Given the continuous succession of events in Syria after the fall of the
Bashar Al-Assad regime, we at Regeneración Libertaria have spoken withthe Tekosîna Anarsîst (Anarchist Struggle) militia. The libertarian
organization analyzes the situation in the rest of Syria and how it can
affect the Rojava revolution of which they are a part. ---- 1.- First of
all, how are you in Rojava and what is the atmosphere there? ---- The
situation is constantly changing, with moments of euphoria for sporadic
victories and moments of terror for the atrocities that occur around us.
Our organization is on high alert, with a large part of our forces
deployed to defend the front lines, as fighters and as combat medical
units. We have also created a provisional information office to monitor
the military and political situation, maintain good coordination of our
forces and evaluate our next steps. We also try to maintain
communication with other comrades and organisations as best we can under
these conditions, sharing updates on the ongoing situation and
coordinating to give collective responses to the current attacks.
The atmosphere is tense, with a strange combination of joy at the fall
of the regime and fear of what will come next. There is hope for the
future of a new Syria without the Al-Assad dynasty, but also many people
are very worried about what will come next. The Kurds have been
suffering attacks from Salafi groups since the beginning of the war, and
it is no secret that the Turkish state is enrolling as many ISIS
fighters as it can in its proxy groups. Today the threats are very
serious, Erdogan seems determined to attack Kobane at any cost and even
threatens Raqqa. We risk losing all the progress and sacrifices that
have been made in this revolution over many years.
2.- At this moment, at the time of this interview, what is the political
and military situation on Syrian territory?
We try to keep abreast of the situation regularly, and we have recently
started sharing those updates
(https://tekosinaanarsist.noblogs.org/war-updates-december-2024/) on our
rudimentary website. Every day new critical developments occur, and the
situation will probably already be different by the time this is
published. Overall, we can see how the collapse of the Assad regime has
created a fragile situation for Syria. Different local and regional
powers want to take advantage of this.
Hayir Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) is the new name of the Syrian branch of
Al-Qaeda. They now have the upper hand in major cities following their
successful military offensive against the regime army, which began in
Idlib (their stronghold) on November 27. They established a provisional
government and are taking control of the transition of power in the
Syrian state, while presenting an image of moderate Islam to the Western
media. They have long received support from Turkey and are rapidly
gathering support from many foreign states. For its part, Turkey is
using its proxy forces, known as the Syrian National Army (SNA), to
attack areas under the control of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF),
the military coalition of the Democratic Autonomous Administration of
Northeast Syria (DAANES), also known as Rojava. These proxy forces
include documented former ISIS fighters in their ranks, and are already
committing horrendous brutalities in the areas they occupy. They
occupied and took control of Shehba and Manbij, now threatening to
invade Kobane. At the same time, Israel has been bombing Syria in what
they claim to be the largest air operation they have ever conducted,
claiming to have destroyed over 500 targets and 90% of Syrian military
capabilities. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) are also expanding their
occupied area in southern Syria under the pretext of a "security zone,"
moving troops and tanks along the border with Lebanon. Russia is
withdrawing its forces from Syria, keeping only its strategic military
bases in Latakia and Tartus. Iran has also withdrawn its forces.
Political debates about the future of Syria are taking place in many
places, some in front of cameras and others behind closed doors. Syrians
who fled the war are beginning to return, especially from neighboring
Turkey and Lebanon, hoping to rebuild a new country after the fall of
the Assad dynasty. There is much more going on, but we will be brief.
3.- We in the West have followed the fall of the Bashar Al Assad regime
with stupefaction. It is hard to believe that a 54-year-old hereditary
dictatorship has collapsed in 10-11 days. For those of you on the
ground, what circumstances brought about the downfall? Why so fast?
After more than a decade of war, the regime's army was exhausted. They
had been relying heavily on Russian and Iranian support, but due to
Russia's invasion of Ukraine and Iran's Israeli occupations of Gaza and
southern Lebanon, their support has weakened lately. HTS had also been
preparing its forces in Idlib for a long time, and their offensive
became a domino effect as soon as they took over Aleppo, Syria's
second-largest city. The soldiers of the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) were
mostly conscripts. They barely had enough food during their mandatory
military service and were often also not ideologically interested in
defending Assad. Therefore, their motivation to fight was almost zero.
