Vol. 79/No. 45 December 14, 2015
Kurdish fighters gain against Islamic State
In recent weeks Kurdish-led fighters have made major gains pushing back Islamic State forces from territory the reactionary group had seized in Syria and Iraq.
The Kurds, an oppressed nationality of some 30 million people living in Iran, Iraq, Syria and Turkey, have been fighting for a century for a homeland against imperialist domination and oppression by ruling capitalist regimes. At the end of the first imperialist world war, France and Britain drew new boundaries splitting control of the area and creating the four countries, dividing the Kurdish people.
Kurdish units have been the only effective fighting force taking on Islamic State on the ground.
Kurdish forces drove IS out of the Iraqi city of Sinjar Nov. 13, ending 15 months of brutal rule where large numbers of the Yazidi religious minority living there were killed and women enslaved. Before being overrun by Islamic State, Sinjar and surrounding villages were home to about 200,000 people, mainly Kurdish and Arab Muslims — both Sunni and Shiite — as well as Christians and Yazidis.
Some 7,500 forces from Peshmerga, the army of the Kurdistan Regional Government in northern Iraq, led the offensive. Also participating were fighters from the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) of Turkey and the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) of Syria. When IS invaded the area, these groups helped lead thousands of Yazidis who had taken refuge on Mount Sinjar to safety in Syria and then to refugee camps in Iraq and Syria.
The retaking of Sinjar, which was aided by some U.S. airstrikes, severed a strategic Islamic State supply line between Iraq and Syria.
In Hasakah province in northeastern Syria, YPG-led Syrian Democratic Forces have driven Islamic State out of nearly 200 villages and towns, encompassing some 526 square miles of territory, reported ARA News Nov. 17. This includes the town of Hawl, a few miles from Iraq’s border, which had been a key access point for IS between the two countries.
Fearing Kurdish advances would inspire Kurds in Turkey to intensify their fight for national rights there, Ankara has conducted attacks and provocations against Kurdish fighters in Syria. In a Nov. 25 statement, YPG spokesman Redur Khalil warned Ankara that it “will take the necessary procedures to target” any plane that breaches airspace in the Syrian Kurdish region.
Ankara, with Washington’s blessing, has been bombing PKK-held areas in northern Iraq and towns in southeastern Turkey where Kurds comprise the vast majority of inhabitants. Curfews and martial law have been imposed and military assaults conducted in civilian areas.
Turkish armed forces conducted daily attacks “from both the air and the ground” in November during a 12-day curfew imposed in Silvan in Diyarbakir province in southeastern Turkey, the Kurdish-based People’s Democratic Party (HDP) reported.
Residents of Nusaybin, a city of 115,000 in Mardin province near Turkey’s border with Syria, took to the streets Nov. 26 to protest occupation by Turkish forces during a 14-day curfew imposed there. Turkish authorities lifted the curfew the next day, but reimposed it three days later.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is seeking to lift parliamentary immunity for HDP Co-chair Figen Yuksekdag in an effort to imprison her on trumped-up charges of insulting the president.
Related articles:
Rulers in US, France whip up attacks on Muslims
SWP campaigns against war drive, witch hunt of Muslims
Communist League candidate denounces UK war drive
Front page (for this issue) | Home | Text-version home