Background-article about Rojava for the Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung Beirut, 28.01.2026
“In the end, even God is against us”, says 53-year-old Hamed Rezaq, referring to the blanket of snow that has buried the city of Kobani over the past few days. “The snow has completely paralyzed life here. We can barely move around the city.” As if the situation in the besieged northern Syrian city were not already catastrophic enough, fear and cold alike now reign supreme. “Our current situation is terrible. We lack everything, and people here are afraid of being killed and massacred”, Hamad adds, who is from the village of Qayntra near Kobani.
Kobani is a multi-ethnic city in northern Syria, on the border with Turkey, dominated by Kurds. It was here that the so-called Islamic State (IS) was first defeated militarily, when it was driven out of the city by Kurdish fighters on 26 January 2015. Since then, the city has been part of the “Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria” (AANES), also known as Rojava. It is controlled by the Kurdish-led military alliance “Syrian Democratic Forces” (SDF). However, due to extensive attacks by troops of the Syrian “transitional government” and allied Islamist militias on self-administered territories, Kobani has now been surrounded and besieged for over a week.
From Aleppo to the Jazira: How the Fighting Reignited
The new rulers in Damascus, led by the self-proclaimed president Ahmad al-Sharaa, a former al-Qaeda fighter, aim to bring all of Syria under their control. This explains the ongoing tension between Damascus and the AANES since al-Sharaa’s ascent to the presidency. This tension culminated in a recent escalation where Damascus attacked AANES provinces after targeting neighborhoods in Aleppo under the SDF governance. The military attack was intense, resulting in the fall of several cities under the Damascus government. Besides Kobani, only a few areas in the Jazira region in the far north-east of the country, around the cities of Qamishli, Hassakeh, and Derik, remain under SDF control.
Open fighting between the self-proclaimed transitional government and the AANES began in early January in the two Kurdish neighborhoods of Sheikh Maqsood and Ashrafiyah.[1] This followed a drone strike that injured two civilians, prompting the Kurdish forces to attack a government vehicle. Government forces then responded with heavy artillery shelling of residential areas. Following intense clashes, which forced around 150,000 people to flee the neighborhoods, the government troops captured the two neighborhoods, bringing an end to 10 years of SDF control. Following this attack, government troops and allied Islamist militias advanced further and, within a few days, conquered large parts of the north-eastern territories that had been under SDF control in a comprehensive offensive. This included large portions of the oil and gas fields that had previously belonged to the Self-Administration.
These areas, which were seized by government forces, are predominantly Arab. With US support, the SDF had militarily defeated IS there in 2019 and established local forms of self-administration. However, videos now show government forces being greeted as ‚liberators‘ upon their arrival in places such as Tabqa and Deir ez-Zor. The IS flag has been raised again in Raqqa.
A Fragile Ceasefire
The situation for the SDF is extremely difficult militarily, especially around Kobani. Nisreen Abdullah is a senior commander in the Kurdish “Women’s Protection Units” (YPJ), who fights within the SDF. Having previously commanded thousands of female fighters in the fight against IS, Abdullah is now stationed in Kobani, reporting from the front via an internet link: “There are very heavy attacks by the Islamists. The front line runs around Sarrin.” Sarrin is a village located just over half an hour’s drive south of Kobani. The military situation is exacerbated by the size and location of the town: “Kobani is a small town, and we are completely cut off and vulnerable as a result.” There are no supplies for the SDF.
On the 24th of January, Damascus and the SDF agreed to a ceasefire, which has now been extended until mid-February. However, this is primarily intended to facilitate the transfer of suspected IS fighters held in former SDF-run camps. The US plans to transfer around 7,000 prisoners to Iraq. Due to the ongoing conflict, some concerns are that IS could exploit the chaos in the country to free its fighters and their families. Some detainees are reported to have already escaped.
However, there have been an increasing number of reports of further military clashes in and around Kobani. Both sides are accusing each other of violating the ceasefire. The transitional government claims that Kurdish forces have carried out drone strikes on its positions. Conversely, videos show unprovoked artillery and ground attacks by militias of the transitional government on villages surrounding Kobani. According to the SDF, civilians have been injured and six people, including children, have been killed in recent days. These developments raise grave concerns about protecting the civilian population and maintaining the fragile stability in northern Syria. Elham Ahmad, the foreign affairs representative of the AANES, stated: “The ceasefire announced by Damascus has not yet been implemented in concrete measures. What we are witnessing today is a massacre in Kobani and ongoing attacks in the Jazira region.” Adding: “The gap between official rhetoric and bloody reality is widening. Any political process that does not prioritize the protection of civilians is nothing more than a political illusion.” The transitional government in Damascus did not comment on these allegations.