In many places, they simply fled as soon as the "rebel" forces started
attacking their positions.
Many people in Syria were fed up with the regime, especially ethnic
minorities such as the Kurds in the north or the Druze in the south, as
well as the majority of the Sunni Arab population. In many places, local
militias started uprisings against the regime, attacking checkpoints and
military barracks across Syria. The DAANES also played a pivotal role in
the collapse of the regime, keeping one-third of the country under
revolutionary self-administration that challenged the power of the Assad
dynasty. The foreign political situation was also ripe for change. Many
Arab countries wanted a Sunni government in Syria, and Western powers
(especially Israel) were planning to get rid of Assad and his
long-standing Russian and Iranian support. It was the perfect storm.
4. With Bashar Al Assad, the last Baathist/Nasserist stronghold falls in
an Arab world where they were supposed to replace tribal, monarchical
and theocratic regimes and unite them through pan-Arab socialism. How do
we understand this reactionary wave in the Arab world? Can Syria end up
in a failed state like Libya?
Right now we are mostly busy on the front lines, we do not have much
capacity to give organisational perspectives beyond our already
published statements. As we have said, many forces have had interests in
a regime change. We have to highlight once again the role of Turkey and
Israel in what is happening. Whatever happens, Syria will be a severely
crippled country, with a military force lacking any kind of advanced
weaponry and without any solid political partner or international
support. Only Turkey can firmly support HTS, pursuing its hopes of
expanding its influence in Syria and destroying the Kurdish Liberation
Movement.
But Erdogan's neo-Ottoman ambitions are already causing contradictions
with the nationalism that HTS now flaunts. In its moderate and
Western-friendly public face, HTS claims a Syria for Syrians, opening
dialogue with the diplomatic delegations that Kurdish political parties
are already sending to Damascus. But the Islamist flavour of HTS
inspires distrust in many revolutionaries. They are already calling for
the establishment of a religious morality police and Islamic courts, so
it is easy to compare their steps with those of the Taliban in
Afghanistan. But many Syrians who fled abroad during the war years,
especially to Turkey and Lebanon, but also to Europe, are returning with
hopes of a democratic Syria that may not fit with what HTS plans to do.
It is difficult to predict how all this will develop.
5.- After the withdrawal of the Syrian Arab Army from many territories,
the area occupied by the SDF has expanded greatly. How do you assess the
entry of new territories and cities? Does this represent a reinforcement
of the revolution?
This question is already outdated, the reality on the ground is changing
rapidly. It is true that with the collapse of the SAA the SDF took over
the military defence of some territories south of Raqqa as well as the
city of Deir Ezzor. Since then, Deir Ezzor city and surrounding
territories have been handed over to the HTS military operations room at
the request of the local population. Areas south of Raqqa remain under
the control of the SDF to prevent the resurgence of ISIS. At the same
time, the important city of Manbij, liberated from ISIS by the SDF in
2016, is now under Turkish influence following the occupation by
Islamist groups from the SNA. In the territories that the SDF took for
only a couple of days, there has been no time to develop local councils
and other democratic structures, so no, it is not a reinforcement for
the revolution. It was simply a move to prevent ISIS from capturing
military supplies from the regime that could have helped them in the
resurgence they are already attempting. At the same time, DAANES
political bodies had been collaborating with local political groups from
other regions, especially in Sweida. With the fall of the regime, a new
terrain for political work and alliances is opening up, and that can be
an important reinforcement for the revolution. There are also risks,
some Sunni Arab groups that were integrated into the SDF are also
defecting to HTS, but it is still early to analyze how this will
develop. Most of the Arab forces in the SDF are already making
statements reaffirming their support for the SDF and a federal Syria.
Another important element that we must reach out to now is all the
libertarian circles of the Syrian revolution and honor the legacy of
Omar Aziz, a Syrian revolutionary anarchist who died on February 16
after being imprisoned by the regime. Bringing those libertarian forces
closer to the libertarian socialist project of Rojava can be a critical
alliance to challenge the authoritarian Islamist project of HTS.
6. DAANES has contacts with the peoples of southern Syria and could the
idea of a confederation be extended to these regions? Have councils
returned anywhere in Syria or is the whole country dominated by
Islamists of different stripes?
