People's Defense Units
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People's Defense Units |
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|---|---|
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| Lineup | 2011 |
| Country | Syria |
| structure | High Kurdish Committee |
| Subordinate troops |
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| Strength | 50,000 |
| Insinuation | Democratic Forces of Syria |
| motto | YPG dimeşe, erd û ezman diheje (YPG marches, and the earth and the sky tremble) |
| Colours | green, red, yellow |
| Butcher | civil war in Syria |
| Web presence | [2] |
| commander | |
| Commander in chief | Sîpan Hemo |
| speaker | Rêdûr Xelîl |
| Commander in Raʾs al-ʿAyn | Cemşîd Osman |
The People's Defense Units ( Kurdish Yekîneyên Parastina Gel , abbreviation YPG , Arabic وحدات حماية الشعب, DMG Waḥdāt Ḥimāyat aš-Šaʿb ) or for the total armed forces YPG / YPJ or YPG / J are an armed Kurdish militia in Syria and control various predominantly Kurdish areas in northern Syria, including those with a significant proportion of the Arab population.
The YPG are seen as the armed arm of the Kurdish-Syrian Democratic Union Party (PYD) . They are often seen as the Syrian faction of the banned Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK). Despite their proximity to the PYD and PKK, the leadership of the YPG stated that it was independent and did not belong to the PKK.
The YPG constitute a de facto army in the three cantons established and ruled by the PYD in 2014, known under the name Rojava ("Western Kurdistan") and comprising around one fifth of Syria . The power in Rojava is with the PYD / YPG. The Turkey classify the YPG as a terrorist organization, but could not convince them to join this classification its Western allies.
The YPG has been part of the Syrian Democratic Forces (DKS) since 2015 .
Foundation, structure, ideology and orientation
Foundation and establishment of PYD and the YPG
Foundation of the PYD
The PYD was officially founded in 2003 as an offshoot of the PKK in Iraqi Kurdistan . Abdullah Öcalan's brother , Osman, stated that he created the PYD and that it received its instructions from the PKK. The founders and leaders of the PYD were all PKK figures who had returned from the Kandil region , where the group's first conference was held.
In contrast to other Kurdish parties, which were politically active but institutionally weak and isolated and remote from the local population, the PYD was prepared for a takeover of power even before the Syrian rebellion. This infrastructure played a decisive role in the subsequent development of the Rojava project.
Takeover of power in northern Syria from 2011
With the beginning of the civil war in Syria , the PYD secured itself from March 2011 onwards to avoid a direct conflict with the Damascus regime. When the Syrian rebellion broke out in 2011, the PYD sharply criticized the opposition alliance Syrian National Council , called the Kurds who joined the opposition “collaborators”, attacked anti-regime demonstrators in Afrin and Aleppo and maintained conciliatory relations with the Assad government . As the 2011 uprisings in Syria continued to spread and develop into war, the PYD used this to its advantage to expand its influence. The PKK sent over 1,000 Syrian Kurds to Syria.
Among the returnees from Kandil in April 2011 was Salih Muslim , who became the public face of the PYD. On the military level, power remained with the PKK commanders from Kandil, while the lower ranks included many economically weak Kurds who were recruited in northern Syria over decades, trained in northern Iraq and sent to the YPG after the uprising began. The PYD was the only Syrian-Kurdish party to have a cadre of trained fighters, and its allegiance to Öcalan helped it gather sympathizers and prevent internal divisions. In preparation for the 2011 takeover, the PYD had hoarded weapons and taken over all important authorities. The PYD emulated PKK / KCK structures and founded its own assembly or council for Syria in December 2011.
After the surprise withdrawal of the Syrian regime from the Kurdish areas in northern Syria - most of what later became Rojava - in June or July 2012, the cohesion of its institutions enabled the PYD to take advantage of the power vacuum that had arisen, to fill it itself and the political and military Take control.
The PYD removed government officials from community facilities in at least five of its strongholds. The PYD-YPG immediately exchanged Syrian flags for PYD flags and the ubiquitous Assad images for Öcalan photos. In doing so, it openly asserted itself as the authority responsible for state institutions in most of the predominantly Kurdish cities. Institutions designated as democratic were created, basic forms of self-organization and council structures of a new form of society called " democratic confederalism ". The area had a functioning and, according to the NZZ, “reasonably democratic” community, which included both ethnic minorities and the participation of women. >
Assertion against the north Syrian opposition
The PYD's takeover of power in the area vacated by the Assad government in summer 2012 with a predominantly Kurdish population in northern Syria led to clashes between the PYD and the anti-Assad rebellion and made Turkey one of the most important supporters of the rebels as a secondary target to strive to secure their southern border against a PKK base. In addition, the PYD ensured that the government of Iraqi Kurdistan , which was friendly to the West, reduced its influence in Syria by developing an authoritarian regime that was heavily dependent on the Assad state and, in brutal form, all Kurdish political organizations and activists oppressed, including those with ties to Erbil as the capital of Iraqi Kurdistan.
In contrast to the PYD's unilateral steps towards autonomy, the 2 to 3 million Kurdish population was fragmented, possibly in part as a result of the past repression under the Assad regime. Since the assassination of Sheikh Muhammad Maschuq al-Chaznawi in 2005, the Syrian Kurds had largely lacked a unifying leader. The PYD, deeply connected to the PKK, was the best organized of a dozen groups active within the Kurdish minority in Syria. The other, divided opposition parties that formed the Kurdish National Council (KNC) at the instigation of the President of Iraqi Kurdistan, Masud Barzani , were unsuccessful against the PYD . The PYD based its power not only on the allegiance of a majority of the population but also on its greater effectiveness than the other Kurdish parties and, in particular, on its use of fighters and weapons. Many Kurds supported the PYD's military gains and welcomed the existence of Kurdish enclaves in Syria, even if they did not agree with all aspects of the PYD's political platform. There was no consensus on whether the interests of the population of 2.5 million Syrian Kurds coincided with those of the PYD. But Kurdish opponents of the PYD also admitted that only the PYD was able to build up its own army, the YPG, in Rojava. It was supposed to serve first of all to protect the self-declared neutrality that its leaders called the “third way”, ie the failure to make a pact with the Syrian regime as well as a pact with Arab rebels, as long as they would not guarantee Kurdish rights. Öcalan's dogma of strict neutrality in the Syrian conflict enabled the PYD, which ideologically advocated anti-Western council communism , to maintain public life and peace in the areas under its control. Especially after the defeat of the FSA against the YPG after the FSA invaded the Kurdish quarter of Aleppo in October 2011, critics from the KNC came to the conclusion that under the circumstances of the Syrian crisis there was no effective alternative to taking power from Öcalan's supporters and for the change from Assad's dictatorship to the PYD's takeover of power should be viewed as a “lesser evil” in view of the guaranteed peace in a civil war situation. Nevertheless, the KNC largely refused to cooperate with the PYD. Perhaps the most important factor in ensuring that the PYD was accorded a minimum of legitimacy was the efforts of the YPG as the military arm of the PYD to protect the local population from attacks by extremist groups such as ISIS.
Some Kurdish parties that rejected the project of democratic self-government accused the PYD of suppressing dissenting opinions. In view of the growing influence of the PYD, the PYD has also been accused by some Kurds of being allied with the Assad regime and of wanting to replace its authoritarian one-party rule with their own. According to the PYD representative Mohammed Reso, some Syrian Kurdish parties had refused to sign the Kurdish plan, declared in November 2013, for an interim administration for the predominantly Kurdish-populated region in north-east Syria. Kurds who protested against the new YPG power were arrested and beaten. According to reports by the human rights organization Human Rights Watch , some critics were killed in unknown circumstances. Contrary to the democratic goals proclaimed by the PYD, there was abuse of power, such as the violent crackdown on peaceful demonstrations by the PYD authorities in Amude , in which six people were killed, many injured and 90 activists were arrested. In contrast to the PKK, however, the PYD was not officially listed on the list of terrorist groups by either the US or the EU.
Foundation of the YPG
The YPG was unofficially founded on October 26, 2011 by the PYD to protect the predominantly Kurdish population in northern Syria. The official founding declaration of the YPG was made on July 19, 2012 by the PYD. The official appearance of the YPG coincided with the withdrawal of the government army from the Kurdish areas, after the Kurds had apparently agreed on a kind of non-aggression pact with the Syrian government under Assad and the YPG developed into the de facto army of the Syrian Kurds. As co-chairman of the PYD, Salih Muslim emphasized that the YPG had been founded by the PYD, but was not a party militia, as the PYD rejected the idea of a party militia and would prefer a united security forces and a united army.
Military takeover in northern Syria from 2012
In June 2012, the YPG set up checkpoints in northern Syria. In 2013, the female combat force known as the YPJ was created. When the PKK and Turkey entered into a ceasefire with each other in 2013 and began to hold political talks, the YPG-PYD established a “democratic self-government” in northern Syria and named it Rojava (“Western Kurdistan”). When Rojava was proclaimed in November 2013, the YPG established itself as the dominant military force in almost every Kurdish-settled area in the provinces of Hasaka , Raqqa and Aleppo . The allegations made by the YPG that they do not follow the PYD are of course refuted by reality. The YPG are officially subordinate to the High Kurdish Committee , but are widely regarded as the military arm of the PYD.
Although the YPG were associated with the PYD as the most powerful Kurdish political party, in the course of the Syrian crisis the YPG were increasingly viewed as the army of all Syrian Kurds. There was no clear definition for Rojava in any of the Kurdish parties. The declared vision of the PYD and PYD chairman Salih Muslims for Rojava was self-government for all ethnic groups in northeast Syria, whether Arabs , Kurds or Assyrians .
The military success enabled the YPG-PYD to expand its system of autonomy. In March 2016 the YPG-PYD proclaimed the “ Democratic Federation of Northern Syria ” (DFNS), which is an area inhabited by Kurds, Arabs and smaller minorities in a wide, contiguous strip of parts of the provinces Hasaka, Raqqa and Aleppo and also the province of Afrin which was not connected to the rest of the territory.
Relationship of the PYD / YPG to the PKK
Wladimir van Wilgenburg, analyst at the US-based Jamestown Foundation , summed up the connection between the YPG and the PKK, in line with Turkey's 2014 perspective, with the words: "YPG is the armed wing of the PKK in Syria."
The PKK itself has stated that the YPG as well as the PJAK in Iran and the HPG in Iraq are separate but closely related groups. Nuri Mahmud, official spokesman for the YPG, told the media in 2017 that the YPG was “a completely different organization from the PKK” and had “no connections” to the PKK. Both groups would operate in different areas, with different methods and for different purposes.
Representatives of the US administration under Barack Obama confirmed that the PKK and YPG are connected and coordinated in the fight against IS, but that the US continues to formally avoid contact with the PKK while dealing directly with the YPG. The US officials also stated that the PKK and YPG would operate under separate command structures and with different goals.
Financing of the YPG by the PKK
In contrast to other Syrian-Kurdish parties, which were neither financially supported by the governments of neighboring countries nor had their own substantial income, the PKK - and thus also the PYD - received significant funds through the acquisition of donations. The PYD was an exception among the Syrian-Kurdish parties because, as a cadre organization, it looked after all those who worked for it full-time. According to experts, the YPG relied on taxes levied in the Kurdish areas and the support of the PKK, which has a network of donors in Europe, Turkey and other areas of the Kurdish diaspora . According to Europol's TE-SAT 2016 report , the PKK increased its fundraising, propaganda and recruitment after the end of its ceasefire with Turkey in July 2015 and the ensuing escalation of the conflict. Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Greece, Romania, Sweden, Switzerland and the Netherlands reported the continuation of the annual PKK fund-raising campaigns, which included fundraising, membership fees and other income. According to Europol, it was assumed that the proceeds were used to finance both the HPG as the military arm of the PKK in Turkey and the PYD with the YPG as its military arm in Syria.
Organizational connection between PYD and YPG with the PKK and the KCK
The technically separate bodies YPG, PYD and PKK belong to the Koma Civakên Kurdistan (KCK).
The KCK is an umbrella organization for those organizations that want to introduce the political ideas of Abdullah Öcalan such as Democratic Confederalism . They are organized decentrally, but can support each other if necessary. For example, after the IS took over 60 villages on the Syrian-Turkish border in 2014 , the YPG asked the PKK for help in the fight against IS, which finally agreed to send fighters to Syria. The YPG and the PKK worked together to liberate the Yazidis from the Islamic State in Sinjar. At the military level, in line with a PKK tradition, the YPG promoted more influential posts for women as commanders. According to a report by the International Crisis Group (ICG) on the Kurds in Northern Syria, Turkey-oriented YPG commanders trained by the PKK are directing the YPG less towards a Syrian solution to the Kurdish question in Syria and more towards the fight against the PKK the Turkish state. This PKK armed conflict, which broke out again in Turkey since 2015, reached one of the deadliest phases in over three decades with over 3,000 deaths since July 20, 2015.
Like the other movements represented in the KCK, the PYD and the YPG are promoting the introduction of democratic confederalism , which does not consist in secession , but in the establishment of highly decentralized local government structures. The PYD is already well advanced in the implementation of Öcalan's ideas, as it has already been able to introduce the form of government of democratic confederalism to a large extent in the areas ruled by the PYD and has official, but also unofficial diplomatic contacts with politicians from a large number of countries knotted.
Structural and organic connection between the PYD / YPG / DKS and the PKK
PKK figures are omnipresent in both the YPG and the PYD. There are strong organic connections between PKK and PYD / YPG. According to the International Crisis Group, there was little prospect in 2017 that the PKK's organic connection with the YPG and its political arm PYD as a Syrian subsidiary could change in the foreseeable future.
The indication of this study that the PYD / YPG leadership is apparently following the PKK leadership in the Kandil Mountains in matters large and small was also in line with the official assessment of the US National Counterterrorism Center (NTCT) before the US Leadership in 2015 intensified their alliance between the YPG as part of the anti-IS coalition. PKK members are at the strategic level and within the command structure of the YPG. The presence of PKK commanders within the YPG is well documented, and there are credible arguments that the PKK military command is the highest authority in the YPG-controlled Rojava area. PKK cadres, trained and tried and tested in the Kandil region and with years of experience in the PKK's fight against Turkey, in some cases decades, hold the most influential positions in the YPG and - as a result - in the chain of command of the DKS.
While Kurds from Turkey and Iran play a notable role, most of these cadres were Syrian Kurds, but their loyalty to the PKK's internal hierarchy appears to override relations with local society in Syria. Many also operate largely from the background or with titles that understate their actual authority, while the nominally responsible representatives have no direct links to the PKK and act as front men . Although the PKK presence in northern Syria is given a local appearance in this way, the actual balance of power on the ground and for outside observers is evident.
In addition, statistics published by the YPG themselves show that over 50% of the Kurds fighting against ISIS in the ranks of the YPG are from Turkey. Despite the throttling of the border crossing through Turkey after September 2014, Kurds from Turkey continued to be well represented in the YPG, which further underscored the YPG's connection with the PKK. Many Kurds from Turkey who were trained with the PKK in the Kandil region later fought in Syria as part of the YPG. In interviews, PKK members identify strongly with the PYD / YPG and stated that they belong to the "same" movement as them. After the unrest in Syria began in early 2011, around 1,500 armed Syrian PKK Kurds crossed the border into northern Syria and made up the first armed Kurdish group in Syria. In those early days of the Syrian uprising, the leadership of the YPG was dominated by Syrian PKK fighters. Most of the leading YPG commanders were trained at the PKK base in the northern Iraqi region of Kandil, according to the ICG. With YPG / YPJ, the PYD provided the only relevant Kurdish combat force defending the Kurdish regions of Syria; the remaining Kurds either also joined the YPG or went to non-Kurdish opposition groups, while others left for Turkey or Iraq. As the YPG expanded its control in northern Syria and increasingly got into confrontations with rebellious and jihadist groups, in addition to the Syrian PKK fighters already present in the YPG, both Syrian and non-Syrian members of the PKK flocked from the Kandil mountains the YPG to join their fight. In 2014, several hundred Turkish-Kurdish fighters had already joined the YPG in Kobanê . The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights put the number of Turkish-Kurdish fighters who crossed the border to fight in Iraq and Syria at 800 in mid-July 2014, while nationalist-Kurdish sources cited a number closer to 300.
PKK fighters are reported to have commanded YPG battalions, were leaders in strategic decision-making, and directed the ideological and military training of recruits. Trained by the PKK cadres made it possible with their experience, discipline and Run-to-order structures ( command-and-control ) that the YPG able to secure areas under their control over their military weight out, and since September 2014 a particularly attractive partners for the US military's efforts, especially when compared to the less organized, less closed and militarily inexperienced Syrian rebel factions who had benefited from US support in other parts of the country.
Ideological connection between PYD / YPG / DKS and PKK
In addition to the connection through their command structure, the YPG and PKK are also connected with one another through their ideology. The YPG does not deny the ideological proximity to the PKK. The PKK leader Öcalan is deeply revered in the Kurdish-dominated regions of Syria. Despite the ideological connection to the PKK, the PYD denies being a branch of the PKK. The formally independent YPG have great ideological similarities with the socialist ruling party PYD.
Both the PKK and the PYD / YPG are ideologically inspired by the PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan. Both the PKK and the PYD reject a Kurdish nation state. The ideology created by Öcalan is taught and promoted to various cadres of the YPG, including non-Kurdish fighters within the YPG. The indoctrination of Arab fighters of the DKS with the ideology of Öcalan was described in extensive reports in the US media. The city of Manbij in Aleppo Province was portrayed by the US military as an example of the successful transfer of power from the Kurds to the Arabs after an area was freed from control by IS, but it was the Arabs who directed Manbij to supporters of the YPG ideology, which, according to Atlantic Council analyst Aaron Stein, made them indistinguishable from the Kurdish troops from the perspective of local residents and Turkey. Öcalan's emphasis on expanding the agenda beyond Kurdish nationalism also provides an intellectual basis for integrating new recruits into the DKS and even the YPG itself from other parts of Syrian society, even if DKS representatives admit that many these recruits are not related to the PKK ideology. Within this PKK ideology there is a tension between militant Kurdish nationalism and inclusive social utopianism, which has a formative effect on the dynamics within the broader YPG organization and thus on the DKS as a whole.
