Two soldiers were killed in defense of a woman's veil. Learn about the story of "Sucho Imam", the symbol of Turkish Kahramanmaraş

Kahramanmaraş, Turkey, has occupied the news and bulletins during the past two weeks after it was hit by a strong earthquake, which has killed more than 47,000 people and caused massive damage to the infrastructure in large areas of Turkey and northwestern Syria.

Kahramanmaraş is an ancient Turkish city dating back to the Paleolithic era, and it formed an important trade center for civilizations since the Assyrian kingdom. It was converted to Islam in 637 AD at the hands of the leader Khaled bin Al-Walid, and it became a base for the Islamic army, and its popular resistance defeated the French army until it gained independence in 1920.

Although the city is characterized by a rich geographical and cultural diversity, it does not enjoy the fame of the rest of the Turkish tourist cities such as Istanbul, Bursa, Yalova, Izmir and others, while the Turks preserve in their heritage a pivotal historical incident linked to the history of the Republic and the Anatolian region, and that incident relates to the milk seller "Sucho Imam".

The official Turkish Radio and Television Corporation "TRT" reports its story about the milk seller "Sucho Imam" (meaning in Arabic "the imam of the milk seller", and his original name is Imam, not his title or job) and his famous story, where he is credited with liberating Kahraman Marash from the French occupation in the last century after he fired the first bullet in his face in late October 1919, and ignited the revolution against him in the state to liberate it less than 4 months later.

The same source provides information about the "hero" of the story, as on October 31, 1919, two days after the entry of the French occupation forces into the city, while "Socho Imam" was practicing his work, two soldiers attacked - one of them French (some accounts state that he was a general) And the other is Armenian - 3 veiled Turkish women were coming out of the historic Uzunoluk bath, and they tried to remove their veils, saying, "This land has become a French colony, and you cannot walk around with a veil here."

The story indicates that after the women sought the help of the people of Marash (which is the historical name of the city before the name Kahraman was added to it in 1973, which means “heroine” in Turkish, in appreciation of its role in the liberation revolution from the French occupation), a number of men who were sitting in the café rushed to a place They defended the women, but the two soldiers shot and killed one of them.

And here, "Sucho Imam" appeared, according to the Turkish accounts, and he took his weapon and shot the two soldiers, Mardia the Frenchman, and seriously wounded the Armenian, who later died because of it. The Turks immortalized the incident with a memorial depicting the incident in his city, Kahramanmaraş.

In the aftermath of the incident, the French tried to arrest "Socho Imam", but they did not succeed in that despite searching all the houses of the city and arresting his cousin and killing him after cutting off his nose and ears to intimidate the people.

Turkish sources attribute credit to the "Socho Imam" bullet for igniting the first spark of the national struggle movement against the French in Kahramanmaraş, which lasted until the liberation of the state on February 11, 1920.

After the city was liberated, "Suzhou Imam" was rewarded and appointed to the municipality and then to operate the cannons in Kahramanmaraş Citadel. He died as a result of a fire that broke out due to the explosion of one of the cannons on November 25, 1922, and was buried in the cemetery of the Chinarli Mosque.

After his death, the municipality of Kahramanmaraş built in 1936, in the same place of the incident, a memorial showing a veiled woman and the general holding the veil, and the hero "Suzhou Imam" kills him by firing squad.

In addition to several places, squares and streets bearing his name, the Martial Law Command turned his grave in 1980 into a shrine.

During the establishment of Kahramanmaraş University, the Turkish government considered that it was necessary to honor "Suzhou Imam" by naming the university after him, which became "Kahramanmaraş Suzhou Imam University."