As we have just mentioned, yes, there are political relations that go
back several years, especially in Sweida. The co-president of the Syrian
Democratic Council (SDC, the Syrian "national" political body of DAANES)
is called Evin Sweida. In several regions, especially in the south,
local councils never really disappeared, even if their work was very
limited and often clandestine. Now it is a question of how the interim
government of HTS will relate to these councils.
HTS has its stronghold in Idlib. The interim prime minister himself is
from Idlib, but in other regions HTS will have to negotiate with local
forces if it wants to build any stable system of government. The NES
self-administration has been an example of integrating different regions
into a confederal model, and the proposal for a federal Syria is on the
table. HTS wants to reorganize the centralized model of the Baath regime
with them in the central government, and their behavior in Idlib in
recent years gives clear clues as to what their ideal model would look
like. Their divide-and-rule policy, arresting leaders of other Islamist
groups and even collaborating with the United States to eliminate the
leaders of the most extremist groups, allowed them to build their
hegemony as a dominant force there. This was also helped by Turkish
support, which provided them with supply routes across the Turkish
border and placed military bases to protect them from regime attacks.
Many ethnic and religious minorities continued to organize their local
councils, and will probably not have much interest in a centralized HTS
government. Those local councils can easily gain more interest in a
confederal model inspired by what the NES is doing. Right now HTS has
the upper hand, aiming to build an Islamist authoritarian state, but
many people in Syria will not accept this. DAANES can become the
spearhead of revolutionary transformations and a confederate Syria, but
HTS, Turkey and other Islamist forces will oppose this. Right now it is
not clear how much will be discussed at a political table and how much
will be resolved on the battlefield.
7.- We have been surprised to see the volatility of the Bedouin tribes,
who change sides very quickly. Do you think they can turn against DAANES
and join HTS?
Yes, as we have said before this is already happening. Some groups in
Deir Ezzor and Raqqa are making statements to join HTS, but most groups
and tribes are reaffirming their support for SDF. For now, the group in
Raqqa that calls to join HTS is not openly opposed to DAANES. They only
want to negotiate their terms for the political transition directly with
HTS, hoping to get a better deal if they defect from the SDF and
negotiate directly with the interim government. Deir Ezzor is a bit of a
different story. Some tribes in the area were affiliated with ISIS and
had previously clashed with the Deir Ezzor Military Council. This is due
to local tribal conflicts, as these tribes had been engaged in power
struggles even before the war began. During the war they had been
switching affiliations between the regime, the FSA, ISIS and the SDF,
with the different tribes taking different sides and continuing their
internal struggles. HTS will likely try to benefit from this situation,
and SDF is well aware of this. The withdrawal of SDF forces from the
city, handing it over to HTS, was likely a negotiated diplomatic move to
show their willingness to cooperate with the transitional government.
HTS is trying to present itself as the saviors of Syria, trying to
capitalize on the dreams of the first protests in 2011. They also have a
well-designed external media strategy, harvesting the sympathies that
the Western media showed for the opposition to Bashar al-Assad.
Presenting themselves as "moderate rebels" is a clever maneuver to
legitimize themselves as state holders, with the aim of freeing
themselves from the label of terrorists and from the sanctions imposed
on them by the Western powers. Their leader now makes integrative
statements in favor of a pluralistic and democratic Syria, with
descriptions of a model strikingly similar to the one being put into
practice by DAANES. They maintain diplomatic relations with the whole
world, talk to the UN and other foreign diplomats, make promises of a
peaceful and stable Syria. But as we said in our first statement of this
war, their goal is no different from what the Taliban are doing in
Afghanistan and they will probably not keep the friendly mask for long.
8.- Now that the SNA is abiding by Manbij and Turkey is supporting it
with aviation and artillery, first, how long can it resist? And then,
what is the situation in Bakur Kurdistan?
