The Kurds of Rojava are once again left to their fate in the face of a new Syrian regime whose authoritarian and jihadist ideological tendencies are now beyond doubt. The illusions that followed the fall of the tyrant Assad have now been shattered. A regime that prefers to appease its fascist neighbor Turkey, under the thumb of Erdogan — for whom the ruthless repression of the Kurdish peoples’ aspirations for autonomy has always been an obsession.
What is at stake today is not just a military power struggle: it is an attempt to crush a territory of emancipation, not a state or a nation, but a space where concrete political autonomy has been developing for fourteen years: the Autonomous Democratic Administration of North and East Syria (AANES), supported by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and, at the heart of the experiment, by the women’s revolution — notably the YPJ.
As Azize Aslan points out, the attacks by the Syrian transitional government crossed a threshold in early January: attacks on the Kurdish neighborhoods of Aleppo (Ashrafieh and Sheikh Maqsoud), the forced displacement of populations already living as refugees, and then the extension of the offensive against northern and eastern Syria with the stated aim of “completely destroying autonomy” and annihilating an “anti-patriarchal and anti-capitalist” revolution built over 14 years.
Once again, official international bodies are demonstrating their baseness, which illustrates their priority vision of a certain type of international order in which peoples are considered negligible and their desire for emancipation particularly suspect. It is precisely this major fear of the forces of domination—at the global level—of seeing the establishment of territorial zones where self-organization and the rejection of state hierarchies would prevail that explains this abandonment.
Gone are the merits and extraordinary courage of the Kurds of Rojava who defeated Daesh, yet designated as public enemy No. 1 just a few years ago. Today, diplomatic cynicism adorns itself with empty words—minority rights, peace, stability—while the logic of crushing, siege, and cleansing continues.
We must therefore conclude that, much more than the terrorist threat, it is the desire for freedom and autonomy of peoples that is not tolerated. Any authoritarian regime, using the most bloody repression, will always be preferred by this so-called world order born of the Megamachine of Capital rather than allowing peoples to self-organize their emancipation.
In the face of this, we must heed the call from Kobanê, relayed by Kurdistan au féminin: “This is a moment of historic responsibility, a moment to stand with our people and defend life, dignity, and the right to exist.”
And the promise of the women of Rojava, which bluntly states what is at stake: ”This resistance is the honor of humanity (…) We have promised to exist and we will not give up this resistance.”
In Rojava, a simple phrase sums up what the history of the Kurdish people has been teaching for decades: “Berxwedan Jiyane” — resistance is life.
That is why the survival of Rojava concerns us all and calls for our constant solidarity. Defending Rojava is not “choosing sides” in the war between states: it is defending what, in the darkness of our times, still proves that another social organization is possible — where peoples of different faiths can live and organize together, against “divide and rule” — against capital, the state, patriarchy, and religious fundamentalism.