Similarity of symbolism between YPG and PKK
The Kurdish name of the YPG, Yekîneyên Parastina Gel , is an almost exact copy of the name of the PKK's military arm, the Hêzên Parastina Gel (HPG). In 2016, the PKK youth group YDG-H changed its name to YPS (civil defense units) and chose a flag that was identical to the flag of the YPG (people's defense units) and only differed in color.
Changing political classifications to the relationship between PYD / YPG and PKK
Originally the PYD had officially declared itself bound by instructions to a PKK parliament, but later changed the corresponding charter. Both the PYD and the YPG representatives later stated that they would not accept any instructions from outside and that they had their own structures that were not interwoven with those of the PKK.
Until the second half of 2014, the US did not consider them part of the “moderate opposition” in Syria. That only changed after the successes of the YPG, who fought IS militias in Kobane in 2014, when the US government expressed its belief after the PYD captured a number of cities on the Syrian-Turkish border in June 2015 that the PYD represent a reliable ally who complies with the US strategy in the fight against IS. In July 2015, a senior US government official said that he had to point out "in order to separate the PKK from the PYD" that the Turkish operations against the PKK in northern Iraq after the PKK attacks in Turkey in 2015, which should be regarded as self-defense, had not been carried out directed against the PYD in Syria. In February 2016, the US State Department positioned itself by stating that it saw the PKK as a terrorist organization, but saw the YPG as an effective force in the fight against IS to recapture its territory. The US government supported the YPG in these efforts against IS and, in contrast to Turkey, did not clearly emphasize the connection between the PKK and the YPG. Contrary to the scientific state of the art, the special envoy for the international alliance against IS, McGurk, claimed in a hearing of the US Congress in February 2016 that the PYD was interested in "distancing itself from any relationship with the PKK". On April 28, 2016, in a hearing before the United States Senate Committee on Armed Services, US Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter affirmed Lindsey Graham's question as to whether the PYD and the YPG, as their military wing, reportedly have at least significant links to the PKK. Contrary to Carter's testimony and a detailed report by the ICG dated May 4, 2017, which documents the domination of the PYD and DKS by the PKK, the US military repeatedly claimed that the PYD could be distinguished from the PKK. The expert Barak Barfi stressed that the leaders of the PYD were never ready to accept the cutting of ties with the PKK in order to appease Turkey. With regard to the future, he expressed his conviction that the PYD would “never break ties with the PKK”.
Under Barack Obama, the US administration tried hard to uphold the fiction that the YPG and the PKK are separate entities, but this did not convince experts. After the USA, which considered the YPG to be different from the PKK, had previously officially armed only Arab elements of the DKS, they announced in May 2017 that they would also include Kurdish elements of the DKS, who were ready to expel IS from its stronghold of Raqqa , to equip with weapons. After the DKS declared victory in the city of Raqqa, which was held by ISIS for three years, in October 2017 after a four-month struggle, the US government announced in November 2017 that it would adjust the US deliveries to its partners in Syria. Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu said that US President Donald Trump had promised the Turkish President to end the US arms shipments to the YPG. James Jeffrey, former US ambassador to Turkey from 2008 to 2010, viewed the decision to end arms shipments to the Kurds as part of an evolving US strategy to continue to play a formative role in Syria and Iran-backed militias and militias the Hezbollah to weaken.
Radiation effects between Syrian and Turkish Kurdish militias
In addition to the organic links between the PKK and the PYD / YPG, there are intensive ethnic and cultural ties between Syrian and Turkish Kurds. These emerged, for example, at the events in Kobane in the summer of 2014, when Turkey's reluctance to provide military support to the YPG armed forces in their fight against IS led directly to reactions from some ethnic-Kurdish circles in Turkey, which also took the form of bloody uprisings in some major Turkish cities. Another example of an ethnically-based broadcast of a conflict in Syria on Turkey took place in the change in tactics of the PKK, which apparently largely based on the urban warfare of the YPG in northern Syria its attacks from rural areas on some in southeastern Turkey relocated cities.
The conflict in Syria had a significant impact on the Kurdish movement, the peace process between Turkey and the PKK and the perception of the Turkish ruling party AKP from the point of view of Kurds in Turkey. To support the PYD's political and military efforts in Syria, ethnic Kurds from Turkey, Iran and Iraq traveled to Syria and joined the YPG as a militia of the PYD. The political ambitions of the PYD in Syria, which coincided closely with those of the PKK, pose a long-term threat to security in Turkey. The growing awareness of cross-border pan-Kurdish nationalism carried after the breakdown of the peace negotiations between the Turkish government and the PKK contributed to the resurgence of violence in southeastern Turkey. This threat increased after the two-year ceasefire between the PKK and the Turkish government in July 2015 and 2016. According to the International Crisis Group , 194 security forces and at least 221 PKK insurgents as well as around 151 civilians were killed in the fighting between July and mid-December 2015 alone, often in urban areas between the symbolism that was renamed YPS in 2016 and symbolism similar to the YPG PKK youth group YDG-H and Turkish security forces played. The success of the PYD in Syria influenced the overarching ambitions of the PKK in Turkey. On the one hand, the PKK was involved in struggles against the security forces within Turkey with the goal of the “establishment of autonomous regions”, the “cultural, cultural, and cultural communities” formulated at the end of 2015 by the Turkish organization Democratic Society Congress ( Democracy Toplum Kongresi , abbreviation: DTK) economic and geographical affinities ”. On the other hand, the PKK supported the PYD project within Syria via the YPG. Together with the PKK's involvement in these two overlapping fronts in Turkey and Syria, the PYD's successes in Syria led Turkey to change its perception of the PYD as a threat to itself.
According to Joost Hiltermann , program director of the Middle East and North Africa section of the ICG, the YPG are providing weapons and other support to the PKK in southeast Turkey, while the PYD is directed and subordinate to the PKK. In the Kurdish cantons of northern Syria such as Kobane, which are under the control of the YPG, the terrorist organization TAK, as an urban and radical offshoot of the PKK , receives its paramilitary training. In 2016, TAK suicide bombers carried out targeted attacks in Ankara and Istanbul . Many of the TAK assassins in 2016 had been trained in YPG camps for up to two years and fought in the YPG militias. Despite the deteriorating security situation in Turkey, the US leadership countered Turkish concerns about its military alliance with the YPG by pretending to decouple the Turkish and Syrian conflicts as part of its “compartmentalization” policy. The US leadership underlined the character of the PKK and YPG as separate entities and formed the Syrian Democratic Forces (DKS) as an umbrella organization for the YPG and Arab opposition forces in Syria. According to the commander of the US Special Operations Command , General Raymond A. Thomas , the US instruction to the YPG to change its "trademark" was on the day before it announced an alliance with Syrian Arabs under the name DKS in 2015 the Turkish concerns about the YPG are made in order to give the YPG “some credibility” through the attribute “democratic”. Turkey continues to regard the YPG as a Syrian offshoot of the PKK. The deployment of the DKS in Turkey acted like a concealment of the cooperation between the coalition and the YPG.
Goals of the PYD / YPG with reference to PKK goals
According to a KurdWatch report from 2011, the PYD initially played a special role among the Syrian-Kurdish parties in the program. While its Syria-specific positions on paper differed little from those of the other parties, the PYD concentrated on Turkey. While many PYD actions in Syria aimed at the release of PKK leader Öcalan, there were almost no Syria-specific activities. For the PYD and PKK, Syria initially remained primarily a place of retreat and recruitment for their fighters in the armed struggle against Turkey. The PYD is not calling for outright secession . Their declaration of self-determination and an accompanying “social contract” mixes Marxist jargon and a vague form of people 's democracy . At the military level, in line with a PKK tradition, the YPG promoted more influential posts for women as commanders.
Like the KCK, the PYD / YPG pursues the goal, which is less about secession than about the establishment of highly decentralized local rulership structures under the Öcalan's flag in the Kurdish regions of southeast Turkey, northern Syria, northern Iraq and northwest Iran, to gain strategic influence in the Middle East for their Kurdish movement. However, the PYD / YPG and PKK have different intermediate goals. While the PKK continues to strive for democratic autonomy and greater linguistic and political rights for the Kurds in Turkey, the PYD / YPG is concentrating on consolidating power in the area it controls and ultimately connecting the three of them geographically Cantons in Syria and part of Iraqi territory northwest of Sinjar , which would enable it to build a corridor from Iraq to the YPG-controlled part of Syria.
According to a detailed report by the ICG on the Kurds in northern Syria, Turkey-oriented YPG commanders who have been trained by the PKK are orienting the YPG less towards a Syrian solution to the Kurdish question in Syria and more towards the PKK's fight against the Turkish state . This PKK armed conflict, which broke out again in Turkey since 2015, reached one of the deadliest phases in over three decades with over 3,000 deaths since July 20, 2015.
Relations of the PYD / YPG to Iraqi Kurdish organizations
According to Joost Hiltermann, program manager of the Middle East and North Africa section of the ICG, Iran is playing the historical competition in northern Iraq between Kurmanji dialect-speaking Pro- Barzani Kurds near the Turkish border and Sorani- speaking Pro Talabani Kurds in the closer to Iran in divide-et-impera tactics and tries to position the Kurds favored by Iran - in Turkey the PKK, in Syria the PYD / YPG and in Iraq Talabanis PUK - in the form of a broad alliance against Barzani's KDP bring.
After 2007, the PYD founded several organizations in Syria in order to use them in negotiations with groups that were close to the Iraqi Kurdish leader Barzani . These groups are all considered part of the PYD.
The PYD refused to join the Kurdish National Council , which was dominated by Masud Barzanî and founded in October 2011 . The PYD joined the Tevgera Civaka Demokratîk ( TEV-DEM) in December 2012 . The attempt of the groups to work together in the joint Kurdish High Committee failed because of differences of opinion. It was significant that the leader of the Kurdish PUK , Jalal Talabani , is said to have advised the Syrian Kurdish representatives to fight together with the Assad government, while Barzani recommended, like Turkey, allied with him, to fight against Assad. The PYD wanted to position itself neither for the opposition nor for Assad and to concentrate on self-defense.
In August 2015, the YPG, together with the PKK, was involved in the defense of the Yazidis against IS in Sinjar .
Strategic changes of direction and tactical alliances
Relationship with the government and Sunni Arab rebels
Since the beginning of the Syrian uprising in spring 2011, the Syrian Kurds have occupied a special position in the Syrian civil war, which has been described in part as a "rocking policy between the Assad regime and the rebellion". Kurdish armed groups fought against government forces as well as against certain units of the FSA. When the FSA was formed, the PYD refused to work with it. Officially, the Syrian Kurds support the "opposition" against the Syrian government, but other rebel groups - as well as the KRG leader Masud Barzani - have repeatedly accused the PYD of compromising with the Assad regime in order to protect their own safety and security To achieve autonomy. After clashes with the FSA, the FSA accused the PYD / YPG of collaborating with the regime in Aleppo in the summer of 2013. Most Syrian-Arab politicians in exile and FSA commanders assumed that Assad had voluntarily had the Kurdish areas evacuated by government troops in order to position the PYD against Turkey and the FSA. The fact that the regime still had bases in the Kurdish region was used as evidence. The result was a tense relationship between the YPG and the Syrian opposition. According to the Middle East expert and advisor to the Turkish "Center for Middle Eastern Strategic Studies" (ORSAM), Vladimir Wilgenburg , Iran intended to use "the Syrian Kurds" to support Assad and integrate them into "the Assad-Iran-Russia axis" to urge. According to some experts, the relationship between the PYD and the Syrian government was less of a cooperation or an alliance, but "more of a tacit coexistence". The PYD and its allies refused to join the uprising against President Assad, arguing that the mostly Sunni rebels rejected Kurdish claims to a semi-autonomous post-Assad state in northeast Syria. In fact, the opposition Syrian National Council (SNC) refused to recognize the right to self-government for minorities. The PYD put the SNC under the control of Turkey.
The military balance of power was upset when an FSA brigade forcibly marched into the Kurdish district of al-Ashrafiya in Aleppo at the end of October 2011 and lodged itself. For the first time, the quarter was then massively bombed by the Syrian air force. 50 people died in demonstrations by thousands of Kurds against the FSA. Shortly after PYD units finally expelled the FSA and thus demonstrated their combat effectiveness, FSA commander Malik al-Kurdi admitted that the attack on al-Ashrafiya and the fighting within the Syrian opposition was a mistake; a ceasefire and the exchange of civilian prisoners were finally agreed. In West Kurdistan, the incident led to a strengthening of the PYD image.
President Assad recognized early on in the civil war that the Kurds could be used for his purposes. Accordingly, when the crisis began to emerge in 2011, he took several steps. He declared those Kurds, who had been made stateless in Syria in the 1960s, to be Syrian citizens again and issued “Decree 107”, which allows the self-administration of state territory through regional structures. The analyst Ghadi Sary concluded from these steps that the Assad government was aware that the Arabs and other groups did not want to be administered by Kurds and preferred to join militias close to the regime so that the presence of the Syrian state could be maintained. The Syrian government also relied on the deep distrust between Kurds and Turkey in the hope that the Kurdish areas could form a barrier for the supplies that Turkey wanted to smuggle into Syria for other opposition groups. The strict Kurdish rejection of the central government, however, anchored in the ideology of the PKK / PYD, harbors conflict potential for the future.
Whenever the YPG overstretched itself after major offensives by Islamist opposition forces, there was increased military coordination between the YPG and the Syrian government and the armed forces of the central government. According to its own statements, the Syrian government, albeit denied by the PYD, had repeatedly sent ammunition and military equipment to the YPG over the airfield in Qamishli during the war . The government's courtesy towards the PYD / YPG is also illustrated by the decision by the Syrian government to allow the local government to extract and produce oil by supplying equipment and paying the salaries of oilfield workers. Syria's UN Ambassador, Bashar al-Jafari , also appeared in February 2016 and stated that PYD would be supported. When fighting broke out in April 2016 between the PYD / YPG and the pro-government NDF militias in Qamishli, with dozens of deaths because both sides had competed for recruits, an agreement was finally reached that observers interpreted as a trade. Nonetheless, there was also fighting between the YPG and government troops, for example in January 2013 and January 2015 in al-Hasakah .
Withdrawal of government forces and takeover of the Kurdish cantons of Rojavas
When the Syrian government surprisingly withdrew its troops from almost all parts of Rojava - i.e. the cantons of Afrin, Kobanê and Jazira - and thus from a large part of the territory on the Turkish border in June or July 2012, the PYD was able to take advantage of the favorable situation to take power in the three Kurdish enclaves, to set up an administration, to take over military control, to proclaim regional autonomy and to announce the holding of elections. The formation of a second Kurdish de facto state began in northern Syria, similar to what had already happened in northern Iraq. Since the start of the uprising against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in March 2011, the Kurds in Syria had tried as far as possible to keep the fighting out of the areas under their control by creating conflicts with both the Syrian government and opposition groups avoided. The fact that the areas ruled by the PYD in northern Syria were among the safest in the civil war country is attributed to the YPG and seen as the reason why over 40 Kurdish groups joined the autonomous transitional government. In part, the security in the Kurdish-settled region was a consequence of Assad's policy, who let the PYD do things freely, so that the Kurds were able to maintain their own checkpoints, schools and health stations with the PYD before the declaration of autonomy and stabilize their areas during the civil war. The policy of neutrality saved the Kurdish-settled region from being destroyed by the war for a long time. The Syrian government air force did not launch any air strikes on Rojava.
The Syrian Kurds integrated representatives of various ethnic and religious groups, including Assyrians , Armenians , Yazidis and Alawis, into the transitional government of the Kurdish-controlled region established in 2014 . Shortly after the Kurds declared their autonomy in Rojava, jihadist troops - ISIS and al-Nusra mainly counted al-Qaeda troops as opponents of the Kurds - advanced into Kurdish territory, which opened up another front in the Syrian civil war. According to the media, the newly formed northern Syrian state was also viewed as a “competing experiment” ( Die Zeit ) by northern Iraqi Kurdistan and was not supported by it.
Conflicts with jihadists escalate
The de facto end to the Kurds' tactics of not taking the side of the Syrian regime or the side of the rebels, which had enabled them to consolidate their power in various cities in northern Syria, came through the escalating fighting in the summer of 2013 the jihadists . According to the media, initially supported by Turkey, which was concerned about a second Kurdish state on its border, jihadists from al-Qaeda- affiliated militias such as - primarily - the al-Nusra Front and ISIS attacked the Kurds, who are considered relatively secular viewed them as "infidels" and "communists". The jihadists included many foreigners who wanted to establish an Islamic state of God in Syria. During this time, more than a thousand experienced PKK fighters came to Rojava to support the Kurdish people in order to help organize the fighting. According to the YPG spokesman Rêdûr Xelîl, the YPG soon had around 45,000 fighters, a third of whom are said to have been women. These approximately 45,000 YPG soldiers now also fought against the Arab “rebel” groups who attacked the region controlled by the YPG on various fronts. The month-long struggle between the Kurds and jihadist rebel groups in 2013 and 2014 was one of the toughest battles among the various regional ethnic conflicts that developed more and more from the Syrian civil war. According to Wladimir van Wilgenburg of the Washington- based Jamestown Foundation , much of the overarching importance of the struggle between ISIS and the Kurds lay in the control of oil wells in northwest and east Syria. According to him, the Kurds controlled around 60% of Syrian oil. The lucrative sale of the oil enabled every group that had control of the oil wells to purchase weapons and secure and support the local tribes. If ISIS had come into possession of more oil wells, the resulting funds would have helped them in their fight against the rest of the rebel militias.
First alliances with predominantly Arab rebels against IS
In 2013/2014 the YPG concluded alliances with rebels of the Quwat as-Sanadid of the Arab Shammar tribe and the Assyrian Military Council .