Things are moving fast these days, Manbij is now under the occupation of
SNA groups. The resistance has been strong, with the heaviest fighting
Syria has seen in recent years, much stronger than anything HTS fought
to overthrow the government. The SDF also released for the first time
videos using FPV drones, which seems to be the new standard of any
post-invasion Ukraine battlefield. But even if the SDF is catching up
with drone warfare, the Turkish air force is something the SDF cannot
fight against, as it lacks any air defense system. Also, we cannot prove
it with numbers, but any annual budget of the entire SDF is probably
less than what the Turkish army spends in just a few days. It is already
impressive to think how much a lightly armed but well-prepared and
disciplined defence force has been able to inflict such heavy losses
against a much larger and better equipped attacker, even when the
attacker has total air supremacy. This is nothing new if we look not
only at Bakur, but also at the mountains of Bashur, where Kurdish
guerrillas have been challenging the Turkish army for decades, with
little more than their hands and a handful of AK-47s, PKMs and some kind
of home-made long-range weapons like the Zagros rifle.
But moving away from the military aspect and into the social and
political situation, the implications for Bakur remain to be seen.
Erdogan will present whatever the outcome of these new operations as a
victory, stressing the "achievement" of returning some of the 3 million
refugees living in Turkey to Syria. Erdogan also supported HTS in its
rise to the government of Syria, getting rid of an unsympathetic
Al-Assad as ruler of the neighbouring country. He will surely ask the
new government to return his investments with political favors, with the
newly opened Turkish embassy in Damascus after 12 years without one. The
repression against the civil organization of the Kurdish liberation
movement is also increasing again in Bakur. Elected mayors of Kurdish
municipalities, as well as political leaders and civil organizers, are
being arrested and imprisoned on alleged secret charges not communicated
to lawyers. Such arrests began a few days before the military operations
began and continue to this day, with dozens of new arrests every few
days. A protest camp has been set up on both sides of the border between
Turkey and Syria in the sister cities of Nusaybin-Qamishlo, and a peace
march has also begun from the city of Amed (Diyarbakir) to Ankara. Young
revolutionaries linked to the liberation movement also carried out some
direct actions, burning different Turkish state buildings.
9.- Israel advanced positions in Quneitra taking advantage of the Syrian
chaos. Hezbollah's supply line has now been disrupted. To what extent
does the fall of Assad mean the possible liquidation of Palestine and
Hezbollah?
With the collapse of the Assad regime, Iran withdrew its militias,
disrupting Hezbollah's supply lines in Lebanon. But they have already
engaged in diplomatic talks with the interim HTS government and seem
optimistic about the prospects of restoring those supply lines. As
mentioned, HTS is now making a very diplomatic outreach to everyone, and
it remains to be seen to what extent the promises they are likely making
to Iranian diplomats will be fulfilled. It is clear that Israel will try
to influence Syria's future as much as it can. They are already taking
advantage of this unstable situation to expand their occupied areas next
to the Golan Heights, with tanks and IDF troops within 30km of Damascus
with its new expanded "security zone." Israel's destruction of almost
all Syrian military capabilities is also a warning of its intentions and
capability. HTS is also showing a friendly face to Israel, stating that
it has no intentions of entering into conflict with them. This also
affects how the new Syrian interim government relates to Palestinian
militant groups. Recently, Syrian media reported that HTS had declared
that Palestinian groups would not be allowed to have weapons, banning
them from further military training on Syrian soil.
It is not clear to us to what extent these things are diplomatic moves
to calm Israel or to what extent they actually reflect HTS' intentions.
In any case, for now Syrian routes and supply lines are cut off to Iran,
and any Palestinian militant activity in Syria will likely be restricted
and closely monitored by Israel. The Lebanese Hezbollah was targeted by
very high-profile attacks, including the assassination of its leader
Hassan Nasrallah and the infiltration (and detonation) of its
communication systems. After that, Hezbollah continued to resist the
Israeli occupation in southern Lebanon and, considering the heavy blows
suffered, the resistance offered is remarkable. The ceasefire in Lebanon
signed on February 27 (the same day that the HTS offensive began)
stipulated that Hezbollah fighters would withdraw 30 km from the borders
with Israel. Cutting off its supply lines with Iran under these
conditions will undoubtedly add serious difficulties to its reorganization.
10.- Finally, in line with the last question, the greatest beneficiary
of the fall of Assadism is the Zionist state. There are many voices from
Israel calling for an alliance with DAANES or even to send it weapons to
contain both the Axis of Resistance and the Islamic fundamentalism that
already governs Syria. DAANES' alliance policy has been as pragmatic as
possible, making agreements with the United States, Russia, the regime
or with some specific militias as long as it has suited. Now, how have
you seen these alliances and how do you see a possible alliance with Israel?
