Face to face with death in pursuit of the truth: Journalist Elif Akkuş

Sercan Meriç

A journalist in the shadow of war, on the trail of the truth… As Elif Akkuş compiles her years of war reporting experience in her book "Truth is Stronger Than Everything," she brings not only the dangers she faced but also her deep passion for the profession to the pages. Her journalistic journey, which began as an intern at TRT, extends to moments where she came face to face with death in the streets of Najaf, the siege she experienced on the Mavi Marmara, and being on ISIS's death list. In this book, Akkuş describes the courage and persistence of a journalist and what they risk for the sake of the truth. We spoke with her for 12punto about her story, which inspires everyone…

You have been a war correspondent for many years and have written your memoirs in the book "Truth is Stronger Than Everything." How did you decide to write this book, and how was the title determined?

The title is actually a conclusion I reached over time, especially after the events we encountered in this profession in risky regions and war zones. No matter what happens, despite all the manipulations, all the inaccuracies, misdirections, and different perceptions, the truth eventually comes out, and that is where its power actually comes from. No one can escape the truth. I actually started writing the book four years ago. I thought of it as a book I would spread over a long term, and writing a book is, of course, very different from journalism. I started writing and stopped at one point. Later, the developments I experienced in my personal life and professional life created a feeling in me that it would be right to publish this book, and that the next stage could be written later. I established an incredible bond of affection with Tekin Yayınevi, actually… Because their building in Üsküdar, their approach, and the fact that it is very old made me feel stronger as well.

Your professional story is actually connected to TRT... You enter TRT as an intern and work in many fields over the years. How did you start the profession? What did you feel when you heard you were going to Iraq for the first time?

Journalism in risky regions was already my dream in middle school. Later, I studied radio and television. I had the opportunity to meet Coşkun Aral, a senior figure in our profession, in some way, and going to the places he went and being where he was was very important to me. He said to me, "I'm going to Sri Lanka. In the meantime, you do an internship at TRT, let's meet after I return..." However, doing an internship at TRT is not a very easy thing. I literally slept at the door of TRT for a week. They see me in the morning, they see me at noon, they see me in the evening. But I can't get in, no matter what. Finally, I managed to get in. First, they put me in editing. I said, "I want to work in the news center..." It's such a bond that I loved TRT very much, and our senior colleagues helped a lot. There were Can Akbel, Melek Dener, Başak Doğru, Kemal Aslan, Nurullah Kadiroğlu… There are also those among them who have passed away. It's such a thing that you learn something every day. Then I started working on a contract basis. There is no period of time when I worked at TRT and was unhappy. Because I am someone who believes that TRT does very important public broadcasting. Therefore, it is very valuable in terms of the institution. It also has great importance in my life. Because whatever I learned, I truly learned it there. I learned it from my senior colleagues there. Over time, I tried to repay what I received from it by trying to represent it in the best way possible.

I think the first time you learned you were going to the war zone was Iraq. What did you feel when you received that call?

I had won. Because they told me, "You can't go. What is a woman doing in a war?" When that news came, I was the winner of a very big war. Even now, when I remember that phone call, I get goosebumps. They had said, "Get ready, you're going to Iraq on Monday." For me, that phone conversation was about a child growing up, dreaming of something while growing up, facing dozens of obstacles, being stubborn, continuing the struggle, and finally winning.

When the hotel was raided in Najaf, when you came face to face with death, what did you experience there?

