the buds of this plant are also named alike, caper is widely used for the plant. It generally grows wildly, its roots are very deep, it spreads a lot and heap together on the ground. Its pile image results in naming it as also brushwood.100

Since my childhood, I had seen the plant with its white flowers in the historical part of my hometown Kerboran/Dargeçit in Mardin where it was growing in different places although I never knew its name. During my fieldwork in Nisêbîn, I have recognized how people talked about that plant and the value of its buds that were collected by women and mostly children in the spring in April and May and how they would sell them to the customers coming from the western part of the country. Although the caper plant buds were known as a source for healing, it turned to be a killing plant in the border region. What makes the caper plant a dangerous one is the fact that it grew better in the mined zone as an uncultivated area. The forbidden mined zone turns into a caper field in the spring seasons attracting many youth and children and thereby causing high number casualties. In other words, while the plant meant for some as medicine, it was a killing instrument for many others. Therefore, the act of collecting buds of caper can be defined as a form of violating laws for protection of the border and as an

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unmaking practice. It also shows how the mined zone has been adopted by local people as a source of income. The agency of caper plant as healing and killing subject allows us again to acknowledge existence of various actors in the processes of making and unmaking of the political border. The stories of death of children generally appeared in the context of collecting this plant. Children whose ages varied from 7 to 16 or older generally collected caper from the mined zone and during this labor many of them wrongly stepped on mines. According to local people, many children brutally died and many were injured and thus became disabled. Alîya witnessed many events of those kids due to proximity of her house to the mined zone. She talked about the story of Omero’s wife and his daughter and how they both were injured while collecting caper. Later, she narrated another traumatic event that happened in 1990 or 1991 during which three children brutally died: The kids were doing picnic. Later, they crossed the wire and entered the mined zone. I was with my neighbor Fehîma and we were visiting another friend. I knead my dough to make bread before leaving my house. Therefore, when it was time to make bread, we came back. On the way home, we were just close to that mulberry tree [she points a tree a few meters away from us in front of her house] and suddenly we heard a huge explosion. The sky was filled with black smoke. I immediately understood that a mine has exploded and told my friend “those kids were around. Hope it is not them”. They were the kids of Seyîd Brahîm family, Xi¸sxi¸s family and Xalê Siltanê family. It was over there [pointing a spot 30-40 meters away from us in the mined zone]. Seyîd Brahîm’s kid stepped on the mine and three of them together died there. The bodies of two kids were blown into pieces. Nothing was left almost. But, the body of Xalê Siltanê’s daughter was not damaged. I saw it when they were washing the body and preparing for funeral. There were pieces of mines in her body. The other two bodies were totally damaged except the head and main parts. I remember, one of the girls was injured and did not die immediately but nobody dared to enter the zone. They said other mines might explode and they did not allow anyone to enter. The poor girl was wailing and screaming “yadee, yadeee… (mommy, mommy…). The soldiers did not allow her mother to enter. They remained there for four hours. The mine experts came four hours later after the explosion. She was very young, 14 or 15 years old.”101

We see a similar traumatic narrative in the life story Zekîya. She is one of those mothers who lost her their kids while they were collecting buds of caper plant many years ago.102 She lost her two kids. I learned about her

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story from one of her relatives because she did not want to be interviewed and to talk about her pain. I respected her mourning, acknowledged her suffering and left her house without insisting. Similar to the situation in the Syrian side, caper buds were a valuable commodity and a good source for poor families and people were collecting thousands of tons of buds to sell to traders from the Turkey and other countries. Contrary to the Syrian situation, the Turkish landmined zone was a fertile field for caper but also becoming a field of death for many poor people during their struggle to earn a living. The intersectionality of caper buds, children and landmines as differing subjects and their relations allow us to see agency of caper not only as a profit-making plant but also an entity that deceived children into the field of death. On the other hand, we observe how the landmined zone was adopted in diverse ways by different age groups (children, youth, adults, and elders) and genders (men and women) for different purposes in everyday life. Overall, the landmines appear as the most influential agents who dramatically change, transform, and destroy the rhythm and certain patterns of life in the local community.

4.6

Grass and Game

The local people’s relations with the political border and their adoption of the landmined zone as a space of economic profit and as a place of leisure were well described in the narratives of women. As stated earlier, the wild grass in the forbidden zone attracted animals and also people seeking to breed their animals. The landmined zone as an appealing space was not only providing mines and caper for selling, it was a place for herding, a place for picnics, a playground for children, and a place for collecting grass for animals during the spring seasons. People’s constant acts of demining in the zone created safe spaces and people were generally rushing into those spots to do picnics. However, the line between mined and demined part was ambiguous. That was why some people were unconsciously entering the mined part and dying. These forms of violation of forbidden zone by local people can be interpreted not only as consequences of desperation in diverse levels but also as ways of challenging the statesponsored border making practices as well. The landmined zone has operated as cyclone, pulling local people into the field of death by providing social and economic benefits. On the Nisêbîn border zone, the location called kahnîka (natural spring)103 has

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been the stage of many brutal events along with all other activities performed by local people. The location named kahnîka was on the right side of the border gate where there was a natural spring. People have talked about how this location within the mined zone was cleaned for people to go there and spend their leisure time. It seems the state authorities also let people into this location in time despite constant warnings of soldiers yelling from the watchtowers warning not to go closer to the mined parts. People also mentioned how this large site was being used regularly as a meadow for animals and as a playground for children and youth. During the interviews, younger male interlocutors talked of how they played soccer there with friends. During the fieldwork in Nisêbîn, I visited and entered that location and spent time with children playing there. The barbed wires were ruined by people and it was easy to enter. While there talking with kids, we heard sirens of Turkish army vehicle in the far distance in the patrolling area. The soldiers were trying to turn back a cow that entered the mined zone. Later, while talking about these issues with Alîya, she proudly talked about how she raised 12 sheep in her private space that she created in the mined zone. However, as stated earlier, people were not always luck while in the zone. One of my key interlocutors Hesîna narrated the death story of three kids who were playing and herding in the kahnîka region 20 years ago. She recounted: My older son was working in construction sites as an assistant for plasterers in Nisêbîn. When he was coming home at the evening, generally he would say he is hungry and ask for food. One day he came home and but did not say anything. He was just quiet. I asked him “My son, why do not you talk, are you hungry?” He replied “mom, we saw young boys being killed in the border zone today. I do not want to eat.” While talking with my son, my sister-in-law called me saying “Hesîna, something happened on the border, I guess they are some of our relatives!” We learned that there was son of my cousin, the grandson of my aunt and the son of one of their neighbors. They were very young. The son of my cousin was a high school student. There were herding their sheep and goats. We did not know what exactly happened, whether they stepped on the mines or whether they tried to dismantle one. The body of son of my cousin was totally damaged, his intestines were all around. The soldier in the watchtower witnessed how their bodies fly to the sky. The body of grandson of my aunt was fine but there were pieces of mines stuck in it. The body of the other boy was also horrible damaged. My son helped the Imam who was washing the bodies

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for funerals in the mosque. He told me that he was scared for what he had seen.104

Hesîna addressed the ambiguity of the reason behind the explosion where they were not sure whether they stepped on a mine or whether they were trying to dismantle one. In her opinion, it was one of those “mayînên xundabuyî” (lost mines). According to local people, although the location of kahnîka was clean of mines, there were still many lost mines in that site. These mines were the ones which glided from their spots or changed their place due to rain, flood, etc. or just forgotten. While narrating the stories of died people and mostly children playing and herding at the mined zone, the narrators became angry and accused the state officials for not taking any serious precautions and responsibility. While talking about his own story, Hiseyîn pronounced angrily and repentantly “I ruined my life just for three-four sheep”105 and lapsed into silence. The use of landmined zone as a meadow for the animals was very common where animals were sometimes passing to the other side and meanwhile patrolling soldiers were trying to prevent them. While walking in the kahnîka region and other places close to the borderline, I also observed these ongoing events on daily basis. As a good observer, Alîya narrated many of these events: I remember, once the rope around the neck of my calf slipped through my hands. He was running towards to the Syrian side. He arrived the watchtower. I went after. The soldiers stopped him. I caught him and brought back… Another time, Ay¸se’s lambs gone. Again, I went after them. The soldiers asked me “whose lambs are these?” I told them “They are mines. I was not at home. Kids let them in. Sorry.” I brought them back. Nothing happened.106

When I questioned Alîya about her comfort for entering the forbidden mined zone and approaching the watchtowers which were far away, she replied “Soldiers knew me. I sometimes gave them food, ayran (watered yogurt), butter etc. As you see, I had supporters” and then giggled. However, all local people were not lucky like Alîya and her animals. The soldiers were ordered to shoot animals entering the landmined zone and they killed many animals as well. The use of landmined zone as a source for grass during the spring seasons was another form of violating the border zone. The collection of wild

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grass for their animals at the barns at home or drying that grass (hay) for the winter was a regular practice of families rearing animals. During this labor that was carried out by women, the grass was collected by hand or a harvester, stuffed into gunny bags, and carried home. As I stated earlier, there were daily tags between those young women coming for grass and patrolling soldiers around the border zone early in the mornings. Alîya claimed that it was not only women from neighboring houses to the border but also women from far districts were also coming for the grass. She said that “there was always excessive tall wild grass growing during the spring period at the zone. There were soldiers disallowing. Clovers were almost half meter tall. You could fill your gunny bag in ten minutes.”107 In conclusion, local people’s narratives and testimonies document how the kahnîka region within the border zone was transformed into a social gathering place where children, youth, women, and elders were spending their leisure times. The use of kahnîka region and other parts of the landmined zone was a consequence of poverty, lack of public spaces, and facilities for leisure times in the old days in Nisêbîn. Nevertheless, going beyond this narrative of poverty, it can be argued that the consistency of violations of law and constant infiltrations into that zone as highly risky acts might be understood another way of adopting and transforming a “state made forbidden space,” the political border. In short, the landmined zone has been transformed into a ground for competitions, negotiations, collaborations, and conflicts between state officials and local people where diverse non-human actors (animals, mines, caper, and others) were also involving as vigorous participants.

Notes 1. Tekin, Sınırın Sosyolojisi, 13. 2. Ramazan Aras, “Naqshbandi Sufis and Their Conception of Place, Time and Fear on the Turkish-Syrian Border and Borderland,” Middle Eastern Studies 55, no. 1 (2019): 44–59. See also, Martin van Bruinessen, Agha, Shaikh and State (New York: Zed Books, 1992), 337–338; Selahaddin Kınacı, Mektubat-ı Sahı ¸ Hazne (¸Seyh Ahmed el-Haznevi’nin Mektupları) [Letters of Sheikh Ahmed Khaznavi] (Istanbul: Sey-Tac Yayınları, 2006); Salih Uçan, Nak¸sibendi Seyhlerinin ¸ Hikmetli Sözleri [Wise Words of Naqshbandi Sheikhs] (Istanbul: Huzur Yayınevi, 2011). 3. According to the local people, the collected buds of caper were sold to buyers who were coming from the western parts of the country. It was claimed that the caper was used mostly in medicine and cosmetics.