Another change in a whole series of alternating arms brotherhoods, the YPG / YPJ, the US-backed FSA and several other Syrian opposition groups such as the Islamic Front (IF) and the Islamist Liwa al-Tawhid voted in a ceremony on September 10, 2014 united armed forces under the coalition name Burkan al-Forat ("Volcano of the Euphrates ") in order to fight together against IS. For the first time in Syria, Arab militias allied with Kurdish ones, which - unlike the Alawites in Syria or Yazidis in Iraq, for example - were Sunnis like the IS fighters. Previously, Syria's rebel groups and the Kurdish militias had been “very skeptical” (according to Der Spiegel ) for years . The aim of the forces united in this way was stated to be the conquest of the areas in the Euphrates region that were under the control of IS at that time. The overthrow of the Syrian government of President Bashar al-Assad, which the FSA was striving for, was not one of the declared aims of the fighting front. Their agreement stated that all partners were obliged to support the common front financially and materially. The media cited as a possible effect of this alliance that the announced arms deliveries by the USA to moderate rebels would also benefit the YPG in this way. The YPG spokesman Polat Can emphasized the fight against al-Qaida jihadists as the reason for the expansion of the YPG's military activities: “It is about the fight against al-Qaida as a whole - for this we will ally with the Free Syrian Army if necessary , for that we will move to Damascus if necessary. "YPG spokesman Rêdûr Xelîl told western media:" Today it is IS, before it was Jabhat al-Nusra, Ahrar al-Sham and also brigades of the supposedly moderate Free Syrian Army (FSA) who wanted to conquer our country ”. “We no longer make big distinctions. Whoever attacks us is our enemy, and that's that. We're just defending ourselves, ”said Xelîl. The YPG were the first to fight the “terrorists”, ultimately on behalf of the whole world, but nobody was grateful for that.
In June 2015, the YPG and FSA jointly recaptured Tall Abyad from IS.
The Syrian Democratic Forces (DKS)
prehistory
The U.S. Department of Defense announced on October 9, 2015, the end of its training and equipment program for the FSA in Syria, which was launched in December 2014 to train 5,400 fighters in 2015 with a budget of $ 500 million, according to reports of the US Central Command of September 16, 2015 was only able to provide “four or five” trained fighters for the “fight in Syria”. In July 2015, some fighters from Division 30 in Aleppo Province were captured as one of the FSA groups by the IS rival Nusra Front, despite US air support, while other FSA groups did not intervene in the fight. Division 30 was created to improve the recruitment and training of fighters by the US outside Syria for the fight against IS. With the FSA, the US leadership wanted to create a reliable military force in Syria in the fight against IS and, according to its own statements, expected in vain that the Nusra Front would welcome the FSA in the fight against IS. Finally, Arab-Kurdish cooperation such as the one with the Quwat as-Sanadid and with FSA brigades in the Burkan al-Forat from 2014 led to the creation of the “Syrian Democratic Forces” (DKS) in 2015.
Foundation of the DKS
After the end of the training and equipment program for the FSA, the US leadership was desperately looking for Arab allies in the fight against IS, so only two days later, on October 11, 2015, urged the YPG to set up and throw an "Arab" association a few hours later, 50 tons of weapons or ammunition. According to official US information, the Sunni-Arab forces, now supported by the YPG and the USA under the name "Syrian Democratic Forces" (DKS), received the material. In October 2015, the Syrian Democratic Forces (DKS), a coalition of Arabs, became Militias around the FSA and Kurdish militias around the YPG founded. According to the announcement of the YPG, the DKS as the new Kurdish-Arab-Christian military force comprised, among others, the YPG, Quwat as-Sanadid, the Kurdish-Arab Burkān al-Furāt , which ostensibly included Jabhat Thūwwār ar-Raqqah, and the Christian Assyrian Military Council , but contained the List also as obscure or completely unknown groups.
Armament of the DKS by the USA
In order to create a rhetorical, and in some cases actual, distinction between the Arabs receiving US arms and ammunition and the Kurds who make up the majority within the DKS, whose arming Turkey was feared, the US military introduced the DKS the name Syrian-Arab Coalition (SAC). Out of consideration for its NATO partner Turkey, the US Department of Defense initially insisted on armed only non-Kurdish SDF members - namely the group named SAC, which is practically unused in Syria. According to some Arab DKS groups, the material ended up in the hands of the YPG instead. The question of whether the ammunition ended up in the hands of Arab or Kurdish YPG militias was a delicate matter, as Turkey, as a NATO ally, had protested against US arms shipments to the YPG and the PKK and YPG as “equally dangerous to humanity “Considered. The US Department of Defense announced on October 12, 2015 that the first air drop of ammunition or weapons "supported Arab groups" and noted that the US shared "the concerns of its Turkish partners about the sensitivity of expanding Kurdish control in traditionally non-Kurdish areas of Syria ". On the same day, Polat Can, as the YPG's liaison officer for the US coalition in the fight against ISIS, said that the YPG had received the air delivery. Later in October 2015, 50 US Special Forces operators arrived in the PYD-controlled area to train and equip the DKS troops.
Troop strength of the DKS
The USA estimated the DKS strength (without YPG) at the end of 2015 at around 5,000 fighters. The special envoy for the international alliance against the Islamic State , Brett McGurk , stated in 2016 that 60% of the cross-armed forces YPG-DCS fighters in the capture of Ash-Shaddadis were Kurds and 40% were Arabs. The YPG spokesman stated in August 2015 that around 15% of the group's total armed forces were Arabs, while the YPG's general commander, Sipan Hemo, claimed in October 2015 that Arabs had so far made up 30% of the YPG.
Controlled areas and their control structures
areas of Syria
During the Syrian civil war in northern Syria, the Kurdish militias succeeded in largely driving the associations of the government of Bashar al-Assad from the Kurdish-inhabited areas on the border with Turkey, securing them militarily and exercising military control - including over Arabs and Christians , Yazidis , Circassians and other ethnic- religious groups who lived in this region - to take over. After the government troops had largely left the region, the Kurds, as the most important ethnic minority in Syria, were able to create a semi-autonomous territory in Syria during the first three years of the civil war. Compared to Iraq, however, the Kurds in Syria were fewer in number and still did not control large contiguous areas, but shared many cities with Syrian Arabs and other population groups.
Since around 2012, the PYD, which is considered to be socialist, had gained power over the region called Rojava by the Kurds , a settlement area of around 2.5 million Kurds in Syria. The YPG was given control of Ain al-Arab by the Syrian regime in July 2012, making it the first city under full control of the YPG and thus the Kurds. In other places like Kamishli and Hasakah, the YPG now ruled jointly with the Syrian regime. The Kurds set up three civilian local administrations in the territories they controlled: for the cantons of Afrin, Ain al-Arab (Kurdish: Kobanê) and Jazira. The YPG succeeded in driving several rebel groups from cities in the region and taking territories along the Turkish-Iraqi border. The PYD had the heavily armed YPG secure all roads between Kurdish areas and the regions held by the Syrian regime and the FSA. In contrast to other militias in the Syrian civil war, the Kurdish units managed to impose effective blackouts on the media active in Rojava before and during major offensives.
After the YPG's first military successes, PYD chairman Salih Muslim announced that the Kurdish-controlled parts of the country would be placed under self-administration and a constitution drawn up. In the oil-rich Hasakah province in the north-east of the country in particular, steps to achieve this goal had long been in place. Kurdish flags waved over many buildings, there were Kurdish license plates and newly formed Kurdish police units. The Kurdish language, the use of which was banned under the Syrian regime, was first taught in schools, initially in Ain al-Arab. On November 12, 2013, ethnic Kurds declared an interim administration in the predominantly Kurdish north-east of Syria, after control of the region had been switched back and forth between them and primarily Arab Islamist rebels, who strictly rejected the Kurds' presumed intention to separate, in the previous months would have. A committee of Kurdish and other groups said it was committed to the unity of Syria, but "in view of the current circumstances and in order to fill the administrative vacuum" it was time to set up an administration to set up a "transitional, pluralistic and democratic administration of the Region ”. Since January 2014, there has been a self-declared Kurdish provincial government in the three areas in northern Syria, which ensured relative security there. In the largely self-governing Syrian Kurdish regions, PYD local councils have been set up, which, according to the media, are said to have 40% women. The leaders of the PYD, as the largest and best organized of 17 larger Kurdish political factions, were encouraged to declare self-government in the north-eastern Rojava region due to the military successes against jihadist groups in autumn and winter 2013/2014.
As the leader of the PYD, Salih Muslim had assured both the "Syrian opposition" and Turkey in 2013 that the areas under de facto autonomy would only be temporarily under the control of the PYD until the uprising had achieved its goals. and that the PYD does not intend to establish an independent Kurdistan in Syria.
The most influential positions within the Asayesh security forces , who control the Rojava areas and the “democratic self-government” that governs them, were held by cadres trained by the PKK who play a central role in the rule over these areas. Contrary to the rhetoric they use, their governance essentially involves a one-party rule built on a social contract that relies on them being militarily successful, ensuring security in the territories, and providing a minimum of services necessary to Maintaining everyday needs is necessary. While self-government has created a number of multi-layered local bodies that are theoretically intended to promote broad participation in governance, in practice they lack significant authority or political influence.
Military characteristics of the YPG
According to the International Crisis Group (ICG), the fighters of the YPG / YPJ receive three-month training in one of nine training camps and receive a monthly salary of around 120 euros. The respective "defense ministers" are in charge of the three Kurdish cantons of Afrin, Kobane and Cizere. The YPG say they have mostly light weapons, but it is believed that they also have some tanks and artillery that they captured from the Syrian army and other groups.
Combat style and equipment
The YPG have been described as an “archetypal guerrilla army” whose speed, concealment, and surprise combat enabled them to deploy their units quickly on the fronts and quickly concentrate their forces before shifting the thrust of their attacks to the enemy to bypass and ambush. The autonomy of the individual units was seen as a key feature of this mode of combat. Although the YPG brigades operated under an overarching tactical requirement, a high degree of freedom was thus impressed on them, whereby they adapted to the changing battlefield. Similar to the IS troops , the YPG were strengthened by the Syrian conflict and adapted their fighting techniques to the area in which they were operating. The YPG relied heavily on the use of snipers covered by mobile support weapons (mainly heavy 12.7 mm Russian -made machine guns ) to fill the battlefield with fire and suppress enemy fire. In addition, the YPG used explosive devices on roadsides to make enemy movements more difficult and - especially at night - to prevent evasive maneuvers.
The Syrian Kurdish area of operations was seen as an isolated operational area in which the YPG faced jihadists such as IS in the south and a hostile Turkey in the north, while the Iraqi Kurdish regional government (KRG) in the east could not be clearly classified as an ally or opponent. This constellation resulted in poor equipment in the YPG units. According to media reports, the units in "Syrian Kurdistan", similar to PKK units and in contrast to the Peshmerga in Iraq, initially neither used armored vests nor combat helmets ; The YPG initially bought weapons and ammunition on the black market .
For example, according to a former German YPG fighter, individual members of the northern Iraqi Peshmerga illegally sold certain German weapons supplies ( MILAN weapons system, etc.), with which the Peshmerga were actually to be armed and trained on behalf of the German government, illegally to the YPG or to the sister organization PKK.
The Rojava region needed the services of smugglers to import machinery and spare parts, medicines and other essential supplies. Media reported on social media such as Twitter published photos of improvised “armored” vehicles that were upgraded from outdated tractors and trucks with metal plates as technicals to make them bulletproof. These self-made "tanks" are said to have been used successfully by the YPG in the fight against IS, especially in Ain al-Arab .
Despite the deficiencies in the equipment, the Kurdish militia YPG was characterized as "the least known, but largest, most disciplined and most powerful armed force among the rebel troops in the Syrian civil war" (Frank Nordhausen / FR) at the end of February 2014.
By August 2017 at the latest, YPG owned ATGM weapons systems. According to Shervan Derwish of the Manbij Military Council , they bought these themselves. For its part, the US confirmed in August 2017 that it had delivered the YPG Guardian troop transports and upgraded Humvees .
Military presence and troop strength
After large parts of the Syrian military had withdrawn from the Kurdish areas in favor of a mobilization against the FSA, the YPG were able to massively expand their military sphere of influence and the number of their fighters in July 2012. The YPG refused to allow the Free Syrian Army to be present in the Kurdish-dominated areas in 2012 with reference to its autonomous military administration. The ICG estimated the number of YPG fighters in 2014 at 25,000 to 30,000 based on the amount of monthly pay.
According to the YPG, the YPG in 2012 consisted of several brigades in the Kurdish areas of Afrin , Ain al-Arab and parts of the al-Hasakah governorate and had up to 45,000 fighters.
The YPG began training the Christian Aramaic-Assyrian militia Sutoro and the Arab brigade Ahrar al-Watan in the northeastern province of al-Hasakah in mid-2013 . The Sutoro has since fought with the YPG on the front lines. On January 9, 2014, the Assyrian Military Council, also Aramaic-Assyrian , announced that it had joined the YPG's offensive against Islamists in northeast Syria.
After the KRG Peshmerga in Iraq withdrew from the Sinjar Mountains on the border with Syria in 2014 and left the population to IS, the YPG also became active in Iraq and founded a Yazidi branch of its group.
In 2017, YPG spokesman Redur Xelil stated that the group had around 60,000 fighters.
losses
According to the YPG, the Syrian Kurds are said to have had 400 fallen " martyrs " to complain by January 2014 . At this time, the YPG spokesman Rêdûr Xelîl raised the accusation, which was also confirmed by other YPG commanders on various fronts, that the Islamist al-Nusra militia was using the Islamist al-Nusra militia in Germany in the Syrian civil war against the then German Bundestag member and Deputy Head of the Left , Jan van Aken built anti-tank missile MILAN against the Kurds.
According to the activist organization SOHR, 163 YPG fighters have been killed in the first three weeks of the fighting since the start of the IS militia offensive against the city of Ain al-Arab in September 2014, compared to 219 on the part of IS fighters. 400 people died, including civilians. According to its own information, the SOHR only referred to confirmed cases, but assumed a far higher number of fatalities and emphasized the difficulty of documenting deaths in the middle of the fighting. The information designated as confirmed by SOHR was also not independently verifiable due to the situation in the region. On October 9, 2014, activists said that around 500 people had died in the fighting that had been going on since mid-September. On October 13, the SOHR stated that around 550 people had been killed since the beginning of the fighting over Ain al-Arab.
An interim assessment of a study by the Atlantic Council showed that over 49 percent of the YPG losses reported by the YPG themselves between January 2013 and January 2016 were ethnic Kurds from Turkey, which confirms the interdependence of the international groups associated with the PKK. In the three years examined, the YPG's “martyrs” ads included 359 Turkish, 323 Syrian, 32 Iranian, seven Iraqi, two Australian , two Azerbaijani , one British , one German , one Greek and one US citizen. Although these data reported by the YPG itself were not compared with the information provided by the PYD and were therefore not methodologically confirmed, they reflect the YPG's well-known offensives, including the clashes with the Nusra Front in 2014 over Raʾs al-ʿAin , the fight for Kobane in September 2014 and the offensive led by the YPG in 2015 to the Euphrates and to the city of Ain Issa, which is near the de facto IS capital Raqqa . According to these data, between 2013 and 2016 around 39 percent of the total losses of the YPG and over 44 percent of the Turkish Kurds killed by the YPG fell during the battle for Kobane.
Women's fighting associations
The women in the Kurdish combat units as well as the YPG in Syria and the Peshmerga in neighboring Iraq are considered to be a prominent feature in the often male-dominated struggles in the region.
Women have fought among the Peshmerga since 1996. According to media reports, their unit is said to include around 100 women fighters and was founded to overthrow Saddam Hussein's government. The participation of women in the fighting organizations of the PKK had been promoted by Abdullah Öcalan , who had passed a “law” that forbade both sexual intercourse and love between the fighters. Only this regulation made it possible for the families in the conservative-religious Kurdish society to let their daughters go to war as fighters without fear of social or religious dishonor . Since then, the PKK in Turkey has campaigned for women to be seen and used as fighters with equal rights.
YPJ as women's fighting associations of the YPG
The proportion of women among the YPG fighters is given as around a third. According to other information, around 40% of YPG members are women. The women had their own "Women's Defense Units" (YPJ). Media reports from March 2015 put the number of women fighting on the side of the YPG in Syria at around 7,000 women.
The YPJ fighters received four weeks of military training, during which they learned how to handle heavy machine guns, tank grenade launchers and the Soviet-Russian AK-47 (“Kalashnikov”) assault rifle . After the military training of the YPG fighters, the PYD itself carried out a 20-day political training course for the fighters, in which the Kurdish language and history of the party, anti-imperialism , equal rights for women, the connection between people and their country, autonomous self-government and other components of the ideology Öcalans and the party, which dealt with a federal Middle East and the unification of the Kurdish settlement areas spread over four countries.
According to YPG spokesman Rêdûr Xelîl, the majority of YPJ fighters are not married, but there are also said to be mothers fighting at the front. According to media reports, the age of the YPJ fighters can be less than 18 years. 15-year-old YPJ fighters in northern Syria were also reported.
Media reception
In connection with fighting against militant groups associated with al-Qaeda such as the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) and al-Nusra Front (JN), but also the Free Syrian Army to gain control of the oil-producing province of al-Hasakah im Northeast Syria and in connection with the fight against jihadist extremists in the Iraq crisis of 2014, various western media reported on the women's associations of the PKK, the paramilitary YPG (for women: YPJ) and the official army of the Iraqi Kurds, the Peshmerga. Video documentaries also reported that the YPG also used female commanders in the fight against ISIS, who commanded both male and female fighters. After pictures of Kurdish women fighters found their way around the world, it was highlighted as a special "contrast to the radical ideology of IS" that the Kurdish YPG were allegedly led by a woman in the fight for Ain Al-Arab. In the western media reports there was repeated reports of a woman as the military supreme commander of Ain al-Arab, although she was only responsible for the YPJ while a male commander commanded the male YPG fighters.
According to the information provided by journalist Frank Nordhausen at the end of February 2014, “many young women” volunteered because they can protect themselves from being married off against their will ”. In other western media reports, the motive for the participation of women in the combat units was given that they wanted to fight "to defend their right to equality". Also, contrary to the actual occurrences within the jihadists, it was said that the “Kurdish 'Amazons'” could effectively “hunt” jihadists because they believed that “whoever dies by a woman's hand” does not get into “paradise”. According to the media, women soldiers reported that ISIS members ran away when they saw a fighter. In connection with the fight by Kurdish units against IS militias in northern Syria, the media also spoke of “Kurdish elite soldiers” who were considered “courageous and merciless”.
In the course of the fighting over Ain al-Arab in autumn 2014, in particular, there were reports of the fate of individual fighters. It was often referred to as the “courage of Kurdish women fighters”. Her pictures spread massively and quickly on the internet. Reports of young Kurdish women who sacrificed their lives in the fight against IS increased in social networks. The Kurds, who opposed IS in Syria, used the Twitter platform in particular to worship fighters, which in part could be viewed as a homage, but also as an attempt to mobilize new military forces. Above all, women were placed at the center of this form of the “martyr cult” (Issio Ehrich / n-tv). One of the popular pictures showed a mother armed with a rifle, who is said to have holed up with her child, who was still underage and also armed with a rifle, in order to defend her house.
