Kurdish Hezbollah
Encyclopedia
Hizbullah often referred to as the Turkish Hezbollah (Turkish Hizbullah) or Kurdish Hezbollah (KH) (Kurdish
: Hizbullahî Kurdî), to avoid confusion with the completely unrelated Lebanese
Shi'a group called Hezbollah, is a Kurdish
Sunni Islamist militant organization, active against the Government of Turkey. Although its members theoretically remain committed to violence, the organization has focused on non-violent activities during the last 10 years.
. The shop was owned by Abdulvahap Ekinci. The meetings were attended by Fidan Güngör and Hüseyin Velioğlu. In 1981 Fidan Gündör founded the bookshop Menzil and Hüseyin Velioğlu founded the bookshop İlim in 1982. Until 1987 the groups gathered around these bookshops worked together.
Further groups within Kurdish Hezbollah were named as Tevhid, led by Nurettin Şirin and Mehmet Şahin and Yeryüzü, led by Burhan Kavuncu.
(PKK), though later they have targeted both the PKK and people who they considered to be with low morals (people who drank alcohol, wore mini-skirts etc.). Some of Hezbollah's major attacks allegedly include bombings of two synagogues in Istanbul on November 17, 2003
, killing 23 and wounding over 300.
, different opinions on leadership and armed actions resulted in the split of the two wings. The so called İlim-wing, under the leadership of Hüseyin Velioğlu insisted to start the armed struggle immediately. The dispute resulted in bloody fighting among both factions.
Besides the town of Batman Hezbollah was strongest in Silvan
district of Diyarbakır
province. For a long time the village Yolaç was used as their base.
However, Turkish security officials stated that the Turkish Hezbollah was financed by and trained in post revolutionary Iran
. Believing that Iran was using terror groups to establish Islamic governments throughout the Middle East.
The weekly "2000'e Doğru" of 16 February 1992 reported that eye witnesses and sympathizers of Hezbollah had informed them that members of the organization were educated in the headquarter of the rapid deployment force (çevik kuvvet) in Diyarbakır. Two days after the article was published its author, Halit Güngen was killed by unidentified murderers. Namik Taranci, the Diyarbakir representative of the weekly journal Gerçek (Reality), was shot dead on November 20, 1992 on his way to work in Diyarbakır. Again, the previous edition of the magazine had examined relations between the state and Hizbullah. Hafiz Akdemir, reporter for Özgür Gündem (Free Agenda), was shot dead in a Diyarbakır street on June 8, 1992, after reporting that a man who had given refuge to assassins fleeing a Hezbollah-style double killing in Silvan was released after only six weeks in custody, without even appearing in court.
The 1993 report of Turkey's Parliamentary Investigation Commission referred to information that Hezbollah had a camp in the Batman region
where they received political and military training and assistance from the security forces.
On 17 January 2011 Arif Doğan, a retired colonel in the Turkish army
who also claims to be a founder of JİTEM, while testifying in court in the Ergenekon case, declared that he set up Hezbollah as a contra group to force to fight and kill militants of the PKK. The organization was originally to be called Hizbul-Kontr ("Party of the Contras").
as well. Information provided by the Intelligence Resource Program of the Federation of American Scientists
based on the 2002 Patterns of Global Terrorism
report suggests that the organisation possibly has a few hundred members and several thousand supporters. Ufuk Hiçyılmaz stated that the group had about 1,000 armed members.
and the subsequent raid of a house in Beykoz
quarter a nationwide hunt on Hezbollah supporters followed. During the operation in Beykoz on 17 January 2000 Hüseyin Velioğlu was killed and Edip Gümüş and Cemal Tutar were detained. Edip Gümüş, born 1958 in Batman was alleged to lead the military wing of Hezbollah and Cemal Tutar was said to be a member of the armed wing.
In the time to follow many trials were conducted in Diyarbakır and other places against alleged members of Hezbollah. In several instances defendants raised torture allegations. Such allegations are documented in Urgent Actions
(UA) of Amnesty International
. In the trial in which Edip Gümüş and Cemal Tutar were indicted the defendant Fahrettin Özdemir said on 10 July 2000 that he had been held in custody for 59 days and had been tortured. In the hearing of 11 September 2000 Cemal Tutar said that he had been held in police custody for 180 days.
The Hezbollah trial was concluded in December 2009. The defendants received varying terms of imprisonment.
Kurdish language
Kurdish is a dialect continuum spoken by the Kurds in western Asia. It is part of the Iranian branch of the Indo-Iranian group of Indo-European languages....
: Hizbullahî Kurdî), to avoid confusion with the completely unrelated Lebanese
Lebanon
Lebanon , officially the Republic of LebanonRepublic of Lebanon is the most common term used by Lebanese government agencies. The term Lebanese Republic, a literal translation of the official Arabic and French names that is not used in today's world. Arabic is the most common language spoken among...