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4. Niles Hansen, “Regional Transboundary Cooperation Efforts in Centralist States: Conflicts and Responses in France and Mexico,” Publius: The Journal of Federalism 14, no. 4 (1984): 137–152; Liam O’Dowd and James Corrigan, “Buffer Zone or Bridge: Local Responses to CrossBorder Economic Co-operation in the Irish Border region,” Administration 42, no. 4 (1995): 335–351; Michael Keating, Nations Against the State: The New Politics of Nationalism in Quebec, Catalonia and Scotland (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 1996); Plurinational Democracy: Stateless Nations in a Post-sovereignty Era (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001); Hastings Donnan and Thomas M. Wilson, Borders: Frontiers of Identity, Nation and State (Oxford: Berg Press, 1999); Emmanuel Brunet-Jailly and Bruno Dupeyron, “Introduction: Borders, Borderlands and Porosity,” in Borderlands: Comparing Border Security in North America and Europe, ed. Emmanuel Brunet-Jailly (Ottawa: University of Ottawa Press, 2007), 6–7. 5. Baud and van Schendel, “Toward,” 211. 6. Tekin, Sınırın Sosyolojisi, 243–246. See also, Lale Yalçın-Heckmann, Tribe and Kinship Among the Kurds (Peter Lang Publishing, 1991); ˙ Muzaffer Ilhan Erdost, S¸ emdinli Röportajı [The Reportage of Semdinli] ¸ (Istanbul: Onur Yayınları, 1987). 7. Tekin, Sınırın Sosyolojisi, 243–246. 8. Hamelink and Barı¸s, “Dengbêjs,” 34. 9. Hamelink and Barı¸s, “Dengbêjs,” 46. 10. Casey, The Fate, 24. 11. “Nisibis,” The Jewish Virtual Library, accessed May 3, 2019, https:// www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/nisibis. See also, Aliyahu Ashtor and Moshe Beer, “Nisibis,” in Encyclopaedia Judaica, ed. Michael Berenbaum and Fred Skolnik, 2nd ed., Vol. 15 (Detroit: Macmillan Reference USA, 2007), 276; Eric Brauer and Raphael Patai, The Jews of Kurdistan (Wayne State University, 1993); Rıfat Bali, “Diyarbakır Yahudileri” [Jews of Diyarbakır], in Diyarbakır: Müze S¸ ehir, ed. Sevket ¸ Beysano˘glu et al. ˙ (Istanbul: Yapı Kredi Yayınları, 1999), 367–389. The chapter can be accessed from the link below. Accessed May 3, 2019, http://www. rifatbali.com/images/stories/dokumanlar/diyarbakir_yahudileri.pdf. 12. Personal interview with Alîya and Hesan in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. 13. In the Kurmancî dialect of Kurdish, both concept of Yahudî and Cihû are used as names of Jews. The word Cihû is pronounced as similar to Jew. 14. Personal interview with Alîya in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. 15. Personal interview with Alîya in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. 16. Personal interview with Naîma (1927–2016) in the Kurdish border village of Beyandûr close to Qami¸slo, Syria in September 2010.

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17. Personal interview with Emîna (1932–) in Kerboran/Dargeçit, Mardin in April 2014. 18. Milliyet Newspaper Archive, January 27, 1961, accessed March 7, 2015. 19. van Bruinessen, Agha, Shaikh and State, 479; Aras, “Naqshbandi,” 44– 59. 20. M. Efendi Karerli, Karerli Mehmet Efendi: I. Dünya Sava¸sı, Koçgiri, S¸ eyh Said ve Dersim’e Dair Yazılmayan Tarih ve Anılarım 1915–1958 [Karerli Mehmet Efendi: Unwritten History of World War I, Koçgiri, Sheikh Said and Dersim and My Memories 1915–1958], ed. Ali Rıza Erenler (Ankara: Kalan Yayıncılık, 2007); M. Nuri Dersimi, Hatıratım [My Memoirs] (Istanbul: Doz Yayıncılık, 1997). 21. Mullah Mustafa Barzanî (1903–1979), the Kurdish political leader of Kurdish movement in Iraq. Milliyet Newspaper Archive, November 9, 1962: 1, 7, accessed March 7, 2015. 22. Thuen, “The Significance,” 741. 23. Bruns and Miggelbrink, Subverting Borders, 17. 24. Baud and Schendel, “Toward,” 230. 25. Baud and Schendel, “Toward,” 231. 26. Özgen, “Sınırda,” 2–3. 27. Arnold van Gennep, The Rites of Passage (Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press, 1960). 28. Van Gennep, The Rites, 21. 29. Victor Turner, “Liminal to Liminoid, in Play, Flow, Ritual: An Essay in Comparative Symbology,” in From Ritual to Theater: The Human Seriousness of Play (New York: PAJ Publications, 1992), 24. ˙ 30. Faruk Be¸ser, Islâm’da Seferilik ve Hükümleri [Travelling and Its ˙ ˙ ˙ Rules in Islam]. Istanbul: Islâmi Ilimler Vakfı (ISAV) (Istanbul: Ensar Ne¸sriyat, 1997); Muhammed Hüsnü Çiftçi, “Kadının Mahremiyetsiz Sefere Çıkması Hususunda Fıkhi bir Analiz” [A Jurisprudential Analysis on Women’s Travel Without Mahram (Related Man)], Journal of Divinity Faculty of Recep Tayyip Erdo˘gan Universit y, no. 15 (June 2019): 206– 243. 31. Personal interview with Silêman in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. 32. Personal interview with Yusiv in Nisêbîn, in May 2013. 33. Michael Taussig, Shamanism, Colonialism and the Wild Man: A Study in Terror and Healing (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1987), 4. 34. Turner, “Liminal,” 26. 35. Willem van Schendel, “Easy Come, Easy Go: Smugglers on the Ganges,” Journal of Contemporary Asia 23, no. 2 (1993), 189. 36. Personal interview with Omer in Nisêbîn, in March 2014. 37. Personal interview with Omer in Nisêbîn, in March 2014. 38. Personal interview with Omer in Nisêbîn, in March 2014.

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39. Personal interview with Seyyîd Evdillah in Nisêbîn, in February 2013. 40. Milliyet Newspaper Archive, December 1, 1960, accessed March 4, 2015. 41. Milliyet Newspaper Archive, November 16, 1961, accessed March 4, 2015. 42. Personal interview with Omer in Nisêbîn, in March 2014. 43. Personal interview with Alîya in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. 44. Personal interview with Ahmed in Nisêbîn, in March 2014. 45. Here, my interlocutor addresses the coup d’état that happened on September 12 in 1980 in Turkey. 46. Personal interview with Ahmed in Nisêbîn, in March 2014. 47. Brigadier General Veli Küçük (1944–) who is retired now, was claimed ˙ to be one of the founders of JITEM (Gendarmerie Intelligence Organization Fighting against Terror) that was a controversial organization involved in numerous illegal activities and murders in the 1990s in the Kurdish region in Turkey. For more details, look at Gülçin Av¸sar, Ergenekon’un Öteki Yüzü: Faili Meçhuller ve Kayıplar [The Other Face of Ergenekon: Unknown Murders and Disappearances—Examination of Ergenekon Files] (Istanbul: TESEV Yayınları, 2013). 48. Personal interview with Ahmed in Nisêbîn, in March 2014. 49. Zygmunt Bauman, Liquid Fear (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2006), 4. 50. Linda Green, Fear, 55. 51. Joanna Bourke, “Fear and Anxiety: Writing About Emotion in Modern History,” History Workshop Journal 55, no. 1 (Spring 2003): 129. 52. Kirsi Lauren, “Fear in Border Narratives: Perspectives of the FinnishRussian Border,” Folklore (Estonia) 52 (2012): 39–62. 53. Emily Hicks, “The Broken Line,” in The Politics of Everyday Fear, ed. Brian Massumi (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1993), 40. 54. Personal interview with Silêman in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. 55. Personal interview with M. Brahîmê Dorikî in Nisêbîn, in June 2014. 56. The name seyyîd (sayyids) is given to descendants of Hz. Ali, the sonin-law of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) and they are generally wellrespected in the Kurdish and the other Muslim communities in the Muslim World. 57. According to the local narratives, the material named ceft was used for tanning the skin of goat which was used as a butter churn. The ceft was made of a mixture of peels of roots of thorn trees, barks of oak trees, and dried barks of pomegranate trees. They were grounded together by adding salt and then boiled with water. Then, that mixture was rubbed on inside and outside of that specially cut skin of goat and kept under the sun for ten days. This procedure was repeated again and then the butter churn was getting ready for use. 58. Personal interview with Ahmed in Nisêbîn, in March 2014.

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59. Sidney W. Mintz, Sweetness and Power: The Place of Sugar in Modern History (New York: Penguin Books, 1986). 60. Personal interview with Omer in Nisêbîn, in March 2014. 61. Personal interview with Hesîna in Nisêbîn, in February 2014. 62. Personal interview with Hesîna in Nisêbîn, in February 2014. 63. Milliyet Newspaper Archive, October 16, 1958, page 3, accessed February 23, 2015. 64. Jinn(s) are supernatural creatures that inhabit the earth according to Islamic faith and sources, the Qur’an and Sunnah. Today, there are still widely circulated talks and rumors about jinns of Nisêbîn among the public. 65. Personal interview with Omer in Nisêbîn, in March 2014. 66. Personal interview with Omer in Nisêbîn, in March 2014. 67. Personal interview with Omer in Nisêbîn, in March 2014. 68. Linda Green, Fear. See also Juan E. Corradi et al., eds. Fear at the Edge: State Terror and Resistance in Latin America (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992). 69. Personal interview with Ahmed in Nisêbîn, in March 2014. 70. Personal interview with Ahmed in Nisêbîn, in March 2014. 71. Personal interview with Alîya in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. ˙ ˙ 72. Ilhami GülerGüler, Ilhami, Allah’ın Ahlakili˘gi Sorunu [The Question ˙ of Morality of Allah] (Ankara Okulu Yayınları, 2000). See also, Ilhami Güler, “Türkiye’de ‘Kadercilik’ Acıya Katlanmanın ‘Afyonu’ Olarak ˙ sleyen Bir Sey,” I¸ ¸ accessed May 16, 2019, https://www.kirmizilar.com/ tr/index.php/konuk-yazarlar2/232-t%C3%BCrkiye-de-kadercilik-ac% C4%B1ya-katlanman%C4%B1n-afyon-u-olarak-i%C5%9Fleyen-bir-%C5% 9Fey. 73. Personal interview with Hiseyîn in Nisêbîn, in June 2013. 74. Personal interview with Fatma in Nisêbîn, in June 2013. 75. Personal interview with Alîya in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. 76. Personal interview with Alîya in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. 77. Personal interview with Alîya in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. 78. Personal interview with Alîya in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. 79. In the Kurdish community, there is common perception of gendarmerie and police stations as dangerous places where you might be sexually assaulted and attacked. For this reason, border people who have the same perception tried to keep away their women to involve in smuggling as much as possible. In the local community, it is believed that people do gossip about those women who have been taken into custody and arrested by soldiers or police. 80. Personal interview with Alîya in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. 81. The local Arab population in the Mardin province are named also Mihalmî. There has been always a certain percentage of Arab population

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82. 83. 84. 85. 86. 87. 88. 89. 90. 91. 92. 93. 94. 95. 96. 97.

98.

99.

100.

101. 102. 103.

in Nisêbîn as well although the majority of population is Kurdish, today. For more details, see Peter Alford Andrews, Türkiye’de Etnik Gruplar [Ethnic Groups in Turkey] (Istanbul: Ant Yayınları, 1992); Otto Jastrow, Mihalmi Kültürü: Etnografik Bir Çalı¸sma [Culture of Mihalmis: ˙ An Ethnographic Study] (Istanbul: Avesta Yayınları, 2015). Ihsan Çetin, Midyat’ta Etnik Gruplar [Ethnic Groups in Midyat] (Istanbul: Yaba, 2007). Personal interview with Alîya in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. Personal interview with Alîya in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. Personal interview with Omer in Nisêbîn, in March 2014. Personal interview with Ahmed in Nisêbîn, in March 2014. Personal interview with Ahmed in Nisêbîn, in March 2014. Personal interview with Hiseyîn in Nisêbîn, in June 2013. Personal interview with Fatma in Nisêbîn, in June 2013. Milliyet Newspaper Archive, May 6, 1959, accessed February 22, 2015. Personal interview with Omer in Nisêbîn, in March 2014. Personal interview with Mahbûba and Adnan in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. Personal interview with Fehîma in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. Personal interview with Faysal in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. Aras, The Formation, 139. Henig, “Iron,” 22. Michael Lambek and Paul Antze, eds., Tense Past: Cultural Essays in Trauma and Memory (London: Routledge, 1996). Fadime Yemi¸s and Nilgün Yenil, “The Panacea Plants for Environment and Humanity: Caper and Ritha,” Pakistan Journal of Analytical and Environmental Chemistry 16, no. 1 (2015): 1–9. The Caper in Syria: Nature’s Gift to Syria’s Resource Poor,” accessed May 19, 2019, https://www.bioversityinternational.org/fileadmin/ _migrated/uploads/tx_news/The_caper_in_Syria__nature_s_gift_to_ Syria%E2%80%99s_resource_poor_1075.pdf. P. Legua et al., “Phenological Growth Stages of Caper Plant (Capparis spinosa L.) According to the Biologische Bundesanstalt, Bundessortenamt and Chemical Scale,” Annals of Applied Biology 163 (2013): 135. ˙ Piyasa ve Ürün Ara¸stırması Raporu Mualla Bilgin, Kapari: Yurt Içi [Caper: The Report on Internal Market and Product Research] (Istanbul Ticaret Odası Dı¸s Ticaret Subesi ¸ Ara¸stırma Servisi, 2004), 3, accessed May 19, 2019, https://www.yumpu.com/tr/document/read/ 23585250/kapari-yurt-ici-piyasa-ve-urun-arastrmas-2004-ito. Personal interview with Alîya in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. Personal talk with Zekîya in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. The name of the place comes from the natural spring there which had more water during the spring seasons but they said that it has died in recent years.