Foreign Volunteers and Lions of Rojava Unit
Foreign volunteers in the region
In March 2015, activist Rami Abdulrahman, head of the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights , stated that a total of 100 volunteer fighters from Western countries were fighting as part of the 30,000-strong Kurdish forces in Syria and that Americans, French, Spanish, Include Dutch and other nationalities.
The number of foreign fighters who fought alongside the Kurds, however, was small compared to the foreign recruits of the jihadists of IS and other groups. Thousands of foreigners (according to estimates by US authorities: 20,000) fought on the side of IS, especially from other Arab countries, but also from Europe and overseas.
Foreign volunteers on the side of the YPG and media representation
In 2014, the PYD / YPG received support from the US-led anti-IS coalition after the YPG held the northern Syrian city with air support from the anti-IS coalition against IS in the iconic battle for Kobanê . As a result, the anti-IS coalition continued to provide air support, financial resources , weapons and intelligence information in order to drive IS itself out of predominantly Arab-populated areas, thus enabling the de facto small state of the YPG to expand rapidly. Since 2014 there has been an influx of people from regions outside the Kurdish areas who wanted to join the YPG in Syria. The attitude described as largely pro-Western and the fact that women with the YPG also fought against IS, earned them sympathy from Western governments and populations. By 2015, the group had been joined by several hundred volunteers from the US and Europe. European and some US decision-makers increasingly called for the PKK to be removed from the list of terrorist organizations and to be supplied with weapons directly by the USA. In February 2015, two YPJ fighters were invited to a meeting with French President François Hollande at the Elysée Palace in Paris - the group's first meeting with a leader of a NATO country.
Between 2014 and 2017, several hundred foreign fighters from western countries joined the YPG, many of whom, however, had returned to their country of origin. An estimated number of around 500 Western volunteers has been named. A study published by the Henry Jackson Society in 2017 does not allow comprehensive conclusions to be drawn about the composition of the YPG's foreign fighters , but it does derive certain trends from its data sample. According to this, people from the Anglosphere played the most visible role among the foreign fighters within the YPG and possibly represent the largest group. Most fighters are young. Over 60% of the foreign YPG volunteers are under 30 years of age, 80% under 40 years. There is no recognizable pattern in the employment category of foreign YPG fighters, with the exception of membership in the military and student body. The foreign YPG fighters are predominantly male. Hardly any of them have an ethnic Kurdish background. Very few of them showed previous connections with the PKK or with any form of militancy.
In October 2014, YPG spokesman Rêdûr Xelîl stated that no foreign fighters were actively recruited. According to the media, the volunteers who arrived were not paid with regular wages and were given uniforms, room and board. As the first Americans to join the YPG, Jordan Matson and Brian Wilson were known by name at that time. BBC News cited the small number of US fighters for YPG a "symbolic counterpoint" to hundreds of foreign jihadists who are fighting the IS joined. According to media reports from February 2014, Western fighters in Sinjar reported efforts to recruit as many foreigners as possible for the YPG, especially those with military training.
While the rebels who fought against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad were mostly jihadist and complicated the US plan to set up and equip oppositional armed forces against Assad, dozens of foreign fighters traveled to the Kurdish-dominated enclave of Rojava to fight the YPG as they established themselves as key partners in the US-led alliance against IS in Syria. These YPG volunteer foreign fighters often had a military background. Many were recruited through Facebook. Some had funded their airfare through crowdfunding websites.
The YPG's Lions of Rojava unit included many foreign volunteers, for example from the United States and the United Kingdom. According to media reports from August 2015, around 150 volunteers from abroad are said to have belonged to the Rojava Lions contingent at that time . According to the media, smiling, handsome and heavily armed Kurdish commanders and fighters could often be seen on the Facebook page. Matson himself, who joined the YPG in September 2014, achieved particularly high media prominence as a foreign YPG recruit. He has given numerous interviews to major media outlets since reports of a minor injury allegedly sustained while fighting ISIS. Conservative media such as Fox News with Sean Hannity and Greta Van Susteren reported on him, ABC described him as an "anti-jihadist" on a "one-man crusade" against ISIS, and in interviews with Matson the YPG banner was in the background shown. Among the three Australians who fought alongside the YPG was former president of the Australian Labor Party of the Northern Territory , Matthew Gardiner. Some Western YPG volunteers were reported in the media that they had come to Syria from Turkey and joined a Kurdish offensive in Iraq in January 2015.
According to a 2014 Kurdish source, a Canadian-born Israeli immigrant was said to have been the first female foreign fighter to join the Syrian Kurdish struggle.
While the foreign fighters allegedly fighting against ISIS were portrayed as "icons of the ISIS war" according to media reports, there were reports of former fighters of the Lions of Rojava who had joined the YPG from abroad, according to which the foreign fighters only in Presence of the media dressed up as fighters for propaganda purposes and presented in good accommodations, but in fact never been used in real combat operations against IS.
British actor Michael Enright , who had played minor roles in Hollywood film productions, publicly declared that he was ready to die on the Kurds' side in the fight against IS and subsequently appeared in videos published by the YPG. For example, Enright declared in a video published on July 14, 2015 by the US foreign broadcaster Voice of America , which allegedly shows him - armed and dressed in riot gear - as a YPG volunteer at the front of al-Hasakah that the YPG would defeat the Syrian regime bombed by IS until the Syrian regime lost the fight against IS, and then “go in and do the rest of the work”. Enright appeared at the YPG under the name Mustafa Michael Ali and said he accepted the name after familiarizing himself with Islam. Jordan Matson had already described Enright as "mentally unstable" in June 2015 according to media reports and accused him of selling his fictional story to the media. In Rojava, Enright is in danger of being killed on his own side because many Western and Kurdish people would like him to be dead.
Fatalities known to be among the foreign volunteers on the part of the YPG
By 2017, according to a report by the Henry Jackson Society , several hundred YPG 29 foreign fighters had been killed by then. According to their nationality , 10 of the YPG foreign fighters killed came from the USA, 4 each from Great Britain and Germany, 3 from Australia, 2 from Canada and one each from Iran, Portugal , Russia, Slovenia and Sweden .
The 28-year-old Australian Ashley Johnston from Maryborough was considered the first YPG fighters to die in the West from the West . The former army reservist Johnston is said to have joined the Kurdish militia on January 4, 2014 and killed on February 23, 2015 during an attack by Kurdish forces on an IS position in Gassan near Til Hemis near the Turkish border that began on February 21 have been. Fighting with non-governmental groups in Syria was banned by Australian law in 2014, which is why Johnston in Australia threatened 10 to 20 years imprisonment for his combat mission. Anti-terrorism authorities suspected that Johnston had been recruited for the YPG via Facebook using methods similar to those used by IS. On June 27, 2015, 23-year-old Gold Coast Australian Reece Harding died when his vehicle hit an anti-tank mine while on patrol .
Shortly after Johnston's death, the death of 25-year-old British Konstandinos Erik Scurfield out was Barnsley known a former Royal Marines - Marines , according to media reports as a fighter of the YPG in the Lions-of-Rojava unit near the town of Qamishli on the Turkish border was killed on March 2, 2015 (according to other sources, according to PYD, he was killed in Al-Hol in the Hasakah province near the Syrian-Iraqi border) and was considered the first British man to be killed in the fight against ISIS.
According to the taz in March 2015, the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution spoke of a "double-digit number" of people from Germany who fought in the ranks of the YPG, the PKK or their allies. According to media reports, among other things, members of the Turkish Marxist-Leninist Communist Party (MLKP) fought in Syria under the high command of the YPG. The MLKP had therefore sent volunteers to Rojava since the beginning of the war against IS to strengthen the YPG / YPJ, according to Suphi Nejat Ağırnaslı , who was allegedly killed on October 6, 2014 in the fighting around Kobane, who was then 30 and from Duisburg who is said to have gone to Istanbul to study a few years earlier. The, according to media information, died after several months on the front near Valley Tamr near the town of Al Hassaka on 7 March 2015 the second native of Germany person on the part of YPG 19-year-old Ivana Hoffmann should in Duisburg in the group Young Struggle active who had a reputation for being close to the MLCP. In Turkey, she is said to have become a member of the MLCP and, according to the Kurdish representative Nasir Haj Mansour, joined the YPJ, also in order to defend the "women's revolution in Rojava" , according to her group Young Struggle . According to the media, Ivana Hoffmann was the first German to be killed in the YPG count, although people from Germany who had joined the guerrilla many years earlier also fought in the ranks of the PKK.
The first American believed to have died on the side of the YPG in the fight against IS was 36-year-old Keith Broomfield, who, according to the YPG, was killed on June 3, 2015.
According to the YPG, the 21-year-old Kevin Jochim from Karlsruhe died in the fight against IS on July 6, 2015. On February 22, 2016, the former Bundeswehr member and Foreign Legionnaire Günter Hellstern was killed near Ash-Schaddadi in the fight against IS .
The US civilian Levi Jonathan Shirley, fighting on the side of the YPG, died on July 14 in fighting in Manbij . On July 21, the British Dean Carl Evans died in the Battle of Manbij . The Slovenian Martin Gruden was killed by Kurdish sources on July 27, 2016 also in manbij.
The American Michael Israel and the German Anton Leschek were killed in an attack by the Turkish Air Force on November 24, 2016 near the village of Arima, northeast of al-Bab . The Briton Ryan Lock and the Canadian Nazzareno Antonio Tassone were killed in an IS attack on December 21, 2016 as they marched on Raqqa. On January 26, 2017, the American Albert Avery Harrington died in a bomb explosion in Suwaydiya-Saghirah , Raqqa . The Briton Luke Rutter and the Americans Robert Grodt and Nicholas Warden were killed on or about July 5th in the Battle of ar-Raqqa . The British Mehmet Aksoy died on September 26, 2017 in an IS attack on his unit in ar-Raqqa. Another Briton, Jac Holmes, was killed in an explosion in late October 2017 when ISIS withdrew from Raqqa while clearing booby traps there.
Motives of the YPG foreign fighters
The military veterans therefore formed an important category for themselves. In 2014 they clearly made up the majority of the recruits, but their number has decreased annually since the YPG changed its contact strategy and focused more on the politically far-left clientele. The former militaries overlapped with other categories in that they were motivated, for example, by humanitarian concerns. Other motivating factors, however, only occurred with these former soldiers, some of whom missed the soldier's life, camaraderie and the combat situation. Some also had difficulty integrating into civilian life. Other former soldiers who served in the wars following the September 11, 2001 attacks , particularly Iraq, felt it was their responsibility to “get the job done” or did not want the victims to be in vain. Others, on the other hand, who had already retired before the attacks of September 11, 2001, felt guilty for having missed the military operation against Islamist terrorism and saw in the YPG an opportunity to make up for this "obligation" that had not been fulfilled.
According to the study published in 2017, another category of foreign YPG volunteers appeared in the first chaotic recruitment wave, before the YPG had set up a systematic accession procedure and selected most of those belonging to this category from the ranks of the YPG. The motives of these volunteers were self-serving considerations, especially greed and esteem, sometimes in direct material terms, sometimes also in terms of reputation or fame, through which financial benefits were expected over time. The Henry Jackson Society report also included people in this category who acted out of the need to pacify an impulse to kill.
According to the study by the Henry Jackson Society, foreign YPG volunteers can be grouped into another category for whom a thirst for adventure or self-fulfillment with a focus on life support are important motivating factors. They included a number of petty criminals and drug addicts who had joined the YPG to find a way out of their pattern of life.
A final category among foreign YPG volunteers is, according to the study, ideologically motivated. Among them are communist, anarchist and other left-wing extremist militants who believed they were creating a revolutionary society in Syria. Some of the volunteers in this category, according to their Henry Jackson Society profiles, acted with full awareness that the YPG is part of the PKK. This was particularly true of those on the left from Turkey who had been allies of the PKK uprising within Turkey for many years, as well as for Greeks and other southern Europeans who come from politically left-wing terrorist groups and who find refuge in the areas controlled by the YPG or " Experience ”wanted to gain. While some Western YPG volunteers would welcome the YPG's connection to the PKK, many others are not clear about this connection.
British intelligence officials told the media there were concerns that some YPG volunteers may experience traumatic mental health problems upon their return and that their militant drives may be exploited by other ideological groups. The expert Wladimir van Wilgenburg wrote in November 2017 that many foreign YPG volunteers from the USA and Europe who had come to Syria to join the fight against IS were at risk of being stigmatized as terrorists and being arrested and Facing law enforcement.
The Henry Jackson Society report published in 2017 created profiles for 60 YPG foreign fighters in Syria from 12 countries, including all 29 foreign YPG fighters who had been killed up to this point. The report also analyzed the motives of these 60 YPG foreign volunteers. According to the study, their motives were diverse, different and overlapped in the people. The study divided these into four broader thematic categories.
YPG during the Syrian Civil War
First fights
The Syrian civil war broke out after uprisings in March 2011 and was initially characterized by an increasing loss of control by the central government in Damascus. Numerous soldiers from the government army deserted and joined the Free Syrian Army or other insurgent groups. The government began to reorganize its remaining troops and withdrew units from remote parts of the country to better protect important areas. Various insurgents and Kurdish units took control of the areas from which the army had withdrawn. The YPG tolerated the government troops or even cooperated if it was to their own advantage. But there were also armed clashes between the two parties. In al-Hasakah and Qamishli , a structure was even formed in which the YPG and government associations exist side by side.
Voices in Turkey were convinced that President Assad had deliberately left the area on the Turkish border to the Kurds in order to put pressure on Turkey and play off the rebel groups within Syria against each other.
In mid-2012, Kurdish groups had taken control of the three enclaves with a Kurdish majority and began to build a kind of grassroots direct administration based on the socialist PKK ideology. Smaller Kurdish groups, who were more attached to the Iraqi Kurds, were pushed aside by the PYD / YPG.
YPG units claimed retaliation after a single attack by government forces on Kurdish-held Sheikh Maksud area in Aleppo in September 2012, in which dozen civilians were killed; they killed some government soldiers and drove government officials from Kobanê.
In this process, the Kurdish PYD and the FSA clashed in the Aleppo area in October 2012. Kurdish fighters said that, contrary to an earlier agreement, the FSA fighters tried to armed into Kurdish-held areas. About two dozen people were killed.
In the same year, between July and November 2012, the YPG units fought advancing Salafist fighters from the Al-Nusra Front and against their allies, the ISIS group , around the border town of Ras al-Ayn , followed by fighting over Tall Abyad .
In November 2013, the PYD finally proclaimed self-government in northern Syria in the cantons of Efrin, Kobanê and Cizre - appropriate legislative assemblies were put together and the Syrian flag was replaced by Kurdish flags.
YPG in Iraq 2014
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In June 2014, the Iraqi metropolis of Mosul fell into the hands of religious extremists of IS. Its fighters now also threatened the Kurdish stronghold of Erbil . The armed units of the Iraqi Kurds, the Peshmerga , were no match for IS. In August 2014, the USA was forced to take action against ISIS in Iraq from the air and began Operation Inherent Resolve .
In August 2014, ISIS launched an attack on Sinjar near the Syrian border in Iraq and captured the city on August 3. The Peshmerga units of the Kurdish regional government had withdrawn when the IS fighters approached. Many of the Iraqi Christians and Yazidis who live there fled to the Sinjar Mountains or were massacred by IS.
According to press reports, it was the PKK that called for various Kurdish groups to work together in this situation. YPG fighters penetrated Iraq from the Syrian governorate of al-Hasakah and secured a provisional road to the Sinjar Mountains, while PKK fighters, who originally came from Turkey and had a base in Machmur , were against IS near Sinjar proceeded. Thousands of Yazidis escaped IS via the escape route. The YPG then also trained Yazidis and sent them back to Iraq as fighters.
Battle of Kobanê 2014
in support of the Kurds in Kobanê against IS
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In September 2014 IS organizations advanced on the city of Kobanê (Arabic: Ain al-Arab ) on the border between Syria and Turkey. The residents of numerous villages in the upstream Kurdish settlement area fled or were evacuated. PYD / YPG and some fighters from other groups tried to hold the city, but were inferior in numbers, weapons technology and supplies of supplies to ISIS, whose fighters also brought tanks and military vehicles made by the USA that they had previously captured from government troops in Iraq had.
On September 26, the position of the defenders became increasingly critical after IS fighters had conquered a strategically important ridge in front of the city. A day later, the US began air strikes on IS near Kobanê. The air strikes were flown in quick succession and by the beginning of November 2014 had already reached 150 sorties.
The US military announced on October 17 that it was exchanging information with the YPG and, on October 19, 2014, dropped 28 supplies of weapons, ammunition and medical supplies for the Kurdish fighters for the first time near Kobanê.
The Turkish government, on the other hand, had previously allowed Kurds to flee Kobanê across the border, but forbade them to return across the border as reinforcements. Under international pressure, Turkey later agreed to allow fighters access, but selected a small group of FSA fighters and later a small group of Iraqi Peshmerga who were allowed to travel through Turkey to Kobanê with their equipment.
At the end of October, around 50 FSA fighters and 150 Peshmerga reached Kobanê.
The battle ended with the breach of the IS siege ring in January 2015, and one last IS attack on the city was repulsed in June 2015.
With attacks from the air by fighter planes, the USA played a significant part in the victory of the YPG units over the advancing IS in this battle. Since the Battle of Kobanê, the US has also coordinated its air strikes in the al-Hasakah governorate and ar-Raqqa governorate with the PYD / YPG units.
The PYD / YPG gained considerable prestige through the battle among the Kurds, but also internationally. The representation of the defensive battle in the western media with the secular defenders, with women in combat units, against the brutal, intolerant Islamists, was marked by clear sympathy for the YPG. Turkey, for its part, lost its reputation due to its behavior during the crisis. For example, the Turkish government had tanks deployed on the border with Syria, a few hundred meters beyond the city limits of Kobanê, which remained inactive in the eyes of the world press while the YPG fought against IS in the streets. The battle and the behavior of Turkey also rekindled Kurdish nationalism in Turkey and immediately put an end to peace efforts between the PKK and the Turkish government. See Turkish offensive against the PKK since 2015 .
