Published on Alternet (http://www.alternet.org)
Home > How the Kurds Will Save Syria
________________________________________
How the Kurds Will Save Syria
By Vijay Prashad [1] / AlterNet [2]
March 24, 2016
As the Russian aircraft began their partial withdrawal from Syria, the
Syrian Kurds declared their ambitions for what they call Rojava. Given the
deeply fragmented nature of Syria during this five-year war, the Syrian
Kurds suggested that the country adopt federalism as its organizational
principle. Syria's partition was off the table, as was the re-creation of a
strong central government. Instead, the Syrian Kurds proposed that a unity
of relatively autonomous states within Syria would be the model. The Kurds,
it was said, have shown in practice what might be part of the post-conflict
agreement.
Idris Nassan, who is part of the foreign ministry of the Kurdish canton of
Kobane, said that the idea of a federation is not merely for the Kurds.
Rojava - which in Kurdish means the west - refers to the Western Kurdistan,
with the Eastern parts in Iraq and Iran. It might have a majority Kurdish
population in some of the towns, but within Rojava live people of many
different ethnicities. In fact, during the meeting to discuss federalism -
held in Rmelan, in the northeastern edge of Syria - the delegates came from
many different communities. They included Kurds and Arabs, certainly, but
also Armenians, Assyrians, Chechens, Circassians, Syriacs, and Turkmen. The
federal area of Rojava would not be a Kurdish area per se, but merely a
self-administered part of Syria.
What was announced last week was the culmination of a five-year project.
When the war began in Syria, its intensity first gathered along the western
flank of the country from Dara'a to Aleppo. Syria's president Bashar
al-Assad recalled large parts of his armed forces to reinforce Damascus and
to fight along that corridor. In moving his troops to the western part of
the country, Assad essentially gave the Syrian Kurds a free hand in their
northern zone. It was then that the Syrian Kurds began to emerge as a
political force.
Emergence of the Syrian Kurds.
For many decades, the Kurdish fighters of Turkish origin who belonged to the
Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) had taken refuge in neighboring Iraq and
Syria. It was from these bases that the PKK maintained its battle against
the Turkish state. Kurdish populations along the border provided safe havens
for these fighters, and the governments of Iraq and Syria used their
presence as a bargaining chip against Turkey. In 2003, the PKK helped set up
a political arm amongst the Syrian Kurds. This formation - the Democratic
Union Party (PYD) - operated amongst Syrian Kurds to build a political
network and to assist the PKK. In 2004, in Qamishli, a conflict at a soccer
match led to a riot against the emblems of Syrian government rule. The
government then cracked down on the various political outfits, including the
PYD. Quiet descended on the region till 2011.
When the Syrian War broke out, the PYD seized the opportunity to emerge from
the shadows. Its leader - Salih Muslim - walked out of a Damascus prison and
returned to Qamishli, where the PYD began to take charge of administrative
functions abandoned by the Syrian government. PKK fighters helped the PYD
create an armed force, the People's Protection Unit (YPG). The YPG, assisted
by the PKK, then fought off any intruder into what they began to see as
their zone. Their main foe - soon enough - became ISIS, whom they have
battled with ferocity along their de facto border. When ISIS took one of
their cities of Kobane, it was devastating to the Syrian Kurds. It appeared
that ISIS was ready to sweep the Syrian Kurdish dreams of Rojava into the
dustheap.
Bombing runs from the United States as well as pressure on the Turkish
government to allow Iraqi Kurdish reinforcements to enter the battlefield
allowed the YPG to push ISIS away from Rojava. The frontline remained
secure: east of the Euphrates River and north of the main roadway that
connects Syria to Iraq lay the limits of Syrian Kurdish ambitions. They
could neither move south nor reconnect with the Syrian Kurdish town of
Afrin. That had been cut-off by the emergence of ISIS and other extremists
north of Aleppo.
The Russian Intervention.
When the Russians intervened last year, the game changed. Russian aircraft
provided close air-support to the Kurdish fighters and the Syrian Army as
both moved swiftly to recapture the rural areas north of Aleppo. Here was
the path to reconnect Jazira, Kobane and Afrin - the three jewels of the
Syrian Kurds. The Syrian Kurds - in order to take advantage of the situation
-created the Syrian Democratic Forces, a military front that comprised not
only the YPG but also sections of the Free Syrian Army, Liwa Thuwar al-Raqqa
and al-Sanadid Forces. A host of different ethnic groups operate under this
umbrella. Their emblem has the colors of the YPG - yellow, green and white,
but it bears an outline map of Syria with the Euphrates winding its way
through the country. The Syrian Democratic Forces provided the YPG with
additional fighting power and legitimacy to stake a claim to be more than
Kurdish. Its claim to autonomy and later federalism was not made from
Kurdish nationalism, but from Syrian patriotism.