4

104. 105. 106. 107.

Personal Personal Personal Personal

interview interview interview interview

with with with with

THE UNMAKING

Hesîna in Nisêbîn, in February 2014. Hiseyîn in Nisêbîn, in June 2013. Alîya in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. Alîya in Nisêbîn, in April 2014.

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CHAPTER 5

The Final Phase: The Turkish Security Wall

What is exactly the raison d’être of walls and fences on the political borders? The fundamental question on the existence of security fences and walls can be related to emotions of fear and safety as two essential aspects of human nature. Under circumstances where these feelings consolidate, people generally tend to apply and use diverse strategies of “b/ordering space”1 in order to protect themselves against internal or external threats. In this context, the fortification of city walls and the Great Wall of China can be considered as ancient cases of human practices of constituting and shaping the space for preventing invasions, protecting sovereignty of states and securing people and communities under threat. Any investigation on the historical construction and evolution of political borders, fences, and walls as rigid and impermeable fortifications would address how these social, political, and economic spatial entities were erected on geopolitical landscapes and how they have become more controversial and complicated forms of encampment in today’s modern and globalized world. During World War I and World War II, demarcation of territorial borders with various form of fences and walls became the most important signifiers of sovereignty, territory, and identity of a state as a cartographic imagination. With the arrival of ontological question of “what borders are” and the epistemological questions of “what and how we know about the borders,” there has been “a turn from a focus on boundaries, as political limits of states, to borders as socio-territorial constructs.”2 Therefore, the intensification of desire for building of fences and walls in recent years

© The Author(s) 2020 R. Aras, The Wall, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-45654-2_5

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by modern nation-states has deepened the concerns about socio-spatial and political aspects of these constructions. In the history of modern territorial states and in their labor of making of political borders in order to secure the nation, the contraction of border walls as physical barriers has been defined by some scholars as “the most aggressive strategy” for economic security.3 However, is it possible to explain the making of border walls by just a political economy theory which claims that “large economic inequalities between the two states sharing a border can lead to walls?”4 While responding to the question of “why do states erect fortified boundaries?”, Ron E. Hassner and Jason Wittenberg also concluded that: Most are built by wealthy states to keep out unwanted migrants, particularly those originating from Muslim-majority states. Contrary to conventional wisdom, states that construct such barriers do not tend to suffer disproportionately from terror-ism, nor do they tend to be involved in a significant number of territorial disputes. The primary motivation for constructing fortified barriers is not territory or security but economics.5

Contrary to these arguments, it is argued in this chapter that the militarysecurity factor lays as the fundamental of explanation for the construction of Turkish security wall without dismissing the roles of other regional, national, and international social, cultural, economic, and political factors. As argued in the previous chapters, the Turkish state’s concern and fear have not only been originated from the economic-security factor on the Turkish-Syrian border. As a part of its authoritarian Kemalist, Turkish nationalist and secular agenda, the state authorities always aimed to cut the social, cultural, religious, tribal, and historical ties between Kurdish communities living on the both sides of the border. An archeological investigation of that fear might lead us to the Kurdish rebellions, particularly the Sheik Said rebellion in 1925 with its ethno-religious nature, in the early decades of the Republic. During state’s violent exclusionist and marginalizing border security and control policies, Turkification, secularization and modernization/westernization of all citizens were fundamental concerns and these policies were carried out by any means necessary. The anticipation of the state authorities was basically to Turkify the Kurdish population residing within national boundaries and in order to achieve this task all forms of ties with other Kurdish communities residing in neighboring countries (Syria, Iraq, and Iran) had to be eliminated.

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Therefore, the Turkish security wall as the final tactic of the state authority cannot just be explained with the border security concerns of the current government that intensified with the recent dirty war in Syria. The augmentation of transnational Kurdish nationalism and the rise of a common will for strengthening ties between Kurdish nationalist groups and movements (the PKK, the Barzanî movement, the other Kurdish Islamist movements and their branches in these four countries) within Kurdish communities residing in both sides of the borders seems to be a haunting and unexpected political development for the Turkish state authorities. Actually, as stated earlier in Chapter 3, the Kurdish Mullah Mustafa Barzanî movement of Iraq was having ties with Kurdish groups in Turkey, Iran, and Syria and this always has been a concern of these nation-states for many decades. Besides, the rise of power of Kurdish nationalist-socialist YPG (Yekîneyên Parastina Gel —People’s Protection Units) movement which is PKK’s branch in the Kurdish region in northern Syria has been another great concern of the Turkish political and military authorities. For these reasons, the making of the wall can also be related to the Turkish state’s anxiety and unwillingness for having an autonomous Kurdish region controlled by an organization connected to the PKK. The risks of this unwanted neighbor are generating from its ongoing impacts on the Kurdish nationalist circles in Turkey. The fact that this political movement as a terrorizing entity has infiltrating into the Kurdish inhabited territories in the Turkish side and thereby provoking its sympathizers since the eruption of the Syrian war alerted the Turkish state authorities more. Today, the world is witnessing fortification of new border fences and walls and thereby the hope and optimism after the fall of the Berlin Wall (1961–1991) have fallen through. The common idea that the process of globalization would end up with a “borderless world” and the expectation that all strict political borders of nation-state would disappear in a liberal and globalized world6 have not come true. In other words, “the events of the first decade of the new millennium upended two common assumptions about the process of globalization: first that it generates a ‘borderless world’ where walls and fences would become increasingly anachronistic and second that it promotes the free flow of capital, goods, and people around the world.”7 Then, why now many nation-states are putting huge amounts of money, energy, and human labor in order to build fences and walls around their national territories in a globalized world? Or, one

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might ask “what precisely drives the seemingly persistent human motivation to call a territory one’s or our own, to demarcate property, to make ours here and theirs there, and to shield it off against the socio-spatially constructed and constitutive Them, the Others?”8 In other words, “creating walls, segregation, borders is creating physical and symbolic facts ‘on the ground’ in order to differentiate spaces in which identities and otherness can be grounded.”9 In the context of rise of walling policies of modern sovereign states in recent decades in a so-called globalized world, Wendy Brown has eloquently interpreted that “what we have come to call a globalized world harbors fundamental tensions between opening and barricading, fusion and partition, erasure and reinscription. These tensions materialize as increasingly liberalized borders, on the one hand, and the devotion of unprecedented funds, energies, and technologies to border fortification, on the other.”10 Then, one might ask “are there any good fences and walls or are they all inherently bad?” In spite of neoliberal, cosmopolitan, humanitarian, leftist, and also religious (in the case of Islamic discourse of Ummah) discourses and their “fantasies of a world without borders,”11 today, there is a growing passion for political and territorial walling and barricading of modern nationstates. Furthermore, “unlike the Berlin Wall, which was meant to keep people in, most of these walls were built to keep people out, deterring illegal immigration, stop- ping the flow of contraband, or protecting citizens from crimes.”12 Currently, the state authorities are more willing to determine, maintain, protect, and legitimize their political territorial borders with construction of fences and walls as a result of waves of immigration, flow of refugees,13 smuggling, economic crisis and precarity, transnational oppositional political movements and wide networks of national and international terrorist groups and movements which can also be defined as new crises of modern nation-states. As a re-current conventional strategy and security measure, we are witnessing construction of new “security fences and walls” on arbitrarily demarcated political borders as violent markers and symbols of territorial sovereignty. Recent researches have documented how the number of diverse forms of security walls around the world from 34 to 63 in the 2000s has augmented and how “this aggressive state strategy to manage border instability is on the rise, not in decline.”14 As a dominant argument in the literature on security walls, cross-border economic disparities, internal ethnic and religious wars, political-military instabilities, the flow of refugees, drugs and human trafficking, and the

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flow of armed fighters have been seen as fundamental reasons for constructions of the political fences and walls that have been mushrooming in the last decade.15 In other words, the fences and walls are being erected in order to regulate these flows, prevent unwanted flows and maintain an economic, social, political, and demographic stability within national borders. The border walls as systematic political security barriers intervene ontological and epistemological existence of ordinary subjects that have been restrained within political territorial borders. Under these developing state strategies, the international flow of human subjects might be suspended in the near future that might erase the concept of refugees as an ontological being and social phenomenon. In this context, how do we sociological and anthropologically define the new phenomenon of the “Turkish security wall” and how this wall is differentiating from the other cases? Here, contrary to Wendy Brown’s evaluation of the walls as icons of global erosion of state sovereignty,16 I define the security walls, with an emphasis on the Turkish one, as a resurgent expression of the state sovereignty which not only emphasizes the boundaries of cartographic imagination of Turkish nation but also deter, confine, and trap human subjects under threat at their home countries. In this chapter, it is argued that the Turkish wall as the final phase of border making process on the Turkish-Syrian border has been fortified (2016–2018) due to political, military, economic, and social reasons which is based on recent observations and collected data. The objectives of this chapter are threefold. The first part of the chapter will briefly summarize how the idea of building a wall came to existence by scrutinizing the official discourses. Subsequently, the process of making the wall and how it has been inscribed on the top of the previous apparatuses will be analyzed. Lastly, the tactic of underground tunnels as a possible form of unmaking mechanism will be investigated in the light of occurrences in other parts of the world. In this context, terrorist and oppositional movements, drug and human traffickers and ordinary smugglers’ attempts of making underground tunnels for crossing the other side might gradually appear as an unmaking practice against this aggressive concrete entity. The fact that there have already been some cases of tunnel making by the members of PKK/YPG can be evaluated as the first indication of tunnel making networks and tunnel economy in the region in the near future. First of all, the Turkish state’s legitimizing discourses of building the security wall that came to surface in the early months of Syrian civil

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war (2011–present) will be addressed. What is the mission of the security wall for the Turkish state authorities? How should we understand the major reasons behind the construction of security wall? It has been argued that not only the “rising numbers of Syrian migrants, the deterioration of Turkish relations with the Assad government and the engagement of the Kurds as another important party in the Syrian conflict”17 but also the “spread of terrorism and inflow of the Daesh fighters, who were using soft border regime to diffuse their activities to the Turkish territory; increase in smuggling and cross-border illegal trade; fears from the conflict spillover; but also territorial integrity concerns with regard to revival of the Kurdish activities in the region”18 radically changed the border policies of the Turkish state. In other words, the Turkish state’s struggle for securing and controlling its Syrian border for decades has aggravated due to the Syrian war and pushed the country into many critical crises. In this context, the construction of the wall can be interpreted as a quick solution to block some of these political regional crises. The state authorities seemed to be convinced by competence of this strategy and that is why they have started to build a security wall on the TurkishIranian border as well which was planned to be completed in the spring of 2019.19 The construction of the security wall on Iranian border is also near completion but it is being exempted from this research and needs to be covered in another work focusing on the history of Turkish-Iranian border. Then, what is the next? Are we going to witness construction of a security wall on the Turkish-Iraqi border as well? In this ongoing political turmoil and crises, the Turkish state looks passionate and willing to wall itself step by step. However, it is hard to predict the impacts and consequences of this walling strategy on local communities and Turkey’s relations with its neighboring countries in the near future. We do not know how militarization of the border zone will trigger further militaristic, ethno-nationalistic, discriminatory, xenophobic and marginalizing emotions and ideologies among the mainstream Turkish community in Turkey. It can be claimed that the Turkish security wall snaking through Kurdish inhabited lands have already induced anger and anxiety among partitioned Kurdish communities residing in both sides of border. Therefore, the wall can be described as a catastrophic military intervention on the local geography that deepen already existing ruptures in social, cultural, economic, ecological, political and religious relations, networks, life patterns, and memories of people living on the both sides of the wall in spite of escalating security concerns of the Turkish state authorities.

