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As usual, Leila Al Shami gets it right on both the Turkish invasion: Inhabitants of the region have good reason to fear a Turkish occupation. The Kurdish-majority city of Afrin, which fell to Turkey and allied forces last year, sets a terrifying precedent. Many civilians were displaced from their homes and prevented from returning, and there was widespread looting of abandoned property, as well as arrests, rape and assassinations. and on what the SDF will be facing now forced by Erddogan to dealo with Assad: Yet it’s unlikely the regime will ever accept Kurdish autonomy, as it’s repeatedly made clear in public statements. Elsewhere in Syria all promises given by the regime in ‘reconciliation’ deals were not worth the paper they were written on. Anti-regime activists, both Arabs and Kurds, are now at risk of being rounded up and detained for possible death by torture. SDF fighters are also not safe. Just days ago Syria’s Deputy Foreign Minister Faisal Maqdad declared that they had “betrayed their country and committed crimes against it.” Whilst many Kurds, abandoned by the US, may feel safer under Assad than Turkey, some Arab civilians living in SDF controlled areas such as Deir Al Zour and Raqqa fear a reconquest by the regime and Iranian militias above all else, and feel safer under Turkish protection. Syrians are rendered desperate, and dependent on foreign powers for survival. Foreign journalists also under threat by the regime have fled Syria leaving atrocities to unfold out of sight of the international media and on the appallingly selective "solidarity" of a large part of the western left: Once again the situation in Syria has highlighted the moral bankruptcy of segments of the left. Many of those protesting Turkey’s assault on north eastern Syria failed to mobilise to condemn the ongoing Russian and regime assault on Idlib where three million civilians are living in daily terror. In fact they’ve failed to notice that for years Syrians have been massacred by bombs, chemical weapons and industrial scale torture. Some of those calling for a No Fly Zone to protect Kurdish civilians from aerial bombardment previously slandered Syrians elsewhere calling for the same protection as warmongerers and agents of imperialism. Once again solidarity seems dependent not on outrage against war crimes, but on who is the perpetrator and who is the victim. Syrian lives are expendable in the battle for narratives and grand ideological frameworks. Full: https://leilashami.wordpress.com/2019/10/14/on-the-turkish-offensive-on-north-eastern-syria/?fbclid=IwAR05Qq-ff-fdMd-x7sT-6TS5fsK6oGOCOm5TO6wFSBIJtGfF08QP4CQZyQ0 _________________________________________________________ Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm Set your options at: https://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
