Speaker 1: Cause Media. Hi everyone, and welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 2: It's James today and I'm joined by Jenny Keston, who's
Speaker 2: a writer, activist and someone who's been in and out
Speaker 2: of Northeast Syria for a long time working with the
Speaker 2: women's movement, and today we're going to be talking about
Speaker 2: the situation in North and East Syria since the fall
Speaker 2: of the Asad regime, some of the conflict that has
Speaker 2: been happening in the resistance of the SDF.
Speaker 1: Welcome to the show, Jenny either. Yeah, first of all,
Speaker 1: it's not sure having him really happy to be here. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you're welcome, of course.
Speaker 2: So I think if we start off, people have been
Speaker 2: messaging me a lot of various platforms about the letter
Speaker 2: that abdulah or Jerland wrote, and I don't want to
Speaker 2: dress that in its entirety today because we've got something
Speaker 2: coming up on that we're going to talk to some
Speaker 2: people from the Freedom for Abdullah campaign, but I do
Speaker 2: want to use it as a jumping off point because
Speaker 2: I think it a has reminded people, as we spoke
Speaker 2: about before the show, that not the Syria exists and
Speaker 2: the SDF exists, which has been largely missing, and like
Speaker 2: the legacy media reporting on Syria, but be like, there's
Speaker 2: been atrocious reporting on what it means for the SDF,
Speaker 2: even though there's a very clear answer to that. So
Speaker 2: for people who have you been reading papers which either
Speaker 2: just ignore the existence of the FDF entirely or speculate
Speaker 2: as to what they're going to do when they've given
Speaker 2: a very clear answer, could.
Speaker 1: You explain to people like where this leaves the SDF.
Speaker 3: Yeah, sure, no, So thanks for that, And yeah, I've
Speaker 3: also been gay a lot of questions about chans later
Speaker 3: and I'm really glad to hear that you guys are
Speaker 3: going to do a program on it, because Western media
Speaker 3: wants to divorce it in this way. It's very snazzy
Speaker 3: and there's like bolts with the blue and something crazy
Speaker 3: has happening. Really, it's unfortunately it has to actually be
Speaker 3: talking about in a kind of more long term and
Speaker 3: intelligent way that sets the context and like, yeah, puts
Speaker 3: that and makes things a bit more clear because it
Speaker 3: is something with the background and it's connected to a
Speaker 3: lot of things, and of course that whole political process
Speaker 3: that Johan's recent statement is a part of, it's going
Speaker 3: to affect the situation here in northern East Siria, because
Speaker 3: the situation here a lot of the time depends on
Speaker 3: the actions of the Turkish state and on expansionism an
Speaker 3: aggression from there, and so as the political situation shouldn't changes,
Speaker 3: it will affect that. What it is not is like
Speaker 3: a call or a statement that means that the SDF
Speaker 3: has to lay down their arms and start this thing.
Speaker 3: This is for several reasons, absolutely not what it is.
Speaker 3: The main one of those being that the SDF is not,
Speaker 3: and never has been, the PAA, and that's something that
Speaker 3: they've tried many times over the years to made very clear,
Speaker 3: but unfortunately hasn't always been like heard and acknowledged.
Speaker 1: And so whatever this statement means.
Speaker 3: That you guys will go into that in your program,
Speaker 3: whatever it is for the PKKA. But the situation not
Speaker 3: fair to stand. It's a different situation here, and so
Speaker 3: the SDF is in a moment of like question and
Speaker 3: a big change. But it's much more to do with
Speaker 3: what's been happening in Syria politically and to do with
Speaker 3: the government and the interim government had said, yeah, government
Speaker 3: that installed themselves here and the regime things, and of
Speaker 3: course the ongoing war and situation of invasions that they're facing.
Speaker 3: So there's a lot of big questions for the SCF.
Speaker 3: But I think it's important right now that we don't
Speaker 3: kind of confuse and misunderstand with the sort of parallel
Speaker 3: process that's going on.
Speaker 2: Yeah, definitely, And I think if people are hearing this
Speaker 2: and you're new to the show, this is your first
Speaker 2: time hearing the sea of acronyms.
Speaker 1: That is the Kurdish Freedom movement.
Speaker 2: I coadereict you to The Women's War, which is a
Speaker 2: series that Robert made. I have a book, but you
Speaker 2: can't read it yet, still editing it. Or you could
Speaker 2: listen to one of our numerous if you search for
Speaker 2: a Java or Northern East Syria or Syria in our feed,
Speaker 2: I'm sure you'll find a lot to explain those acronyms
Speaker 2: to you. But yeah, we've had this situation right where
Speaker 2: since December, the situation in Syria has drastically change and
Speaker 2: we now have two state actors.
Speaker 1: Well, we have lots of stay active.
Speaker 2: We always had lots of state actors intervening in Syria,
Speaker 2: but we have this new state actor in the Syrian
Speaker 2: state right And I think people if they're you know,
Speaker 2: if they're like reading the New York Times or god forbid,
Speaker 2: seeing Charles Lister, then that they'll have a certain vision
Speaker 2: of this that sort of exempts the SDF.
Speaker 1: It sort of just ignores this.
Speaker 2: Whole area of Syria and says like, oh, well, the
Speaker 2: Syrian Revolution has succeeded. I think we should address, like
Speaker 2: what has happened to the SDF to northern East Syria
Speaker 2: since the collapse of the ASAD regime in December.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so obviously what's happened to Aysyia in.
Speaker 3: Northern Assyria and t SDF is very connected to the
Speaker 3: whole overall stereo process, And you're right when you hear
Speaker 3: the reporting on it, I think lots of parts of
Speaker 3: it can get erased in kind of depending who's talking
Speaker 3: and what their angle is or whatever.
Speaker 1: There are a lot of things left out not just
Speaker 1: occurred in North.
Speaker 3: Of East Syria, but other minority ethnic groups or like
Speaker 3: women organizing across Syria, like all of these things. It's
Speaker 3: a very complex situation which I won't pretend I can
Speaker 3: completely lay out and summarize for everyone in five minutes.