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The Idea of the Security Wall

What are the fundamental factors that convinced the Turkish state authorities to build the security walls and why now? Why Turkish authorities have applied to this top-down strategy of border management and how much it indicates weakness of the state in its labor of maintaining the security of border that has turned into a perforated entity? Actually, when the Turkish state’s making of political borders has been scrutinized through the case of Turkish-Syrian border it can be argued that there have always been continuities and dis-continuities in this labor since 1923. The Turkish governments always tried to control and maintain security on this border by implementation of diverse apparatuses and agents which have been documented in the previous chapters. However, the history of Turkish border security policies enables us to see diversifying periods and perceptions in that history as well. The first liberal turn was carried out by Turgut Özal from 1983 to 1993 during which Özal tried to transform some policies and institutions in the country. Nevertheless, the early 1990s were the horrific times in the Kurdish region where the armed conflicts between the state forces and the PKK were very intense. Thousands of people lost their lives, thousands were incarcerated and serious human rights violations were banal daily events in the region. It can be argued that the second liberal turn started with the rule of AK Party governments in 2002 during which liberal policies were employed for managements borders. Here, it should be noted that the AK Party governments were not that much effective and transformative due to legacy of former governments, the bureaucratic structure and the impacts of the army on the politics until the end of the 2000s during which many human rights violations and other cruelties endured all around the country. From 1923 to 2002, the Turkish state’s border making practices on the Syrian border can be analyzed in two phases in terms of the radical shift in ideological, religious, and historical cartographic perceptions of the state authorities. I define the first period from 1923 to 2002 as the period of Kemalist, secular, and Turkish nationalist governments that prioritized exclusive and discriminatory politics in their labor of securing and maintaining national political borders. For the Kemalist Turkish nation-state ideology, territorial sovereignty and national-borders were undisputable in the process of “becoming a nation” during which the territory and its inhabitants were targeted along with Turkification and severe assimilation policies. So, imposition of new security laws along with physical

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interventions of the state at the Syrian borderland appeared in diverse forms in a sequence after 1923. In this era, the state’s attempts of regulating and controlling the world of its citizens were supplemented with cutting their ties with their kin residing in the neighboring countries. Since 1984, the date of eruption of the terror of the PKK, the question of how to prevent and deal with the terror has been on the agenda of the Turkish state authorities. According to the data provided by the office of Gendarmerie General Commander in 1990, 25 military officers, 24 sergeants, 237 soldiers, 23 police officers, 56 village guards, 11 headmen, 15 teachers, and 568 civilians were killed by the PKK. In this period, 574 members (terrorists) of the PKK were also killed by the state forces.20 In the following years, the casualties would increase and exceeding 40 thousand people. For these reasons, there has been always a quest of the state officials for constructing such mechanism due to constant terror attacks of the PKK and the penetrations of its members through Iraqi, Iranian, and Syrian borders. For instance, similar to the mechanism (barbed wire fences, landmines, watchtowers, etc.) constructed on the Syrian border, the Turkish media sources were announcing construction of border security project (sanitary cordon) supported with physical preventive system on Iranian and Iraqi borders as well in June 1994 in order to deter infiltrations of the militants of the PKK.21 The Turkish state authorities were always disputing and trying to persuade state authorities in neighboring countries Iraq, Syria, and Iran to collaborate and not allow PKK to have bases in their territories.22 However, Turkish state’s efforts did not work until today due to PKK’s persistent ties with local Kurdish communities in these countries and lack of a comprehensive political solution for the Kurdish social, cultural, and political demands in Turkey. I define the second period, from 2002 to the present, the era of rule of AK Party, as the period dominated by neo-Ottomanist and Islamistconservative ideology mainly based on the thought of ummah (Muslim brotherhood). By opening the doors for a new period after the hostility dominated Cold War Era, they have aimed to generate inclusive, integrative, and expansionist politics that include a series of paradoxes. The rule of AK Party can be defined as a slow rupture in Turkish state politics of governing political borders. The AK Party governments’ inclusive approach to its neighbors smoothened long decades-old politics on the borderlands. In the case of Turkish-Syrian border, relations between both sides moved toward cooperation and then integration, from enmity to amity23 before eruption of the war. After long years of hostility, foreign

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ministers of both countries agreed to remove physical barriers at certain parts of the Turkish-Syrian border in 2008 and to lift the visa requirements mutually in 2009. The AK Party and its Foreign Minister of the time Ahmet Davuto˘glu deserted conventional Turkish political paradigm, developed a new language, perception and paradigm and coined a new concept, “zero problems with neighbors.”24 Davuto˘glu argued that: I have asserted that a major reason for Turkey’s relative isolation from its neighborhood had to do with the framework that dominated the mindset of Turkish foreign-policy elites for decades - a mindset that erected obstacles between Turkey and its neighbors physically, mentally, and politically. The new AK Party government hoped to reintegrate Turkey with its surroundings, and this new strategy necessitated a major break with the old foreign-policy culture. In its electoral platform, the AK Party resolved to improve relations with Turkey’s neighbors and pursue a more dynamic and multidimensional foreign policy.25

As being argued elsewhere, “the main purpose of this foreign policy principle is to form a line of stability around Turkey.”26 By commencing a reformist program, the AK Party governments applied an integrative and peaceful approach toward neighboring countries, particularly with the Muslim countries which were interpreted by some journalists as a move toward formation of “a Federation in the Middle East.”27 Indeed, the Turkish state’s perception of border security began to dramatically change when the Syrian civil war erupted in 2011. The Turkish authorities and public began to worry about flow of illegal immigration, flow of hundreds of thousands of refugees into the Turkish territories including thousands of members of international terrorist groups along with drug, human and arm trafficking. Turkish state’s efforts of securing and protecting its Syrian border for decades were just ruined in a short time and the Turkish-Syrian border was turned into a sieve-like structure through which not only Syrian ordinary people but also members of local and transnational terrorist groups (ISIS, PKK, etc.) were easily infiltrating from all parts of the border with the help of smugglers and guides during days and nights. Needless to say, the recent flow of Syrian refugees and waves of illegal immigration on the Turkish borders and the borders of south and eastern European countries revealed permeability of these borders and resulted in certain forms of crises in those countries. Here, it is important to note that although Turkey opened its border

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gates for civilians escaping from the civil war and has become a home to millions of Syrian refugees, smuggling people (human trafficking) from Syria to Turkey is still a great business for smugglers who were used to smuggling goods in the last years. Meanwhile, it was also argued in the national and international media sources how the Turkish-Syrian border was turned into a gate for mobility of newly recruited fighters not only for the ISIS28 but also for the PKK/YPG. The ongoing political developments in Syria but particularly in northern Syrian have been seen as a threat by Turkish authorities for territorial integrity and sovereignty of the country. According to Barbora Olejárová, the major concerns for territorial integrity and geopolitics, terrorism and organized crime, foreign policy and international pressure were fundamental factors that persuaded Turkish authorities to change their open-borders policy.29 Therefore, the main discourse of the Turkish authorities was grounded on the security of both the border and the country and thereby used for legitimizing the construction of the wall which was named as “güvenlik duvarı” (the security wall). It has been argued that the global impacts of events like 9/11, the Arab Spring, the Syrian war, transnational terror of ISIS, and other similar events have deeply changed and made a shift in the border security policies in many countries around the world.30 Today, many European countries from the south (Greece) to the north (Norway) have also erected barbed wire fences and walls on their borders in order to prevent and control flow of refugees and illegal immigrants. It is interesting to observe in this trend that many EU countries have been constructing fences on their “eastern and southern borders” in waves in order to prevent flow of immigrants and refugees. So, on the travel route of unwanted humans and goods, Turkey has walled its almost all eastern and southeastern borders, Greece and Bulgaria have fenced their eastern borders with Turkey, the Macedonian army has erected fences on its border with Greek border in 2015 and it goes like this. It has been stated that “since the start of Europe’s migrant crisis in 2015, at least 800 miles of fences have been erected by Austria, Bulgaria, Greece, Hungary, Macedonia, Slovenia and others”31 in order to prevent infiltrations of immigrants. Besides, the new perception of border security necessitates inclusion of not only national actors and neighboring states but also regional and sometimes global actors (countries) as well. In line with this global trend, Turkey also has applied very similar discourses in order to legitimize and support its idea and practice of construction of the security wall. In short,

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the war in Syria and the new phenomenon of transnational terror have deeply affected the Turkish border security policies and forced Turkish authorities to change their perception of “homeland security” and start new initiatives. The early statements of Turkish officials about security concerns started to pop up on the media sources in 2013. The statement of the Minister of Customs and Trade Hayati Yazıcı on May 27 in 2013 was one of the first declarations about the plans made by the government and the army officials for constructing new customs buildings, border gates, area planning, and the security wall. While talking about ongoing renovations at the border gates, Yazıcı addressed the signed protocol between his Ministry and the Ground Forces Commander on building a security wall. He also stated how they are going to build the wall with barbed fences whose height will be determined according to the needs of the Turkish army. Besides, Yazıcı declared how they are going to have novel preventive systems, phones, cameras, barriers, and lightening system in the new plan.32 On the other hand, in those days, the vice-prime minister and spokesman of the ruling government of AK Party Bülent Arınç was denying the claims about the construction of a security wall by oppositional Kurdish politicians. He affirmed that: Turkish state priorities the security of its citizens and therefore applying these temporary precautions. That wall is going to be constructed just on 1300-meters borderline. The wall is not going to be extended and heightened. The barbed wire is also going to be installed on top of the wall. Actually, what is called the wall is not a wall. It is going to be a barbed wire based structure as it has been there before.33

The idea of building a security wall all along the Syrian border was not totally accepted by the officials at the beginning and there were already constructed lower walls in certain parts of the border. Arınç described this former version of the wall as a precaution rather than a fixed, stable, and permanent entity. It seems the Turkish state authorities were not having a consensus at the beginning and that is why there were contradictory statement by members of the Turkish government. Eventually, nearly two years later in 2015, Bülent Arınç declared that Turkey is going to construct an integrative security system on the Syrian border but not giving details about actual plan.34 The report on the Turkish border security policy on the Syrian border prepared by Murat Ye¸silta¸s claims that the

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idea of building a security wall as a precaution on the border due to the ongoing internal war and instability in Syria was denied by the government officials.35 In this period, building a concrete border security wall was not predicted by some political analysts as well. The ambiguity within the discourses of Turkish government and in the other political circles in this early period indicates the controversies on this idea. However, this idea gained a deeper ground in Turkish politics and was advocated by the Army officials soon later which resulted in the construction of a more professional border security wall equipped with high security technology. The Syrian war changed almost all dynamics of the region and therefore reshaped the Turkish security concerns about its political borders and in particular the Turkish-Syrian border. Since the eruption of demonstrations against the oppressive Syrian regime in March 2011, Turkey applied, and practiced its “açık kapı siyaseti” (open-door policy) for Syrian refugees36 during which the flow of refugees gradually increased and has reached around four million. According to the latest statistics of UNHCR from April 30, 2019, Turkey hosts around 3.6 million Syrians, 170 thousand Afghans, 142 thousand Iraqis, 39 thousand Iranians, 5700 Somalians and 11,700 people from other nationalities.37 On the other hand, the Turkish public began to express its frustration and gradually its perception also “has shifted from perceiving Turkish open border policy as a manifestation of solidarity and Turkish dominance in the region, to seeing Syrian refugees as a threat to social order, economic growth and security.”38 As a result, Turkey started to shift toward a more restrictive border policy and developed a firm security mechanism by construction of the security walls partially on certain critical points on the border zone in 2013. However, the actual plan of walling the whole Syrian border with more innovative mechanism was initiated in 2016 and completed in 2018.39 In sum, the fundamental idea behind the construction of the wall seems to be “the prevention of trans-national terror and unwanted immigration” and this idea was widely disseminated and propagated in the national media sources and through discourses of the state officials including high-ranked army members. Actually, the ruling government officials’ statements of opening the doors for civilians, majority of whom were women, elders and children escaping from the war, were escorting to the parallel discourses of unwanted flow of people by some oppositional and Turkish nationalist parties in the country. So, the only legitimate reason for making of the wall in the statist discourses was “blocking the terror.”

