01 February 2019•Update: 02 February 2019
By Omer Koparan
JARABULUS, Syria
A Syrian man who has been living in Jarabulus since YPG/PKK terrorists forced people to migrate is a possible anti-terror operation by Turkey will enable him to return home.
Mohamed Abu Ibrahim, who came to Jarabulus four years ago with his family from their hometown of Shuyukh on the eastern banks of the Euphrates River, is currently staying in a camp in the city.
Jarabulus falls under the security zone established under Turkey’s Operation Euphrates Shield in 2016 which aimed to eradicate YPG/PKK and Daesh terrorists from the region.
Nearly every day, Abu Ibrahim has been coming to the coast of the Euphrates River with his two small children to get a glimpse of his hometown on the opposite side.
Telling his children about a terror-free Shuyukh, he has instilled in them the goal of going back to their home when the YPG/PKK’s oppression ends.
“The PKK forced nearly 10,000 families including ours to migrate from Shuyukh, and 90 percent of them are living in camps in Jarabulus,” Abu Ibrahim told Anadolu Agency.
“My son, Shuyukh used to have very fertile land…Life was very beautiful there. People loved each other,” he said while standing on the bank of the river.
“Look son, we keep Shuyukh in our hearts. You should keep it there like us as well.”
Abu Ibrahim said he always told his sons that the land was inherited from their ancestors and they should fight, if necessary, to take it back.
“These days, it is said that an operation will be carried out east of the Euphrates. Everyone is happy over the news,” he said, adding he wants to be buried in the eastern area even if he dies on the western side.
‘Everybody is afraid of them’
“The PKK won’t allow us to return,” Abu Ibrahim said, adding the terrorists destroyed their homes and burned their crops.
“They keep threatening us. Everybody is afraid of them,” he said, stressing that all of the people staying in the camps were waiting for the operation.
He added that even if the people were given palaces to live in, they would prefer their houses in their hometown.
“Even if they have single-room houses there, it is a heaven for them,” he said.
Yazen, one of Abu Ibrahim’s sons, said: “I used to play ball with my friends. We played hide and seek. We had a big garden.
“Now, we are in Jarabulus. We come here [by the riverside] to see our house.”
Yazen said he was sorry for the land they lost.
“I want to become an engineer. I want to build a bridge to go to our home,” he said.
In recent days, Turkish officials said Turkey has completed all preparations for an operation east of the Euphrates in northern Syria which Ankara said would preserve territorial integrity in the war-torn country.
Since 2016, Turkey’s Euphrates Shield and Olive Branch operations in northwestern Syria have liberated the region from YPG/PKK and Daesh terrorists, including Al-Bab, Afrin Azaz, making it possible for Syrians who fled the violence there to return home.
In its more than 30-year terror campaign against Turkey, the PKK -- recognized as a terrorist group by Turkey, the U.S. and the EU -- has been responsible for the deaths of some 40,000 people, including women and children. The YPG/PYD is the group's Syrian branch.
