on 5 Feb 24 by thefreeonline and Manish Rai at North Press
Rojava/AANES has always been in a perilous situation, but in 2024 the autonomous region is especially threatened.
Its multi-ethnic army, the 100K strong Syrian Defense Forces (SDF), was sponsored by the USA to fight and win against the ISIS caliphate, eventually conquering their capital Raqqah and expelling them from the Deir ez Zor, a fairly oil rich Sunni Arab area on the Iraqi border.
Then president Donald Trump declared the US were only there for the oil, and the SDF is always accused of being just the police force of US looters, although it is over half composed of Arabs. The Coalition by now is a ‘de facto’ US force.
Surrounded by the Syrian state, Turkey, Russia, Islamic Militias (FSA/Nusra/HTS), and Iranian sworn enemies Rojava cannot afford to lose its marginal international and theoretical US protection. But the US is now under great pressure to pull out.
The US bases can only be supplied by air or across the Iraqi border, but that will make little sense as the US is finally “negotiating a phased withdrawal” from its illegal and unwanted Iraqi bases – leaving its small Syrian presence isolated.
The Syrian war is basically over and Syria is being recognised by the rest of the Arab world, yet the US persists with strangling the economy as well as Lebanon with the draconian ‘Caesar Sanctions’ regime. This makes no sense either.
Caesar Act Sanctions, a kind of ‘s0ur grapes punishment’, stupidly and cruelly condemning the Syrian population (and Lebanon) to continued blockade and penury, even as Syria is readmitted as an Arab partner State.
In addition due to US support and sponsorship of the atrocities of the Gaza genocide it’s bases in Syria and Iraq are regularily attacked by Iraqi Shia militia groups(IRI) supported by Iran, with a tit for tat bombing and drone battle that threatens a disastrous and unwanted major war everyone would lose (Feb 2024).
A US pullout may make sense but it would betray Rojava to genocidal neighbours, although the US has done this twice before, and allowed Turkey to invade. It would also empower a revival of the ISIS extremist guerillas, (who initially were promoted by the US and Turkey as a pawn against Syria).
Al Hol Camp| We Can’t End the ‘Forever War Without’ Stopping “The CITY of ISIS” prison camp in Rojava |
Up to 70,000 of ISIS (Daesh) fighters and their families who were defeated by the SDF and the US led coalition are still imprisoned or held in the vast Al Hol camp, which would have to be opened and abandoned if the US left and international supplies were cut. Also half of the SDF could switch sides to the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) if the US stopped subsidizing their meager salaries.
Despite repeated efforts the Damascus ‘Arab only’ government refuses any autonomy for the Rojava/AANES area and promises a return to a new generation of Kurdish repression, with Turkey swiftly grabbing all the North East it can. Russia likely cannot now act as honest broker as it must placate Turkey due to the Ukraine war.
Iraq military bases: US pulling out of three key sites – BBC News The US army is pulling out of al-Qaim and two other key military bases in Iraq in the coming weeks. For years Iraq and Syria have been demanding US forces leave their countries.
Iran is the rising power in the region, but is strongly against the Rojava Revolution for ideological reasons, having bombed Kurdish supporters in eastern Iraq in 2022 for backing the Iranian women’s uprising.
The only reason the US would stay is if it really cares about leaving chaos and an ISIS revival, or if it thinks its worth retaining an isolated target in the region to provoke Syria, Iraq and Iran.
So how can the invaluable Rojava Revolution survive? If it can keep US protection for a few more years the region may have totally changed as US hegemony disappears and regional alliances adapt.
One practical but unlikely outcome in the longer term might simply be a reconciliation with Damascus. Another might be for a new anti-ISIS coalition, without the US aggressor and western colonists, and guaranteed perhaps by BRICS, that is China and India in a multilateral future.
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Sole aim of Turkey’s attacks is to crush Kurdish aspirations
By Manish Rai – at North Press Feb 2024
For the last few months, Turkey has been constantly attacking Northeast Syria which is the only Middle East area run by a democratic multi-ethnic and feminist Kurdish administration.
Thousands of people joined a demonstration in Tel Rifaat town of the Shehba Canton in protest at the Turkish state’s invasion and genocidal practices in northern Syria. 40% of the population of Efrin (Afrin) now survive in a semi no-man’s land, defended by the multi-ethnic SDF of AANES, after expulsion by the Turkish invasion, plantation and Turkification of their homes and properties
Currently, the world is distracted from the Israel-Gaza war and the crisis in the Red Sea. Turkey sees this as a good opportunity to escalate its aggression towards Syrian Kurds on the pretext of self-defense.
The recent upswing in the conflict started when nine Turkish soldiers were killed in clashes with Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) fighters in northern Iraq. Ankara responded by increasing its relentless air strikes and illegal ground military operations against Kurdish guerilla hideouts in the mountainous Iraqi area, as well as in northeast Syria.
Continue reading “Rojava Revolution may be destroyed and ISIS Revived if/when US pulls out of Syria + Turkey Military hate Campaign is solely to crush Kurds”