2015
With the help of US air support, the YPG succeeded in capturing 17,000 square kilometers of territory from IS by mid-September 2015, but the absence of a Kurdish population in other areas made further penetration difficult. The YPG were no longer confronted with small, IS-controlled villages in the provinces of Hasakah and Raqqa, but with densely populated cities like al-Haul and ash-Schaddadi . That is why the Syrian Democratic Forces (DKS) were founded in October 2015, an association of Kurdish and Arab militias.
In November 2015, the DKS / YPG coalition fought over the city of al-Haul in north-east Syria. In December they captured the Tischrin Dam on the Euphrates.
Expansion 2016
Towards the end of 2015, the Air Force of the Russian Federation , the refreshed units of the Syrian Army and the Shiite militias supporting them began to pave the way around Aleppo through the area of various rebel groups by bombing them. These government troops stopped their advance after liberating the previously besieged enclaves of az-Zahra and Nubl and did not move against the areas held by the YPG / DKS.
For their part, YPG / DKS fighters use this opportunity to march east from the region north of Aleppo around Afrin . The area was not only defended by Islamist fighters, as the YPG announced, but also by US-equipped FSA associations. Nevertheless, the Kurds captured several villages and on February 11, 2016 finally the Menagh military airfield , which was abandoned by the regime in 2013 and which a few dozen fighters from the Levant Front had defended, but which had recently been weakened by a Russian air attack.
The movement from Afrin to the east was seen by the Americans as part of a Kurdish offensive aimed at connecting the “cantons” of the desired Kurdish Rojava area with a land bridge through Arab settlement areas.
When YPG units of the Afrin Offensive approached the border town of Aʿzāz , which was held by other rebels, a short time later , Turkish troops intervened and began to bombard the YPG with artillery from Turkey at Menagh . The Turkish Prime Minister Davutoğlu then publicly announced that the YPG would have to stay away from Aʿzāz in the future.
The Manbidj offensive of the DKS began in May 2016 and aimed to expel IS from the city of the same name on the Euphrates .
The Turkish leadership had already warned in June 2015 against an expansion of the PYD / YPG area over the Euphrates to the west and, after the conquest of Manbij by the DKS, launched its own offensive from Turkey at the end of August 2016 to attack IS in order to occupy its territory, thus withdrawing it from the YPG's access and driving a wedge between the Kurdish cantons. However, the pro-Turkish groups did not get further south than al-Bab , where the IS resistance held them until February 2017, while Syrian government troops from the Aleppo area south of al-Bab had marched from west to east, and so had the Turkish forces Lock the bridgehead to the south. Skirmishes between pro-Turkish fighters, DKS / YPG units and Syrian government troops near Manbisch finally had to be ended by direct intervention by the USA and Russia by stationing their own troops in the al-Bab - Manbisch area as a deterrent.
Tabqa and ar-Raqqa 2017
With the pacification of the Manbisch region, YPG / DKS units were able to march further south to take action against the de facto IS capital ar-Raqqa on the Euphrates. Rojda Felat commanded the start of the offensive on ar-Raqqa . First they crossed the Euphrates in a surprise attack at the end of March in order to take Tabqa. In May, Tabqa and the Tabqa Dam were captured. The battle for ar-Raqqa began with reaching the city limits in May 2017. Ar-Raqqa was conquered by IS on October 17th.
However, tensions between YPG and Turkey with their allies within Syria continued in 2017. Sporadic fighting between groups close to Turkey and the YPG within Syria continues and resumed near the border, in the region south of Aʿzāz, in July. In July, a British holidaymaker was arrested in Turkey on charges of terrorism who had fought for the YPG in Syria.
Afrin 2018
On January 20, 2018, Turkey started an offensive against the YPG in Afrin. According to international law experts such as Anne Peters from the Max Planck Institute and Stefan Talmon from the Institute for International Law , it was an offensive that violated international law. According to Erdogan, the aim of the offensive was the expulsion of the Kurds from Afrin and the handover of Afrin to what he believed to be the rightful owners, the Arabs. The Turkish government previously said that it has nothing against the Kurds, only against the YPG. According to the British Independent , Turkey has hired former al-Qaida and ISIS fighters for the offensive . On March 18, 2018, Turkey and militias allied with them captured the city of Afrin. On the same day they destroyed the Kawa statue, which is important for Kurdish culture. The YPG withdrew to the Sheba plain. Depending on the information, between 137,000 and 200,000 people are said to have fled Afrin. Most of them reside in refugee camps in Shehba.
Northern Syria 2019
The Americans, initially allied with the Kurds, had encouraged the People's Defense Units to dismantle the defensive positions on the Turkish border and told them that this would prevent a Turkish invasion. When the American President Donald Trump finally announced his approval for the invasion to the Turkish President Erdoğan by telephone on October 6, 2019 and Trump's troops withdrew accordingly, the Kurds saw themselves deceived by the Americans.
Allegations of human rights violations against the YPG
The human rights organization KurdWatch regularly recorded human rights violations against opponents of the PYD in chronological order. These incidents indicate that not all Kurds are accepting the supremacy of the PYD. In June 2014, Human Rights Watch (HRW) identified massive human rights violations by the PYD. In this context, disproportionate prison terms, unfair trials and the use of child soldiers were mentioned in particular.
Persecution of political opponents
Even at the beginning of the Syrian civil war, there were reports of human rights violations committed by the PYD and the YPG. In 2013 it was reported that the YPG had killed three opposition Kurds during a demonstration in Amude . The persecution of Kurdish political opponents who accused the PYD of totalitarian autocracy was reported. For example, the Kurdish politician Dersem Omar was placed under arrest in 2013.
Child soldiers
HRW also mentioned the accusation made in a Focus article at the end of May 2015 that a 14-year-old girl was supposed to have been recruited from school by the YPJ in Qamishli . In response to a request from HRW on June 10, 2015 for a response to the allegations, the YPG responded on June 24 that the group recognized that it was facing "significant challenges" in ending the use of child soldiers due to the ongoing armed conflict. You acknowledge that there have been "some individual cases" in the past year. In mid-July 2015, HRW reported that the YPG, which on June 5, 2015 had signed a commitment to demobilize all fighters under the age of 18, had demobilized 149 children after one month, but continued to let child soldiers fight despite their promise. HRW Representative Fred Abrahams said the YPG should keep their promise to end child warfare. The fact that the Kurdish forces are fighting against groups that disregard martial law such as IS does not justify the abuses in their own armed forces.
In 2017, the UN documented 224 cases of child recruitment by the YPG and women's units. This increased the number fivefold compared to the previous year. Also in 2017, six cases of child abduction by the YPG were documented by the UN.
Evictions of civilians
After the YPG conquered the previously IS-ruled corridor between the Syrian Kurdish cantons of Cizîrê and Kobanê, in which more Arabs than Kurds live, reports of expulsions of Arabs and Turkmens became loud. While the Turkish and Arab media and blogs in particular had reported on it, Western newspapers and broadcasters barely took up the allegations on their part. The YPG denied the allegations and spoke against it of "offers" that had been made to civilians from the fighting areas in order to prevent IS from using them as living shields.
In October 2015, Amnesty International (AI) accused the US-supported YPG war crimes in the form of displacement or forced resettlement of the civilian population and the destruction of their villages and spoke of a real wave of expulsions of thousands, primarily non-Kurdish (especially Turkmen and Arab) residents after the YPG took their villages. In particular, what happened in Hassaka Province, where Kurds and Christians as well as Sunni Arabs lived. The expulsion was viewed by AI as a “targeted and coordinated campaign for collective punishment” by the YPG against villages in which the YPG perceived residents to have sympathized with IS or other non-state armed groups (such as the FSA). AI accused the Kurdish-led administration of abusing their power and disregarding international law in a way that equated to war crimes. In their allegations, AI relied on satellite images and eyewitness reports from dozens of residents in Hasakah and Raqqa provinces that the YPG threatened to request air strikes by the US-led alliance.
The allegations were made even more explosive because they were made at a time when the YPG was upgraded by the USA to become the USA's most important ally against IS “in view of the massive Russian interference in Syria” (Martin Durm / SWR), after the western one States had previously hesitated to officially ally themselves with the YPG as the "extended arm of the Kurdish PKK in northern Syria". The allegations of ethnic cleansing against the YPG were later refuted by the UN.
At the time, several governments allied with the USA viewed the YPG as skeptical or even hostile, whose parent organization - the PKK - was still on the list of terrorist organizations in several European countries and - triggered by the Suruç attack - has been involved in the armed conflict again since July 2015 with Turkey, in which the US had viewed Turkey's actions against the PKK as a clear act of self-defense.
After AI had not received a statement from the Kurdish administration of the areas until the report was published, YPG spokesman Rêdûr Xelîl dismissed the allegations as "false accusations" after the report was published and stated that the population was from a group merely for their own protection War zone evacuated. Another representative of the Kurds in northern Syria told the media that troops may have carried out minor attacks on residents if they suspected them to be affiliated with the IS militia. However, the actions are not related to the ethnicity of the residents. The head of the Kurdish internal security forces known as Asayish , Ciwan Ibrahim, admitted that there had been evictions, but called them “isolated incidents” and said that this was done for the civilians' own safety.
See also
literature
Reports from non-governmental organizations analyzing international conflicts
- International Crisis Group: Fighting ISIS: The Road to and beyond Raqqa - The US campaign against ISIS in northern Syria both benefits from and is complicated by its partnership with an affiliate of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), a group fighting against its NATO ally Turkey. The challenges will grow as the war on ISIS moves further east (English; PDF ), Briefing N ° 53 / Middle East & North Africa, April 28, 2017.
- The report shows how the US campaign against IS in northern Syria is benefiting from the partnership with the YPG / SDF, but at the same time is being complicated by the partnership with this PKK-affiliated group, while the PKK against Turkey as a NATO Allies of the United States in combat.
- International Crisis Group: The PKK's Fateful Choice in Northern Syria - The Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) and its Syrian affiliates face a stark choice: risk their gains in northern Syria through continued prioritization of the PKK's fight against Turkey, or pursue local self- rule in the area they have carved out of the chaos of the Syrian war (English, PDF ), Report N ° 176 / Middle East & North Africa, May 4, 2017.
- The ICG's fourth report on the Kurds in Northern Syria shows that Turkey-oriented YPG commanders who have been trained by the PKK are less interested in a Syrian solution to the Kurdish question in Syria than in the PKK's fight against the Turkish one State aligned.
Reports from human rights organizations
- Human Rights Watch: Under Kurdish Rule - Abuses in PYD-run Enclaves of Syria ( PDF ), June 19, 2014.
- Human Rights Watch: Syria: Kurdish Forces Violating Child Soldier Ban - Despite Promises, Children Still Fight , July 15, 2015.
- Amnesty International: Syria: Arbitrary detentions and blatantly unfair trials mar PYD fight against terrorism , 7 September 2015.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Syrian Kurds now say they now control the size of Qatar and Kuwait combined ( Memento from November 20, 2017 on WebCite ) (English), businessinsider.com, August 14, 2015, by Tom Perry (Reuters).
- ↑ a b c d e f g h i j YPG: The Kurdish militia battling ISIS jihadists ( Memento from November 23, 2017 on WebCite ) (English), dailystar.com.lb, October 9, 2014 (print version: The Daily Star, October 8, 2014, p. 8), by Sara Hussein (AFP). Also published as: YPG: The Kurdish militia battling IS jihadists for Syria town ( Memento of 16 October 2014 Webcite ) (English), Global Post, October 10, 2014 (AFP: saw / al).
- ↑ a b c Khaled Yacoub Oweis: The West's Darling in Syria - Seeking Support, the Kurdish Democratic Union Party Brandishes an Anti-Jihadist Image ( Memento from November 11, 2017 on WebCite ) (English, PDF ( Memento from October 31, 2017 on WebCite )), Science and Politics Foundation, SWP Comments 2015 / C 47, October 2015.
- ↑ a b c Sabina Catar: Kurdish political parties in Syria . In: Austria / Federal Ministry of the Interior (ed.): The Kurds - History - Religion - Language - Politics / Wolfgang Taucher, Mathias Vogl, Peter Webinger . Austria / Federal Ministry of the Interior, Vienna 2015, ISBN 978-3-9503643-6-1 , p. 112–139 ( online [PDF; accessed October 31, 2017]). ( Archived ( Memento of November 20, 2017 on WebCite )).
- ↑ "These Kurds are fighting in the Syrian conflict" SPON of February 18, 2016
- ↑ a b c d e f g IS - YPG: Kurdish spearhead in the fight against jihadists in Syria ( Memento from October 24, 2014 on WebCite ) , Tiroler Tageszeitung, October 11, 2014 (AFP).
- ↑ a b c Michael Werz & Max Hoffman: The United States, Turkey, and the Kurdish Regions - The Peace Process in Context ( Memento from October 4, 2014 on WebCite ) (PDF; English), Center for American Progress, Washington, July 2014, pp. 1–49, here pp. 6, 24, archived from the original .
- ^ Charles Lister: A Long Way from Success: Assessing the War on the Islamic State ( Memento from November 25, 2017 on WebCite ) (English; PDF download ( Memento from November 25, 2017 on WebCite )). Perspectives on Terrorism (Terrorism Research Initiative, Center for Terrorism and Security Studies), 9, (4), (2015).
- ↑ a b Rayk Hähnlein, in: Kurds: Terrorist acts of the »Freedom Falcons« harm the PKK ( Memento from July 27, 2017 on WebCite ) , Science and Politics Foundation, in short, December 16, 2016.
- ↑ Syrian Kurds Win Support in Battle With Al-Qaeda Forces ( Memento from August 29, 2014 on WebCite ) (English). Al Monitor, October 25, 2013, by Wladimir van Wilgenburg, archived from the original on August 29, 2014.
- ↑ Kurdish militants train hundreds of Yazidis to fight Islamic State ( Memento from September 1, 2014 on WebCite ) (English). Reuters IN, August 17, 2014, by Youssef Boudlal, archived from the original .
- ↑ a b c d Kurds declare an interim administration in Syria ( Memento from September 8, 2014 on WebCite ) (English). Reuters US, November 12, 2013, archived from the original .
- ^ "Turkey v Syria's Kurds v Islamic State" BBC of 23 August 2016
- ↑ Deniz Yücel: “Good Kurds, bad Kurds. Who is a terrorist? ” Welt, February 24, 2016
- ↑ a b c d e Aslı Aydıntaşbaş, Kemal Kirişci: The United States and Turkey - Friends, Enemies, or Only Interests ( Memento from October 10, 2017 on WebCite ) (English), The Center on the United States and Europe (CUSE) at Brookings: Turkey Project Policy Paper, No. 12, April 2017, pp. 1–27.
- ↑ a b U.S. general told Syria's YPG: 'You have got to change your brand' ( Memento from October 27, 2017 on WebCite ) (English), reuters.com, July 22, 2017, by Jonathan Landay and Phil Stewart (Editing: Jonathan Oatis).
- ↑ a b c Barak Barfi: Kurds Now Our Best Ally Against ISIS in Syria ( Memento from November 4, 2017 on WebCite ) (English; PDF download ), Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Fikra Forum, October 9, 2015. The The article was originally published on the Fikra Forum homepage.
- ^ The Kurdish Democratic Union Party . In: DIWAN (Carnegie Middle East Center) . March 1, 2012 (English, carnegie-mec.org ).
- ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z aa ab ac ad ae af ag ah ai aj Barak Barfi: Ascent of the PYD and the SDF ( Memento vom November 21, 2017 on WebCite ) (English; PDF: www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/pdf/ascent-of-the-pyd-and-the-sdf PDF, PDF download ( Memento from November 21, 2017 on WebCite )), The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Research Notes, April 32, 2016.
- ↑ a b c d e f g h International Crisis Group : Flight of Icarus? The PYD's Precarious Rise in Syria - The PYD (Kurdish Democratic Union Party) has imposed its dominance in northern Syria, but its long-run prospects - like those of the areas it controls - depend on the party's ability to adopt a more balanced and inclusive strategy ( Memento from November 21, 2017 on WebCite ) (English; PDF ( Memento from November 21, 2017 on WebCite ) ), Report No. 151 / Middle East & North Africa, May 8, 2014.
- ↑ a b c d e f g h "Syria: the Kurdish expansion has its price - In northeast Syria the Kurdish YPG militias are waging a bloody war against the Islamic State. In doing so, they also conquer Arab villages. The greatest challenge for Kurdish self-government: the complex relationship between Kurds and Arabs - politically and militarily ” online ( memento from September 23, 2014 on WebCite ), Alsharq - Blog, September 22, 2014, by Nils Metzger, archived from the original .
- ↑ a b c Who is the Syrian-Kurdish opposition? - The development of Kurdish parties, 1956‒2011 ( Memento from November 20, 2017 on WebCite ) (English; PDF), European Center for Kurdish Studies, KurdWatch, Report 8, December 2011. German version: Who is the Syrian-Kurdish opposition? - The development of Kurdish parties 1956-2011 ( memento from November 20, 2017 on WebCite ) , European Center for Kurdish Studies, KurdWatch, report 8, December 2011.
- ↑ Rana Marcel Khalaf: Governing Rojava: Layers of Legitimacy in Syria ( Memento from November 19, 2017 on WebCite ) (English), chathamhouse.org, December 8, 2016. Complete work (PDF; English): Rana Khalaf: Governing Rojava - Layers of Legitimacy in Syria ( Memento from November 19, 2017 on WebCite ) , Chatham House, Middle East and North Africa Program, Research Paper, December 2016, ISBN 978-1-78413-184-5 .
- ↑ a b c International Crisis Group: Turkey: The PKK and a Kurdish Settlement - Turkey needs to recover the initiative after the PKK (Kurdistan Workers' Party) insurgency's aggressive escalation of violence and implement a long-term conflict resolution strategy that addresses Kurdish grievances ( Memento from November 25, 2017 on WebCite ) (English); PDF ( Memento from November 25, 2017 on WebCite ), Report No. 219 / Europe & Central Asia, September 11, 2012.
- ↑ The Kurdish dimension to Turkey's Syria policy ( Memento from November 20, 2017 on WebCite ) (English), foreignpolicy.com, April 10, 2012, by Gönül Tol.
