For all of the latest developments, see these sources
Rojava Information Center:
https://rojavainformationcenter.com
ANF English:
Hawar News:
We stand in solidarity with Rojava, an example to the world
1 Nov 2019 | LaDonna Brave Bull Allard et al., The Guardian
Leaders from social movements, communities and First Nations from around the world, including LaDonna Brave Bull Allard, Eve Ensler and Stuart Basden on the Turkish invasion in north-east Syria
Turkey’s Erdoğan protected ISIS leader Baghdadi
31 Oct 2019 | David Phillips, Ahval
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan protected Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi – and U.S. President Donald Trump should have known. In his national address announcing that U.S. Special Forces killed Baghdadi, Trump commended Turkey while turning a blind eye to Turkey’s collusion with ISIS.
https://ahvalnews.com/turkey-isis/turkeys-erdogan-protected-isis-leader-baghdadi
Solidarity Message on World Resistance Day
2 Nov 2019 | Friends of Kurdistan Manchester, Facebook
Today we marked World Resistance Day in Manchester with fire. After weeks of attack by the Turkish state there is mounting evidence of illegal chemical weapons usage and war crimes against civilians, but the people of Rojava have not stopped resisting. We made sure that everyone on their way to the airport sees.
https://www.facebook.com/1716802975006725/posts/2753916241295388?vh=e&d=n&sfns=mo
Beyond good and evil: Why Europe should bring ISIS foreign fighters home
25 Oct 2019 | Anthony Dworkin, European Council on Foreign Relations
The dilemma was all too predictable. As forces fighting the Islamic State group (ISIS) succeeded in pushing it back in recent years, it was clear that they were soon likely to gain control of large numbers of the organisation’s members and followers – including many from European countries. Yet, seven months after the fall of ISIS’s last bastion in Syria, EU member states have still failed to come up with a coherent policy on how to handle the hundreds of their citizens who travelled to join the terrorist group, and who are now in the hands of the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).
Ilhan Omar and the Turkey Question
01 Nov 2019 | Djene Bajalan & Michael Brooks, Jacobin Magazine
Since her election to Congress in 2018, Minnesota representative Ilhan Omar has emerged as one of the most important progressive leaders in contemporary US politics. She has used her considerable rhetorical skills to push for Medicare for All and a Green New Deal. She has championed legislation to cancel student loan debt and provide all school children with three meals a day. Last month, she endorsed Bernie Sanders for president.
https://jacobinmag.com/2019/11/ilhan-omar-turkey-armenia-kurds-imperialism
Europe could do more to stop the Turkish invasion of Rojava, but states fear a democratic revolution
29 Oct 2019 | Ercan Ayboga (interview), Open Democracy
Following Turkey’s attack on the mainly Kurdish region of North East Syria, Ercan Ayboga spoke to us about Turkey’s racist policies, direct democracy in Rojava and the international reaction.
Fierce resistance continues in northeast Syria against Turkey’s illegal invasion
4 Nov 2019 | Tom Anderson, The Canary
Turkish-led forces invaded Rojava on 9 October. The NATO member has faced accusations of ethnic cleansing and war crimes, and its illegal invasion has so far killed over 300 civilians, created around 300,000 displaced people, and allowed hundreds of Daesh (Isis/Isil) supporters to escape detention.
Eyewitnesses to the Rojava revolution: women empowerment
4 Nov 2019 | Debbie Bookchin, Emre Sahin, Marina Sitrin, ROAR Magazine
What has been taking place in Rojava is easily one of the most inspiring and exciting experiments in autonomous self-government to ever exist. It is also one of the most massive, and gender inclusive, often compared to the Spanish Revolution of 1936, as well as the Zapatistas in Chiapas, Mexico. And yet, people outside the region know little about the different dimensions of the revolution taking place in Rojava. And now, this revolutionary territory is under military and political attack — its very existence at risk.
https://roarmag.org/essays/eyewitnesses-rojava-revolution-bookchin-sahin/
Stop Erdogan! November 13th! Protest at The White House
2 Nov 2019 | American Rojava Center for Democracy (ARCDEM)
President Erdogan of Turkey is coming to Washington, DC. It is time to stand together & oppose Erdogan’s attack on Northern Syria, Rojava. His plan of ethnic cleansing in Syria has already displaced hundreds of thousands of Kurdish, Arab, Assyrian, Yazidi, Armenian & Christian peoples, killed thousands of people with many more wounded.
http://www.arcdem.org/2019/11/stop-erdogan-november-13th-protest-at-the-white-house/
A New Middle East Is Coming
28 Oct 2019 | Conn Hallinan, Dispatches from the Edge
The fallout from the September attack on Saudi Arabia’s Aramco oil facilities is continuing to reverberate throughout the Middle East, sidelining old enmities—sometimes for new ones—and re-drawing traditional alliances. While Turkey’s recent invasion of northern Syria is grabbing the headlines, the bigger story may be that major regional players are contemplating some historic re-alignments.
https://dispatchesfromtheedgeblog.wordpress.com/2019/11/05/a-new-middle-east-is-coming/
Ken Loach in corresponds with Peace in Kurdistan and raises the Turkish invasion of Rojava on Question Time.
28 Oct 2019 | Peace in Kurdistan Campaign
“…but also what’s happened to the Kurds is appalling, I mean I’m surprised the Kurds aren’t trying to cross- they’re approaching genocide there.”