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As a result of this critical reason, interestingly, there has not been genuine disputes and oppositions against the security wall in the public in Turkey except the protest of leaders and some members of pro-Kurdish leftist-nationalist Party, HDP (People’s Democratic Party).

5.2

The Making of the Wall

Today, the Turkish security wall has gained a status of being the third longest wall in the world after the Great Wall of China and the fences on the US-Mexico border.40 The making of the border wall as a fixed, durable, and inflexible entity has been a new site and symbol of the state power and a concrete form of boundary of “imagined Turkish nation.” However, it is not much clear how the underground tunnels as an unmaking practice of geopolitically divided communities could subvert these walled borders and turned them into unstable and ineffective constructions. Today, the state power seems to be achieving its ultimate goal by building these concrete walls which block not only the mobility of humans but also damaging the habitat of many wild animals living in the region as well.41 Before the construction of the Turkish wall, it was claimed in the analysis on Turkish border security policies that “ongoing instability in the Middle East, geopolitical chaos, emerging new forms of terror, the institutional and legal infrastructural deficiencies in the Turkish border security, disorder within bureaucratic competences and responsibilities, the geographical and seasonal conditions that aggravate border controls”42 were the major problems that were faced during the state’s labor of border security. It seems that these worsening conditions in the Syrian border have started to trigger the idea of making a security wall which started to popping up in the agenda of Turkish Military Authorities in the early years of the Syrian civil war. In this context, one of the first military initiatives started to take place in 2013 with construction of 1 km length and 1.5-meter high concrete wall at certain part of the border zone in Nisêbîn. The 1.20-meter fence was put on the top of the wall and thus reaching 2.70 height. This new state implemented apparatus was immediately reacted by local people of Nisêbîn. During the construction of the wall, the Mayor of Nisêbîn Ay¸se Gökkan and some other members of pro-Kurdish PDP (BDP) party headed demonstrations against the wall by crying the motto “We do not want the walls within the lands of Kurdistan” in November 1, 2013. The counter-discourse of local people was that the Kurdish lands (homeland)

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cannot be divided by such a security wall that will totally disconnect Kurds of Turkey from the Kurds of Syria.43 Gökkan described the wall as “a wall of disgrace” and soon later she started a hunger strike in order to stop ongoing construction for nine days during which the construction stopped. During her hunger strike, Kurdish civilians from both sides of the border were supporting her by organizing public demonstrations on the border.44 However, when her hunger strike and other demonstrations ended, the Turkish state authorities restarted the construction of the wall with the support of the security provided by police in order to prevent demonstrators.45 One year later, in 2014, it was reported that “333 km ditch have been dug, 60 km embankment were made, 160 km razor wire barrier was made, 13 km wall was constructed and 217 km border zone has been lightened including setting a surveillance system for the nights and thermal cameras”46 in order to maintain control and security on the border. In the same year, the national newspapers were reporting how the first blocks of wall were implemented on the border zone in the border village of Ku¸saklı in Reyhanlı in the province of Hatay.47 Later, in another similar report on July 30, 2015, it was informed that due to ongoing infiltrations of terrorist fighters, human, drug and arm trafficking, smuggling (oil, tobacco, and other goods), and ballistic missiles of terrorist organization from the Syrian side, the Turkish Army Forces began to ditch the borderline and construct 2.5-meter high concrete wall in the border region of Yaylada˘gı in Hatay.48 Meanwhile, the Minister of Finance was declaring that the government have transferred 203 Million Turkish liras for the construction of a new security system.49 Today, there are 20 border gates on the Syrian border and 12 of them are closed, five of them are restricted and just three of them are active.50 The first initiatives of building a small-size wall along with other supportive apparatuses “including drones and zeppelins that have been used on the US-Mexican border”51 were not fulfilling expectations of the Military officials. Therefore, with agreement with the government, the Military officials decided to construct a more comprehensive plan for border security in 2016. The construction was also going to be carried out by ˙ which was operating the Housing Development Administration (TOKI) under the Turkish Prime Ministry. On September 28 in 2016, the head of TOKI˙ Ergun Turan was reporting the difficulties of constructing the security wall due to landmined area and other geographical challenges. Turan was also stating that the wall is made of portable concrete blocks that can be moved somewhere else in two months when it is needed.52

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The fact that all of these military precautions and strategies did not work properly, later forced the government and the army to design a larger plan with higher size wall including new forms of watchtowers and gendarmerie stations.53 In other words, Turkey started to move for “the open-door policy to building fortress.”54 There have been various reports on the characteristics of the Turkish border security wall that has been constructed on the border zones of 911 km (566-miles) where the border provinces of Sırnak, ¸ Mardin, Sanlıurfa, ¸ Gaziantep, Kilis, and Hatay are located. The report by Anadolu Agency on June 9 in 2018 has informed that: The border wall project incorporates physical, electronic and advanced technology layers. The physical layer includes modular concrete walls, patrol routes, manned and unmanned towers and passenger tracks. Modular walls are being erected along the Turkish-Syrian borderline with seventon mobile blocks, two meters wide and three meters high. The blocks have also been topped with a one-meter-high razor wire. An electronic layer consists of close-up surveillance systems, thermal cameras, land surveillance radar, remote-controlled weapons systems, command-and-control centers, line-length imaging systems and seismic and acoustic sensors. The advanced technology layer of the project includes wide area surveillance, laser destructive fiber-optic detection, surveillance radar for drone detection, jammers and sensor-triggered short distance lighting systems.55

The wall is supported by newly constructed mobile 120 watchtowers that are equipped with high technological standards. The new construction was named as kulekol 56 which is a combined site to be used as a gendarmerie station and also a watchtower. The pictures of the erected security wall along with the kulekols have been popping up on the news and in the mainstream national media sources. These new towers-like buildings are 15 meters high and having 14-meter diameter and made of highdurable construction material (steel, bullet-proof). Around ten soldiers could stay in this five-floor tower which has other facilities (kitchen, water, shower, toilet, etc.). They are constructed at regular intervals of 8 km on the border. These tower-stations are also equipped with high surveillance technology.57 The making process of Turkish security wall on the Syrian border has been completed but interestingly there have been very few reactions against the wall. There have been various reasons behind this indifference, silence, and ignorance in the general public in Turkey. The first

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reason is closely related to intense terror attacks of terrorists including suicide bombers at the Turkish capital cities who infiltrated from Syrian border. The manufactured statist discourses of “the nation under threat” have silenced general public and these discourses were used as legitimizing instrument for making of the wall. Secondly, there have been very few visual representations of the wall on the Turkish media and therefore people have not been informed what happened on the border. I have witnessed the fact that the majority of Turkish public is not aware of such construction and when you mention about the existence of the wall they are being shocked. Third reason can be explained with the majority support of public for the ruling government. The decisions of government have been general not questioned and totally being supported by its supporters. Lastly, the timing of construction of the wall can be interpreted as another important reason for the silence. The period of construction of the wall (2016–2018) has coincided with the period of state of emergency “Ola˘gan Üstü Hal ” (OHAL) in the country which was declared in July 2016 due to failed coup d’état attempt carried out by Fethullahist Terrorist Organization (FETÖ)58 and lifted in July 2018. Turkey was going through a turmoil and the state of emergency was also restricting any public oppositional acts or statements against the government, the state. For these reasons, there have been a deep silence and ignorance against the security wall in Turkey. In short, “threats to internal security and territorial integrity forced Turkey to reverse its border policy and return to the traditional concept of borders as barriers rather than places of contact. This occurred continuously in three stages – first, closure of official border crossings; second, introduction of visa requirements for Syrian citizens and third, build-up of walls along the borders…”59 The Turkish security wall as the latest tactic of the Turkish state authorities for controlling their Syrian borders seems to be efficient for now for diverse reasons stated above. However, as Erik Ringmar also stated in his work on the history of the Great Wall of China, “walls can never properly be controlled by the people who build them; walls always result in a number of unintended consequences. In particular, we can be critical of the idea that walls can protect a culture. On the contrary, as is obvious to all people living by a wall, it not only separates people but also unites them. Walls, that is, create a culture of their own.”60

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The Unmaking: Underground Tunnels

The history of underground tunnels dates back to ancient times during which they were used for various purposes.61 It is interesting to see how the emotion of fear is capable of motivating people to put a very high labor in order to defeat the threat. From past to the present, this subterranean structure as a complex engineering construction became an effective strategy of many armies during “the wartime as both an offensive and defensive military strategy.”62 The tunnel warfare strategy was used by many countries during World War I, World War II and during the wars in Korea and Vietnam. For instance, during the war in Vietnam, “Vietnamese proved capable of developing tunnel networks that could extend up to 200 km. The Vietnamese systems were capable of housing entire civilian villages for extended periods of time. Their facilities came equipped with hospitals, storage facilities, and living accommodations.”63 Furthermore, it has become a very powerful tactic for oppositional political movements and smugglers in the modern era. The underground tunnels appeared as a tactic of resistance against the Israeli occupation and apartheid walls in the West Bank and Gaza Strip have been employed by Palestinians for a long time in order to breach the siege and quarantine and thereby getting access to basic human sources for life. The hundreds of tunnels at the Gaza Strip are passages that have been used for smugglings goods, arms, and many other things people needed from Egypt.64 During his visit in Rafah, Nicolas Pelham describes the intensity of working tunnels and their role in sustaining life in Gaza. He states that “On the southern reaches of the town, the horizon is interrupted by hundreds of white tents flapping in the wind. Instead of dispossessed refugees, the tents shelter the mouths of hundreds of tunnels, which for the past five years have played a critical role in providing a lifeline for Gazans hit by a punishing siege. Beneath the awnings, thousands of workers shovel heavy materials for Gaza’s reconstruction.”65 Likewise, Nicole J. Watkins and Alena M. James also documented how these tunnel networks have been constructed successful and how they have been allowing Hamas militants to enter into occupied lands and thereby being fearful concerns for Israeli authorities.66 In contemporary history of Middle East, it has been claimed that the history of use of underground tunnels in Syria goes back to early 1920s during the resistance against the French occupation.67 In today’s Syria under fire, all political fractions and oppositional groups including the

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Syrian regime have been using hundreds of tunnels during the ongoing internal war as a defensive and offensive strategy or tactic against each other. Furthermore, these tunnels “quickly became a supply route for the armed groups and a de facto commercial enterprise…More tunnels were dug over time; including one housing a fuel pipeline as fuel smuggling became one of the most profitable businesses in the Syrian war.”68 It has been also argued that the economy based on tunnels provided more power to those armed groups who were controlling the tunnels and therefore empowered them as more influential agents in the economic, social, and political life of local communities.69 In different parts of the world, smugglers, illegal immigrants, resistance movements, or terrorist groups one way or another have found ways to circumvent the barriers, fences, and walls sometimes by climbing over them, cutting through them or digging under them. However, digging under thick barbed wired fences and concrete walls have not been that much easy. In the history of Turkish-Syrian border, there have been rumors about few underground tunnels constructed by smugglers and the members of the PKK due to the fact that crossing the border through landmined zone has not been that much difficult for them. For these reasons, excavation of tunnels by smugglers was rarely seen and narrated by local people in Nisêbîn. In this context, while Alîya was talking about collaboration between smugglers and the army members talked about one of the existing tunnel: Smugglers were having big difficulties if there was a deal in order to cross the border. When there was an agreement, they were just crossing the other side without any problems. There was big hole in the barbed wire fences and those without any agreements were passing through. There was a man named Abbas. As I know, he made a tunnel at his garden from his house to the other side. Normally, he was passing through that tunnel to the other side. However, once he went from that hole through fences. He was too much self-confident but he stepped on the mine and died.70