Speaker 3: But yeah, what you did have was the culmination the
Speaker 3: end of a period and a massive change when as
Speaker 3: you say, there was a regime change, there was a
Speaker 3: change of government, and that happened with this like offensive
Speaker 3: sweeping down from Idland to Damascus, succeeding in taking over
Speaker 3: the government in Damascus from the Asad family, which was
Speaker 3: the end of a sixty one year rain, which caused
Speaker 3: absolute jubilation. It's safe to say all across Syria, and
Speaker 3: that includes where I am, and none from Syria because anyway,
Speaker 3: just yeah, people were very happy in celebrating. But also
Speaker 3: there were cities here. When you look at the map
Speaker 3: and you see this like semi autonomous region, what you
Speaker 3: had to understand was that there were actually within the cities,
Speaker 3: there were neighborhoods and sections that were still under the
Speaker 3: Asad government. It wasn't as simple as like the whole
Speaker 3: city is in the autonomous administration.
Speaker 1: So here as well, even there were still.
Speaker 3: Statutes of a Sad and people took the streets and
Speaker 3: tore them down, and really close to actually where I'm
Speaker 3: recording this today, there's a roundabout where they took down
Speaker 3: the statue of a Sad and it's been replaced by
Speaker 3: pictures of the martyrs of people who have fallen fighting
Speaker 3: for the autonomy of the region here and fighting for
Speaker 3: their political system.
Speaker 1: So you know, it's very very beautiful.
Speaker 3: People celebrated and more happy with a qualifier, with a
Speaker 3: very big qualifier, you know. So that jails opened as
Speaker 3: well and the flags went up, and yeah, it was
Speaker 3: a real moment of jubilation, celebration. But unfortunately the force
Speaker 3: which eventually succeeded in toppling a SAD and installing itself
Speaker 3: as the now as they're saying, the interim or transitional
Speaker 3: government of Syria, you know, we can say it was
Speaker 3: not one of the many like progressive democratic alternative forces
Speaker 3: the originally in the uprisings the SA government, yeah, back
Speaker 3: in twenty and eleven. Since then, things have changed. And
Speaker 3: isn't a podcast directly about that. I'm sure you guys
Speaker 3: speak about it as well at other times. But instead
Speaker 3: what you have is hts who are kind of conglomerate
Speaker 3: militia of these different militia groups. There's another acronym for
Speaker 3: you there names I.
Speaker 1: Think, yeah, three languages acronyms. Pointing people to resources is.
Speaker 3: Always very useful, and they are kind of mixed up
Speaker 3: amalgamation of different militias who are operating in Syria, and
Speaker 3: what's crucial to say about them is.
Speaker 1: That they're you know, their political background and perspective. A
Speaker 1: lot of people in these organizations.
Speaker 3: Are like really really similar unfortunately and all too familiar
Speaker 3: to the people here who fought against ISIS, the Islamic State,
Speaker 3: because they're coming from similar backgrounds, and also to al
Speaker 3: Qaeda and the organizations who were kind of the Syrian
Speaker 3: branches of al Qaeda.
Speaker 1: But like, yeah, I've played a really direct role.
Speaker 3: In finding and they want to now sort of put
Speaker 3: on a new face, put on a suit, go out
Speaker 3: and shake the world's hand and become world statesmen from
Speaker 3: the government, which unfortunately it looks like all of our
Speaker 3: governments are all too willing to very quickly accept.
Speaker 1: And we'll get in a minute.
Speaker 3: We can talk a bit specifically about the roles and
Speaker 3: almost your listeners are in the States, so that the
Speaker 3: American government has been playing here. But yes, so there's
Speaker 3: a big qualifier on how much people are celebrating because
Speaker 3: of the very dodgy history and the real like threat
Speaker 3: the xcs's politics holds unfortunately, particularly for ethnic and minorities,
Speaker 3: on women, and they're establishing their power and it's by
Speaker 3: no means a kind of non violent or peaceful process,
Speaker 3: and there's a lot of tensions flaring up with a
Speaker 3: lot of problems. However, yes, it is the case that
Speaker 3: in a lot of Syria, the majority of Syria outright,
Speaker 3: like warfare on the ground as for an asstop because
Speaker 3: there's one group have taken power and so we're in
Speaker 3: a different moment, We're in a different process. So what's
Speaker 3: different up here, what's different up in the north and east,
Speaker 3: and what's not being discussed as much. And the point
Speaker 3: that I'm often trying to make, what I'm trying to
Speaker 3: write articles and doing interviews at the moment, is that like,
Speaker 3: actually the war in the whole of Syria has not
Speaker 3: completely stopped. Yea, mostly yes, you can say in most regions,
Speaker 3: but significantly here in northern Eastyria. It's not just that
Speaker 3: there is still classes or flare ups between different groups
Speaker 3: like there might be in other regions. There is like
Speaker 3: a full scale invasion, a ground invasion with air.
Speaker 1: Support that has also been going on. Yeah, and that
Speaker 1: was tied. Where has that come from? Like what is that?
Speaker 1: Ones that look like this is another group another history
Speaker 1: letter Drinn for you.
Speaker 3: But the important thing to understand is that this offensive
Speaker 3: was tying to coincide with the HCS takeover it. FCS
Speaker 3: also has a lot of links with the Perkish state,
Speaker 3: and I wouldn't I personally would bot goose with bars
Speaker 3: to say that that government is a Turkish public government
Speaker 3: or that the relationship is that direct, But there is
Speaker 3: a relationship, and what you saw when they kind of
Speaker 3: successfully went on the offensive was at the same time,
Speaker 3: other armed groups which operate are kind of loosely affiliated
Speaker 3: and mostly operating on a mercenaries of a paid basis
Speaker 3: rather than being kind of ideologically driven or whatever, but
Speaker 3: are affiliated under the name the SNA, the Syrian National Army,
Speaker 3: which is even more confusing because they're not and were
Speaker 3: never the National Army of Syria what they are, and
Speaker 3: yet these paid militias, which yeah, we can describe if
Speaker 3: he might describe as hard as gangs, mercenaries, et cetera,
Speaker 3: et cetera. And it kind of depends that it's like
Speaker 3: a mix of different forces. What's very important there is
Speaker 3: the very close relationship that they have with the Turkey
Speaker 3: state that essentially the Turkish government has made the choice
Speaker 3: that it wants to continue its.
