Yusuf Kocaoglu stands within the wreckage of buildings broken by the earthquake in Antakya, Turkey, as he tries to stroll via the town the place he used to offer historical past excursions.

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Yusuf Kocaoglu stands within the wreckage of buildings broken by the earthquake in Antakya, Turkey, as he tries to stroll via the town the place he used to offer historical past excursions.

Claire Harbage/NPR

ANTAKYA, Turkey — Yusuf Kocaoglu, an expert information, leads us on a tour he by no means needed to offer.

The positioning of historical Antioch — a crossroads of civilizations and a contemporary vacationer and spiritual pilgrimage vacation spot in southern Turkey — is likely one of the cities left most devastated by the Feb. 6 earthquake that killed tens of 1000’s in Turkey and Syria.

For 10 years, Kocaoglu, a local of the town, led excursions of its historic core, guiding guests from around the globe. It has now suffered near-total destruction. The bazaar, the breakfast place he’d take vacationers, the native hangouts — all are decimated.

“There is no such thing as a place now I can take you as a result of all of them are destroyed,” he says. “The general public left the town.”

Constructed round 300 BCE, the town, now referred to as Antakya, has survived a number of earlier calamitous earthquakes. Now, Turkish army autos, on patrol to maintain the peace, roll previous total streets lowered to rubble. Our bodies are nonetheless believed to be rotting underneath the particles.

A view inside what was the dome of the historic Habib-i Najjar Mosque in Antakya.

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A view inside what was the dome of the historic Habib-i Najjar Mosque in Antakya.

Claire Harbage/NPR

The Feb. 6 earthquake and aftershocks worn out monuments of world heritage and faith within the metropolis, an early cradle of Christianity and vital within the Roman Empire. Historic websites all through the area suffered.

“The earthquakes broken buildings spanning centuries and cultures, from Roman forts to historic mosques to church buildings holy to numerous Christian denominations,” Bénédicte de Montlaur, president and CEO of the World Monuments Fund, tells NPR. “We’ve got little doubt that the heritage misplaced in these tragic occasions will take years to restore and that we are going to want a big worldwide mobilization to assist the native efforts.”

The town’s centuries-old kaleidoscope of peoples — Alawites, Alevis, Armenians, Christians, Jews, and lately Syrian battle refugees — has now scattered. There have been greater than 200,000 folks dwelling within the metropolis earlier than the quake, however now survivors who’ve remained within the surrounding district live in tents, Kocaoglu included.

“Antakya and the encircling area has a deep, numerous historical past and has lengthy been dwelling to folks talking completely different languages and practising completely different religions,” says Jennifer Stager, a researcher of historical Antioch at Johns Hopkins College. “It’s critical that our focus stay on the dwelling folks in want, whereas recognizing that these monuments are a major a part of the area’s historical past and modern life.”

Mosques decimated

Navy personnel stroll in entrance of Habib-i Najjar Mosque in Antakya.

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Navy personnel stroll in entrance of Habib-i Najjar Mosque in Antakya.

Claire Harbage/NPR

The mosque that Turkey claims is the oldest within the Anatolia area has caved in. Habib-i Najjar Mosque was constructed as a church in 638 CE and transformed backwards and forwards over the centuries from a church to a mosque. It was destroyed in an 1853 earthquake and rebuilt throughout the Ottoman interval, however its seventeenth century minaret remained. After this month’s earthquake, the minaret and the mosque’s domed roof are gone.

The Sermaye Mosque, constructed within the early 1700s, was distinctive in mosque structure for its entrance constructed via the minaret. Now the minaret is a stump. Different mosques in Antakya are full piles of rubble, just like the Ottoman-era New Mosque, often known as Yeni Camii.

A person shovels trash into a fireplace on the road in entrance of the place the minaret of Sermaye Mosque stood earlier than the earthquake prompted it to fall.

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A person shovels trash into a fireplace on the road in entrance of the place the minaret of Sermaye Mosque stood earlier than the earthquake prompted it to fall.