As documented in the previous chapter, collaborations between smugglers and the army members were widely seen events in the border region and that was the major reason for not necessitating tunnels in the Nisêbîn border region. The tunneling has started when the conflicts intensified between the Turkish state forces and the PKK in recent years after the construction

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of the wall. The circumstances in the border region have changed for all parties of the conflict after the construction of the border security wall which gradually direct illegal mobility patterns smugglers, political subjects, and terrorist groups into the underground tunnels. The news about the YPG/PKK’s ongoing efforts of digging up tunnels for defense in northern Syria on the Turkish border has been popping up in the Turkish media,71 and it is not hard to predict that a tunnel warfare might spread to the Turkish-Syrian border zone, soon. Recently, the Turkish military has informed public about underground tunnels constructed by members of the PKK in Nisêbîn. Meanwhile, we do not have any accurate data about possible tunnels in other parts of the Turkish-Syrian border. In 2015, the PKK started a city war against the Turkish forces with a declaration of “self-governance” particularly in the cities of Sur and Silvan (Farqîn) in Diyarbakır (Amed), Cizre (Cizîre), Silopi (Silopî), Sırnak ¸ (Sirnex), ¸ Dargeçit (Kerboran), Derik (Derika Çîyayê Mazî) and Nusaybin (Nisêbîn) in Mardin (Merdîn)and in other cities in the region. During the urban clashes in different cities in the Kurdish region, PKK members were digging ditches, trenches, occupying locals’ houses, setting landmine traps, constructing barricades, and forcibly recruiting locals along with volunteers. The Turkish state forces ended occupations in 2016 but the cost was very high. During the armed conflicts, curfews and crackdowns, hundreds of thousands of people were forced to leave their houses and thousands of houses were destroyed by both the PKK and the state forces during the conflicts and hundreds of people died including soldiers, police, PKK members, and civilians.72 The first tunnels were constructed by members of the PKK in this period in order to be connected to the Syrian branch of the PKK, YPG in Syria for logistic reasons and as a route for escape. According to the Turkish media sources, “in 2016–2018, five tunnels, measuring 35 meters (114 feet) by 400 meters (1312 feet), were found by security forces in Mardin’s Nisêbîn district.”73 The first tunnel which was heading to Syria’s Qami¸slo region was detected on November 3 in 2016. It was 400 meters long and 50 meters crossing the border and connecting Nisêbîn with the Syrian city of Qami¸slo which is under control of YPG/PKK militants. In the following months, the second tunnel was detected on July 25 within the Kahnîka cemetery in the Zeynel Abidin district which is close to the border zone in Nisêbîn. The third one was found on August 17 in Nisêbîn again. Later, another tunnel was detected with the collaboration

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˙ of both the Turkish Intelligence Service (MIT) and the Police Depart74 ment. The fact that the most of the Syrian side of the Turkish-Syrian border (northern Syria) is under the control of the YPG/PKK facilitates conditions for construction of new tunnels and thereby sustains the tunnel system as an operative war strategy of in the region. Today, the world is witnessing the rise of tunnel economies by smugglers and tunnel warfare by transnational armed groups and terrorist organizations as a result of expansion of fences, walls, and other security measures on the political borders. Besides, the intensification of the state hegemony and power in every aspect of life with the advancement of war, arm, and surveillance technologies along with asymmetrical warfare have pushed weaker counter-states, movements, and rebels to find novel ways of resistance. As seen in the case of Gaza Strip which has tuned into an open-air prison under immense surveillance,75 tunnel system emerged as a response to the blockades, terror, and quarantine of Israel. In this context, the phenomenon of tunnel warfare has been an efficient tactic for oppositional political movements and also a very useful passageway for illicit cross-border trading and smuggling. The modern nation-states have been continuously developing and obtaining new technologies for maintaining their territorial security and controlling unwanted populations through militarization of their political borders during which the walls have gained more prominence. On the other hand, local people who are against and resist this mounting power of the modern states are seeking new tactics of warfare to cope with state-sponsored apparatuses and agents where the underground tunnels have become crucial. While the walls mean for the Kurdish residents living on both sides as a traumatic construction, it is seen by the state authorities as a defense mechanism against terror and unwanted immigrants and refugees. The histories of Turkish political borders with Iran, Iraq, and Syria reveals great concerns and fears of the Turkish state authorities since the early years of the Republic. The histories of Kurdish rebellions and nationalist movements in these countries reveal also dividedness of Kurds between these four nation-states which have led to spread of Kurdish transnationalism and separatist emotions across borders of these nation-states. The Kurdish territories of any of these states were seen and used as a place to take refuge by Kurdish religious and nationalist rivals for a long time. Having Kurdish kin on the other side has turned the border zones as escaping routes for decades. Therefore, the Kurds have always been seen by these countries as a threat for their own sovereignties

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endangering their securities. As a result, the Turkish security walls which were welcomed by neighboring countries (Iran, Syria) are functioning as blocking mechanism through cutting cultural, social, political, and economic ties and networks between Kurdish communities residing on both sides of the walls. However, the histories of ancient and former walls at the other parts of the world document unintended consequences of these entities through time. As Erik Ringmar eloquently stated “walls in the end are nothing in themselves and only something as a part of tactic, but tactics often change—for technological, political or cultural reasons—and the walls, as a result, will be rendered obsolete and useless.”76

Notes 1. Henk Van Houtum, Olivier Kramsch and Wolfgang Zierhofer, eds. B/ordering Space (London: Routledge, 2005). 2. Henk Van Houtum, “The Geopolitics of Borders and Boundaries,” Geopolitics 10 (2005), 673–674. 3. David B. Carter and Paul Poast, “Why Do States Build Walls? Political Economy, Security, and Border Stability,” Journal of Conflict Resolution 61, no. 2 (2015), 1. 4. Carter and Poast, “Why,” 3. 5. Ron E. Hassner and Jason Wittenberg, “Barriers to Entry: Who Builds Fortified Boundaries and Why?,” International Security 40, no. 1 (Summer 2015), 158. 6. Kenichi Ohmae, The Borderless World: Power and Strategy in the Interlinked Economy (New York: HarperBusiness, 1990); David Newman and Anssi Paasi, “Fences and Neighbors in the Postmodern World: Boundary Narratives in Political Geography,” Progress in Human Geography 22, no. 2 (1998): 186–207; Mike Moore, A World without Walls: Freedom, Development, Free Trade and Global Governance (Cambridge University Press, 2003). 7. Stéphane Rosière and Reece Jones, “Teichopolitics: Re-considering Globalization Through the Role of Walls and Fences,” Geopolitics 17 2012), 217. 8. Van Houtum, “The Geopolitics,” 676. 9. Brigitte Piquard, “Gated Populations, Walled Territories: Impacts on the Notion of Space and on Coping Mechanism in the Case of the West Bank Wall,” in Cities and Crises, eds. Dennis Day, Annette Grindsted, Brigitte Piquard and David Zammit (Bilbao: University of Deusto, 2009), 65. 10. Brown, Walled States, 7–8. 11. Brown, Walled States, 20.

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12. Esteban Flores, “Walls of Separation: An analysis of three ‘Successful’ Border Walls,” Harvard International Review 38, no. 3 (Summer 2017), 10. 13. Actually, Syrians immigrants in Turkey do not grantee a refugee status according to international law and Turkish domestic legislation. They hold a temporary protection status. For more details please see, Bahadır Erdem, “Situation of Temporary Protection Statute of the Syrians in terms of Social, Political and Citizenship Law in Turkey,” Public and Private International Law 37, no. 2 (2017): 332–351. 14. Carter and Poast, “Why,” 2. 15. Carter and Poast, 5. 16. Brown, Walled States, 28. 17. Barbora Olej´arov´a, “The Great Wall of Turkey: From ‘The Open-Door Policy’ to Building Fortress?” Pogranicze. Polish Borderlands Studies 6, no. 2 (2018): 117. 18. Olej´arov´a, “The Great,” 117. 19. “Turkey to Complete Wall on Iranian Border by Spring 2019,” Reuters, accessed on May 22, 2019, https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-turkeyconstruction-toki-interview/turkey-to-complete-wall-on-iranian-borderby-spring-2019-idUKKBN1EZ179. 20. “Ordunun Güneydo˘guda daha etkin mücadelesi için hazırlanan önlem paketi MGK’ya getiriliyor,” Cumhuriyet newspaper archive, March 24, 1994, accessed on March 3, 2019. 21. “Teröre sınır kelepçesi,” Cumhuriyet Newspaper Archive, June 19, 1994, accessed on March 3, 2019. 22. “Tahran’a PKK uyarısı,” Cumhuriyet Newspaper Archive, January 17, 2000, accessed on March 3, 2019. 23. Hinnebusch and Tür, Turkey-Syria, 167. 24. Ahmet Davuto˘glu, “Principles of Turkish Foreign Policy and Regional Political Structuring,” Vision Papers, Center for Strategic Research (SAM), no. 3 (April 2012), accessed on May 25, 2019, http://sam.gov. tr/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/vision_paper_TFP2.pdf. 25. Ahmet Davuto˘glu, “Zero Problems in a New Era,” Foreign Policy, March 21, 2013, accessed on May 24, 2019, https://foreignpolicy.com/2013/ 03/21/zero-problems-in-a-new-era/. 26. Murat Ye¸silta¸s and Ali Balcı, “A Dictionary of Turkish Foreign Policy in the AK Party Era: A Conceptual Map,” Center for Strategic Research (SAM) Papers, no. 7 (2013), 14–15, accessed on May 25, 2019, http:// sam.gov.tr/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/SAM_Papers-7.pdf. 27. Mete Çubukçu, “Ortado˘gu Federasyonuna Do˘gru!” [Towards Middle Eastern Federation], NTV News, September 19, 2009, accessed on May 24, 2019, https://www.ntv.com.tr/turkiye/m-cubukcu-yazdi-ortadogufederasyonuna-dogru,bi9l19qQ00-Jzv398XgS9w.

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28. “Turkey-Syria Border Has Become Gate into ISIS for Foreign Fighters,” CBS News, September 26, 2014, accessed on May 23, 2019, https://www.cbsnews.com/news/turkey-syria-border-has-becomegate-into-isis-for-foreign-fighters/ See also, “A Path to ISIS, through a Porous Turkish Border,” New York Times, March 9, 2015, accessed on May 23, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/10/world/europe/ despite-crackdown-path-to-join-isis-often-winds-through- porous-turkishborder.html. 29. Olej´arov´a, “The Great,” 123–129. ˙ Sava¸sa Kom¸su Olmak: Türkiye’nin Suriye Sınır 30. Murat Ye¸silta¸s, “Iç Güvenli˘gi Siyaseti”, SETA Analiz, no. 136, (A˘gustos 2015), 11– 12. Accessed on May 22, 2019, http://file.setav.org/Files/Pdf/ 20150813162453_sinir-guvenligi.pdf. 31. “Trump isn’t the only one who wants to build a Wall. These European nations already did,” USA Today, May 24, 2018, accessed on May 27, 2019, https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2018/ 05/24/donald-trump-europe-border-walls-migrants/532572002/. 32. “Suriye Sınırına Güvenlik Duvarı,” [Security Wall on the Syrian Border], Turkish Republic Ministry of Trade, May 27, 2013, accessed on May 23, 2019, http://doguakdeniz.ticaret.gov.tr/kurumsal-haberler/ suriye-sinirina-guvenlik-duvari. 33. “Nusaybin’deki Duvar De˘gil Tel Örgü,” Radikal Newspaper, November 4, 2013, accessed on May 24, 2019, http://www.radikal.com.tr/politika/ arinc-nusaybindeki-duvar-degil-tel-orgu-1159009/. 34. “Türkiye, Suriye Sınırına ‘Entegre Güvenlik Sistemi’ Kuracak”, July 22, 2015, accessed on May 23, 2019, https://tr.sputniknews.com/turkiye/ 201507221016693821/. ˙ Sava¸sa,” 21. 35. Ye¸silta¸s, “Iç ˙ Sava¸sa,” 10. 36. Ye¸silta¸s, “Iç 37. “Turkey: Key Facts and Figures,” April 2019, UNHCR (The UN Refugee Agency), accessed on May 25, 2019, https://www.unhcr.org/tr/en/ unhcr-turkey-stats. 38. Olej´arov´a, “The Great,” 118. 39. “Syria-Turkey Border Wall Completed,” The National, June 10, 2018, accessed on May 24, 2019, https://www.thenational.ae/world/mena/ syria-turkey-border-wall-completed-1.738637. 40. “In October 2006, President George W. Bush signed a bill authorizing the construction of a 700-mile-long fence along the U.S.-Mexico border.” Please see, Hassner and Wittenberg, “Barriers,” 157. 41. Unfortunately, this issue has been thought and covered in the Turkish media, and there has been a widely seen ignorance and indifference in the public. On November 27, 2016, just one of the Turkish media sources raised a concern on this issue by making a news

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46. 47.