Speaker 1: Aggression and its expansionism on not.
Speaker 3: Any Syria and the other than immediately sending their own army,
Speaker 3: they instead pay and fund and direct and support these
Speaker 3: militias who are also operating for their own benefit. Yes,
Speaker 3: but the relationship between them their actions right now in
Speaker 3: the Turkish.
Speaker 1: State is much more direct.
Speaker 3: So at the same time as you have this this
Speaker 3: sweep to the south that caused the agni change at
Speaker 3: Sivia heading to the east, so originally the reason Zeppa
Speaker 3: followed by city at Mintage in the region around there,
Speaker 3: you have this onslaught from the essay and that is
Speaker 3: what the SDF you originally mentioned are currently up against.
Speaker 3: And that's the situation that we're in, and it's it's
Speaker 3: still ongoing. It's very much not stopped. It's still much
Speaker 3: very much like hot engagement and hot fighting that is happening.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And it's like sometimes to introduce another econom we
Speaker 2: use like TFSA to refer to some of those groups
Speaker 2: like the Turkish Free Syrian Army and that they're essentially
Speaker 2: an operation by the Turkey state to co operate what
Speaker 2: was initially a democratic grassroots revolution more than a decade ago.
Speaker 2: And like if you haven't been following I suppose it
Speaker 2: would be easy to be confused by this, but the
Speaker 2: SNA have not been backwards in documenting their war crimes
Speaker 2: in the advance towards I guess, their advanced westwards towards
Speaker 2: the Euphrates and even over the Euphrates, and there have
Speaker 2: been some really horrible things, some of them, like I've
Speaker 2: shared online if people want to. They're not hard to
Speaker 2: find if you want to find them, but are not
Speaker 2: going to put them right in front of you because
Speaker 2: they're horrible. And as the SNA have advanced, they've reached
Speaker 2: a couple of locations that are very crucial, right, and
Speaker 2: that's where they've been kind of stopped by the SDF,
Speaker 2: because the SDF haven't been in like such a large
Speaker 2: sale conflict for the last couple of years. They've been
Speaker 2: fighting against like Islamic State splinter cells, and to a
Speaker 2: degree the SNA that, like the SDF, has modernized a
Speaker 2: lot more than the SNA have I guess in the
Speaker 2: past years, right, they've embraced the use of first person
Speaker 2: few drones. They've even shut down several Turkish Biractar drones,
Speaker 2: which they previously If they have the ability to do
Speaker 2: it then then they weren't able to use that ability
Speaker 2: until very recently. So like they in a sense, their
Speaker 2: resistance has been very impressive, right because we have on
Speaker 2: the one hand, it's the second largest army in NATO
Speaker 2: giving its like full support to the SNA and on
Speaker 2: the other hand we have the FDF, which is interior
Speaker 2: US partner Force. Right there are US bases still in Syria,
Speaker 2: there are US troops still in Syria. Well yeah, for now,
Speaker 2: But like I mean, I remember when I was in
Speaker 2: Java in October twenty twenty three, the US shot down
Speaker 2: a Birector drone over a US base, and then it
Speaker 2: did not shoot down the dozens of other Birector drones
Speaker 2: that were bombing the cities the city that you're in
Speaker 2: right now, city that I was in, other cities. You know,
Speaker 2: I met a mother who had lost her fourteen year
Speaker 2: old son to one of these drone bombings, really like
Speaker 2: horrific and just cruel bombing of one of very clearly
Speaker 2: civilian targets. So like, the US is there, but they're
Speaker 2: not doing anything to help. Supposedly their friends, supposed their partners,
Speaker 2: and like every interview I conducted began with like five
Speaker 2: minutes of me being asked why the Americans weren't being
Speaker 2: friends when the SDF had been friends to them in
Speaker 2: the battle against ISIS, And like, that's not something you
Speaker 2: have a good explanation for other than like, I think
Speaker 2: most Courtish people can understand the difference between people and
Speaker 2: government and people and state, and like, I might have
Speaker 2: a belief, but it's not the same as the government
Speaker 2: of the US. So can you explain the role of
Speaker 2: the US here because people will be very confused, right,
Speaker 2: And I think it's easy to sort of simplify this
Speaker 2: as like America is in Syria for oil, but there's
Speaker 2: a little bit more to it than that, right.
Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely, And again it's it's such a.
Speaker 1: Big question, and it's a question of how far back
Speaker 1: do you go? How far do you zoom out?
Speaker 3: In both as you keep moving back from today, the
Speaker 3: plot kind of thickens and as you you know, if
Speaker 3: you imagine if you're looking at the Google maps Asteria
Speaker 3: and then you you click them button, the takes you
Speaker 3: out and out and the map gets wider and wider.
Speaker 3: The story kind of fills itself in as well. Like
Speaker 3: that seems to make more sense when they are put
Speaker 3: in that context, and I think a good place to
Speaker 3: start maybe is, Yeah, this consistent for a long time,
Speaker 3: like American attitude to this whole region, not just Syria,
Speaker 3: which is to play yet to play very carefully to
Speaker 3: your advantage and make a lines is where it suits
Speaker 3: you and continue to where it suits you and not
Speaker 3: stick to them.
Speaker 1: Where it doesn't. And that is. Yeah.
Speaker 3: One aspect of that is the resources which goes further
Speaker 3: than just oil, is also gas and is also the
Speaker 3: resource of the space to create a trade group, right, Like,
Speaker 3: that's a really important question in the Middle East at
Speaker 3: the moment, and it's one of the reasons that Kurdistan
Speaker 3: is such an important place politically. A lot of these
Speaker 3: lines of potential trade roots and these kind of lines
Speaker 3: of power and money they intercept and they cross over here.
Speaker 3: So there are all these different like resources at play.
