Trudy Rubin: Syrian Kurds may be our best hope for displacing the Islamic State

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AMUDA, Syria — To cross into the Kurdish region of Syria, you scramble onto a scruffy motorboat at Fishkhabour in the north of Iraqi Kurdistan, near the remote corner where Iraq, Turkey and Syria meet.

Then you chug across the dun-colored Tigris River and disembark on a barren rocky shore in Syria. A few hundred yards away, long lines of trucks and oil tankers cross back and forth between Syria and Iraq atop two shaky pontoon bridges, the Syrian Kurds’ only commercial lifeline.

Welcome to the self-declared, federal region of Rojava and North Syria, which stretches along the Turkish border and is recognized by no one. Allied with the Americans, helped by the Russians, despised by the Turks, at odds with its Iraqi Kurdish cousins, the region is a study in contradictions.

But little Rojava already plays an outsized role in the international fight against the Islamic State. The Kurdish Peoples’ Protections Units (half of whom are women) are the only Syrian ground forces that have succeeded in fighting the Islamic State, or even want to do it (most of the groups the United States tried to train were far more interested in fighting the regime of Bashar Assad).

http://www.thonline.com/ap/commentary/article_e31958c1-f564-59a4-a490-955ff8b2ce90.html

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1. A new federalism: Making it official in Syria's north

In a meeting last Thursday in the Al-Hasakah oil town of Rumeilan, 200 representatives of Kurdish-controlled territories voted to form a federal system in northern Syria.

Thursday’s vote united the three Kurdish Self Administration-controlled cantons of Jazirah, Afrin and Kobani under a single “Federal Democratic System of Rojava – Northern Syria.” Other northern Syrian territories controlled by the Syrian Democratic Forces also fall within the new federal system.

This is not strictly a Kurdish state, according to a statement released after the meeting. The federal system “encapsulates all social components and guarantees that a future Syria will be for all Syrians.”

Less than a day later, the denunciations of the PYD-led plan rolled in. The Syrian National Coalition opposition-in-exile called the announcement an attempt to “usurp the will of the Syrian people.”

http://syriadirect.org/news/three-views-of-a-fledgling-federal-system-in-northern-syria/

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2. Only from their own territory. The Kurds aren't the answer.

Only going after IS bankers in Saudi Arabia and Qatar will make a real dent. That and perhaps aiding the Syrian Army. One seems about as unlikely as the other.

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3. I don't think their ambitions run much beyond that.

But you're right, they are only "useful" where they are somewhat native, and they know it.

Barzani seems to have decided to suck up to Turkey, which may not bode well for the Syrian Kurds.

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4. Of all the sides and factions in that sewer, the Kurds are the only ones I can admire.

That includes the US and Russian roles in this, which really come down to pounding each others regional allies with varying degrees of lethal force. The Israelis only want the Sunnis to bleed the Shi'ia, and break up Ba'athist states. Israel is perfectly happy to see the rise of another major Saudi terrorist group, and watch it metastasize around the world, provided that they keep on the other side of their wall. Meanwhile, Turkey only wants to expand its influence and get rich promoting smuggling and arms dealing by all sides.

The whole thing is only going to get worse.

[MisterP]

5. 2 years later: we have to do something about the peshmerga!