Shi'a group called Hezbollah, is a Kurdish
Kurdish people
The Kurdish people, or Kurds , are an Iranian people native to the Middle East, mostly inhabiting a region known as Kurdistan, which includes adjacent parts of Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Turkey...
Sunni Islamist militant organization, active against the Government of Turkey. Although its members theoretically remain committed to violence, the organization has focused on non-violent activities during the last 10 years.
History
The organization of Turkish/Kurdish Hezbollah started in 1979/1980 with meetings in the bookshop Vahdet in DiyarbakırDiyarbakır
Diyarbakır is one of the largest cities in southeastern Turkey...
. The shop was owned by Abdulvahap Ekinci. The meetings were attended by Fidan Güngör and Hüseyin Velioğlu. In 1981 Fidan Gündör founded the bookshop Menzil and Hüseyin Velioğlu founded the bookshop İlim in 1982. Until 1987 the groups gathered around these bookshops worked together.
Further groups within Kurdish Hezbollah were named as Tevhid, led by Nurettin Şirin and Mehmet Şahin and Yeryüzü, led by Burhan Kavuncu.
Activities
In the early 1990s the organization became a direct threat to the already rising Kurdish separatist movement. The Kurdish Islamist group (of Sunni thought) began as an oppositional force against the Kurdistan Workers' PartyKurdistan Workers' Party
The Kurdistan Workers' Party , commonly known as PKK, also known as KGK and formerly known as KADEK or KONGRA-GEL , is a Kurdish organization which has since 1984 been fighting an armed struggle against the Turkish state for an autonomous Kurdistan and greater cultural and political rights...
(PKK), though later they have targeted both the PKK and people who they considered to be with low morals (people who drank alcohol, wore mini-skirts etc.). Some of Hezbollah's major attacks allegedly include bombings of two synagogues in Istanbul on November 17, 2003
2003 Istanbul bombings
The 2003 Istanbul bombings were four truck bomb attacks carried out on November 15, 2003 and November 20, 2003, in Istanbul, Turkey, leaving 57 people dead, and 700 wounded. Several men have been convicted for their involvement.- First bombings :...
, killing 23 and wounding over 300.
Conflict between Menzil and İlim
In 1987, when Hüseyin Velioğlu moved his bookshop to BatmanBatman, Turkey
Batman is a city in the Southeastern Anatolia Region of Turkey and the capital of Batman Province. It lies on a plateau, 540 meters above sea level, near the confluence of the Batman River and the Tigris. The Batı Raman oil field, which is the largest oil field in Turkey, is located just outside...
, different opinions on leadership and armed actions resulted in the split of the two wings. The so called İlim-wing, under the leadership of Hüseyin Velioğlu insisted to start the armed struggle immediately. The dispute resulted in bloody fighting among both factions.
Besides the town of Batman Hezbollah was strongest in Silvan
Silvan, Turkey
Silvan is a district of the Diyarbakır Province of Turkey. Its population is 41,451 Notable attraction is Malabadi Bridge.-History:Silvan has been identified by several scholars as one of two possible locations of Tigranakert, the ancient capital of the Kingdom of Armenia, which was built by...
district of Diyarbakır
Diyarbakır
Diyarbakır is one of the largest cities in southeastern Turkey...
province. For a long time the village Yolaç was used as their base.
Official support
Former Minister Fikri Sağlar said in an interview with the paper Siyah-Beyaz (Black-White) that the army not only used Hezbollah, but actually founded and sponsored the organization. He maintained that such a decision had been taken in 1985.However, Turkish security officials stated that the Turkish Hezbollah was financed by and trained in post revolutionary Iran
Iran
Iran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...
. Believing that Iran was using terror groups to establish Islamic governments throughout the Middle East.
The weekly "2000'e Doğru" of 16 February 1992 reported that eye witnesses and sympathizers of Hezbollah had informed them that members of the organization were educated in the headquarter of the rapid deployment force (çevik kuvvet) in Diyarbakır. Two days after the article was published its author, Halit Güngen was killed by unidentified murderers. Namik Taranci, the Diyarbakir representative of the weekly journal Gerçek (Reality), was shot dead on November 20, 1992 on his way to work in Diyarbakır. Again, the previous edition of the magazine had examined relations between the state and Hizbullah. Hafiz Akdemir, reporter for Özgür Gündem (Free Agenda), was shot dead in a Diyarbakır street on June 8, 1992, after reporting that a man who had given refuge to assassins fleeing a Hezbollah-style double killing in Silvan was released after only six weeks in custody, without even appearing in court.