Speaker 3: And I think another thing that's important to look at
Speaker 3: is that, Yeah, the the US as the US government
Speaker 3: as you put it, as as distinct from the citizens
Speaker 3: in anyway, doesn't just go into this blind and kind
Speaker 3: of react day by day. It's not like a reactive
Speaker 3: force in the world. The US government is and would
Speaker 3: you know, proudly announced I think as well with the
Speaker 3: creey thing on this one point, that they are, no
Speaker 3: matter who the administration is and where it's politically leaning
Speaker 3: at the time, a very proactive force. They have a
Speaker 3: plan where that they go and they try and put
Speaker 3: it into practice. And famously, historically and very intensely, a
Speaker 3: lot of that has played out in the Middle East
Speaker 3: because of the Middle East position in the world resources
Speaker 3: and the role that it's played in kind of who
Speaker 3: gets to be the big dog in the world over
Speaker 3: the years and throughout history, it's become for those various
Speaker 3: reasons like very important and so yeah, again without it's
Speaker 3: many podcasts of its own, and I'm sure you are
Speaker 3: making them, so I won't try and like summarize it,
Speaker 3: but I think you can't talk about America's role in
Speaker 3: Syria in the Middle East in.
Speaker 1: General without mentioning like Israel and the role Israeli state.
Speaker 3: Place for for and with America and things like, you know,
Speaker 3: we're all sort of following and for you guys following
Speaker 3: more closely. People were all following the current Americans administration
Speaker 3: and leadership and what's been coming out of there, and
Speaker 3: sometimes you think, like God, is it just not when
Speaker 3: you look at something like you know, the video for
Speaker 3: like the new Gaza that we're going to make for example, Yeah,
Speaker 3: and Trump Trump's Gaza.
Speaker 1: Whatever that was.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, So I mean it makes it sick. And
Speaker 3: then you're also not sure if it's it's serious or
Speaker 3: if it's mad. But I think unfortunately it's actually Yeah,
Speaker 3: it's quite an intelligent play. And what it speaks to
Speaker 3: that is relevant to what I'm saying here is this
Speaker 3: kind of long term plat right that to annihilate a
Speaker 3: region into the best of your ability so that you
Speaker 3: can move in and develop. It is a tried and
Speaker 3: tested method of many many governments, and so America is
Speaker 3: not the only one. But at the moment we're at
Speaker 3: kind of crucial moment in the Middle East when one
Speaker 3: sort of wall of forces are trying to greatly reduce
Speaker 3: the role and power of some others so that they
Speaker 3: can put.
Speaker 1: Their plan into place and so that they can yeah
Speaker 1: they can, so they can make money.
Speaker 3: You know, we always were following money and where development
Speaker 3: can be made and where trade routes can be made.
Speaker 3: And so what happened the tiny of the regime change
Speaker 3: that we've just discussed, the timing of HTS being able
Speaker 3: to move into the Masters and take it over. It's
Speaker 3: no coincidence that it came after like a shift in
Speaker 3: the Israeli like genocidal war on Gaza, and after what
Speaker 3: the then military action they were taking against Tesbola and Lebanon,
Speaker 3: which they felt then had up to a point achieved
Speaker 3: what they wanted to achieve, and then things kind of
Speaker 3: moved to Syria, right, So I'm not saying that the
Speaker 3: new government has kind of come from has been sponsored
Speaker 3: by that at all. I think there's a huge amount
Speaker 3: of tension there, but the withdrawal of like the weakening
Speaker 3: and or withdrawal of forces to Iran and Hezbela here
Speaker 3: played a huge role with then being able to establish
Speaker 3: themselves as a government. So that is also something that
Speaker 3: you know that's not directly necessarily every step sort of
Speaker 3: kind of puppeteered by the US at all, but it
Speaker 3: is a part of the politics that the US has
Speaker 3: had a long historical influence on and that it backs
Speaker 3: and that it's in conversation is in the whole of
Speaker 3: the Middle East. It's this kind of greater Middle East plan.
Speaker 3: It's vision for it, if you if you will, and
Speaker 3: The other aspect that I think is important to talk
Speaker 3: about is the US's relationship with North and East Sria,
Speaker 3: specifically you mentioned they're like, you know, there's like supposed
Speaker 3: friendship with We can say that like friendship with the
Speaker 3: Kurds as people will refer to it, or the alliance
Speaker 3: and coalition between the SDF and the US, which was
Speaker 3: sort of most most famous and most well known during
Speaker 3: the fight against ISIS when the international coalition it's always
Speaker 3: the spearheaded by America was bombing and providing air support
Speaker 3: for the SDF as the as they pulled it, the
Speaker 3: boots on the ground, the actual brand force that could
Speaker 3: go and take territory back from ISIS, which yes, did
Speaker 3: look like a kind of did look like a friendship.
Speaker 1: But I think from both.
Speaker 3: Sides, everyone always knew that that was a practical alliance,
Speaker 3: perhaps perhaps a strategic alliance at best, we can say,
Speaker 3: but I think that the US has not got a
Speaker 3: history of operating on a basis as like friendship or
Speaker 3: of that kind of commitment to the forces it works with,
Speaker 3: and a lot of history and modern recent history can
Speaker 3: attest to that. And from the side of people here,
Speaker 3: I think it's really important to say that, yeah, people
Speaker 3: were angry and that you know what you heard.
Speaker 1: You were talking about interviewing people and then kind of
Speaker 1: being like, well, what are they doing?
Speaker 3: Like we we fought all with them, partly on their
Speaker 3: behalf like and then they deserve.
Speaker 1: Yes, people are angry, but the more kind of.
Speaker 3: Politically engaged someone is sort of moving up that scale.
Speaker 3: I think the less faith they ever had in the US. Yeah. So,
Speaker 3: and now you've got the US kind of muttering about
Speaker 3: withdrawing their troops from Syria. Right and as Daja who
Speaker 3: because they said this before, I was actually here when
Speaker 3: they said this reportant back in twenty nineteen. I also
Speaker 3: happened to be in northern East Syria, and it was
Speaker 3: if I'm not wrong, it was Trump again. If I
Speaker 3: turned out and they said we were drawing our forces
Speaker 3: from Syria, did they actually withdraw Not exactly.
Speaker 1: No.
Speaker 3: You still saw them driving around in big cars, mostly
Speaker 3: right next to the oil fields.
Speaker 1: It was a bit it was almost tomical, sort of
Speaker 1: like when.
