Turkey plans to launch a fresh assault on Kurdish-led North and East Syria, Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) spokesperson Farhad Shami has warned. A potential military operation is likely to target regions close to the key Syrian Kurdish city of Kobanî (Kobanê), and will further imperil the SDF’s efforts to withhold an ongoing ISIS insurgency, the representative of the US-allied, multiethnic military coalition said in comments to Channel 8 News.
“Although [the US and Russia] say they haven’t a ‘green light’ yet, the Turkish government is now looking to Russia and the United States for permission to launch another wave of attacks against Rojava [autonomous Kurdish-led North and East Syria],” Shami said.
The spokesperson went on to suggest that Turkey is particularly targeting Kobanî, not only due to the city’s global significance as the site of ISIS’ first territorial defeat, but also since it lies between two regions which Turkey was able to occupy in successive military operations aimed at rolling back gains by the SDF and preventing the establishment of Kurdish-led democratic autonomy in contiguous regions along the Syrian-Turkish border.
He explained: “Kobanî has become the key, in a symbolic sense, as a global site of resistance against ISIS. But Kobanî has also become a bridge between Tel Abyad and Jarablus for the Turkish state. We have information that the Turkish government is planning to carry out a ground attack against Rojava next summer, against which we as the SDF are making preparations in both in the military and diplomatic fields.”
The SDF remains formally allied with the US-led International Coalition to Defeat ISIS, but shifting US strategic priorities and heightening tensions driven by Israel’s war on Gaza mean this relationship is coming under further pressure, all the more so since the US has failed to prevent ongoing waves of Turkish drone strikes which have killed hundreds of key SDF commanders, civil-society and political leaders in North and East Syria, as well as obliterating key humanitarian infrastructure.
“ISIS is alive, especially in the Syrian desert,” Shami continued, calling for further international support to continue operations targeting the Islamist group. “That’s why we and our allied forces have carried out more than 79 [anti-ISIS] operations in just three months…. We are confident in ourselves and our forces’ ability to prevent an ISIS resurgence, but of course these attacks will continue.
ISIS commanders are able to use Turkish-occupied regions of Syria to attack regions under the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (AANES) with impunity, Shami said, arguing that multiple regional forces were intent on destroying the project in multi-ethnic direct democracy underway in regions defended by the SDF.
“What angers the enemy most, especially the Turkish state, the Syrian regime, and ISIS, is their fear that AANES is approaching a formal political status,” Shami said. “That’s why we’re always under attack… On the one hand, the attacks of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards against the SDF and American forces have increased, and Turkey has not stopped its attacks. Is there a plan to put North and East Syria under siege once again?”
Shami further linked Turkey’s attacks on Syria to its broader territorial objectives including in neighbouring Iraqi Kurdistan, where Turkish authorities have also signalled a coming offensive.
Speaking prior to Turkey’s recent local elections, President Erdoğan said: “We are about to complete the circle that will secure our Iraqi borders. Hopefully, this summer, we will have permanently resolved the issue regarding our Iraqi borders. Our will to create a security corridor 30-40 kilometres deep along our Syrian borders remains intact. We have preparations that will give new nightmares to those who think that they will bring Turkey to its knees with a ‘Terroristan’ along its southern borders.”