The 1993 report of Turkey's Parliamentary Investigation Commission referred to information that Hezbollah had a camp in the Batman region
Batman Province
Batman Province is a Turkish province southeast of Anatolia. The province's population exceeded 500,000 in 2010.The province is important because of its reserves and production of oil which was started in the 1940s. There is a 494-km long oil pipeline from Batman to the Turkish port of İskenderun....
where they received political and military training and assistance from the security forces.
On 17 January 2011 Arif Doğan, a retired colonel in the Turkish army
Turkish Army
The Turkish Army or Turkish Land Forces is the main branch of the Turkish Armed Forces responsible for land-based military operations. The modern history of the army began with its formation after the collapse of the Ottoman Empire...
who also claims to be a founder of JİTEM, while testifying in court in the Ergenekon case, declared that he set up Hezbollah as a contra group to force to fight and kill militants of the PKK. The organization was originally to be called Hizbul-Kontr ("Party of the Contras").
Human resources
Corry Görgü puts the number of militants as high as 20,000 a figure presented by the Center for Defense InformationCenter for Defense Information
The Center for Defense Information , founded in 1972 by retired U.S. Navy Rear Admiral Gene La Rocque, states that it is dedicated to strengthening national and international security through international cooperation, reduced reliance on unilateral military power to resolve conflict, reduced...
as well. Information provided by the Intelligence Resource Program of the Federation of American Scientists
Federation of American Scientists
The Federation of American Scientists is a nonpartisan, 501 organization intent on using science and scientific analysis to attempt make the world more secure. FAS was founded in 1945 by scientists who worked on the Manhattan Project to develop the first atomic bombs...
based on the 2002 Patterns of Global Terrorism
Patterns of Global Terrorism
Patterns of Global Terrorism was a report published each year on or before April 30 by the United States Department of State. It has since been renamed Country Reports on Terrorism...
report suggests that the organisation possibly has a few hundred members and several thousand supporters. Ufuk Hiçyılmaz stated that the group had about 1,000 armed members.
Prosecution
After the kidnapping of several businessmen in IstanbulIstanbul
Istanbul , historically known as Byzantium and Constantinople , is the largest city of Turkey. Istanbul metropolitan province had 13.26 million people living in it as of December, 2010, which is 18% of Turkey's population and the 3rd largest metropolitan area in Europe after London and...
and the subsequent raid of a house in Beykoz
Beykoz
Beykoz is a district in the suburbs of Istanbul, Turkey at the northern end of the Bosphorus on the Anatolian side. Beykoz includes everything from the streams of Küçüksu and Göksu up to the opening of the Bosphorus into the Black Sea, and the villages in the hinterland as far as the river of Riva...
quarter a nationwide hunt on Hezbollah supporters followed. During the operation in Beykoz on 17 January 2000 Hüseyin Velioğlu was killed and Edip Gümüş and Cemal Tutar were detained. Edip Gümüş, born 1958 in Batman was alleged to lead the military wing of Hezbollah and Cemal Tutar was said to be a member of the armed wing.
In the time to follow many trials were conducted in Diyarbakır and other places against alleged members of Hezbollah. In several instances defendants raised torture allegations. Such allegations are documented in Urgent Actions
Action alert
An action alert is a message that an organization sends to mobilize people - often members of their group and supports of a specific point of view - calling on them to take action to influence public policy. Typically, action alerts are in reference to a timely issue, where prompt action is needed...
(UA) of Amnesty International
Amnesty International
Amnesty International is an international non-governmental organisation whose stated mission is "to conduct research and generate action to prevent and end grave abuses of human rights, and to demand justice for those whose rights have been violated."Following a publication of Peter Benenson's...
. In the trial in which Edip Gümüş and Cemal Tutar were indicted the defendant Fahrettin Özdemir said on 10 July 2000 that he had been held in custody for 59 days and had been tortured. In the hearing of 11 September 2000 Cemal Tutar said that he had been held in police custody for 180 days.
The Hezbollah trial was concluded in December 2009. The defendants received varying terms of imprisonment.
Release of suspects
Eighteen members of Turkish Hezbollah, suspected of militant activities, were released from jail on 4 January 2011, in accordance with a recent amendment to the Turkish criminal code that set a limit of 10 years on the time detainees can be held without being sentenced in a final verdict.See also
- Islamic terrorism
- Great Eastern Islamic Raiders' FrontGreat Eastern Islamic Raiders' FrontThe Great Eastern Islamic Raiders' Front is an Islamic militant organization which follows the Büyük Doğu ideology of Necip Fazıl Kısakürek, a well-known Turkish author, poet and Islamist ideologue...
- List of designated terrorist organizations
- List of illegal political parties in Turkey
External links
- Levitsky, Olga, "In the Spotlight: Turkish Hezbollah". Terrorism. Center for Defense Information. December 10, 2003.
- Turkish Hezbollah: Release of Turkish Hezbollah Members Rocks Turkey