- ↑ a b c d e f g h i j Dictatorship as a lesser evil - In the Kurdish regions of Syria, the trained cadres of the socialist PYD are in charge. They secure peace for the Kurds, but that has its price ( memento from September 23, 2014 on WebCite ) , fr-online.de, November 8, 2012, by Frank Nordhausen, archived from the original on September 23, 2014.
- ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Kurds in Syria - The woman who teaches al-Qaeda to be afraid ( page 1 ( memento from September 4, 2014 on WebCite ), page 2 ( memento from 4 September 2014 ) September 2014 on WebCite )), fr-online.de, February 28, 2014, by Frank Nordhausen, archived from the original ( [1] ) on September 4, 2014.
- ↑ a b c d e f g h Aaron Stein, Michelle Foley: The YPG-PKK Connection . In: MENASource ( Atlantic Council ) . January 26, 2016 (English, online ). Also published as: YPG-PKK Connection Spells US-Turkey Friction - Shared overarching political goals between the main Syrian Kurdish militia, the YPG, and the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) in Turkey have Ankara uneasy and point to what looks to be increasingly inevitable friction between the US and Turkey in Syria ( Memento from November 21, 2017 on WebCite ) , News Deeply - Syria Deeply, January 27, 2016, by Aaron Stein and Michelle Foley.
- ↑ a b c International Crisis Group: Syria's Kurds: A Struggle Within a Struggle - Syria's conflict gives its Kurdish population an opening to rectify historic wrongs and push for more autonomy, but facing internal divisions, poor ties with the non-Kurdish opposition and regional rivalries, its challenge is to articulate clear, unified and achievable demands ( Memento of November 24, 2017 on WebCite ) (English); PDF ( Memento from November 25, 2017 on WebCite ), Report No. 136 / Middle East & North Africa, January 22, 2013.
- ↑ a b c d e f Fighting in Syria: Kurds prepare for battle against IS ( Memento from September 22, 2014 on WebCite ) , Spiegel Online, September 22, 2014, by Raniah Salloum, archived from the original on September 22, 2014.
- ↑ "Genocide against the residents of Kobane" ( Memento from September 23, 2014 on WebCite ) , Background.de, September 23, 2014, by Thomas Eipeldauer, archived from the original on September 23, 2014.
- ^ Another false war , NZZ, January 23, 2018, page 11
- ↑ Ankara's fear of “Rojava” , NZZ, October 30, 2015
- ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v Kyle Orton: The Orton Report - The Forgotten Foreign Fighters: The PKK in Syria ( Memento from November 19, 2017 on WebCite ) ( English), Henry Jackson Society, August 17, 2017. Full report: the Forgotten Foreign Fighters: the PKK in Syria ( Memento of 19 November 2017 on Webcite ) (English), the Henry Jackson Society, 2017, ISBN 978-1- 909035-32-4 .
- ↑ a b c Michael Werz & Max Hoffman: The United States, Turkey, and the Kurdish Regions - The Peace Process in Context ( Memento from October 4, 2014 on WebCite ) (PDF; English), Center for American Progress, Washington, July 2014, pp. 1–49, here p. 24, archived from the original on October 4, 2014.
- ↑ a b c d e North Syria - Sad Winners ( Memento from September 8, 2014 on WebCite ) , Die Zeit, Nº 12/2014, March 22, 2014, by Onur Burçak Belli, archived from the original on September 8, 2014.
- ↑ a b c Weapons for the PKK? - A conversation with the left-wing party politician Ulla Jelpke, who toured the Kurdish areas of Turkey, Syria and Iraq for two weeks ( page 1 ( memento from September 4, 2014 on WebCite ), page 2 ( memento from September 4, 2014 on WebCite )) , Telepolis, August 26, 2014, by Tomasz Konicz, archived from the original ( page 1 , page 2 ) on September 4, 2014.
- ↑ a b Michael Werz & Max Hoffman: The United States, Turkey, and the Kurdish Regions - The Peace Process in Context ( Memento from October 4, 2014 on WebCite ) (PDF; English), Center for American Progress, Washington, July 2014 , Pp. 1–49, here p. 25, archived from the original on October 4, 2014.
- ↑ Situation in Amuda, Syria ( Memento from October 5, 2014 on WebCite ) (English). US Department of State - Press Statement, Patrick Ventrell, July 1, 2013, archived from the original on October 6, 2014.
- ↑ a b Federal Government of Germany: Printed matter 18/3702. (PDF) German Bundestag, January 7, 2015, SS 7 , accessed on August 3, 2018 .
- ↑ a b c d e International Crisis Group: The PKK's Fateful Choice in Northern Syria - The Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) and its Syrian affiliates face a stark choice: risk their gains in northern Syria through continued prioritization of the PKK's fight against Turkey , or pursue local self-rule in the area they have carved out of the chaos of the Syrian war ( Memento from November 19, 2017 on WebCite ) (English, PDF ( Memento from November 19, 2017 on WebCite )), Report N ° 176 / Middle East & North Africa, May 4, 2017.
- ↑ The battle for control in Syria ( Memento from October 16, 2014 on WebCite ) (English). Daily News Egypt, July 21, 2012, by Maryam Ishani and Connor Molloy, archived from the original .
- ↑ Kurds oust Syrian forces from northern towns ( Memento from October 16, 2014 on WebCite ) (English). Al Jazeera, November 19, 2012, by Jose Miguel Calatayud, archived from the original .
- ^ Parties, Youth Movements and Coordinating Committees in Western Kurdistan. In: pydrojava.net. PYD , October 15, 2013, archived from the original on September 9, 2014 ; accessed on July 25, 2018 (English).
- ↑ How Kurdish Militias Have Successfully Fought Off the Islamic State ( Memento of 3 September 2014 Webcite ) (English). Vice News, August 14, 2014, by Mutlu Çiviroğlu, archived from the original on September 3, 2014.
- ↑ a b c America's Marxist Allies Against ISIS ( Memento of 20 November 2017 Webcite ) (English), Wall Street Journal, July 24, 2015, by Matt Bradley and Joe Parkinson.
- ↑ a b 'Our sons were heroes' say families of British men killed fighting Isis - Think Tank report angers families by saying British volunteers with Kurdish forces Should be Treated as potential terrorists ( Memento of 19 November 2017 Webcite ) (English), theguardian .com, August 20, 2017, by Matt Blake.
- ↑ European Union Terrorism Situation and Trend Report (TE-SAT) 2016 ( Memento from November 20, 2017 on WebCite ) (English; PDF ( Memento from November 20, 2017 on WebCite )), europol.europa.eu, European Police Office, 2016, ISBN 978-92-95200-68-5 , doi: 10.2813 / 525171 , here p. 35.
- ↑ a b c d e Expert View: The YPG, PKK and Turkey's Options in Syria - Turkey opposed the US decision to arm Syrian Kurds fighting ISIS due to the groups' alleged ties to the Turkish-Kurdish PKK. But the relationships between these factions and foreign powers are much more complex than they seem, experts say ( Memento from November 21, 2017 on WebCite ) (English), News Deeply - Syria Deeply, May 15, 2017, by Alessandria Masi and Kim Bode . Interviews with Nicholas A. Heras, Robert Lowe, Gokhan Bacik and Eva Savelsberg.
- ↑ Hasnain Kazim: Radical Kurds against IS militia - Now the PKK should judge it. In: spiegel.de. September 22, 2014, accessed August 8, 2018 .
- ↑ Sinjar: Free at last! In: ZEIT ONLINE . ( Online [accessed July 13, 2018]).
- ↑ a b Turkey’s PKK Conflict: The Rising Toll ( Memento from November 25, 2017 on WebCite ) (English), International Crisis Group, [Update from November 2017].
- ↑ Kekevi: System of Group of Communities in Kurdistan: An Assessemnt of State, Federalism, KCK Practices and International Developments. P. 114 , accessed on March 28, 2019 (English).
- ↑ Dark Victory in Raqqa . In: The New Yorker . ( Online [accessed August 6, 2018]).
- ↑ WORLD: Macron's advance and Erdogan's outrage . In: THE WORLD . March 31, 2018 ( online [accessed August 6, 2018]).
- ↑ Senator Lindsey Graham visits US-Backed Kurdish Fighters in Manjib Syria . In: MintPress News . July 3, 2018 ( online [accessed August 6, 2018]).
- ↑ Reuters Editorial: In north Syria, British officials vow solidarity with Kurdish ... In: US ( Online [accessed August 6, 2018]).
- ↑ a b c Emel Parlar Dal: Impact of the transnationalization of the Syrian civil war on Turkey: conflict spillover cases of ISIS and PYD-YPG / PKK . In: Cambridge Review of International Affairs . tape 29 , no. 4 , 2016, p. 1396-1420 , doi : 10.1080 / 09557571.2016.1256948 . (Published online on February 10, 2017, pp. 1–25).
- ↑ a b c d e f g h Fighting ISIS: The Road to and beyond Raqqa - The US campaign against ISIS in northern Syria both benefits from and is complicated by its partnership with an affiliate of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), a group fighting against its NATO ally Turkey. The challenges will grow as the war on ISIS moves further east ( Memento from November 20, 2017 on WebCite ) (English; PDF ( Memento from November 20, 2017 on WebCite )), International Crisis Group, Briefing N ° 53 / Middle East & North Africa, April 28, 2017.
- ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Security Risk Seen in Foreign Recruits Fighting for Kurds in Syria ( Memento from November 19, 2017 on WebCite ) (English), voanews.com, August 17, 2017, from Jamie Dettmer.
- ↑ US Must Tell Kurds to Stop Attacking Syrian Rebels ( Memento from November 19, 2017 on WebCite ) (English), nytimes.com, February 24, 2016, by Charles Lister.
- ↑ a b c Cale Salih: Turkey, the Kurds and the fight against Islamic State ( Memento from November 21, 2017 on WebCite ) (English; PDF ( Memento from November 21, 2017 on WebCite )), European Council on Foreign Relations, 14 September 2015.
- ↑ a b IS has destroyed Sykes-Picot - “There will be a Kurdish state” ( memento from October 24, 2014 on WebCite ), n-tv, October 15, 2014, interview by Hubertus Volmer with Ferhad Seyder, archived from the original .
- ↑ a b c d e f g Ghadi Sary: Kurdish Self-governance in Syria: Survival and Ambition ( Memento from November 19, 2017 on WebCite ) (English), chathamhouse.org, September 15, 2016. Complete work (PDF; English ): Ghadi Sary: Kurdish Self-governance in Syria: Survival and Ambition ( Memento from November 19, 2017 on WebCite ) (English), Chatham House Research Paper, Project: Middle East and North Africa Program, Research Paper, September 2016, ISBN 978-1-78413-167-8 .
- ↑ Turkey and the PKK: Saving the Peace Process ( Memento from November 21, 2017 on WebCite ) (English; PDF ( Memento from November 21, 2017 on WebCite ) ), International Crisis Group, Report No. 234 / Europe & Central Asia, November 6, 2014.
- ↑ Cengiz Gunes & Robert Lowe: The Impact of the Syrian War on Kurdish Politics Across the Middle East ( Memento from November 21, 2017 on WebCite ) (English), chathamhouse.org, July 23, 2015; Complete work: Cengiz Gunes & Robert Lowe: The Impact of the Syrian War on Kurdish Politics Across the Middle East ( Memento from November 21, 2017 on WebCite ) (English; PDF), Chatham House Research Paper, Project: Middle East and North Africa Program, Syria and its Neighbors, July 2015, ISBN 978-1-78413-063-3 .
- ^ German Constitutional Protection: Workers' Party of Kurdistan . 2015, p. 12 & 13 .
- ↑ Syria: The Kurds and their dream of autonomy . ( handelsblatt.com [accessed July 13, 2018]).
- ↑ a b U.S. military aid is fueling big ambitions for Syria's leftist Kurdish militia ( Memento of 29 October 2017 Webcite ) (English) washingtonpost.com, January 7, 2017 by Liz Sly.
- ↑ Senior Administration Officials On Counter-ISIL Coalition Efforts , US Department of State, July 28, 2015.
- ↑ Daily Press Briefing - February 10, 2016 (English), US Department of State, daily press briefing, February 10, 2016.
- ↑ Hearing: From Iraq and Syria to Libya and Beyond: The Evolving ISIL Threat ( Memento from October 29, 2017 on WebCite ) (English; PDF), House Committee on Foreign Affairs, Hearing Before The Committee On Foreign Affairs - House Of Representatives, 114th Congress, Second Session, Serial No. 114-141, February 10, 2016, p. 44.
- ↑ Pentagon Chief: US-Backed Syrian Kurds Aligned with Terror Group PKK ( Memento from November 24, 2017 on WebCite ) (English), Breitbart.com, May 4, 2016, by Edwin Mora.
- ^ Stenographic Transcript Before the Committee On Armed Services United States Senate Hearing To Receive Testimony On Counter-ISIL (Islamic State Of Iraq And The Levant) Operations And Middle East Strategy (English; PDF), armed-services.senate.gov, Alderson Court Reporting, Washington, April 28, 2016.
- ↑ James Jeffrey: Trump's Plan to Arm Kurds Lays Bare the Strategic Vacuum in Syria ( Memento from November 22, 2017 on WebCite ) (English; PDF: www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/pdf/trumps-plan-to-arm Kurds-lays-bare-the-strategic-vacuum-in-syria), The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Policy Analysis, May 9, 2017. Also published as: Trump's Plan to Arm Kurds Lays Bare the Strategic Vacuum in Syria - the administration's plan to retake Raqqa from the Islamic State Could Further inflame tensions between Washington, Ankara and Tehran ( Memento of 22 November 2017 Webcite ) (English), Foreign Policy, May 9, 2017 by James Jeffrey.
- ↑ Barak Barfi: An Uncertain Future for Syria's Kurds ( Memento from November 4, 2017 on WebCite ) (English; PDF), Issue brief, No. 02.16.17. Rice University's Baker Institute for Public Policy, Houston, Texas.
- ↑ Who Exactly Are 'the Kurds'? - Are they terrorists, allies in the war against the Islamic State, or a nation in need of a state? The answer is yes to all of these ( Memento from November 26, 2017 on WebCite ) (English), theatlantic.com, February 25, 2016, by Steven A. Cook. Original publication : Thinking About “the Kurds” - The myriad alliances and rivalries between Turkey, the United States, and the Kurds of Iraq, Syria, and Turkey are complicating US-Turkish foreign policy in the Middle East (English), The Council on Foreign Relations, from From the Potomac to the Euphrates and the Middle East Program, February 23, 2016, by Steven A. Cook.
- ↑ US to stop arming anti-IS Syrian Kurdish YPG militia - Turkey ( Memento from November 25, 2017 on WebCite ) (English), bbc.com, November 25, 2017.
- ↑ Trump tells Turkish president US will stop arming Kurds in Syria ( Memento November 25, 2017 on WebCite ) (English), chicagotribune.com, November 24, 2017, by Carol Morello and Erin Cunningham (Washington Post).
- ↑ Ali Uslu: The Kurdish Movement: Politicians and Fighters ( Memento from November 21, 2017 on WebCite ) (English; PDF ( Memento from November 21, 2017 on WebCite )), Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), April 1 2016.
- ↑ Aaron Stein, Michelle Foley: The YPG-PKK Connection . In: MENASource ( Atlantic Council ) . January 26, 2016 (English, online ). Also published as: YPG-PKK Connection Spells US-Turkey Friction - Shared overarching political goals between the main Syrian Kurdish militia, the YPG, and the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) in Turkey have Ankara uneasy and point to what looks to be increasingly inevitable friction between the US and Turkey in Syria ( Memento from November 21, 2017 on WebCite ) , News Deeply - Syria Deeply, January 27, 2016, by Aaron Stein and Michelle Foley. There with reference to: Kurdistan, Middle East - DTK: Declaration of Political Resolution Regarding Self-rule (English), syria360.wordpress.com, December 27, 2015, by Alexandra Valiente.
- ^ Joost Hiltermann: The Kurds: A Divided Future? ( Memento from November 25, 2017 on WebCite ) (English); International Crisis Group (Op-Ed), Middle East & North Africa, May 19, 2016. Original publication: The Kurds: A Divided Future? ( Memento from November 25, 2017 on WebCite ) (English), The New York Review of Books, May 19, 2016, by Joost Hiltermann.
- ↑ a b Ghady Sary: Kurdish self-governance in Syria: Survival and ambition. (PDF) Chatham House, September 2016, SS 7 , accessed on August 3, 2018 .
- ^ Christopher Phillips: The Battle for Syria - International Rivalry in the New Middle East , Yale University Press, 2016, ISBN 978-0-300-21717-9 .
- ^ Ghadi Sary: Kurdish Self-governance in Syria: Survival and Ambition. (PDF) Chatham House, September 2016, SS 9 , accessed on August 3, 2018 .
- ↑ Sonja Gillert: IS-Terror: German Yazidis accuse Kurds . In: THE WORLD . September 14, 2014 ( online [accessed August 3, 2018]).
- ↑ The Unholy War in Iraq: The Flight of the Yazidis from the Islamic State . In: Vice . August 25, 2014 ( online [accessed August 3, 2018]).
- ↑ a b Al-Qaeda - Syria: Al-Qaeda offensive against Kurdish militia ( memento from September 2, 2014 on WebCite ) , DTJ online, July 22, 2013, by Caspar Schliephack, archived from the original .
- ↑ a b PYD has authority only on regions 'given by the al-Assad regime': Iraqi Kurdish leader Barzani (English). Hürriyet Daily News, November 14, 2013, archived from the original ( October 15, 2014 memento in the Internet Archive ) on September 5, 2014.
- ↑ a b c d e Syrian Kurds Increasingly Pressured by Jihadists ( Memento from September 3, 2014 on WebCite ) (English). Voice Of America, June 7, 2014 by Jamie Dettmer, archived from the original on September 3, 2014.
- ↑ a b "Kurdish-jihadist clashes fracture Syria opposition" BBC of August 18, 2013
- ↑ Iran supports PYD for immediate interests ( Memento of 11 October 2014 Webcite ) (English). Today's Zaman, August 18, 2013, archived from the original on October 11, 2014.
- ↑ Iran negotiates with Syrian Kurds ( Memento from October 11, 2014 on WebCite ) , DTJ Online, August 26, 2013, archived from the original on October 11, 2014.
- ^ Community of Destiny: PYD, YPG and the PKK - PART 2 ( Memento from October 11, 2014 on WebCite ) , DTJ Online, October 10, 2014, by Caspar Schliephack, archived from the original on October 11, 2014.
