Running Nov. 27-30 this year, the Islamic holiday Eid al-Adha (Kurban Bayramı in Turkish) requires every Muslim with the means to do so to sacrifice an animal as a reminder of the unflinching faith in God of the Prophet Abraham, who was willing to sacrifice his own son to God before God intervened to provide him with an animal to sacrifice instead. During the four-day holiday, animals are sacrificed, with the meat divided among family and the needy, and candies and clothing are given to loved ones. Many in Turkey elect to pay for someone else to sacrifice an animal instead of heading down to the butcher to do it themselves, with most people opting for this route giving the money to a charity organization.
Turkish charities are active as always this Eid al-Adha season, collecting money and sacrificing animals, canning the meat and distributing it to the poor. However these activities are not confined to Turkey alone, with a highly popular option being to send aid abroad to Muslim countries and countries with destitute Muslim minorities. Posters and billboards across the country list the prices to sacrifice an animal and donate it to the poor in Turkey and abroad. The prices are often much higher for an international sacrifice, given the local costs of animals and/or the cost of delivering the meat to often conflict-torn areas. For example, the Kimse Yok Mu (Is Anybody There?) Foundation, one of Turkey’s most active charities, has set its sacrifice price at TL 330 for the meat to be distributed domestically, but up to TL 555 for other locations (in this case, Palestine).
Prices, however, do not stand in the way of Turkish donors determined to help the needy abroad. Kimse Yok Mu President Mehmet Özkara told Sunday’s Zaman that as part of last year’s Eid al-Adha charity drive, in addition to the distribution of sacrificial meet in 38 Turkish provinces, his organization facilitated the sacrifice of a total 13,510 animals in 28 foreign countries, distributing meat to a total 110,000 families in Turkey and abroad. This year, Kimse Yok Mu is organizing sacrifices and aid distribution in 44 foreign countries.
Turkish charities distributing more than just meat
Bülent Yıldırım, the head of another major Turkish charity, the Humanitarian Aid Foundation (İHH), also spoke with Sunday’s Zaman about his group’s international efforts. The İHH organizes sacrifices in 120 countries and operates a bit differently -- people having the organization perform a sacrifice on their behalf pay a set cost of TL 250. The İHH aims in this way to ensure the even distribution of sacrifices across places where there are needy people, avoiding a concentration in the countries where costs are lowest. “In this way we are able to perform sacrifices and distribute aid in the places where it is needed most,” Yıldırım said.
Remzi Yılmaz of the Turkish Red Crescent said that so far Turkish citizens had shown great interest this year in donating meat abroad, particularly to war-torn nations like Iraq, Sudan and Palestine. “The Turkish people have great empathy for their brothers in foreign countries. They see the horrible conditions on the news and want to do everything that they can to ease their situations,” he said.
Along with meat -- an unaffordable luxury for many throughout the world -- Kimse Yok Mu and the İHH provide a variety of other food and clothing items, in addition to holiday presents for children as part of their holiday charity campaigns in foreign countries. Volunteers from the organizations say that the warm receptions they receive when they distribute aid in other countries create an incredibly strong bond between Turkish donors and recipients of aid.
Yıldırım emphasized in his comments that a spirit of brotherhood, not just feelings of pity, fuels the outpouring of aid from Turkish charities abroad and noted that it was this will on the part of the Turkish public that allowed these charities to be so successful in their international organization of sacrifices. Another member of the İHH, Hüseyin Oruç, has accompanied the İHH’s volunteers to nearly 50 different countries to participate in aid efforts there. “In the places we go to, you have many people who haven’t eaten any meat in at least two years,” Oruç said. “It’s indescribable, the look of happiness on their faces when we begin distributing meat. Things that we may take for granted are of immense importance to many people.”
İstanbul businessman Ali Kemal Tarlak will be traveling with a delegation from Kimse Yok Mu to Afghanistan this year because he wants to help in the direct aid distribution process. “I’ve been going to Afghanistan for Eid al-Adha for five years. We’ve seen the desperate looks on the faces of the people there. It’s indescribable,” he said. “We gave people vouchers so that they could pick up meat from us on the distribution date. They wouldn’t be happier if you put money in their pockets -- that’s how important it is.” todaszaman