Speaker 3: Part and parts next to the oil fields. But that
Speaker 3: withdrawal was symbolic. That withdrawal was they withdrew from bases
Speaker 3: right on the border with Turkey, which lies just to
Speaker 3: the north of Syria and as such just nets to
Speaker 3: north of eas Syria for anyone without the the map
Speaker 3: immediately in their head. And they announced it very very
Speaker 3: clearly and very publicly, and so it was a kind
Speaker 3: of it was a green flag to say to Turkey.
Speaker 1: Yeah, on you come, Yeah, we're not going to stop you.
Speaker 3: We're not gonna because what you don't want to do
Speaker 3: is hit an American by accident, as you gave the examples.
Speaker 3: They you know, they brought down a drum, but it
Speaker 3: was over an American base, not because it was bombing
Speaker 3: civilians nearby, which dozens of other were, and so that
Speaker 3: you had that kind of symbolic withdrawal which led to
Speaker 3: in twenty nineteen, it's one of the times that Turkey
Speaker 3: has like annexed section essentially annexed a section of Syria
Speaker 3: North and East Syria under the remit of the Autonomous Administration,
Speaker 3: but nonetheless still technically Syrian territory. And in that time
Speaker 3: it was Surah, Khania and.
Speaker 1: Gerrispi, which people may have heard of.
Speaker 3: And so that, yeah, that was the like green flag
Speaker 3: to Turkey to take that step and at that time, yeah,
Speaker 3: maybe share it's a lot of a lot of political stuff,
Speaker 3: a lot of acrogyms, a lot of all this, and maybe.
Speaker 1: I'll just share a be anecdote.
Speaker 3: Yeah, at that time and when they made the announcement
Speaker 3: they were going to leave, people organized a march to
Speaker 3: an American base and I was here at the time
Speaker 3: and I joined it with some of the women's organizations.
Speaker 1: It was the most amazing day. Like I sort of
Speaker 1: went home and wrote this massive.
Speaker 3: Journal aniti because I've already been here for a very
Speaker 3: long time, but my mind was still a bit blown
Speaker 3: by it. For one thing, it was such an example
Speaker 3: of how the social movement here works and what society
Speaker 3: is like and all the complexities, because yeah, a lot
Speaker 3: of people here are very wedded to the liberatory, progressive, grassroots, democratic,
Speaker 3: women's readom ecological movement that I'm sure you've spoken about
Speaker 3: in your programs on Rasjava, and thousands and thousands of
Speaker 3: people completely take ownership of that and see themselves in
Speaker 3: that and are the driving fossil that. Obviously, that doesn't
Speaker 3: mean every single person here one sold on covement at all.
Speaker 1: Yeah, some of them are trying to get on with life.
Speaker 1: Some of them just trying to get on with life.
Speaker 3: Some of them are you know, I mean, if you
Speaker 3: talk about women's freedom, there's always going to be.
Speaker 1: Really few men or a bit like what does this
Speaker 1: mean for me? What do I have to give up?
Speaker 1: So it would be sick, it would be silly and
Speaker 1: new topics to say that everyone's top we sold.
Speaker 3: However, nobody wants to get invented by one of the
Speaker 3: largest armies in NATO. Yeah, so you had this sort
Speaker 3: of actually even broader than usual kind of coming together,
Speaker 3: like groups from the sort of like tribal clan structures
Speaker 3: here that are still like in really political force and
Speaker 3: that don't you know, have a kind of uneasy truth
Speaker 3: and sort of slowly learning each other relationship with the movement,
Speaker 3: you can say, but they really came out in force
Speaker 3: as well as well as like the Courdish movement as
Speaker 3: well as like lots of different ethnic groups. And we marched,
Speaker 3: And to be honest, I didn't know we were going
Speaker 3: through an American based A lot of people didn't. It
Speaker 3: was quite confusing dates because I think it want to
Speaker 3: announce things too widely until they got there. Yeah, and
Speaker 3: we went and did this kind of the Yeah, they
Speaker 3: like read out a letter symbolically, I think in some
Speaker 3: of the Arabic community leaders went up to the base
Speaker 3: and we the majority of people. There's got hundreds of
Speaker 3: hundred of people in this crowd, and they stayed back
Speaker 3: at a distance. And I found out later that that
Speaker 3: is because the American soldiers said, if two bigger groups
Speaker 3: of people come close, we will like we will open fire.
Speaker 3: Like that that information was given. Yeah, I don't know
Speaker 3: what they were scared of. You know, it's like like
Speaker 3: any mart here. The people in the front row are
Speaker 3: always rant, yeah, yeah, old ladies. Yeahs no different on
Speaker 3: that day. I mean, they're a bit scary, to be said.
Speaker 3: I don't think that it's a bit embarrassing if the
Speaker 3: American solders would together, but that stuff of it's just
Speaker 3: but while we were there by like your chance, the
Speaker 3: fleet of not tacks but big armored cars rolled in
Speaker 3: and there was just this moment I really.
Speaker 1: Clearly remember, and just kind of pause and they.
Speaker 3: Rolled through the crowd, and the crowd parted and turned
Speaker 3: and looked, and nobody teared or clapped.
Speaker 1: Obviously there was no.
Speaker 3: Sense of oh it's the Americans, right, yeah, but nobody
Speaker 3: sort of through, you know, for anything else. Through insults
Speaker 3: or chanted anything negative either. There was just this stillness
Speaker 3: and this really palpable energy of this kind of sense
Speaker 3: of people looking at you know, obviously they're just these
Speaker 3: soldiers that happened to be driving these trucks, but they
Speaker 3: really symbolized something more than that, and people were kind
Speaker 3: of looking sort of insisting that you looked them in
Speaker 3: the eye, saying like, hey, if anyone owes anyone, you
Speaker 3: owe us after everything we.
Speaker 1: Fought for and everything we've done.
Speaker 2: Yeah, thirteen thousand marches they were called exactly, exactly.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so many people lost in the fight against IIST
Speaker 3: and so much like blood and sweat and tears given,
Speaker 3: and there was just, yeah, this palpable sense of like,
Speaker 3: at least have the decency to kind of look at us.
Speaker 1: And admit what you're doing, because you know what you're doing.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and it really, yeah, it really felt it was.