The PYD set up an office in Moscow. This is its first international office.
The gains its fighters made discomforted the government of Turkey, which has
long wanted to prevent another autonomous Kurdish region on its borders. The
Iraqi Kurds - under Western protection and with the permission of the Turks
- created such an enclave in 1991. Now it appeared as if the Syrian Kurds -
under Russian protection - would do the same. It is out of antipathy to the
Kurdish project, even though it is cloaked in Syrian nationalism, that the
government in Turkey refused to allow the PYD or the YPG have a seat at the
peace talks in Geneva. Russia tried to intervene on behalf of the PYD, to no
avail. What was the PYD going to do in this situation - blocked from a seat
at the table and yet gaining ground in the battlefield? It declared its
intentions on its own, namely to create a state within a future Syrian
federation.
Neither the Assad government in Damascus nor the opposition in Istanbul
likes the idea of a federal Syria. Both are drawn to the habit of strong
central rule. But, as the Syrian Center for Policy Research in Damascus
showed, the war has fragmented the country seemingly irreversibly. A
fragmented Syria is the reality. This fragmentation can go in two
directions. It can be used as an excuse to partition the country. Or Syria
can be preserved as a federal republic. In Iraq, the US occupation allowed
the Kurdish Region to be defined in ethnic terms, leaving the rest of the
country to be also -de facto -seen in sectarian terms (Shia and Sunni). The
Syrian Kurds have prevented this by suggesting that their region - Rojava -
is not an ethnic enclave but a state in a federation that is committed to
equality and democracy. They call this the Project for a Democratic Syria.
That the participants at the conference that took this position are not only
Kurds illustrates their vision. This is not, as Salih Muslim put it, a claim
to secessionism. It is a way to save Syria from disintegration.
Vijay Prashad is professor of international studies at Trinity College in
Hartford, Connecticut. He is the author of 18 books, including Arab Spring,
Libyan Winter (AK Press, 2012), The Poorer Nations: A Possible History of
the Global South (Verso, 2013) and the forthcoming The Death of a Nation and
the Future of the Arab Revolution (University of California Press, 2016).
His columns appear at AlterNet every Wednesday.
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Published on Alternet (http://www.alternet.org)
Home > How the Kurds Will Save Syria
How the Kurds Will Save Syria
By Vijay Prashad [1] / AlterNet [2]
March 24, 2016
As the Russian aircraft began their partial withdrawal from Syria, the
Syrian Kurds declared their ambitions for what they call Rojava. Given the
deeply fragmented nature of Syria during this five-year war, the Syrian
Kurds suggested that the country adopt federalism as its organizational
principle. Syria's partition was off the table, as was the re-creation of a
strong central government. Instead, the Syrian Kurds proposed that a unity
of relatively autonomous states within Syria would be the model. The Kurds,
it was said, have shown in practice what might be part of the post-conflict
agreement.
Idris Nassan, who is part of the foreign ministry of the Kurdish canton of
Kobane, said that the idea of a federation is not merely for the Kurds.
Rojava - which in Kurdish means the west - refers to the Western Kurdistan,
with the Eastern parts in Iraq and Iran. It might have a majority Kurdish
population in some of the towns, but within Rojava live people of many
different ethnicities. In fact, during the meeting to discuss federalism -
held in Rmelan, in the northeastern edge of Syria - the delegates came from
many different communities. They included Kurds and Arabs, certainly, but
also Armenians, Assyrians, Chechens, Circassians, Syriacs, and Turkmen. The
federal area of Rojava would not be a Kurdish area per se, but merely a
self-administered part of Syria.
What was announced last week was the culmination of a five-year project.
When the war began in Syria, its intensity first gathered along the western
flank of the country from Dara'a to Aleppo. Syria's president Bashar
al-Assad recalled large parts of his armed forces to reinforce Damascus and
to fight along that corridor. In moving his troops to the western part of
the country, Assad essentially gave the Syrian Kurds a free hand in their
northern zone. It was then that the Syrian Kurds began to emerge as a
political force.
Emergence of the Syrian Kurds.
For many decades, the Kurdish fighters of Turkish origin who belonged to the
Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) had taken refuge in neighboring Iraq and
Syria. It was from these bases that the PKK maintained its battle against
the Turkish state. Kurdish populations along the border provided safe havens
for these fighters, and the governments of Iraq and Syria used their
presence as a bargaining chip against Turkey. In 2003, the PKK helped set up
a political arm amongst the Syrian Kurds. This formation - the Democratic
Union Party (PYD) - operated amongst Syrian Kurds to build a political
network and to assist the PKK. In 2004, in Qamishli, a conflict at a soccer
match led to a riot against the emblems of Syrian government rule. The
government then cracked down on the various political outfits, including the
PYD. Quiet descended on the region till 2011.