Kobani Under Siege
The siege of Kobani poses a significant challenge for its people. According to the UK-based “Syrian Observatory for Human Rights”, tens of thousands of people in Kobani are affected by a near-total lockdown. Its director, Rami Abdel Rahman, explained that, in recent days, many families from surrounding villages have also sought refuge in the city after government troops advanced further. One of these displaced people is Bihar Bêkes (pseudonym used to protect the source). As a Kurd from a small village west of Kobani, he fled to the city ahead of the advancing Islamist militias. “We had to leave our homes in the dead of winter, in the middle of a snowstorm”, he explains. Since arriving in the city with his family, he says he has barely slept. He fears that his home village will be looted and its Kurdish population massacred.
The influx of people from the surrounding area has drastically worsened the city’s supply situation: vegetable markets are empty, and bakeries are closed. Fresh food is almost impossible to find, and fuel supplies are almost depleted. “We don’t even have enough milk for our children anymore”, Bihar explains. He warns that if a solution isn’t found within the next few days, the situation will deteriorate further.
The collapse of the electricity and internet connections has made communication with the city’s residents extremely difficult. Kobani previously relied on the Tishreen Dam for its electricity and water supply. However, since Damascus took control of the dam following military clashes almost two weeks ago, supplies to Kobani have ceased. However, the Syrian Ministry of Energy denied responsibility for the power and water outages, stating that it would “work to maintain the supply within the scope of available technical resources”. So far, nothing has been done.
The situation in the healthcare sector is particularly critical. In a video message, Bahtiyar, a doctor from Kobani, described the situation as chaotic and barely controllable. Even without open fighting in the city center, he said, the population lives in constant fear. The “Kurdish Red Crescent” has also complained of a growing shortage of medicine. The Crescent stated that five young children had died in Kobani since the beginning of the siege due to the effects of the cold and lack of care. The United Nations has now also sounded the alarm. UN Deputy Spokesperson Farhan Haq described the situation in Kobani as dramatic and confirmed that government forces currently block all access routes to the city. On Sunday evening, a first UN aid convoy of 24 trucks carrying fuel, food, and medicine reached Kobani from Aleppo, only after negotiations with the transitional Government. This is little more than a drop in the ocean. The new rulers in Damascus have not yet established a permanent humanitarian corridor into the city.
Hamed Rezaq in Kobani fears that history is repeating itself, since the fighting continues despite the ceasefire. “The so-called Syrian army consists of the same Islamists who attacked Kobani in 2014. They have given themselves an official name now.” Nevertheless, he hopes that the city can defend itself once again. A general mobilization has been declared in the town, with numerous civilians participating. Among them is Bihar Bêkes. He is convinced of the city’s resilience: “They will never enter Kobani, and we will never give up. Kobani is the heart of the resistance. We will either die or live here.”
Turkey, Damascus, and a Broken Political Deal
Whether such a final attack on Kurdish territories in northern Syria can be averted will also depend on the level of international pressure applied to Damascus and Ankara. The current military escalation has a specific history, primarily rooted in Turkey and Syria. Following the fall of the dictatorship and Bashar al-Assad’s departure to Moscow, an agreement in principle was reached in March 2025 between the AANES and the new authorities in Damascus on the integration of the Kurdish-controlled regions and the SDF into the Syrian state structure. However, after months of negotiations, this agreement was not implemented, with both sides accusing each other of delay.
Turkey played a key role in this process. Ankara considers the Kurdish forces to be an offshoot of the Turkish-Kurdish PKK and therefore classifies them as a terrorist organization. The PKK declared its disarmament and dissolution during peace talks last spring. Now, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is demanding that the Kurdish units in Syria also be disbanded. Ankara believes that the PKK will continue to exist in another guise if the YPG and YPJ are not disarmed. Consequently, Turkey is pressuring Damascus to insist on the individual integration of Kurdish fighters into the new Syrian army. Both Damascus and Ankara have rejected the SDF’s demand for independent battalions to operate within the Syrian army. While the new Syrian ruler, Ahmad al-Sharaa, aims to centralize all power in Damascus, Turkey is resisting the continued presence of Kurdish forces on its border. Syria and Turkey share a border approximately 900 kilometers long, running primarily through Kurdish settlement areas.