Speaker 3: It's very kind of moving at the time, and that
Speaker 3: I feel like it's very symbolic into politics here of
Speaker 3: how you know, someone asking the other day what was
Speaker 3: it like for people to rely on America knowing that
Speaker 3: they betrayed them, and I said, well, they didn't, They
Speaker 3: never relied on them. You know, I was relying on
Speaker 3: but you know, there's that kind of the expectation of
Speaker 3: at least some sense of dignity. That is a very
Speaker 3: important concept for people here in dignity and yeah, so yeah,
Speaker 3: that that is I always remember that that would yeah
Speaker 3: say again, I know it's confusing. That was five five
Speaker 3: and a half years ago now and now you've got
Speaker 3: this sort of is history repeating itself. They're talking about
Speaker 3: the troops, but I think it's important to understand what
Speaker 3: that means. What that means is they're talking about potentially
Speaker 3: giving a greed of blag for more military aggression, and
Speaker 3: I think they kind of haven't decided yet it's really
Speaker 3: going to do it. And there's a lot of things
Speaker 3: in the balance and in terms of I'll just say
Speaker 3: one more, one more thing.
Speaker 1: And it gets a bit longer.
Speaker 3: In terms of like the plan for Syria and America's role,
Speaker 3: like this is my opinion. I can't say for sure
Speaker 3: that this is the definite reality, but my understanding in
Speaker 3: the situation is that once again people here in this
Speaker 3: movement are kind of caught between a rock and a
Speaker 3: hard place, And the rock and the hard place now
Speaker 3: looks like you've got the new government that set itself
Speaker 3: up in Damascus. Yes, and their goal is they can
Speaker 3: wangle it and get the outside of international support, is
Speaker 3: to build your sort of socially at least, if not politically.
Speaker 1: The model is going to look a bit like Afghanistan
Speaker 1: and the Colabat right.
Speaker 3: Like from the signs of changes they've made to the constitution,
Speaker 3: incidents of like violence, sectarianism and feminist side have been rising.
Speaker 3: Attacks they've already made on women's rights, like very rapidly,
Speaker 3: and things that have been put in like the president
Speaker 3: and that legally has to be a Muslim, all of
Speaker 3: this stuff.
Speaker 1: That's sort of their plan. But on the other hand,
Speaker 1: I think if.
Speaker 3: You kind of let the America government lose on Syria
Speaker 3: to build up its fan at the moment, I think
Speaker 3: they are seeing an opportunity to use this kind of
Speaker 3: formula from Iraq into Yeah, and I think they want
Speaker 3: to create this sort very open to capitalist market who
Speaker 3: trade kind of space in which the North and East
Speaker 3: area with the majority, though not entirely Curtis, can sort
Speaker 3: of play this role that the Kurdistan region of Iraq
Speaker 3: has played.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't know what you call it, Like a
Speaker 2: safe conduit to capital. Like it's a very stark difference
Speaker 2: if people haven't traveled that part of the world to
Speaker 2: be in pol A Bill and then to cross into Rajava,
Speaker 2: that you can see the impact that a decade of
Speaker 2: that being the safe place to have your oil company
Speaker 2: headquarters has had on the Ghatstan regional government. Yeah, I'm
Speaker 2: better move on if before we finish up, I want
Speaker 2: to talk about the current manifestation of resistance, right and
Speaker 2: specifically at Tishering Dam, because that's something that A has
Speaker 2: been reported on and B like it mirrors what you
Speaker 2: saw in twenty nineteen, and that like it's not just
Speaker 2: a military resistance, right, but also like a civil size
Speaker 2: society resistance. Can you explain maybe if people have seen anything,
Speaker 2: they've seen that horrible video of people dancing and then
Speaker 2: SNA drone just dropping a mortar bomb right in the
Speaker 2: middle of them.
Speaker 1: But can you explain how we got there?
Speaker 3: Yeah, of course, Now, yeah, great, I'm glad you asked
Speaker 3: at that, because in some sense it's you know, there
Speaker 3: is horrible stuff in there. But this is the this
Speaker 3: is the beautiful bit, This is the great bit, the
Speaker 3: bit that yeah, we should be.
Speaker 1: Talking about at the moment.
Speaker 3: So yeah, the Tishing Dam is a big tydro electric
Speaker 3: facility that is on the Euflates River. If you look
Speaker 3: at a map, Asia Euplets is kind of in the
Speaker 3: middle of the top and that is the region roughly
Speaker 3: where there's offensive that we spoke out of the Turkish
Speaker 3: funded militias, which has come from the west across to
Speaker 3: the east, at times closer and further away from the river,
Speaker 3: and currently like a few kilometers away, that's where that
Speaker 3: offensive has been stopped by the FDA and cannot progress
Speaker 3: any further despite intensive air support from Turkey, and they're
Speaker 3: sort of increasingly putting pressure on that, but it hasn't
Speaker 3: got anywhere.
Speaker 1: But it's close, right, you know.
Speaker 3: It's not too far away, and people are following the
Speaker 3: news and what's right on the other side. If you
Speaker 3: get across the river, there there's the dam, and then
Speaker 3: there's a bridge further to the north of Krakos out bridge.
Speaker 1: That's similarly kind of crucial.
Speaker 3: And if you get across the river, you're not far away.
Speaker 3: It's all from the city of Kabani, which I'm sure
Speaker 3: most of your lessons will heard of. Is this massively
Speaker 3: important symbol of anti fashion resistance. It was one of
Speaker 3: the ignition points of the revolution for the social movement
Speaker 3: here and it was really important a plight against ISIS.
Speaker 3: And I think it's safe to say that Turkey via
Speaker 3: the SNA had its eye on Kabani again and that
Speaker 3: this is in fact an attack on Kabani which has
Speaker 3: been kind of held back. And so the dam is
Speaker 3: important symbolically as this like strategic river crossing. It's this
Speaker 3: kind of no paths that are like they will not
Speaker 3: pass moment. It's also important logistically, like for the society
Speaker 3: here because it's a hydro electric facility. It supplies electricity,
Speaker 3: helps with the supply of water for various reasons for
Speaker 3: thousands and thousands of people. It's now out of action
Speaker 3: might go without saying, but when you're in the middle
Speaker 3: of an active war zone, you can't keep running a
Speaker 3: place like that. So that is directly attacking and impacting
Speaker 3: the society and normal communities here, and so yeah, it's
Speaker 3: no wonder that those normal communities and that society but
Speaker 3: always feel very very implicated and are kind of ready
Speaker 3: to to stand up and defend themselves. It's not as yeah,
Speaker 3: the military assault is not kept separate from the society,
Speaker 3: and the society is also under attached indirectly attacks on
Speaker 3: infrastructure such as that, and directly by like drone strikes
Speaker 3: on many many civilian targets.