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49.

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51. 52.

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about wild life of gazellas (antelopes) in the Hatay border region. In the news, local people talk about mobility patterns of gazellas through barbed wires for decades and now how it is going to be impossible for them to cross the border. See, “Göçmen da˘g ceylanlarına Suriye sınırına in¸sa edilen duvar engel olacak!” T24, November 27, 2016, accessed on June 2, 2019, https://t24.com.tr/haber/gocmen-dag-ceylanlarinasuriye-sinirina-insa-edilen-duvar-engel-olacak,373274. ˙ Sava¸sa,” 37. Ye¸silta¸s, “Iç “Suriye Sınırında Duvar Yükseliyor, BDP’liler Tepkili,” Radikal Newspaper, October 13, 2013, accessed on May 23, 2019, http://www. radikal.com.tr/turkiye/suriye-sinirinda-duvar-yukseliyor-bdpliler-tepkili1155510/. “Turkey’s New Border Wall Angers Kurds on both sides of Syrian Divide,” The Guardian, November 8, 2013, accessed on May 24, 2019, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/08/turkey-newborder-wall-kurds-syria See also, BBC. “Nusaybin’de Duvara Kar¸sı Ölüm Orucu.” [Indefinite Hunger Strike against the Wall in Nusyabin], accessed on January 7, 2019. https://www.bbc.com/turkce/haberler/2013/11/ 131101_nusaybin_duvar. “Nusaybin’in Suriye Sınırında Duvar Yapımına Tekrar Ba¸slandı,” December 9, 2013, accessed on May 23, 2019, https://www.haberler.com/ nusaybin-in-suriye-sinirinda-duvar-yapimina-tekrar-5283858-haberi/. ˙ Sava¸sa,” 33. Ye¸silta¸s, “Iç “Suriye sınırına seyyar duvar örülüyor,” April 27, 2014, accessed on May 27, 2019, http://www.haber7.com/guncel/haber/1151750-suriyesinirina-seyyar-duvar-oruluyor. ˙ “Suriye Sınırına Roketatara Dayanıklı Duvar,” Ihlas News Agency, July 30, 2015, accessed on May 23, 2019, https://www.iha.com.tr/haber-suriyesinirina-roketatara-dayanikli-duvar-483485/. ˙ ste sınır duvarının maliyeti,” August 30, 2015, accessed on “I¸ May 27, 2019, https://www.sozcu.com.tr/2015/ekonomi/iste-sinirduvarinin-maliyeti-923512/. “Turkey-Syria Border Crossings Status,” United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), Humanitarian Response, May 15, 2019, accessed on May 24, 2019, https://www. humanitarianresponse.info/en/operations/stima/border-crossing-status. ˙ Sava¸sa,” 34. Ye¸silta¸s, “Iç ˙ Suriye sınırına duvar örecek” [TOKI˙ Will Build Wall on Syrian “TOKI, Border], September 28, 2016, accessed on May 27, 2019, https://www. ntv.com.tr/ekonomi/toki-suriye-sinirina-duvar-orecek,sJVoZBnU_ESEGEU29a0AQ. According to the SETA report, the Turkish army officials were planning to reorganize existing 317 gendarmerie stations on the Syrian border and to

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66. 67.

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unite them under one commandership in order to have a more efficient ˙ and coordinated fight for security and control. Please see, Ye¸silta¸s, “Iç Sava¸sa,” 32. Olej´arov´a, “The Great,” 117. “Turkey Installs 764 km Security Wall on Syria Border,” Anadolu News Agency, June 9, 2018, accessed on May 24, 2019, https://www.aa.com. tr/en/middle-east/turkey-installs-764-km-security-wall-on-syria-border/ 1170257. The word kulekol is combination of the Turkish word kule which means tower and kol which is the last syllable of the Turkish word karakol (gendermarie station). “Mehmetçi˘ge Yüksek Güvenlikli Koruma: Kulekol” [High Security Protection for Mehmetçik: Kulekol], TRT News, accessed April 12, 2019, https://www.trthaber.com/haber/turkiye/mehmetcigeyuksek-guvenlikli-koruma-kulekol-387634.html. During the night of coup attempt, 249 ordinary people who resisted against the coup plotters were killed and more than 2000 people were injured by FETÖ members within the Turkish army. Olej´arov´a, “The Great,” 130. Erik Ringmar, “The Great Wall of China Does Not Exist,” in Walling, Boundaries and Liminality: A Political Anthropology of Transformations, ed. Agnes Horvath, Marius Ion Benta and Joan Davison (London: Routledge, 2018), 132. Robert Steven Diamond and Brian Garret Kassel, “A History of the Urban Underground Tunnel (4000 B.C.E.–1900 C.E.),” Journal of Transportation Technologies 8, no. 1 (January 2018): 11–43. Allen D. Reece, A Historical Analysis of Tunnel Warfare and the Contemporary Perspective (School of Advanced Military Studies, U.S. Army Command and General Staff, 1997), accessed on May 28, 2019, https://apps. dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a339626.pdfNicole; J. Watkins and Alena M. James, “Digging into Israel: The Sophisticated Tunneling Network of Hamas,” Journal of Strategic Security 9, no. 1 (Spring 2016), 84. Reece, A Historical, 2–4. Nicolas Pelham, “Gaza’s Tunnel Complex,” Middle East Report, no. 261 Illicit Crossings (Winter 2011): 30–35. Nicolas Pelham, “Gaza’s Tunnel Phenomenon: The Unintended Dynamics of Israel’s Siege,” Journal of Palestine Studies, 41, no. 4 (Summer 2012): 6. Watkins and James, “Digging,” 84. “Secrets of Underground Life and War Inside Syria’s Tunnels,” Sputnik News, May 21, 2018, accessed on May 29, 2019, https://sputniknews. com/middleeast/201805211064659174-secrets-of-syrian-undergoundtunnels/.

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68. Vesna Bojicic-Dzelilovic and Rim Turkmani, “War Economy, Governance and Security in Syria’s Opposition-Controlled Areas,” Stability: Journal of Security and Development 7, no. 1 (2018): 5. 69. Bojicic-Dzelilovic and Turkmani, “War,” 6. 70. Personal interview with Alîya in Nisêbîn, in April 2014. 71. “YPG/PKK continues digging tunnels in northern Syria,” Anadolu Agency, April 15, 2019, accessed on May 28, 2019, https://www.aa. com.tr/en/middle-east/ypg-pkk-continues-digging-tunnels-in-northernsyria/1452935. 72. For more details, look at Necdet Özçelik and Murat Ye¸silta¸s, When Strat˙ egy Collapses: The PKK’s Urban Terrorist Campaign (Istanbul: SETA Yayınları, 2018); Metin Gürcan, “Ankara vs. The PKK: Old War, New Strategies,” Turkish Policy Quarterly 14, no. 4 (Winter 2016): 47–57. 73. “YPG/PKK terrorists continue to pose threat to Turkey,” Anadolu Agency, December 15, 2018, accessed on May 29, 2019, https://www. aa.com.tr/en/middle-east/ypg-pkk-terrorists-continue-to-pose-threat-toturkey-/1339877. 74. “Türkiye-Suriye sınırında Tünel bulundu” [A Tunnel Has Been Found on Turkish-Syrian Border], Habertürk, December 3, 2017, accessed on May 28, 2019, https://www.haberturk.com/turkiye-suriye-sinirinda-mitve-emniyet-in-calismasi-sonucu-tunel-bulundu-1699278. 75. Michael Dahan, “The Gaza Strip as Panopticon and Panspectron: The Disciplining and Punishing of a Society,” International Journal of E-Politics (IJEP ) 4, no. 3 (2013): 44–56. 76. Ringmar, “The Great,” 122.

CHAPTER 6

Concluding Remarks

Today, there is a new turn toward reinforcing and militarization of the political borders, an increase in military spending and construction of fences and walls in order to secure the nation and control illegal border crossings of immigrants, refugees and members of oppositional political movements, terrorist groups and other patterns of mobility. Therefore, understanding phenomenon of fencing and walling as a recently escalating strategy of the modern nation-states turned into a crucial task among scholars working in this field. The political borders of modern states including the so-called democratic and liberal ones are gradually “thickening” rather than “weakening” in the last decade.1 Along with the question of effect on human subjects, the question of how these fences and walls are marking ecologies and bionetworks at the border regions has not been comprehensively responded by researchers. Rather than expected disappearance of political borders in conjunction with globalization, territoriality of modern nation-states has been too much emphasized through implementation of diverse border making strategies. As a result, the questions of how political borders are made in terms of given symbols, meanings, identifications, representations, performances and how they are unmade through diverse forms of resistance, resilience, adaptation, tactics, and other unmaking practices and performances have gained more importance. In a recent work on walling, boundaries, and liminality, some scholars asked “whether with walling, with external physical protection, we receive comfort and normalization, or rather that walling offers a heightened and © The Author(s) 2020 R. Aras, The Wall, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-45654-2_6

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false sense of security by internally destabilizing individuals.”2 By introducing an ethnographic history and anthropological analysis of TurkishSyrian border, this work supports the latter argument of these scholars. It claims that the fear of external threats for the Turkish state authorities has not diminished since 1923 and it is continuing to grow alongside with employment of new security apparatuses on the Syrian border. This work documents a story of making of Turkish-Syrian political border which ended up with fortification of security wall by the Turkish state. This work emphasizes how this making process has expanded emotion of fear of unwanted the other as neighbor among those who reconstruct political borders along with erection of security wall. The evolution of making of the Turkish-Syrian border from the first stage of border markers to the security wall has revealed how the border zone has been turned into a space for performance of dominance of the state as a sovereign entity. Furthermore, this work has revealed how political borders have been used as instruments for homogenization of the imagined nation by excluding the others and transforming citizens residing within national boundaries into submissive subjects. Political borders are not only processes of the making and unmaking during which various strategies and tactics transpire, they are geopolitical entities that impose certain epistemological and ontological paradigms promoted by the state. Besides, this study demonstrates how political borders themselves might change according to miscellaneous forms of changes, conflicts, wars, and transformations at both national and international levels. Nevertheless, in the historical process “there will always be cases where some powerful states are able to seize and hold the territory of a weaker neighbor.”3 As it can be seen as a predominant argument in the literature, crossborder economic disparities, internal and cross-border ethnic and religious wars, political-military instabilities, and cross-border mobility of various human subjects are seen as fundamental reasons for constructions of security fences and walls. In the Turkish case, it can be argued that the fundamental reason behind the Turkish security wall seems to be a military and security reason aiming to prevent infiltrations of armed terrorist groups, suicide bombers, cross-border mobility of members of various armed groups and other fighters. However, limiting uncontrolled flow of refugees whose number has reached nearly four million in Turkey can be counted as another major reason. In other words, the Turkish security wall has been erected to prevent the flow of Syrian refugees and illegal entries of other immigrants. On the other hand, the existence of PKK