Fractured Alliances: Arab–Kurd Relations Inside the AANES
This discontent also stems from the Self-Administration’s governance practices. Despite its democratic and multi-ethnic aspirations, authoritarian structures and Kurdish dominance have repeatedly come to the fore. While non-Kurds have held administrative positions, key behind-the-scenes decisions have often been made by military cadres affiliated with the Kurdish PKK. Furthermore, human rights organizations report that repression has intensified in the Arab areas of the Self-Administration, particularly since the fall of the Assad regime. There are reports about arrests of suspected IS members or individuals sympathetic to the new rulers in Damascus. Consequently, the Self-Administration was increasingly perceived as foreign rule, particularly in areas outside the traditional Kurdish settlement region. There, the AANES has mostly failed to secure the support of crucial segments of the Arab population, who no longer wished to live under an administration perceived as ‚Kurdish‘.
Indeed, during the advance of new government forces, large sections of SDF units, comprised of Sunni Arab tribes, either rebelled or joined them. During the Syrian war, some tribes in the region had joined the SDF and fought with the Kurdish militias. However, they never fought against Bashar al-Assad’s regime, but rather exclusively against the ‘Islamic State’ advance. As early as 2023, skirmishes had occurred between Arab tribes and the SDF in the Deir ez-Zor region. Turkey, which has consistently fueled Arab-Kurdish conflicts, is likely to have played a role in these clashes.
Meanwhile, reports of war crimes by the transitional government forces are increasing. One video allegedly shows a female prison employee and a Kurdish YPJ-fighter being beheaded in Raqqa in an Islamic State-style execution. There are also recordings of humiliation, primarily of women, and countless videos purportedly showing acts of revenge and violence against civilians. As the conflict progresses, the fighting has long since become a battleground of narratives, with both sides levelling serious accusations against each other.
The Shadow of Past Atrocities
Concerns that government troops may commit atrocities against Kurds are justified. The massacres of Alawites on the coast in March 2025, as well as the escalation of violence in Suweida, a Druze-majority area, last summer, where units under Damascus’s command also committed crimes against civilians, have fueled fears that the Kurds could be the next victims of Islamists and jihadists in the country. This fear is particularly prevalent among the Yazidi population, who suffered genocide in 2014. It also stems from the fact that the SDF was forced to withdraw from the notorious al-Hol camp during the fighting. The camp houses families of jihadist fighters. Around 23,000 people are held there, including thousands of foreign women with their children. Against this backdrop, the fear of a resurgence of IS is ever-present. The al-Hol camp and the Sinjar region, home to mainly Yazidis, are only around 80 kilometers apart as the crow flies.
A key factor in the recent military escalation is the US’s abandonment of the Self-Administration. The US and the SDF had been allies for a long time in the fight against IS. Trump’s special envoy for Syria, Thomas Barrack, officially announced the betrayal of the SDF on social media. In a post on X, he wrote that the SDF’s original purpose as the main anti-IS ground force had largely become obsolete, as Damascus is now willing and able to assume security responsibilities. Following this ‚green light‘, government forces were able to proceed against the SDF, lacking now US support. According to a Reuters report, the US and France have now allegedly instructed Ahmad al-Sharaa not to invade the remaining Kurdish-held territories.
However, the West’s primary concern is maintaining good relations with the new Syrian leader. While al-Sharaa was laying siege to Aleppo, EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen visited Syria and pledged €620 million to Damascus for the coming year. A visit to German Chancellor Friedrich Merz in Berlin was also planned, but was postponed at short notice due to the conflict with the Kurdish population. Nevertheless, Merz will certainly still have the opportunity to meet al-Sharaa – his invitation remains in place, the Chancellor confirmed.
While al-Sharaa is being courted by the West, his troops and Islamist currents in this new army are continuing to attack Kobani. The world is watching, as it did in 2014/15. Therefore, Commander Nesrin Abdullah appealed directly to the international community from the front lines to stop the advance. She made it clear who they would otherwise be dealing with: “Syria is dead”, said Abdullah. She fears an Islamist rollback in Syria.
This text was written with the support of Khalil Muhammad. He is a journalist and interpreter from Qamishli, but is currently in Kobani.