Speaker 1: Unfortunately. Yeah, in recent.
Speaker 3: Times that has increased, particularly in villages surrounding Banni, and
Speaker 3: you seem like kids also hospitalized and.
Speaker 1: Killed as a part of that.
Speaker 3: So on the eighth of January, what began was that
Speaker 3: what they called a convoy, like a big, big trek
Speaker 3: of different vehicles got together and arranged and organized from
Speaker 3: different towns across Anatomy Syria.
Speaker 1: To go to kishin dam As.
Speaker 3: This very like the day symbol is very clear like
Speaker 3: important physical location and also very symbolic thing where war
Speaker 3: has also been fought before. There's also in previous campaigns
Speaker 3: against ISIS, for example, there was fighting in the regions.
Speaker 3: So people feel like, you know, their sons and daughters
Speaker 3: have fought for this three river crossing before.
Speaker 1: It's still you know, it's there in the historical memory
Speaker 1: as well.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and people went and since then, which is almost
Speaker 3: exactly two months as we're recording this, we're right around
Speaker 3: the two months anniversary months, and there's been a constant
Speaker 3: presence stare protests dam, and that's got several different kind of.
Speaker 1: Aspects to it.
Speaker 3: It is mostly to raise the voices and raise awareness
Speaker 3: and make visible what's happening. And yeah, if it's hard
Speaker 3: to understand why like hundreds of people would go from
Speaker 3: their homes to somewhere that is closer to the active fighting,
Speaker 3: to somewhere that's in a very unstable region, like yeah,
Speaker 3: first of all, you have to understand that nowhere in
Speaker 3: notedly Syria is actually sick, right like in Commas, for
Speaker 3: the city where I am, there's been residential buildings bombs
Speaker 3: dropped on them from drones like within the.
Speaker 1: Last couple of months as well. It's not like there's
Speaker 1: this sense of safety wherever you are.
Speaker 3: The difference is a sense of doing something about it
Speaker 3: and of standing together and coming together in these like
Speaker 3: amazingly brave and amazingly creative ways that only the communities
Speaker 3: have not in Assyria can manage. So yes, Unfortunately, during
Speaker 3: these two months, and there have consistently been air strikes
Speaker 3: on the dam, and I don't have the exact statistics,
Speaker 3: and you wouldn't necessarily get an honest answer about how
Speaker 3: many of them of pondirect from Turkey and how many
Speaker 3: have come from SNA drones, right, but the Sena drunes
Speaker 3: are paid for by the Turkis state anyway, So at
Speaker 3: the end of the day, yeah, morally, how much difference
Speaker 3: does it make? And they have attacked the civil protests there,
Speaker 3: and up until now, I believe twenty five civilians have
Speaker 3: been killed and many more than that hospitalized. But despite this,
Speaker 3: and in the shadow of this, with the most beautiful
Speaker 3: defiance like that, protest has continued. And what the videos
Speaker 3: that maybe don't get shared as much or shared enough
Speaker 3: that people might not have seen, are also these images
Speaker 3: you know, which are very I can attest are very
Speaker 3: real because I went there myself a few weeks ago,
Speaker 3: which is everybody getting out and dancing at the slightest
Speaker 3: opportunity or the slightest excuse or lack of an excuse.
Speaker 1: And the most amazing art that's been.
Speaker 3: Made, like paintings of the people who've been killed or
Speaker 3: they would say, here fallen martyr. In these two months, yes,
Speaker 3: there's been theater like the performed using the bits of
Speaker 3: the bombed out cars that were bombed just a few
Speaker 3: days before as props to kind of like work. Yeah,
Speaker 3: tell the story of what's been happening, like the most
Speaker 3: like creative things.
Speaker 1: Also statements for the press, and all.
Speaker 3: Your different organizations show ups, so like the organized youse
Speaker 3: show up as the use and obviously the women's organizations
Speaker 3: as women saying like, you know, this is our revolution,
Speaker 3: this is our community, and we know what it looks
Speaker 3: like when it gets occupied. We're not just going to
Speaker 3: stand by and see it happen again. It's our land,
Speaker 3: it's our water, and it's our kids. Is the refrain
Speaker 3: that kind of gets repeated over and over again. And
Speaker 3: of course they're they're in solidarity as well with the
Speaker 3: with the SDF themselves, with the military force. It would
Speaker 3: be it would be crazy if they weren't, because yeah,
Speaker 3: they are also embedded in their communities. No, they're not
Speaker 3: extracted from the society the way that most kind of
Speaker 3: state armies are. So yeah, the situation at Tiswine is
Speaker 3: still ongoing. And when I was there, it was it
Speaker 3: really was the most amazing experience. There were bombings. Well,
Speaker 3: I was there and tragically one of the people I
Speaker 3: got to know there who was a journalist, his name
Speaker 3: was Eggie Brush.
Speaker 1: Just less than two weeks after I got back, I
Speaker 1: found out that he's also been killed in another drone strike.
Speaker 2: So it was yeah, it's.
Speaker 3: Very very just kind of doesn't It doesn't stop, the
Speaker 3: aggression doesn't stop, but nonetheless, people kind of coming together
Speaker 3: to resist it doesn't stop either.
Speaker 1: And once I'd been.
Speaker 3: There, it seemed a lot less crazy, or had to
Speaker 3: imagine that people would come together around it because you
Speaker 3: see like the immense power that it was, and you
Speaker 3: see that how everyone here has lost someone, know, like
Speaker 3: the vast majority of people here have lost members of
Speaker 3: their family. You said yourself, thirteen thousand fallen in the
Speaker 3: fight against Isis alone, and since then, like war one
Speaker 3: way or another has been going on.