When the Syrian War broke out, the PYD seized the opportunity to emerge from
the shadows. Its leader - Salih Muslim - walked out of a Damascus prison and
returned to Qamishli, where the PYD began to take charge of administrative
functions abandoned by the Syrian government. PKK fighters helped the PYD
create an armed force, the People's Protection Unit (YPG). The YPG, assisted
by the PKK, then fought off any intruder into what they began to see as
their zone. Their main foe - soon enough - became ISIS, whom they have
battled with ferocity along their de facto border. When ISIS took one of
their cities of Kobane, it was devastating to the Syrian Kurds. It appeared
that ISIS was ready to sweep the Syrian Kurdish dreams of Rojava into the
dustheap.
Bombing runs from the United States as well as pressure on the Turkish
government to allow Iraqi Kurdish reinforcements to enter the battlefield
allowed the YPG to push ISIS away from Rojava. The frontline remained
secure: east of the Euphrates River and north of the main roadway that
connects Syria to Iraq lay the limits of Syrian Kurdish ambitions. They
could neither move south nor reconnect with the Syrian Kurdish town of
Afrin. That had been cut-off by the emergence of ISIS and other extremists
north of Aleppo.
The Russian Intervention.
When the Russians intervened last year, the game changed. Russian aircraft
provided close air-support to the Kurdish fighters and the Syrian Army as
both moved swiftly to recapture the rural areas north of Aleppo. Here was
the path to reconnect Jazira, Kobane and Afrin - the three jewels of the
Syrian Kurds. The Syrian Kurds - in order to take advantage of the situation
-created the Syrian Democratic Forces, a military front that comprised not
only the YPG but also sections of the Free Syrian Army, Liwa Thuwar al-Raqqa
and al-Sanadid Forces. A host of different ethnic groups operate under this
umbrella. Their emblem has the colors of the YPG - yellow, green and white,
but it bears an outline map of Syria with the Euphrates winding its way
through the country. The Syrian Democratic Forces provided the YPG with
additional fighting power and legitimacy to stake a claim to be more than
Kurdish. Its claim to autonomy and later federalism was not made from
Kurdish nationalism, but from Syrian patriotism.
The PYD set up an office in Moscow. This is its first international office.
The gains its fighters made discomforted the government of Turkey, which has
long wanted to prevent another autonomous Kurdish region on its borders. The
Iraqi Kurds - under Western protection and with the permission of the Turks
- created such an enclave in 1991. Now it appeared as if the Syrian Kurds -
under Russian protection - would do the same. It is out of antipathy to the
Kurdish project, even though it is cloaked in Syrian nationalism, that the
government in Turkey refused to allow the PYD or the YPG have a seat at the
peace talks in Geneva. Russia tried to intervene on behalf of the PYD, to no
avail. What was the PYD going to do in this situation - blocked from a seat
at the table and yet gaining ground in the battlefield? It declared its
intentions on its own, namely to create a state within a future Syrian
federation.
Neither the Assad government in Damascus nor the opposition in Istanbul
likes the idea of a federal Syria. Both are drawn to the habit of strong
central rule. But, as the Syrian Center for Policy Research in Damascus
showed, the war has fragmented the country seemingly irreversibly. A
fragmented Syria is the reality. This fragmentation can go in two
directions. It can be used as an excuse to partition the country. Or Syria
can be preserved as a federal republic. In Iraq, the US occupation allowed
the Kurdish Region to be defined in ethnic terms, leaving the rest of the
country to be also -de facto -seen in sectarian terms (Shia and Sunni). The
Syrian Kurds have prevented this by suggesting that their region - Rojava -
is not an ethnic enclave but a state in a federation that is committed to
equality and democracy. They call this the Project for a Democratic Syria.
That the participants at the conference that took this position are not only
Kurds illustrates their vision. This is not, as Salih Muslim put it, a claim
to secessionism. It is a way to save Syria from disintegration.
Vijay Prashad is professor of international studies at Trinity College in
Hartford, Connecticut. He is the author of 18 books, including Arab Spring,
Libyan Winter (AK Press, 2012), The Poorer Nations: A Possible History of
the Global South (Verso, 2013) and the forthcoming The Death of a Nation and
the Future of the Arab Revolution (University of California Press, 2016).
His columns appear at AlterNet every Wednesday.
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