- ↑ Syrian Kurds refine oil for Themselves for first time - The Kurdish surgery is Producing about 15,000 barrels of oil per day, more than the Syrian government ( Memento of 21 November 2017 Webcite ) , The National, July 30 (English) 2015 (AFP).
- ↑ a b c Kurdish-jihadist clashes fracture Syria opposition ( Memento from September 2, 2014 on WebCite ) (English). BBC News, Guney Yildiz, archived from the original on September 2, 2014.
- ↑ a b The fight for oil in the Kurdish region? ( Memento from September 9, 2014 on WebCite ) , Telepolis, December 11, 2012, by Mona Sarkis, archived from the original on September 9, 2014.
- ↑ a b c d On the way to the second Kurdish state? ( Memento from September 9, 2014 on WebCite ) , Telepolis, August 14, 2013, by Martin Hoffmann, archived from the original on September 9, 2014.
- ↑ a b c d e f g Syrian War - German weapons kill in Syria ( Memento from September 1, 2014 on WebCite ) , fr-online, January 23, 2014, by Frank Nordhausen, archived from the original .
- ↑ YPG ve ÖSO'dan IŞİD'e karşı 'ortak eylem merkezi' ( Memento from September 11, 2014 on WebCite ) (Turkish). BBC Türkçe, September 10, 2014, archived from the original on September 12, 2014.
- ↑ Syrian Kurds Ally With Rebel Groups To Fight The Islamic State ( Memento from September 12, 2014 on WebCite ) (English). Vice News, September 12, 2014, by John Beck, archived from the original on September 12, 2014.
- ↑ a b Vulkan gegen Kaliphat - Kurds and parts of the Syrian opposition join forces against IS ( Memento from September 16, 2014 on WebCite ) , Junge Welt, No. 216 / Abroad / Page 6, September 17, 2014, archived by Nick Brauns from the original on September 16, 2014.
- ↑ Unleashed IS advances, Exodus from Syria ( memento from September 23, 2014 on WebCite ) , Die Welt, September 21, 2014, by Alfred Hackensberger, archived from the original .
- ↑ AP. "Kurdish forces seize border town of Tal Abyad, cutting off key Isis supply line" The Guardian of June 16, 2015
- ↑ Administration searches for new approach to aiding rebels in Syria ( Memento from October 28, 2017 on WebCite ) (English), washingtonpost.com, September 16, 2015, by Karen DeYoung.
- ↑ Rivals of ISIS Attack US-Backed Syrian Rebel Group ( Memento from November 21, 2017 on WebCite ) (English), nytimes.com, July 31, 2015, by Anne Barnard and Eric Schmitt.
- ↑ US general told Syria's YPG: 'You have got to change your brand' . In: Reuters . July 21, 2017 ( reuters.com [accessed June 14, 2020]).
- ↑ a b c d e Syrian Arab militias dispute they received US airdrop of ammunition ( Memento of November 21, 2017 on WebCite ) (English), miamiherald.com, October 20, 2015, from Roy Gutman (McClatchy).
- ↑ Daily Press Briefing - October 14, 2015 (English), US Department of State, daily press briefing, October 14, 2015.
- ↑ a b Aron Lund: Syria's Kurds at the Center of America's Anti-Jihadi Strategy - The self-proclaimed Islamic State has recently experienced significant setbacks at the hands of the Syrian Democratic Forces, a Kurdish majority alliance backed by the United States ( Memento November 25, 2017 on WebCite ) , Carnegie Middle East Center, Diwan, December 2, 2015.
- ↑ Expert View: US Decision to Arm Syrian Kurds Will Boost Fight Against ISIS - Experts say the US decision to arm Kurdish forces in Syria will strengthen US-backed forces fighting ISIS and result in possible tacit agreements between the US and unlikely partners ( Memento vom November 21, 2017 on WebCite ) (English), News Deeply - Syria Deeply, May 12, 2017, by Alessandria Masi and Kim Bode. Interviews with Nicholas A. Heras, Robert Lowe, Gokhan Bacik and Eva Savelsberg.
- ↑ New Syrian rebel alliance FORMED, says weapons on the way ( Memento on the 21 November 2017 Webcite ) (English), reuters.com, October 12, 2015 by Suleiman Al-Khalidi and Tom Perry.
- ↑ Press Briefing by Press Secretary Josh Earnest and Special Presidential Envoy for the Global Coalition to Counter ISIL Brett McGurk ( Memento of 21 November 2017 Webcite ) , White House, February 23 (English) 2016th
- ↑ YPG General Commander Hemo on Syrian Democratic Force, US Weapons & Amnesty Report ( Memento from November 21, 2017 on WebCite ) (English), Mutlu Civiroglu's private homepage, October 15, 2015, by Mutlu Civiroglu (translation from Kurdish by Ê Din).
- ↑ Joseph Holliday, The Struggle For Syria In 2011 - an operational and regional analysis ( Memento September 7, 2014 on WebCite ) (English; PDF), The Institute for the Study of War (ISW), Middle East Security Report 2, Washington , DC, December 2011, 28 p., Here p. 11, Map 2, archived from the original on September 7, 2014.
- ↑ a b c d Syria - ISIS advance: Syrian Kurds introduce conscription ( memento from September 2, 2014 on WebCite ) , DTJ online, July 20, 2014, by Caspar Schliephack, archived from the original on September 2, 2014.
- ↑ Syria: Own State for the Kurds? ( Memento from September 2, 2014 on WebCite ) , DTJ online, January 22, 2014, by Caspar Schliephack, archived from the original on September 2, 2014.
- ↑ a b Battle of Kobane - This woman commands the Kurdish fighters against the IS militia ( memento from October 12, 2014 on WebCite ) , Focus Online, October 12, 2014, archived from the original .
- ↑ a b c d Analysis: YPG - the Islamic State's worst enemy ( Memento from September 16, 2014 on WebCite ) (English). IHS Jane's Defense Weekly (JDW), September 11, 2014, by Michael Stephens, archived from the original .
- ↑ Iraq - Meet the PKK 'Terrorists' Battling the Islamic State on the Frontlines of Iraq ( Memento of 3 September 2014 Webcite ) (English). Vice News, Aug 22, 2014, by John Beck, archived from the original .
- ↑ a b Kobani Residents Return to Widespread Devastation ( Memento from March 4, 2015 on WebCite ) (English). Voice Of America, February 2, 2015, by Khadijan Farquin (speaker: Elizabeth Arrott), archived from the original .
- ↑ Tobias Heimbach: Turkish offensive in Northern Syria: These German weapons could be used. In: businessinsider.de. Business Insider , October 10, 2019, accessed October 13, 2019 .
- ↑ Petra Gasslitter: German fought with Kurds against IS - "I wish I were in Afrin". In: stern.de. Stern (magazine) , February 18, 2018, accessed on October 13, 2019 : “… preaching peace and delivering arms, clearly, hypocritical. Nonsense if it is now claimed that the Peshmerga do not pass on German weapons to the YPG. "A Peshmerga general sells such a Milan weapons system to the YPG or the PKK for one million dollars. That is the Middle East. Weapons always find their way ..."
- ↑ a b Hope in barbarism ( memento from October 1, 2014 on WebCite ) , young world, September 11, 2014, by Ulla Jelpke, Şükriye Doğan and Nezir Suleiman, archived from the original .
- ↑ Converted trucks and tractors - The Kurds go to war against IS with these self-made tanks ( Memento from October 1, 2014 on WebCite ) , Focus Online, September 30, 2014, archived from the original .
- ↑ a b Shawn Snow: Kurdish fighters display heavy firepower in show of force to Turkey . In: Military Times . August 8, 2017 ( online [accessed August 7, 2018]).
- ↑ The Forgotten Front in Syria Website of the VICE magazine. Retrieved November 20, 2012
- ↑ Kurds take another town in Syrian 'dirty game' ( Memento from December 6, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Website of the news channel al-Arabiya. Retrieved November 20, 2012
- ↑ https://www.fr.de/politik/keinen-kurden-deal-regime-11301911.html There was no deal between the Kurds and the regime website of the newspaper Frankfurter Rundschau. Retrieved December 1, 2012
- ↑ Karlos Zurutuza: Kurds Build Bridges At Last. In: ipsnews.net. October 13, 2013, accessed on August 3, 2018 .
- ↑ The seed goes to the website of the newspaper Junge Welt. Retrieved November 6, 2013
- ↑ The Christians in Syria go into battle In: Die Welt. Retrieved October 23, 2013.
- ↑ Kurdish militia aims to connect Kurdish enclaves in Syria In: Al-Monitor. Retrieved December 15, 2013
- ↑ online
- ↑ Margret Johannsen, Bruno Schoch, Max M. Mutschler, Corinna Hauswedell, Jochen Hippler: Friedensgutachten 2016, Institute for Peace Research and Security Policy, Lit, 2016, ISBN 978-3-643-13370-0 , p. 145
- ↑ Tom Perry: "Exclusive: Syrian Kurdish YPG aims to expand force to over 100,000" Reuters of March 30, 2017
- ^ Civil war in Syria - jihadists with Milan missiles ( memento from October 15, 2014 on WebCite ) , Berliner Zeitung, January 22, 2014, by Frank Nordhausen, archived from the original .
- ↑ Greetings from the Bosporus - Notes from life in Istanbul - From Istanbul to Syria ( Memento from October 15, 2014 on WebCite ) , gruss-vom-bosporus.berliner-zeitung.de published on January 28, 2014 by the FrankN account (Frank Nordhausen) , archived from the original ( memento of October 15, 2014 on WebCite ).
- ↑ Also civilians among the dead ( Memento from October 8, 2014 on WebCite ) , ORF.at, October 7, 2014, archived from the original .
- ^ IS Terror - Desperate Battle for Kobane ( Memento from October 9, 2014 on WebCite ) , RP Online, October 9, 2014, archived from the original .
- ↑ Fight for Kobane - Kurds apparently stop the IS advance ( memento from October 13, 2014 on WebCite ) , tagesschau.de, October 13, 2014, archived from the original .
- ↑ a b c d Fighting women: Kurdish “Amazons” hunt jihadists ( memento from August 29, 2014 on WebCite ) , Kurier.at, August 22, 2014, by Evelyn Peternel and Leila Al-Serori , archived from the original .
- ↑ a b "Kurdinnen-Kampfanzug": Protest against H&M overall ( memento from October 8, 2014 on WebCite ) , Kurier.at, October 8, 2014, archived from the original .
- ↑ a b c d When women go to war against jihadists ( memento from October 6, 2014 on WebCite ) , DiePresse.com, October 6, 2014 (print edition: Die Presse, October 7, 2014), archived from the original .
- ↑ a b c d e Women in the fight against the “Islamic State” ( memento from October 5, 2014 on WebCite ) , Deutsche Welle, October 4, 2014, by Sophie Cousins / ml (Al-Yarubiyah), archived from the original .
- ^ War in Syria: First German dies fighting IS terrorists ( Memento from March 10, 2015 on WebCite ) , Stern.de, March 9, 2015, archived from the original .
- ↑ The bulwark of Kurdish women fighters and the PKK ( Memento from October 5, 2014 on WebCite ) (Video: 00:06:34), BR - Report Munich, September 9, 2014, by Ahmet Şenyurt, archived from the original ( Memento from 6 October 2014 in the Internet Archive ).
- ↑ Meet the Kurdish Female Freedom Fighters of Syria ( Memento from August 31, 2014 on WebCite ) (English). VICE , Oct 29, 2013 by Glen Johnson, archived from the original .
- ↑ The women risking Their Lives to keep the world safe from terror ( Memento of 13 October 2014 Webcite ) (English). Mamamia, September 29, 2014, by Aparna Balakumar, archived from the original .
- ↑ Activists: Woman leads Kurdish fighters in defense of Kobane ( memento from October 12, 2014 on WebCite ) , Zeit.de, October 12, 2014, archived from the original ( memento from October 12, 2014 on WebCite ).
- ↑ Turks look the other way when Kurds cross the border ( memento from October 15, 2014 on WebCite ) , Welt.de, October 13, 2014, by Alfred Hackensberger, archived from the original .
- ↑ Female Peshmerga units - IS fighters fear these women ( memento from August 29, 2014 on WebCite ) , n-tv, August 23, 2014, by Jürgen Weichert, archived from the original .
- ↑ Iraq Crisis: Kurds Push to Take Mosul Dam as US Gains Controversial Guerrilla Ally ( Memento from August 29, 2014 on WebCite ) (English). The Wall Street Journal, August 18, 2014, by Joe Parkinson, archived from the original .
- ↑ a b Soldier Arin Mirkan - This Kurdish woman sacrificed herself to stop IS ( memento from October 6, 2014 on WebCite ) , Blick.ch, October 6, 2014, archived from the original .
- ↑ a b Kurds praise dead fighters - The Martyrs of Kobane ( Memento from October 7, 2014 on WebCite ) , n-tv, October 6, 2014, by Issio Ehrich, archived from the original .
- ↑ a b c d Former Royal Marine from Yorkshire becomes first Briton to die fighting Isil ( Memento from March 6, 2015 on WebCite ) (English). The Telegraph, March 4, 2015, by Louisa Loveluck and Josie Ensor, archived from the original .
- ↑ a b c d e Dead German Fighter - From Duisburg to the war against IS ( Memento from March 10, 2015 on WebCite ) , FAZ.net, March 9, 2015, by Rainer Hermann, archived from the original .
- ↑ a b c d e f German woman killed fighting Islamic State in Syria ( Memento from March 10, 2015 on WebCite ) (English). Reuters US, March 9, 2015, by Tom Perry and Sylvia Westall, archived from the original .
- ↑ Islamic State: Ex-UK soldier wants to train Kurdish forces ( Memento from March 10, 2015 on WebCite ) (English). BBC News, March 10, 2015, archived from the original .
- ↑ a b c Toy Soldiers - Americans 'Fighting ISIS' Are Just Props ( Memento from March 13, 2015 on WebCite ) (English). The Daily Beast, March 13, 2015, by Mat Wolf, archived from the original .
- ↑ a b "Islamic State": German dies fighting IS ( memento from March 10, 2015 on WebCite ) , Zeit.de, March 9, 2015, archived from the original .
- ↑ Britons joining Kurds to fight IS 'pose security risk' to UK ( Memento from November 19, 2017 on WebCite ) (English), BBC News, August 17, 2017, with an analysis by Emma Vardy.
- ↑ a b A Divorced Father-of-Two from Ohio Is Fighting the Islamic State in Syria ( Memento from March 6, 2015 on WebCite ) (English). VICE News, October 22, 2014, by Karlos Zurutuza, archived from the original .
- ↑ a b c d Islamic State: The US volunteers who fight with Syria's Kurds ( Memento from March 6, 2015 on WebCite ) (English). BBC News, Oct 21, 2014, by Jim Muir, archived from the original .
- ↑ a b c Jordan Matson (28): "My government does not help the Kurds - I do" - The Kurds receive support from an unexpected source for the fight against IS: Western volunteers join them ( Memento from March 7, 2015 WebCite ) , 20 minutes, February 7, 2015, by Vivian Salama and Bram Janssen, archived from the original .
- ↑ a b YPG fighter - Kevin died for Kurdistan ( memento from August 8, 2015 on WebCite ) , welt.de, August 6, 2015, by Alfred Hackensberger.
- ↑ a b c d Islamic State: Mother only discovered son Ashley Johnston was fighting in Syria after his death ( Memento from March 6, 2015 on WebCite ) (English). ABC News, March 4, 2015, by Sean Rubinsztein-Dunlop and Dylan Welch, archived from the original .
- ↑ a b c YPG Volunteer Michael Enright on Frontline ( Memento from July 25, 2015 on WebCite ) (Kurdish; video in English: 4:45 min.), Dengeamerika.com ( Voice of America in Kurdish edition), July 14 2015.
- ↑ Pirates of the Caribbean actor joins fight against Isis in Syria ( Memento of 25 July 2015 Webcite ) (English) theguardian.com, June 2nd, 2015.
- ↑ Why a 'Pirates of the Caribbean' actor dropped everything to fight the Islamic State ( Memento of 25 July 2015 Webcite ) , washingtonpost.com (English), 1 June 2015 by Abby Phillip.
- ↑ Actor Michael Enright joins Kurds in Fight Against ISIS in Syria ( Memento of 25 July 2015 Webcite ) (English), abcnews.go.com, 1 June 2015 by Louise Dewas.
- ↑ Pirates of the Caribbean actor Michael Enright fighting with Kurdish YPG against Islamic State ( Memento from July 25, 2015 on WebCite ) (English), abc.net.au, June 17, 2015, by Patrick Wright.
- ↑ a b c Kurdish militia pays tribute to Ashley Johnston, killed fighting with its forces - The 28-year-old Australian is understood to have been the first Westerner to die fighting with the array of militia groups opposed to Isis ( Memento vom 6. March 2015 on WebCite ) (English). The Guardian, March 2, 2015, by Michael Safi, archived from the original .
- ↑ Mother of killed Australian Ashley Johnston did not know he was on the frontline against Islamic State ( Memento from March 6, 2015 on WebCite ) (English). The Sydney Morning Herald, March 3, 2015, by Heath Aston, archived from the original .
- ↑ Young Australians are dying fighting Islamic State but can it be stopped? , accessed June 7, 2017
- ↑ Family of ex-marine who died battling Isis praise his courage and conviction ( Memento from March 6, 2015 on WebCite ) (English). The Guardian, March 4, 2015, by Matthew Taylor, Nigel Bunyan, and Fazel Hawramy, archived from the original .
- ↑ a b Another Westerner killed by Islamic State days after Australian Ashley Johnston slain in Syria ( Memento from March 6, 2015 on WebCite ) (English). The Sydney Morning Herald, March 5, 2015, by Heath Aston, archived from the original .
- ↑ a b Şeoreşa Rojava sembola biratiya Gelane ( Memento from March 6, 2015 on WebCite ) (Kurdish). ypgrojava.com (Navenda Ragihandina YPG), March 4, 2015, archived from the original ( memento of March 6, 2015 on WebCite ).
- ↑ a b c d Killed in the fight against IS: “To the last bullet” ( memento from March 10, 2015 on WebCite ) , taz.de, March 9, 2015, archived from the original .