As anarchists and as revolutionaries, we are totally opposed to the
genocidal policies of the State of Israel. Any alliance with them will
necessarily undermine the revolutionary project of the NES, as any
alliance with the US has already done. But as you have said, the
pragmatism of DAANES has been making moves not so much aimed at
protecting a revolutionary line, but rather at ensuring the survival of
the autonomy achieved. This is something that we will have to evaluate
and reflect on in the long term, considering to what extent it is
possible to compromise revolutionary values to ensure the continuity of
the progress achieved. Historically, anarchists prioritize the
ideological and revolutionary line over survival, which often led to the
annihilation of any anarchist revolution. We are not saying that we
always approve of the steps that self-management is taking, but it is
for sure forcing us to reflect on what we can and cannot do as part of
an ongoing revolutionary process. And, well, it is always a very
difficult decision to choose between your revolutionary principles or
the possible extermination of your people and your political movement.
We have come to Rojava to support and defend this revolution, to learn
from it, and to transfer the experiences we learn here to other
anarchist movements. The Kurdish Liberation Movement is not an anarchist
project, even though we can easily argue that their political project
aims to build a libertarian socialism. We have our voice, as they have
theirs, and we can criticize them as much as they can criticize us. For
now, they do not show serious interest in any cooperation with the State
of Israel, and they do not forget their roots when the Kurdish
Liberation Movement found refuge in the training camps of the
Palestinian revolutionary forces in the Bekka Valley. It is true that
today the Palestinian revolutionary movement is a shadow of its former
self, and we all know how much the State of Israel contributed to this.
The Palestinian resistance is now led by Islamist forces, which are
politically very far from our revolutionary goals. Still, it is our duty
to stand with the Palestinian people, in the hope that a solid
revolutionary force will emerge, ready to fight against the oppression
they suffer. It is also our duty to stand with the people of Syria,
especially the Kurds who have been denied their identity for so long,
but also the Arabs who have been brutally repressed by the Assad regime,
as well as many other minority groups such as Armenians, Assyrians,
Syriacs, Druze, Yazidis, etc.
The imposition of the nation-state model by the Western powers caused
irreparable damage to the peoples of the Middle East. The scars of
occupation and colonialism, always combined with the plundering of
resources and oil extraction, continue to bleed in those arid lands. The
model of democratic confederalism that the Kurdish movement is putting
into practice provides a radical proposal to address this, moving away
from centralized governments and borders between nation-states, the new
global standards imposed by European colonialism. Furthermore, they are
also bringing to the fore the women's revolution and the
anti-patriarchal struggle, pointing out the deep-rooted relationship of
male domination with the state mentality. Social ecology is also
highlighted as a necessity, building alternatives that escape the
destructive model of capitalism. These are all values that we, as
anarchists and as revolutionaries, have always defended. That is why we
stand shoulder to shoulder with our Kurdish and Arab comrades defending
this revolution. Of course we have our red lines, and if things go in a
direction that we cannot accept we will have to reconsider our role
here. For now, after more than seven years of fighting here, we are
confident in saying that this revolution is the greatest opportunity we
have to seriously challenge capitalism, patriarchy and the nation-state
model. It is the best opportunity we have to build a free life.
11.- Add whatever you think is appropriate.
There is not much to add. Thank you for this opportunity to share our
thoughts and perspectives. Iberian anarchism has been a reference for
libertarian movements and the Spanish revolution is an example that we
studied deeply. We are glad to build this dialogue and we hope to be
able to continue developing our relations. We are now going through
difficult times here and our focus has to be on the land we are
defending. As we said in our last statement, the regime has fallen, the
war continues. We have to strengthen our relations between anarchist
organisations and collaborate more closely with Syrian anarchists who,
like Omar Aziz, worked to build a libertarian path in the Syrian
revolution. The Rojava revolution in north-east Syria can be a model for
a new dawn, not only for Syria, but for the whole Middle East, even for
the whole world. We are ready to fight for it, ready to be a drop in the
coming storm. Make sure you are too.
https://www.regeneracionlibertaria.org/2024/12/23/entrevista-a-lucha-anarquista-sobre-la-situacion-en-siria/
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