Syria Talks: Is Jaw Jaw Better Than War War?
4 Nov 2019 | Daniel Warner, Counterpunch
The opening of Geneva talks of a Syrian constitutional committee organized by the latest UN representative for Syria, Geir Pedersen, brings to mind the famous adage attributed to Winston Churchill; “It is better to jaw jaw than to war war.” One hundred fifty Syrians from the government, opposition and civil society are meeting in the city of Calvin to work on a document that will form the basis of a future “credible, inclusive, and non-sectarian” government.
https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/11/04/syria-talks-is-jaw-jaw-better-than-war-war/
Turkey ‘to send back’ ISIL prisoners even if citizenships revoked
4 Nov 2019 | Al Jazeera
Turkey will send captured ISIL members back to their countries, even if their citizenships have been revoked, Minister of Interior Suleyman Soylu has said.
Explosion in Syrian Town on Turkish Border Kills 13
2 Nov 2019 | Reuters
At least 13 people were killed and more than 30 injured in the Syrian town of Tal Abyad on Turkey’s border after a car bomb exploded in a market on Saturday, according to Turkish state media and the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Hundreds of U.S. Troops Leaving, and Also Arriving in, Syria
30 Oct 2019 | Eric Schmitt & Helene Cooper, New York Times
WASHINGTON — Every day in northeastern Syria, waves of American troops are pulling out under President Trump’s order this month that paved the way for a Turkish offensive that included assaults on the Pentagon’s allies, the Syrian Kurds.
Hundreds of thousands take part in ‘World Resistance Day’ against the Turkish invasion of Northeast Syria
3 Nov 2019 | Tom Anderson, The Canary
On Saturday 2 November, hundreds of thousands of people took part in a ‘World Resistance Day’ against the Turkish invasion of Northeast Syria (aka Rojava). Turkish-led forces invaded Rojava on 9 October. The NATO member has faced accusations of ethnic cleansing and war crimes, and its illegal invasion has so far killed over 300 civilians, created around 300,000 displaced people, and allowed hundreds of Daesh (Isis/Isil) supporters to escape detention.
Britain still exporting arms to Turkey despite evidence of chemical weapons use against civilians in Northeast Syria
2 Nov 2019 | Tom Anderson, The Canary
A volunteer doctor in northeast Syria believes that the Turkish armed forces are using chemical weapons in civilian areas.
The Importance of What Is Happening to the Kurds
31 Oct 2019 | Gâspâr Miklôs Tamâs, ANF English
The ongoing tragedy of a great people should preoccupy us all. When Hitler was asked by his acolytes whether posterity will be horrified by what the Nazis have done to the Jews, he answered, nobody remembers how the Armenians were killed in 1915. He was quite right, nobody much remembers the Armenian genocide (1.5 million dead) and the world is full of Holocaust-deniers, not to speak of those would like to complete it. The Kurds are – like the Armenians and the Jews were then – a stateless people.
https://anfenglishmobile.com/women/the-importance-of-what-is-happening-to-the-kurds-38912
Doctor presents report on use of chemical weapons in Rojava
1 Nov 2019 | ANF English
Swedish-Iranian doctor Abbas Mansouran, who has extensive experience with chemical weapons, works as a volunteer in Rojava. He has written a report in which he describes the use of chemical weapons by the Turkish army in Rojava.
Where the Russia-Turkey deal leaves players on the ground
5 Nov 2019 | Anton Mardasov, Al-Monitor
On Oct. 29, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu informed his Turkish counterpart about the earlier-than-expected withdrawal of Kurdish armed groups from the 30 kilometer security zone along the Syrian-Turkish border. “Both Syrian border guards and Russian military police have entered the area,” Shoigu said.
https://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2019/11/russia-syria-turkey-us.html
Baghdadi’s death complicates Turkey’s plan in Idlib
4 Nov 2019 | Fehim Tastekin, Al-Monitor
Although Turkey is trying to curb operations against Syrian opposition groups in Idlib, back-to-back American operations hunting down notable Islamic State (IS) members have complicated Ankara’s efforts to maintain the status quo.
Trump OKs wider Syria oil mission, raising legal questions
5 Nov 2019 | Lolita Baldor, AP
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump has approved an expanded military mission to secure an expanse of oil fields across eastern Syria, raising a number of difficult legal questions about whether U.S. troops can launch strikes against Syrian, Russian or other forces if they threaten the oil, U.S. officials said.
US role in Syria grows more complex with Trump claim to oil
31 Oct 2019 | Robert Burns & Lolita Baldor, AP
WASHINGTON — By claiming a right to Syria’s oil, President Donald Trump has added more complexity — as well as additional U.S. forces and time — to an American military mission he has twice declared he was ending so the troops could come home.
Senior Isis commander alleges Turkey’s President ordered 2014 attack on Kobane
30 Oct 2019 | Steve Sweeney, Morning Star
TURKEY’S authoritarian President Recep Tayyip Erdogan ordered the deadly 2014 jihadist attack on Kobane in northern Syria, a senior Isis commander alleged today.
Trump alleged to have withdrawn troops from Syria over Khashoggi murder
4 Nov 2019 | Steve Sweeney, Morning Star
US PRESIDENT Donald Trump may have pulled troops out of Syria because of information intercepted by Turkish intelligence alleging that Washington had approved the arrest of dissident Saudi Arabian journalist and US resident Jamal Khashoggi.