they said it was finished

Ah, they said it was finished because they wanted it to be!

(Ekmek ve Adalet ["Bread and Justice"] weekly magazine, June 10, 2002, No. 12, pages 14 and 15)

When some groups broke off the Death Fast, three different newspapers presented it in the same way:
"The Death Fasts have ended" Hurriyet "The F-Type actions have been ended" Cumhuriyet "The Death Fast has been ended" Ozgur Politika

Hurriyet ("Freedom") is easily explained.
It has a "rational" motive: it is the voice of the monopolies. It does not trouble itself with awkward matters like the truth.

OK, What about Cumhuriyet ("Republic")?
It's for leftism, for democracy…
Let's leave Cumhuriyet to one side for a moment.

Let's look at Ozgur Politika ("Free Politics", a Kurdish nationalist daily published in Europe).
What do you call making deliberate use of the headline "the Death Fast has been ended" when you know it to be untrue? Leaving politics and ideology to one side, there is only one way to describe it in blunt terms: MEDIA LIES! This means that those who have done this have engaged in deliberate DISTORTION. Breaking off or continuing the Death Fast - this can be evaluated, interpreted, and one's own preference expressed. But they are not writing the truth. From this point of view the problem is also a matter of morality.

The oligarchy could not be happy! But the "quitters" were pleased.

It is clear that the decision by some organisations to quit could not give the oligarchy much pleasure. This was because the resistance continued. It lost neither its determination nor its strength. Everybody who understands the rules of the class struggle and the dialectic knows that this resistance with its 91 martyrs and hundreds of gazis (a term meaning "wounded soldiers", a reference to those prisoners in the resistance left crippled by forced medical intervention or by injuries incurred in the state attack on the prisons in December 2000) is more powerful than can be expressed by the number of Death Fast resisters.

The strength of the resistance is its determination. And in this direction the resistance has lost none of its strength. It can even be said that the load of responsibility on our shoulders derived from the determination of the resistance is even greater now than it was before.

Because this is the case, the authorities could not be pleased. The "quitters" could not be turned into a propaganda attack. But the quitters were pleased. And in order to feel pleasure, they had no trouble with distorting the truth. But they forgot one thing;
Does writing that something is "over" mean that it is really over?
The state's behaviour is appropriate to its class. It is playing the democratisation and EU game that suits its own world. A world that feeds on lies and deceit

"The Death Fasts have finished." That was what Hurriyet wrote. That was what Cumhuriyet wrote. That was what Özgur Politika wrote... And so they declared that it was finished... Why?
Isn't it obvious that the truth will come out in the end?
In the end, won't it be clear that these headlines are a LIE and a DISTORTION?
So why did they do it?

Because they want it to end. Not just the oligarchy, not just Dogan Medya (a right-wing media outlet in Turkey). but the supporters of the EU, the General Staff, those who support this or that "wing" of the system, almost all sections zealously expecting democracy from it (even supposed leftists and patriots) - all of them have wanted to be rid of the resistance as soon as possible.

Those with this mentality ignored the thousands who carried the red banner on May Day. Those with this mentality have created a ghetto for themselves. They are living in a world of their own. This world is one that feeds on continually leading others astray. They have constantly legitimised their policies by coming up with fairy tales about there being "positive developments". They have seen resistance and fighting as "amateurism" and "mindlessness", and they have claimed to be practising "high politics" or to be "intelligent left-wingers".

The resistance has been a looking glass showing that all their grand tactics and policies, their conciliatory behaviour, inclination to seek permission from and faltering attitude towards tyranny are in reality tokens of their pettiness and helplessness.

Resistance to tyranny is a kind of examination for everyone. This was an examination they could not pass. The resistance's continuation is a reminder to everyone that "they failed the test". So these people want to be rid of the resistance as soon as possible.

But they have erred on one point. And a lot hangs on that point. When the resistance is ended, they will not be able to escape from being judged and sentenced by the truth. How can such a mentality as theirs wage the struggle for rights and freedoms?

"The Death Fast is finished." The egoist, pragmatist minds of small-group sectarians wrote of things as they wanted them to be, not what they were. Whether in a disguised form or openly, they all supported Husnu Ondul's call to "give up". (Ondul is chairman of IHD, the Human Rights Association in Turkey.) The resistance, people's violence, the struggle were all barriers to "democracy". However, while this bourgeois propaganda can deceive fools, it is a pity that it has found a resonance among those who call themselves intellectuals and left-wingers.

They believe things that are incredible. A murderer who holds the post of government minister says, "End the Death Fast, then a symposium will be set up, we will put the F-Type prisons on the table." It is comprehensible that he would say that. It is class behaviour. The bourgeoisie uses terror and deceit at the same time. But Husnu Ondul gets up and says the same thing.

On December 9, there was an appeal to "give up" put out by the famous "19 organisations" who said much the same thing as this. An example of the same mentality at work today is given here: "The chair of the Adana branch of IHD, Sehmus Kaya, gave a reminder that the Death Fasts by the prisoners have ended and said that there are no more obstacles left preventing Justice Minister H. Sami Turk from finding a solution." (June 1, Ozgur Politika)

Did the Death Fasts prevent a solution from being found? Have the Death Fasts ended now? Which errors and distortions shall we correct in this statement? How will such a mentality be able to struggle for rights and freedoms?

The quitters, by supporting the lie of "it is finished", have made common cause with those who want to choke the resistance.

It is not enough for them to believe the symposium fairy tales. They want others to believe in them too. Let us suppose that "international institutions" also take part in this symposium. And in the end they say that "the F-Type prisons meet international standards". From the EU Committee for the Prevention of Torture (CPT) to Amnesty International and other human rights organisations, the state of mind they all possess is familiar. You do not need to wait for a symposium to find this out. Everyone can read the CPT's latest report on the F-Type prisons to know what an "international" symposium will come up with.

Then what will you do? Will you say to the prisoners, "the F-Type prisons meet international standards, they say, so you should accept them as well"?

The "quitters" and those who said "it is finished" are acting in concert with the oligarchy and Europe to break the resistance. Writing and saying that "it is over", knowing full well that that is not true, means that you share with the oligarchy the aim of destroying the resistance behind a wall of silence.