Speaker 1: So people know what lost means.
Speaker 3: Already they've already lost, but they're not going to let
Speaker 3: that make them step back. They're gonna do their fallen
Speaker 3: loved ones justice and continue to stand up in their name.
Speaker 3: And yeah, it's a very sort of big thing, but
Speaker 3: it's really powerful when you see it in person and
Speaker 3: and all that kind of humanity and humor and joy
Speaker 3: despite the situation.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, that is a very unique thing to Curtis Dane,
Speaker 2: And like the Kurdish freedom movements, this sort of joy.
Speaker 2: I mean, I've been it's very similar in Burma rightly,
Speaker 2: where they also do they love to dance, oh well
Speaker 2: in a war, and like it is one of the
Speaker 2: things that I think, like the joy is hard to explain.
Speaker 2: I know we're sort of rating long on time here,
Speaker 2: but I just like when people hear Syria and to
Speaker 2: exempt when they hear me and Maud or they'll think
Speaker 2: of wars, but like you should also think about all
Speaker 2: the people who exist outside of the conflict, or who
Speaker 2: don't think this outside of it that's the wrong word,
Speaker 2: but who are not fighting at the front line. Like,
Speaker 2: the experience of revolution is a very joyful one, even
Speaker 2: amidst very difficult times. And it's difficult to explain it
Speaker 2: if you haven't experienced it because it sounds so juxtaposed,
Speaker 2: but it isn't necessarily. The guy have actually really fond
Speaker 2: memories of meeting Kurdish people coming into the United States
Speaker 2: in the mountains at the time when the United States
Speaker 2: was detaining people outdoors in very difficult conditions, and like
Speaker 2: dancing with them there at a time when it was miserable.
Speaker 2: The ability to salvage joy. It gives you a sense
Speaker 2: of sovereignty, I suppose, and I can understand why that's
Speaker 2: such an important part of the Curdish freedom movement when
Speaker 2: every expression of Curtis's identity has been suppressed for so long,
Speaker 2: Like the ability to seize your moments what James Scott
Speaker 2: would call like little small acts of resistance, Like it's important.
Speaker 2: It's more important I think people understand. And if you're
Speaker 2: understanding it from a Western military doctrine, it doesn't fit.
Speaker 2: But that's because you're using the wrong framework. Yeah, exactly, Jenny.
Speaker 2: If people are interested in following your work about this,
Speaker 2: or perhaps they're interested in doing what they can to
Speaker 2: support the revolution and what is a challenging time, a
Speaker 2: very a very changing time, like how can they do
Speaker 2: both of those things?
Speaker 3: Yeah, so well, if they are interested in following the
Speaker 3: sort of updates and so on that I've been doing,
Speaker 3: I've got Instagram and TikTok channels, which are both at
Speaker 3: j Keston.
Speaker 1: I'm assuming you can stick that written form somewhere. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we'll put it in the show notes.
Speaker 3: And telegram channel as well if people find it easier
Speaker 3: to sort of get Yeah, that's just the most condensed
Speaker 3: way to kind of download information. Videos or whatever, which
Speaker 3: you can find under the same name, and there's also
Speaker 3: links to it on the on Instagram TikTok and on there.
Speaker 3: We've got we linked tree that has some suggestions for
Speaker 3: if people want to support, like ways to donate, say
Speaker 3: to the Kurdish Red Present and stuff like that. And
Speaker 3: then specifically, yeah, I mean there is a lot that
Speaker 3: people can do and whatever it.
Speaker 1: Is, it all starts with getting more I wouldn't say informed,
Speaker 1: I would say getting more.
Speaker 3: Connected, right, So getting informed is a part of that,
Speaker 3: but not just in the sense of information learning, Like
Speaker 3: it's also connecting with like the feeling of things here
Speaker 3: and why it's become so important to so many people across.
Speaker 1: The world, not just people from here.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And the more we learn about that them all,
Speaker 3: we'll start to see like how we can be a
Speaker 3: friend to the movement.
Speaker 1: Here and where how our role can fit. And I
Speaker 1: know that there are specifically in America.
Speaker 3: A couple of organizations, is it that there'll be Books
Speaker 3: has been really prominent in organizing one of them.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Emergency Committee for Java.
Speaker 3: Emergency Committee for a Java, that's the one. Yeah, I
Speaker 3: mean you had emergency in there somewhere. That's definitely worth
Speaker 3: looking up and following a lot of the.
Speaker 1: Work that they do.
Speaker 3: And you've also got like think tanks like the Kurdish
Speaker 3: Piece Institute that a kind of lobbying, and so yeah,
Speaker 3: there are some there is some stuff from coming from
Speaker 3: the United States as well, But I think, yeah, the
Speaker 3: more people get a chance to kind of learn about
Speaker 3: stuff here and see the connection and be able to
Speaker 3: see and find themselves in it, and I think that's.
Speaker 1: Got a lot to do with what you were just
Speaker 1: speaking about.
Speaker 3: Hearing you put so well, I wouldn't extend it much more,
Speaker 3: but yeah, like people here, it's really there's always war happening,
Speaker 3: and always war kind of filing on top of you,
Speaker 3: but that's never what it's about. The question is always
Speaker 3: what are you're fighting for and what you're fighting to defend?
Speaker 3: And what would you be doing if there was no war.
Speaker 3: Everyone here'll always say if there was no war, we'd
Speaker 3: still have enough work to do with all the really,
Speaker 3: like I was that word ambitious, like social transformation.
Speaker 1: That people here are really committed to.
Speaker 3: Yeah, there's enough going on and it's very big and
Speaker 3: as you put it, it's very beautiful and very joyful
Speaker 3: and so that's Yeah, that's the bit that I encourage
Speaker 3: people to try and learn more about, because that's the
Speaker 3: bit that makes you stay and makes people like me
Speaker 3: stick around for years finding out more and more and
Speaker 3: making friends and getting closer and closer to the communities here.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that's a very good way to put it. So, yeah,
Speaker 1: I encourage people to do all that.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much for your time doing I know
Speaker 2: it's late there that we really appreciate you joining us today.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much. Cheers.
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