The Economist Asia - 27.01.2018

The EconomistJanuary 27th 2018 Middle East and Africa 37

2 says the White House, at least. A Turkish

source said no such concerns were shared.

While America loses leverage in Syria,

Russia isfilling the vacuum. It hasmended

its relationship with Turkey, which reached

a low point in 2015, when the Turks shot

down a Russian fighter jet over Syria. Hap-

py to stoke tension between America and

its allies, Russia almost certainly gave the

operation in Afrin a green light. It may be

that in return Turkey looks the other way as

Russian and Syrian forces pound rebels in

Idlib, who are ostensiblyallied with Tur-

key againstthe Assad regime. But some

think the Russianswill eventually turn on

Turkey and cut a deal with the Kurds that

hands Mr Assad control of Afrin.

A more immediate concern is whether

the Turks plan to push into otherYPG

strongholds. America has some 2,000

troops stationed in Syria, many in the

Kurdish-held north-east. If Turkish troops

start shooting atYPGfighters in those ar-

eas, American soldiers could end up in the

crossfire. The result could be a direct clash

between NATOallies. 7

A

BU JABR waited more than three years

to exact his revenge. In 2014 the jiha-

dists of IslamicState (IS) murdered hun-

dreds of his fellow tribesmen in the prov-

ince of Deir ez-Zor. Mr Jabr returned to his

village in December, leading a group of tri-

bal fighters. Backed by American air pow-

er, his men have driven ISinto the desert

along the Iraqi border. The jihadists still

send car bombs into his lines, but he says

they will be defeated soon. American-led

air strikes are said to have killed up to 150 ji-

hadists in Deir ez-Zor on January 20th.

Mr Jabr’s men fall under the command

of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), a

Kurdish-led alliance formed to defeat ISin

northern and eastern Syria. Armed and

trained by America, the SDFis close to vic-

tory. Its flags flutter over a quarter of the

country, much of which was once held by

the jihadists. But when Turkish tanks rum-

bled into the Kurdish-held western enclave

of Afrin on January 20th (see previous

story), the Kurdssuddenly found them-

selves fighting on two fronts.

Turkey’s anger has grown as the area

under Kurdish control expanded, over the

course of the war, to include even Arab and

Turkoman towns captured from IS(see

map). In 2016 the ruling Democratic Union

Party (PYD) declared the Kurdish-held terri-

tory, which abutsthe Turkish border, a fed-

eral region called Rojava. It was not a move

towards secession, said the PYD, but a

model for the rest of Syria. The regime of

Bashar al-Assad dismissed the declaration

and the Turks seethed. But the Kurds, who

make up around 10% of Syria’s population,

have consolidated their grip on the north.

Shahoz Hasan, the PYD’s joint chief, re-

fers to Rojava as a “democratic experi-

ment”. The party has empowered women

and set up village committees, in line with

the teachings of Murray Bookchin, an

American philosopher whose writings

have greatly influenced the Kurdish move-

ments in Syria and Turkey. But Rojava is

hardly pluralistic. The PYDrepresses critics

and other Kurdish parties.

The PYD’s leaders say they will never

again allow Rojava to be ruled directly

from Damascus. For decades the Kurds in

Syria suffered under the oppression of Mr

Assad and, before him, his father. Many

were stripped of their citizenship and de-

nied the right to own property. Others

were booted off their land to make way for

Arabs. Kurdish publications were banned

and private schools were prohibited from

teaching the Kurdish language. Little in-

vestment flowed into the oil- and gas-rich

region. Instead the regime in Damascus

milked the fertile northern plains to feed

the rest of the country. As a result, the Kurds

are desperately poor.

Surrounded by potential enemies and

in need of support, the PYDhas flirted with

nearly all of the combatants in Syria. Its

strongest backer is America, which views

the PYD’s armed wing, the People’s Protec-

tion Units (YPG), as the most dependable

ground force againstIS. America has given

it weapons and training, and deployed

2,000 of its own troops to the region. Fear-

ing a return of the jihadists and Iranian he-

gemony, America has promised to stay in

north-eastern Syria until a peace deal is

reached. The PYDdoes not think it will al-

low the Turks to go beyond Afrin.

Russia, which backs Mr Assad, proba-

bly blessed the Turkish operation, if only to

spite America. In response, the PYDsaid it

would probably not attend Russian-spon-

sored peace talks at the end of January.

Still, Russia and MrAssad maysee a poten-

tial partner in the PYD, which has accepted

Russian military supportand maintained

ties to the regime. The group is regarded as

more pragmatic than the other rebel out-

fits. When Mr Assad’s forces retreated from

areas in the north, they made sure to hand

them to the PYD. One could imagine the re-

gime and the Kurds supporting a deal that

keeps Mr Assad in power and grants Ro-

java autonomy.

But the Kurds will probably have to con-

cede some of their gains in order to keep

most of Rojava. Any deal would probably

require Kurdish forces to be folded into the

national army; captured oilfields to be re-

turned to the central government; and

seized Arab lands to be given up. “If real ne-

gotiations happen we will talk about all

these things,” says Mr Hasan. “We are al-

ways open for discussions.” First, though,

he mustdeal with the Turks. 7

The war in Syria (2)

The precarious

state of Rojava

DEIR EZ-ZOR AND QAMISHLI

Syria’s Kurds try to keep control of their

territory

IRAQI

KURDISTAN

Government Islamic State Government

Kurds

Rebel-held

Turkish troops/rebels

Damascus Baghdad

Deir ez-Zor

Raqqa

Qamishli

Aleppo

Afrin Manbij

Idlib

Reyhanli Mosul Erbil

SYRIA

TURKEY

IRAN

JORDAN

IRAQ

ISRAEL

LEBANON

Russian

air base

Sparsely

populated

Mediterranean Sea

Tigris

Euphra

tes

Afrin “Rojava”, area claimed

by Kurds

100 km

Areas of control, Jan 2018

Source: IHS Conflict Monitor

Kurds curse Turkey
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