Claire Harbage/NPR

The Ulu Mosque, constructed within the 18th century, used to broadcast the decision to prayer 5 instances a day within the heart of the town. Now it’s utterly gone. Loudspeakers hooked up to avenue poles now carry the prayer name — a logo, Kocaoglu says, that life in Antakya clings on.

Church buildings in destroy

The Apostle Peter introduced Christianity to historical Antioch within the first few many years after Jesus’ dying. The New Testomony says this metropolis is the place Christians had been first referred to as Christian.

The Orthodox Church in Antakya, the headquarters of the Greek Orthodox patriarchate till the 14th century, was decimated within the quake — its façade now a jumble of iron and cement particles.

Yusuf Kocaoglu factors to the Orthodox Church in Antakya that was destroyed throughout the earthquake.

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Yusuf Kocaoglu factors to the Orthodox Church in Antakya that was destroyed throughout the earthquake.

Claire Harbage/NPR

A more recent Protestant church, housed in a constructing in-built 1860 and beforehand the location of a French consulate, was additionally crushed. Run by a Korean Methodist group, its South Korean pastor, Yakup Chang, led Sunday worship companies on the street exterior the church. One among his congregants was lacking within the quake.

“It’s totally onerous,” the pastor sighs. “Can I do one thing? No. We simply lean on one another. Stick collectively. That is what I ought to do.”

A Jewish neighborhood grieves

Historic Antioch was additionally a serious hub of Judaism exterior the Holy Land. The Jewish neighborhood remained within the metropolis for two,300 years. By the point of February’s earthquake, it numbered solely a dozen or so members.

The Antakya synagogue remains to be standing, having sustained minor harm. Its historical Torah scroll, written on antelope vellum, was taken out of the town for safekeeping after the earthquake.

After the quake, the neighborhood’s surviving members moved to Istanbul. Antakya’s Jewish neighborhood president, Saul Cenudioglu, and his spouse Fortuna, had been killed when their house constructing collapsed.

Yusuf Kocaoglu stands in entrance of the synagogue in Antakya, which remains to be standing. The top of Antakya’s tiny Jewish neighborhood died within the earthquake.

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Yusuf Kocaoglu stands in entrance of the synagogue in Antakya, which remains to be standing. The top of Antakya’s tiny Jewish neighborhood died within the earthquake.

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“He was actually hospitable,” says Kocaoglu, our information. “He used to love serving to folks.”

It is unclear if the town’s few surviving Jews will return to dwell there after the earthquake.

Beer among the many ruins

A part of Pasha Restaurant nonetheless stands amidst the rubble in Antakya.

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A part of Pasha Restaurant nonetheless stands amidst the rubble in Antakya.

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The Lonely Planet information to Turkey summarizes Antakya’s attraction in a sentence: “Atmospheric old-town fragments cling on amid the fashionable hubbub.” At present, a slim avenue of bars and eating places lies in waste.

For the primary time on the tour, Kocaoglu turns away to cry.

“That is the guts of Antakya,” he says. “We had numerous reminiscences right here with my pals, with my friends from completely different nations. I bear in mind them.”

A bulldozer has paved a hilly path via the wreckage. Amid rubble stands considered one of his favourite previous haunts, the Pasha Restaurant, sliced down the center. Proprietor Orhan Uyanik, salvaging crates of beer from the ruins, wonders concerning the destiny of a pair who obtained engaged right here not too long ago.

Orhan Uyanik (left), the proprietor of Pasha Restaurant in Antakya, sits within the rubble and opens one of many remaining beers that survived the quake.

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Orhan Uyanik (left), the proprietor of Pasha Restaurant in Antakya, sits within the rubble and opens one of many remaining beers that survived the quake.

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Regardless of the cataclysmic loss, Kocaoglu, and all these we meet alongside the way in which, cling to the Turkish authorities’s promise to rebuild Antakya and its historic websites – and take solace in how the town has rebounded via the ages.

The town “was ruined by the earthquakes six or seven instances. Perhaps that is the eighth. It would not matter,” says Kocaoglu. “We’ll attempt to do one thing for our metropolis time and again.”