Syrien: Lassen die USA die SDF fallen?
Pressekonferenz der SDF
Nach den heftigen Kämpfen in Aleppo, in deren Folge die syrisch-kurdischen Kräfte der SDF zwei seit Jahren von ihnen kontrollierte Stadtviertel räumen mussten, stellt sich nun die Frage, wie es um die Zukunft der kurdischen Selbstverwaltungsgebiete im Nordosten des Landes steht.
Offenbar nämlich ziehen die USA, bislang wichtigster Unterstützter der SDF, sich zunehmend zurück und arbeiten stattdessen lieber mit der syrischen Interimsregierung zusammen.
The mostly Kurdish militia in control of Syria's energy and farming heartland is facing extinction after losing its former stronghold in Aleppo to government forces, with sources telling The National that the US told the group not to resist the takeover.
The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) has positioned itself as the defender of the Kurdish community since the civil war, although Syria’s one million Kurds are not cohesive and some do not support the militia. But on Sunday, its last affiliated personnel left Aleppo on buses to SDF-held areas in eastern Syria.
A Kurdish source in contact with the SDF command said the group's leader, Mazloum Abdi, was told by US Central Command to hand over the areas and not intervene on behalf of his men. The message was relayed before a US-supervised meeting between Israel and Syria on January 6 in Paris.
“The US has wider geopolitical objectives and the feeling is creeping into the SDF that they have become a spent force,” the source said. "I am afraid there will be more calls to come from Centcom to abandon more cities."
The source expected Deir Ezzor, capital of an oil-producing province, partly held by the SDF, to be next. (...)
A source in Washington, recently briefed on American policy in eastern Syria, said his impression was that US President Donald Trump would “sacrifice” the SDF as long as Damascus, and its main regional ally Turkey, went along with his quest for a Syrian-Israeli rapprochement and co-operated with the US on counter-terrorism.
“The SDF knows that, without US support, it will be futile to defend their holdings,” said the source, who referred to the example of the Afrin countryside north of Aleppo, which was captured by Turkey and its Syrian proxies in 2018, expanding Ankara's zone of control in Syria. Russia and Iran also had zones of control in Syria during the civil war, but only the American and Turkish ones remain.
“The SDF put up a fight for Afrin but ultimately lost because it did not have US support to heel the area,” the source said."