Najaf was a very troubled place. People who are in the war know where to go, where not to go, which place is riskier, etc…. But it was necessary to go there. Because all hell is breaking loose around the Imam Ali Shrine, there are clashes, and it is one of the most active places. I had also told my cameraman friend, "Look, if you want, don't come. This is risky, but I'm going." He said, "No. I'll come too." There is a border point when going to Najaf. At that border point, wounded people are coming from Najaf and so on. We have a guide, we have a driver. There are rocket-wielding types there. While we were filming, they suddenly surrounded us. Suddenly hundreds of people are calling us "Agents"... Before we could even say how, the friend there came with the car, entered that crowd, and got us out of there. Before we turned the corner, a mortar shell fell there. Because there is a crowd. In a war zone, you should never be in the middle of a crowd. There were people who died there, people who were wounded. We escaped by a hair's breadth. We moved to Najaf. We broadcasted on the roof in Najaf. While I was writing news on one side, I heard a strange noise from below. I looked and saw someone coming up, searching the rooms. Our guides were also downstairs. He is shouting from below, "Elif!" I don't make a sound at all. Upstairs, there was a friend of ours from the İhlas News Agency. We made eye contact with him. There was a foreign journalist diagonally across from us. My cameraman friend Cüneyt Avşaroğlu was there. I said: "We need to hide somewhere.." There is a toilet. We saved ourselves by dangling ourselves out of the toilet and so on. Afterwards, there was a vehicle that we realized later had been following us from Iraq, that is, from Baghdad, until we got there. Then we left there.

Mavi Marmara was on Turkey's agenda for a very long time. You were also on the ship. How did you board the ship? What did you experience on that journey?

I was on duty in Van. Then they called me from the center, "Get ready, you're going to Palestine. Get ready, we're sending you to that ship, you know, the one that's going to be hit," they were saying. They were even making fun of these things a bit. After that, I even got a passport again from Van. Then we waited for a few days in Antalya, and the ship departed from Kepez Port. We bought waterproof containers where we could put the camera tapes. We are ready for everything like this. There is footage from inside the ship regarding the Mavi Marmara. I am screaming at the top of my lungs there, "What will happen to the tapes?" The ship has been seized, meaning all hell is breaking loose. I am still screaming: "What are we going to do with the tapes?" Even at that moment, you say: "What will happen to the footage?" Because that's the reason for being there anyway. In the following minutes, when the Kalima Shahada was recited over the ship's loudspeaker, my brother came to my mind there. I thought, "Will I never be able to see him again? If only I had said one more thing to him." You say if you jump into the sea, the sea is also full of Israeli soldiers. Land is not visible, where will you swim?

What did you feel there?

On that interesting line between life and death, I never felt, "Why did I do this job? I'm going to die, I'm going to go at this age." When I look back, I have no regrets about the work I did. If it were today, I would go running.

Let's also talk about the story of you being put on ISIS's death list.

It was something that happened during the Syria process. We were one of the first teams to enter Syria, and we were constantly broadcasting. We are constantly there, telling what the terrorist organization ISIS is doing. While telling these, of course, you become a target. It didn't come as a surprise. I didn't say, "Why did they put me on the list?" This also applies to other terrorist organizations. At another point, for example, after the Trench Operations, messages like "We know your house," "You live here" came to my social media accounts from some accounts that sympathized with the PKK or supported the PKK. These were already possible risks that we could foresee and things we experienced. Such a process had also been experienced. I even stayed away from Syria for a while. I didn't go for a while. Then I went again and continued to do my job.

Many things have changed in the Middle East since you started the profession. You have also witnessed this change firsthand. When you think of all those wars, terror, destruction, all of them, how can you summarize what those people experienced, for example?

Let me tell you something. Being stateless is a very bad thing. May God not leave anyone stateless. May no country's people experience what it means to be stateless. If you don't have a homeland, you have nothing. This is the clearest thing I have seen regarding this process. Because many people do not know what it means to be stateless, they can look at life, the country they live in, and their lands from very different places. I have seen thousands of people who were left stateless. I mean, I have seen so many people who wanted to reach a tiny piece of water by walking hundreds of kilometers, who lost their children, who lost their relatives, who lost the place they lived, their neighbors, everything, who fled to lands they did not know by walking, who lived in mosque courtyards and tried to provide for their cleaning and food from there in some way, who lived lives where they never, ever knew what would happen not tomorrow, but an hour later. I tried to explain to the people in my own circle what this was as much as I could. There is nothing as valuable as a homeland.