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