The Kurdish Awakening in Syria: Could It Lead to Regional War? Col. (ret.) Dr. Jacques Neriah, August 15, 2013 Vol. 13, No. 23 August 15, 2013 • After largely sitting on the sidelines of the Syrian revolution, political groups from Syria’s Kurdish minority have moved decisively to claim control of Kurdish-populated areas. • For the first time in modern Syrian Kurdish history, Kurds have created an exclusively Kurdishcontrolled enclave. Kurdish spokesmen have indicated that they are planning to form a provisional Kurdish government due to the absence of any central authority. • The Kurds have faced resistance to their new gains from the jihadist groups Jabhat al-Nusra and the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant. • For the first time since the start of the Syrian civil war, the president of Iraqi Kurdistan, Massoud Barzani, threatened to intervene on behalf of Syrian Kurds. Immediately after Barzani’s statement, Iranian Kurds also announced that they were ready for battle. • A “Greater Kurdistan” is no longer a remote possibility. This reality poses challenges for all of the states with large Kurdish populations: Turkey, Iraq, Syria, and Iran. Kurdistan is on the verge of becoming the new regional flashpoint in the Middle East. The Kurdish people have long sought autonomy, and the Syrian civil war has created new opportunities for them to achieve their goal.
The Syrian Spark After largely sitting on the sidelines of the Syrian revolution, political groups from Syria’s Kurdish minority have moved decisively to claim control of Kurdish-populated areas. In July 2012, Syrian opposition activists reported that a group called the Free Kurdish Army had taken control of several towns in northeast Syria on the Turkish border, such as Amuda and Qabani. Few analysts paid attention to this news at the time, since most observers were focused on what appeared to be the disintegrating Assad regime. Today, for the first time in modern Syrian Kurdish history, Kurds have created an exclusively Kurdishcontrolled enclave.1 Kurdish-liberated areas are being administered by local councils, and Kurdish spokesmen have indicated they are planning to form a provisional Kurdish government due to the absence of any central authority. The Kurds have faced resistance to their new gains, not just from the Assad regime, but from other rebel forces, namely the jihadist groups Jabhat al-Nusra and the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant. The jihadists are prepared to fight to maintain control of the Syrian border areas with Turkey and Iraq, respectively, in order to ensure that arms continue to flow into their hands. The border areas are no less important to the Kurds. For them, control of the border regions means that there can be territorial continuity between Syrian, Iraqi, Turkish, and possibly Iranian Kurdistan – the necessary condition for an independent and united Kurdistan. In July 2013, the jihadists carried out a series of attacks on Kurdish towns. They killed a respected Kurdish leader, Issa Hassou, with a car bomb.2 Kurdish forces reacted swiftly, and after some major battles with the jihadists, regained lost territory and expanded their control to new areas.
The Domino Effect News of the fighting between Syrian Kurds and jihadists spread east to Iraq. The president of Iraqi Kurdistan, Massoud Barzani, was livid. He heard rumors that the jihadists were ransacking Kurdish villages and holding hundreds of Kurds captive. Therefore, for the first time since the start of the Syrian civil war, Barzani threatened to intervene on behalf of Syrian Kurds. He said if Kurds were “under threat of death and terrorism,” then Iraqi Kurdistan would be “prepared to defend them.”3 Barzani accused al-Qaeda of being responsible for the slaying of innocent Kurdish women and children and urged all Kurdish parties to go to Syria – “Western Kurdistan,” as he called it – in order to verify the tragic news.