- ↑ Terror - Dead Duisburg fighter was considered a "nice girl" ( memento from March 10, 2015 on WebCite ) , DerWesten, March 9, 2015, by Hayke Lanwert, archived from the original .
- ↑ Turkey has 'caught' man who helped UK girls join 'IS' ( Memento of 13 March 2015 Webcite ) (English). Deutsche Welle, March 12, 2015, archived from the original .
- ↑ Father of American killed fighting Isis says God directed him to Syria ( Memento of 24 July 2015 Webcite ) (English) theguardian.com, June 17,, 2015.
- ↑ Ji Çapemenî û Rayagiştî! ( Memento from July 24, 2015 on WebCite ) (Kurdish), ypgrojava.com, June 11, 2015.
- ↑ Keith Thomas Broomfield - For the Public Opinion ( Memento from July 24, 2015 on WebCite ) (English), ypgrojava.com, June 11, 2015.
- ↑ Merasîma Oxirkirina Qurbanîyên ERISA Pirsûsê ( Memento on the 24 July 2015 Webcite ) (Kurdish) dengeamerika.com (Voice Of America in Kurdish issue), July 23, 2015. Also published as: Merasîma Oxirkirina Qurbanîyên ERISA Pirsûsê ( Memento of 24 July 2015 on WebCite ) , dengeamerika.com.
- ↑ Death of an anti-fascist - young German internationalist dies in the fight against »Islamic State« in Syria ( memento from July 24, 2015 on WebCite ) , jungewelt.de, July 15, 2015, by Nick (Nikolaus) Brauns.
- ↑ “Ez Bi Xwesteka Avakirina Jiyana Azad Hatim” ( Memento from July 24, 2015 on WebCite ) (Kurdish), ypgrojava.com, July 13, 2015.
- ↑ "I Came Here Desiring A Life With Freedom." ( Memento from July 24, 2015 on WebCite ) (English), ypgrojava.com, July 13, 2015.
- ↑ Fight against ISIS - Germans died in combat in Syria ( memento from August 2, 2015 on WebCite ) , bild.de, July 14, 2015.
- ^ Paramedics at the YPG in Syria: A German in the fight against IS tagesschau.de
- ↑ An American civilian fighting with the YPG, Levi Jonathan Shirley, died on July 14 in Manbij, the YPG reported
- ^ Nicola Slawson: "British man killed fighting Isis in Syria" The Guardian of August 2, 2016
- ^ "Two Western YPG volunteers killed in Manbij" rudaw.net from August 2, 2016
- ↑ Brittny Mejia and Nabih Bulos: "Californian killed in Syria is remembered as humble, dedicated to Kurdish cause" LA Times of December 1, 2016
- ^ Matt Blake: "Briton killed while fighting against Isis in Syria" The Guardian of January 2, 2016
- ^ "Two foreign YPG volunteers died in Syria four days before Christmas" rudaw.net of January 3, 2017
- ↑ Ara News: Kurds confirm death of third US volunteer as part of Raqqa campaign ( Memento from February 2, 2017 in the Internet Archive ) from January 28, 2017
- ↑ Raf Sanchez: "British man Luke Rutter killed fighting Isil in Syria" The Daily Telegraph of July 11, 2017
- ^ Matt Blake: "British man and two Americans killed fighting Isis in Syria" The Guardian, July 11, 2017
- ^ Matt Blake: "British film-maker killed by Isis militants in Syria" The Guardian of September 27, 2017
- ^ "Jac Holmes: British man who volunteered to fight against Isis killed in Syria" The Independent of October 24, 2017
- ↑ Homeward Bound? They Fought ISIS. Now They Could Be Branded as Terrorists - For foreign volunteers from Europe and the US who came to fight ISIS, the moment of victory raised a whole new set of problems ( Memento of 19 November 2017 Webcite ) (English), thedailybeast.com , November 7, 2017, by Wladimir van Wilgenburg.
- ^ A b c SIPRI : “Armaments, Disarmament and International Security”, Oxford University Press, 2015, ISBN 978-0-19-873781-0 , pp. 29, 30
- ↑ Wyre Davies: "Crisis in Syria emboldens country's Kurds" BBC.com of July 28, 2012
- ↑ "PYD Kills Syrian Soldiers in Revenge Attack" ( Memento from September 22, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) in Rudaw from September 10, 2012
- ↑ Ivan Watson, Shiyar Sayed Mohammed and Ammar Cheikh Omar: "Syria rebels, Kurdish militia discuss cease-fire" CNN of October 30, 2012
- ↑ David L. Phillips: " The Kurdish Spring: A New Map of the Middle East ", Routledge, 2016, ISBN 978-1-4128-5576-1 , pp. 162 ff.
- ↑ Şehîdên Berxwedane Şegalê ( memento from August 30, 2014 on WebCite ) , ypgrojava.com, August 8, 2014, archived from the original on August 30, 2014.
- ↑ pevçûn navbere hêzên me û komên çete ( Memento from August 30, 2014 on WebCite ) , ypgrojava.com, August 12, 2014, archived from the original on August 30, 2014.
- ↑ Erebeyek Çeteyan Hate Darbekirin ( memento from August 30, 2014 on WebCite ) , ypgrojava.com, August 12, 2014, archived from the original on August 30, 2014.
- ↑ POL-H: Demonstration next Saturday ( memento from September 8, 2014 on WebCite ) , www.presseportal.de, Police Directorate Hanover, newsroom, August 14, 2014, archived from the original on September 8, 2014.
- ↑ Göttingen: More help for Yazidis required ( memento from September 8, 2014 on WebCite ) , NDR.de, August 14, 2014, archived from the original on September 8, 2014.
- ↑ "Stop the Terror": Yazidis demonstrate in Hanover ( memento from September 8, 2014 on WebCite ) , Neue Presse, August 16, 2014, archived from the original on September 8, 2014.
- ↑ Yazidis demonstrate in Hanover ( memento from September 8, 2014 on WebCite ) , Neue Presse, picture gallery (139 photos), photos: Rainer Droese / Alexander Körner / Frank Wilde / dpa, archived from the original on September 8, 2014.
- ↑ a b c d e f Aaron Stein: Turkey's New Foreign Policy: "Davutoglu, the AKP and the Pursuit of Regional Order", Routledge, 2014, ISBN 978-1-138-90723-2 Chapter: "Turkeys Hostage Crisis" p . 78 and following
- ↑ "Iraq: la ville de Sinjar tombe aux mains de l'Etat islamique" lemonde.fr of August 3, 2014
- ↑ a b Tracey Shelton: “'If it wasn't for the Kurdish fighters, we would have died up there'” Pri.org of August 29, 2014
- ↑ a b Ishaan Tharoor: "A US-designated terrorist group is saving Yazidis and battling the Islamic State" Washington Post of August 11, 2014
- ^ "Islamic State tightens grip on Syrian border town; shells hit Turkey “ Reuters September 26, 2014
- ^ "Battle for Kobane: Key events" BBC from June 25, 2015
- ↑ a b c Buddhika Jayamaha: A Daunting Triangle: Turkey, the Kurds, and the ISIL Threat. CTC Sentinel 2014 Vol 7 Issue 11. Retrieved November 21, 2017.
- ↑ "Syrian rebels join battle to protect Kobane" aljazeera.com of October 29, 2014
- ↑ "Iraqi peshmerga fighters cross into Kobane" aljazeera.com of October 31, 2014
- ↑ "Syria Islamic State: Kurds' claim control over Kobane" " BBC of June 27, 2015
- ↑ Christopher Phillips: " The Battle for Syria: International Rivalry in the New Middle East, " Yale University Press, 2016, ISBN 978-0-300-21717-9 , p. 211
- ↑ Reuters: "Turkish PM confirms shelling of Kurdish forces in Syria" The Guardian of February 13, 2017
- ^ Sarah El Deep: "Turkey, Kurds, Russia, US forces make up a confusing, violent pageant in Syria" Chicago Tribune of March 11, 2017
- ↑ Salzburger Nachrichten: Rojda Felat - the face of victory in Raqqa . ( Online [accessed July 10, 2018]).
- ↑ Reuters Editorial: US-backed militias say they made new advance against Islamic ... In: US ( Online [accessed July 14, 2018]).
- ^ Isis fighters strike deal with US-backed forces in exchange for their lives . In: The Independent . ( Online [accessed July 14, 2018]).
- ^ Raqqa is liberated from Isis but civilians face months of hardship . In: The Independent . ( Online [accessed July 14, 2018]).
- ↑ AP: "Kurdish militia to hand over bodies after Syria clashes" Washington Post of July 18, 2017
- ^ "British man who fought against Isis in Syria is arrested by Turkish authorities over 'terrorism'" The Independent of July 28, 2017
- ^ Turkey targets Kurds: The 100, 300 and 700-word story . In: BBC News . 2018 ( online [accessed July 11, 2018]).
- ↑ EJIL: Talk! - The Turkish Operation in Afrin (Syria) and the Silence of the Lambs. Retrieved July 11, 2018 .
- ↑ Editors Monitor: Operation Olivenzweig: War against the Kurds - Made in Germany . January 30, 2018 ( online [accessed July 11, 2018]).
- ↑ Kurdistan24: Erdogan says Afrin is majority Arab, threatens Arabization . In: Kurdistan24 . ( Online [accessed July 11, 2018]).
- ↑ Turkey gives nod to 'Kurds but not the YPG' in Syria talks. Accessed July 11, 2018 .
- ↑ Turkey accused of recruiting ex-Isis fighters to attack Kurds in Syria . In: The Independent . ( Online [accessed July 11, 2018]).
- ↑ Turkish forces celebrate capture of Afrin by tearing down statue of Kurdish hero . In: The Independent . ( Online [accessed July 11, 2018]).
- ↑ From Afrin to Erbil: One refugee family's journey . In: Rudaw . ( Online [accessed July 11, 2018]).
- ↑ a b "Erdogan's army gathers on the border with Syria" Tagesspiegel.de of October 7, 2019
- ↑ "Trump Endorses Turkish Military Operation in Syria, shifting US policy" New York Times on October 7, 2019
- ^ Syria: Abuses in Kurdish-run Enclaves , Human Rights Watch, June 29, 2015.
- ^ Kurd militia kills 3 protesters in Syria town: Activists , ahramonline, June 29, 2015.
- ↑ Kurdish PYD militia kills 3 protesters in Syrian Kurdistan: activists , Ekurd Daily, June 29, 2015.
- ↑ What is Behind the PYD's Attack on Barzani's Party? , The Washington Institute, June 29, 2015 by Barzan Sheikhmous.
- ↑ Syrian Kurdish Group Linked to PKK Kills Protesters ( Memento from July 16, 2015 in the Internet Archive ), Al-Monitor, June 29, 2015, by Andrea Glioti.
- ↑ YPG bi Daxuyanîyekê Bersîva Rexneyên HRW Dide ( Memento from July 24, 2015 on WebCite ) (Kurdish), dengeamerika.com ( Voice of America in Kurdish edition), July 24, 2015.
- ↑ Headshot for the little disobedient ( memento from July 5, 2015 on WebCite ) , Focus Magazin, No. 23, May 30, 2015, by Andrea-Claudia Hoffmann.
- ↑ a b Syria: Kurdish Forces Violating Child Soldier Ban - Despite Promises, Children Still Fight ( Memento of 24 July 2015 Webcite ) (English), Human Rights Watch, July 15, 2015.
- ↑ http://undocs.org/s/2018/465
- ↑ a b c d e f Amnesty International accuses Kurds of expelling Arabs ( memento from October 14, 2015 on WebCite ) , Telepolis, October 13, 2015, by Peter Mühlbauer .
- ↑ Ethnic cleansing charged as Kurds move on Islamic State town in Syria ( Memento from October 14, 2015 on WebCite ) , mcclatchydc.com, June 13, 2015, by Mousab Alhamadee and Roy Gutman.
- ↑ a b Kurdish forces deny claims of abuse in towns They liberate from IS ( Memento of 15 October 2015 Webcite ) (English) The Sydney Morning Herald, June 19, 2015 by Ruth Pollard.
- ↑ Erdogan fears fall of Syria's Tell Abyad ( Memento from October 15, 2015 on WebCite ) (English), al-monitor.com, June 14, 2015, by Fehim Taştekin.
- ↑ a b 'We had nowhere to go' - Forced displacement and demolitions in Northern Syria ( Memento of 15 October 2015 Webcite ) (English), Amnesty International, Index number: MDE 24/2503/2015, October 12, 2015 ( PDF ( Memento from October 15, 2015 on WebCite ). See also: "We had nowhere else to go": Forced displacement and demolitions in northern Syria (English; video: 7:43 min.), YouTube, published on the YouTube channel Amnesty International on October 13, 2015.
- ↑ Syria: US ally's razing of villages amounts to war crimes ( Memento from October 14, 2015 on WebCite ) (English), amnesty.org, October 13, 2015.
- ↑ a b c Syria: Amnesty International accuses Kurds of displacement - PYD fighters supported by the USA are said to have forced thousands of civilians to flee and destroyed villages in northern Syria. Amnesty speaks of a war crime ( memento from October 14, 2015 on WebCite ) , zeit.de, October 13, 2015 (Zeit Online, Reuters, ap, ces).
- ↑ a b c d Reports from Northern Syria - Amnesty accuses Kurdish militia of war crimes ( memento from October 14, 2015 on WebCite ) , tagesschau.de, October 13, 2015, by Martin Durm.
- ↑ a b c d e f Syria: Amnesty accuses Kurdish militia of expulsions ( memento from October 14, 2015 on WebCite ) , spiegel.de, October 13, 2015 (anr / Reuters / dpa).
- ↑ Amnesty International accuses Kurdish YPG of war crimes ( Memento from October 14, 2015 on WebCite ) (English), al-monitor.com, October 13, 2015, by Amberin Zaman.
- ↑ a b c Report from Amnesty International - Satellite images pollute the Kurdish militia - Crimes are committed on all sides in Syria. Now human rights activists are also accusing Kurds of serious offenses. Eyewitnesses reported how the PYD party abused its power and violated international law ( memento from October 14, 2015 on WebCite ) , n-tv.de, October 13, 2015 (n-tv.de, kpi / dpa).
- ↑ Revenge for alleged IS support? - The human rights organization Amnesty International (AI) raises violent allegations against the Syrian Kurdish militia YPG. Entire villages and cities were systematically destroyed. It is a "targeted and coordinated campaign for collective punishment" of the inhabitants of the villages previously controlled by the terrorist militia Islamic State (IS) ( memento of October 16, 2015 on WebCite ) , orf.at, October 13, 2015.
- ↑ Amnesty: US-backed Syrian Kurds May Have Committed War Crimes ( Memento of 16 October 2015 Webcite ) (English), voanews.com, October 13, 2015.
- ↑ UN says no ethnic cleansing by Kurds in northern Syria | Kurdish Institute. Retrieved July 10, 2018 (American English).
- ↑ UN: YPG and SDF have not committed ethnic cleansing . In: Rudaw . ( Online [accessed July 10, 2018]).
- ↑ EU concerned about democratic dialogue in Turkey ( memento from August 5, 2015 on WebCite ) , AFP, August 4, 2015.
- ↑ Three Turkish soldiers killed in new PKK attack ( memento from August 5, 2015 on WebCite ) , orf.at, August 4, 2015.
- ↑ Two soldiers killed in a new PKK attack ( memento from August 5, 2015 on WebCite ) , derstandard.at, August 4, 2015 (APA).
- ↑ USA: Turkish air strikes on PKK are “self-defense” ( memento from July 29, 2015 on WebCite ) , diepresse.com, July 29, 2015 (APA / dpa / AFP).
- ↑ Turkish Air Force attacks ISIS targets in Syria ( memento from July 25, 2015 on WebCite ) , phoenix.de, July 24, 2015.
- ↑ a b Amnesty accuses US-backed Syrian Kurdish group of demolishing homes ( Memento on the 16 October 2015 Webcite ) (English), reuters.com, October 12, 2015 by John Davison.
Remarks
- ↑ Although the media in the West and some in the Middle East tend to show images of female fighters when proxy photos are used to represent PYD or YPG, the YPJ are often grouped under the term "YPG" in the media. (Sources: Sabina Catar: Kurdish political parties in Syria . In: Austria / Federal Ministry of the Interior (ed.): The Kurds - History - Religion - Language - Politics / Wolfgang Taucher, Mathias Vogl, Peter Webinger . Austria / Federal Ministry of the Interior, Vienna 2015, ISBN 978-3-9503643-6-1 , p. 112-139 ( online [PDF]). )
- ↑ In the literature, the term “PYD / YPG” can be used specifically for the political and military factor referred to as a whole, while the term “PYD” then refers solely to the political and the term “YPG” only to the military activities of the Actor relates. Although the military arm of the political organization PKK bears the name “HPG”, a corresponding conceptual breakdown for the PKK can be omitted in the same literature that makes the described breakdown into “PYD / YPG”, “PYD” and “YPG” so that the term “PKK” then refers to both the political and the military activities of the actor. (Source: Cale Salih: Turkey, the Kurds and the fight against Islamic State ( Memento from November 21, 2017 on WebCite ) ( PDF ( Memento from November 21, 2017 on WebCite )), European Council on Foreign Relations, September 14, 2015 .)
- ↑ In connection with the conflict in Syria, the definition of a terrorist organization poses a challenge because this definition is to a large extent the subject of geopolitical interests of the various parties to the Syrian conflict. For example, a list of 160 groups designated as terrorist organizations, which was drawn up by Russia after the Vienna Conference of the International Syria Support Group (ISSG) held in November 2015 and presented by Jordan , could not be accepted at the ISSG meeting in New York . The aim had been to differentiate Syrian groups classified as moderate from terrorist organizations in order to exclude the latter from future peace negotiations between the Syrian regime and the opposition. However, the list had been attacked and criticized by most of the 17 ISSG member states without reaching a consensus. Turkey had also spoken out against the list because only one Turkish state had agreed to regard the PKK as a terrorist organization. (Sources: Osman Bahadır Dinçer & Mehmet Hecan: The Changing Geo-strategy of Turkey's Foreign Policy Along its Southern Border - From Aspirations for Regional Integration to the need for Crisis Management (English, PDF), Institute for Strategic Dialogue, 2016; Osama Al Sharif: Jordan's Syria blacklist blasted by key players ( memento from November 20, 2017 on WebCite ) , al-monitor.com, December 28, 2015)