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and its Syrian branch YPG and the rise of Kurdish transnationalism seem to be another huge concern for the Turkish state authorities. The idea of establishment of a Kurdish autonomy in the Kurdish region in northern Syria has been seen as the greatest threat which also played a huge role in acceleration of construction of the Turkish security wall. Here, I argue that the Turkish security wall is differentiating from other cases due to a plethora of reasons in spite of creating a big paradox for the current government as well. The first paradox stems from the ruling government’s neo-Ottomanist ideology. The security wall is dividing the lands inherited from the Ottomans and therefore it can be described as an intervention to the neo-Ottomanist cartographic imagination. The second paradox is related to ruling government’s Islamist/conservative spirit that is based on the ideology and thought of Ummah (Muslim Brotherhood). Indeed, the security wall is dividing the territories of Ummah and disconnecting Muslim communities (Kurds, Arabs, and Turkmens) from each other. However, despite ruling AK Party government, recent political developments in the region indicate how actually the Turkish state started to shift again toward its Kemalist and Turkish nationalist rhetoric based on security and military which can be considered as third paradox for the AK Party government. On the other hand, the use and abuse of Kurdish question in the history of Turkish politics have always resulted in engendering fear of possible an independent Kurdish state. This fear has been constantly fabricated by the state since the early years of the Republic. As a result, the possibility of formation of a Kurdish self-governing region in northern Syria with the support of Western powers has been fueling these fears and deeply influencing Turkish border security policies. The idea that any Kurdish self-autonomy might result in empowering of Kurdish nationalism and mobilization of Kurdish masses in Turkey that might end up with a similar direction can be evaluated as the main base of this fear. In this context, the security wall can be interpreted as a shield to curtail any infiltrations of armed and other political subjects and to cut organic ties between Kurdish political movements and separatists groups residing in both sides of the border. In general, it has been argued that security walls are constructed as stable, fixed, and exclusive entities. However, the Turkish security wall does not look a completely stable and fixed one due to the fact that it is consisting of mobile concrete blocks and watchtowers that can be removed to other places any time. While security walls are exclusive by nature and aiming to cut the ties with the other side by any means necessary, the Turkish

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wall is defined by the current government as a limiting one for the flow of refugees and a defensive one against terror and for military operations. However, despite contradictory political discourses and practices of ruling government that can be observed through its constant utilitarian shifts between the Islamic ideology of Ummah (Muslim brotherhood) and the Turkish nationalist rhetoric which sometimes reaches a supremacist tone, the Turkish security wall seems to become a stable one in the region. Today, the Turkish security wall is operating as a fixed one by cutting all ties of the kin communities from each other and damaging bionetwork in the region. People who want to escape from the atrocities and massacres are being trapped behind the wall and left to their own destinies. Besides, the wall has been built through the habitat of many species and unfortunately many animals are blocked in their natural paths. In today’s world, the policies of modern states of dealing with immigrants and refugees are changing as it has been observed in the case of Syrians. In the first stage, many states started to keep and support these people in the protected camp-like places within the territories of their home countries instead to accepting refugees to their countries. This is also what Turkish authorities started to do nowadays by creating a safe zone behind the wall within the Syrian territories.4 In the second stage, if the previous strategy is not possible, these countries prefer to keep refugees in a neighboring country, it has been largely Turkey in the case of Syrian refugees. The EU and other western countries mostly preferred to support refugees in the host country rather than welcoming large numbers into their own territories. In the third stage, it is better to keep those who somehow achieved to arrive at the Eastern European countries in the territories of these countries rather than allowing them to reach western and northwestern European territories. Overall, the deteriorating political conditions, massacres and ongoing human crisis in the Syrian war indicate the fact that actually refugees are seen as useless masses by so-called civilized world. The fear of possible arrival of “immigrants and refugees” has resulted in continuation of building fences on the south and eastern borders of the EU and construction of the walls on Turkish eastern and southeastern borders. Is that true that “Good fences make good neighbors”?5 This study on the history of Turkish-Syrian border has disclosed that fences and walls are constantly generating restriction, immobility, entrapment, and seclusion rather than fostering inclusion, flexibility, and mobility among neighboring communities.

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To conclude, anthropological and sociological studies on the histories of political borders unveil how political borders are being constructed, deconstructed, and shaped by changing and shifting relations between antagonism and amity in different periods between nation-states during which the state itself is going through structural, political, and ideological transformations. They also document how people develop new techniques and infiltration tactics on the way to cope with outcomes of the borders. Overall, I define security walls as a violent reaffirmation of sovereignty of modern nation-state. It is one of the fundamental practices of exclusion and apparatuses of modern state for performing its biopower among border communities and thereby dominating, regulation and controlling life at both subjective and collective levels. In short, the process of (re)production security fences and walls by modern states can be interpreted as “an explosion of numerous and diverse techniques for achieving the subjugations of bodies and the control of populations.”6 Therefore, going beyond security-oriented statist approaches, we need to develop a new understanding of political borders and implementation of diverse conventional and high-tech apparatuses with a particular focus on the agency of new fences and walls and their various impacts on both human and non-human subjects and environment. The wall as a symbol of total closure is a military technology aims to limit space and the sense of belonging to place, determine one’s ties and relations with the other and thereby excluding those left behind the line or the wall. However, the state’s perception of the others as “unwanted” does not always correspond with local people’s perception about the same subjects. Historical, religious, ethnic, linguistic and ideological ties, sense of belonging and shared histories and memories of the past among local communities residing in both sides of fences and walls generate a counter-narrative, cartographic perception, and imagination that contradict statist discourses and policies.

Notes 1. Jason Ackleson, “From ‘Thin’ to ‘Thick’ (and Back Again?): The Politics and Policies of the Contemporary US-Canada Border,” American Review of Canadian Studies 39, no. 4 (2009): 336–351. 2. Agnes Horvath, Marius Ion Benta, and Joan Davison, eds., “Preface,” in Walling, Boundaries and Liminality: A Political Anthropology of Transformations (London: Routledge, 2018).

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3. John R. Victor Prescott, Political Frontiers and Boundaries (London: Allen & Unwin, 1987), 10. 4. The cases of regions of Afrin and Azez in northern Syria can be considered in this manner. As a result of Turkey’s military operations in collaboration with Free Syrian Army (ÖSO) the control of regions of Azez and Afrin has been largely taken from YPG/PKK militia. With the support of the Turkish state, the Free Syrian Army (ÖSO) authorities are trying to reconstruct the regions as safe zones and places. What has been understood from discourses of the Turkish state authorities is that they plan to encourage or force Syrian refugees residing in Turkey to return back home and settle in these safe zones. 5. Robert Frost, “Mending Wall,” in North of Boston (CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 2012). 6. Michel Foucault, A History of Sexuality, Volume 1 An Introduction (New York: Random House, 1978), 140.

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Index

A Agamben, Giorgio, 19, 115, 118 agency, 4–6, 39, 50, 74, 86, 89, 94, 98, 104, 105, 164, 170, 171, 179, 180, 221 AK Party, 14, 28, 31, 60, 197–199, 219 Akyüz, Latife, 36, 48 Anderson, Benedict, 108 Anderson, Malcolm, 49, 108 Anthropology at home, 9 Appadurai, Arjun, 4, 15, 19, 73, 114 Armenian, 7, 26, 29, 112, 128, 129, 131 Asad, Talal, 97, 118 assimilation, 11, 57, 113, 124, 197 Assyrian/Syriac, 16, 68, 70, 113, 128, 129 Atatürk, Mustafa Kemal, 11, 52–54, 109 B Barzanî, Mullah Mustafa, 71, 133, 185, 193

Batman, 16, 141, 148 bazaar, 42, 67, 100, 104, 119, 136, 148 BDP (Barı¸s ve Demokrasi Partisi, Peace and Democracy Party), 203 Bentham, Jeremy, 19, 90, 91, 118 border determination, 10, 31, 53 border security, 5, 7, 10, 11, 23–25, 31, 32, 38, 58–60, 75, 78, 82, 92, 94, 97, 98, 100, 101, 104, 121–123, 133, 144, 192, 193, 197–205, 209, 219 Botan region, 117, 147 Bourke, Joanna, 151, 186 Brown, Wendy, 40, 194, 195, 211, 212

C Canadian Landmine Foundation, 78 Cold War, 7, 50, 56, 71, 72, 76, 108 Çuhruk, Kamuran, 81, 116 Cumhuriyet Newspaper, 110

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 R. Aras, The Wall, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-45654-2

245

246

INDEX

D Davuto˘glu, Ahmet, 33, 199, 212 dengbêj , 37 Dersimi, Nuri, 185 discourse, 3, 10, 11, 14, 24, 34, 37, 50–54, 56–59, 61–63, 65, 82, 86, 89, 95, 123, 124, 127, 135, 140, 142, 143, 150, 160, 194, 195, 200, 202, 206, 220–222 Donnan, Hastings, 39, 40, 48, 108, 111, 184 E European Union (EU), 24, 27, 30, 32, 50, 76, 200, 220 F fear of the state, 13, 14, 94, 102 Foucault, Michel, 19, 24, 90, 91, 96, 97, 118, 222 G genealogy, 10, 11, 23, 49 Gökkan, Ay¸se, 203, 204 The Great Wall of China, 191, 203, 206 Green, Sarah, 19, 25, 41 ˙ Güler, Ilhami, 163, 187 H Henig, David, 118, 188 honor, 11, 51, 52, 104, 170 hunger strike, 204 I identity, 1, 9, 22–27, 30, 34, 38, 50, 122–124, 126, 137, 191, 194 ideology, 8, 11, 14, 18, 50, 105, 196–198, 219, 220

Israel, 7, 24, 56, 91, 129, 210 K Kalashnikov, 145, 146, 155 Kemalist, 11, 13, 53, 124, 192, 197, 219 Khaznavi, Sheik Ahmed, 122 Küçük, Veli, 150, 186 Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), 71, 111 Kurmancî, 9, 16, 112, 184 L Landmine and Cluster Munition Monitor, 79, 80, 116 Latour, Bruno, 4, 16 M mahremiyet (intimacy), 139 Marcus, George E., 4, 15, 19, 47, 73, 114 Milliyet Newspaper, 80, 82, 116, 133, 147, 157, 174, 185–188 Mintz, Sidney, 18, 154, 187 multiplex subjectivity, 9 N Najmabadi, Afsaneh, 51, 52, 109 namûs, 11, 51, 52, 108, 170 national borders, 10, 11, 49, 51, 52, 55, 195 nationalist, 7, 13, 23, 24, 51–56, 61, 71, 133, 192, 193, 197, 202, 210, 219, 220 O Ottawa Treaty, 79 the Ottoman, 5, 12, 31, 39, 49, 63, 109, 131, 164, 219

INDEX

Özal, Turgut, 8, 60, 107, 197 Özgen, Ne¸se, 15, 16, 34, 35, 46, 47, 64, 65, 75, 92, 106, 108, 109, 112, 114–120, 136, 185

P Palestine, 41, 62 Parla, Ay¸se, 35, 47 paswan, 64, 107 PKK (Partîya Karkeren Kurdistan, Kurdish Workers’ Party), 7, 8, 18, 56, 59, 60, 104, 108, 111, 119, 132, 193, 197–199, 208, 209, 218

Q Qami¸slo, 6, 7, 36, 65, 88, 106, 122, 129, 130, 165, 209

247

T Taussig, Michael, 19, 141, 185 Tekin, Ferhat, 15, 35, 36, 47, 121, 122, 125, 128 terror, 5, 7, 18, 24, 25, 59, 60, 74, 104, 108, 141, 198, 200–203, 206, 210, 220 Treaty of Lausanne, 1, 49, 128 Turkification, 11, 63, 113, 124, 128, 192, 197 The Turkish security wall, 7, 12, 13, 61, 78, 193, 196, 203, 206, 211, 218–220 Turner, Victor, 19, 47, 138, 142, 185 U Ummah, 14, 194, 198, 219, 220

R rite of passage, 12, 138, 139, 142, 143, 160

V Van Bruinessen, Martin, 41, 110, 114, 183, 185 Van Gennep, Arnold, 138, 185 Van Schendel, Willem, 15, 125, 135, 184, 185

S sense of belonging, 1, 3, 24, 27, 37–39, 123, 126, 127, 221 state of exception, 12, 98, 141 suitcase trading, 28, 42, 107 surveillance, 11, 75, 90–92, 94, 204, 205, 210 Syrian civil war, 22, 196, 199, 203

W Wilson, Thomas M., 39, 40, 48, 108, 111, 184 World War I/WWI, 1, 5, 11, 21, 26, 32, 49, 53, 54, 58, 68, 74, 76, 191, 207 World War II/WWII, 21, 67, 70, 71, 76, 77, 113, 191, 207