Konflikten i Syrien

Further complicating the picture are internal divisions among the Syrian Kurds. The PYD militia continues to harass and even kill other Kurds, most recently in villages near Afrin, north of Aleppo. Moreover, according to well-informed sources, some PYD elements have reportedly made secret, self-serving local deals with both the regime and the opposition, including jihadist rebel elements such as Jabhat al-Nusra; they may even be working with Iraqi and Iranian agents.

After strengthening its presence in Syria the PKK began to eliminate Kurdish leaders who might pose a threat to the Assad regime or competition to the PKK. Local Kurdish leader Mashaal Tammo, assassinated by unknown gunmen in 2011, may have been a victim of this campaign, though PKK official have suggested Turkey is responsible (Kurdish Globe [Erbil], October 26).

Tammo was one of the founders of the Kurdish Future Movement after the 2004 Qamishli riot. Soon after its foundation, Tammo’s movement faced political competition from the PYD, which has its own take on Tammo’s murder. The PYD claim that Turkey is behind the assassination of the Kurdish leader and refers to the murder as a message from Ankara to Damascus that Turkey is more than capable of spreading chaos in Syria. This allegation presumes that Turkey calculated the Kurdish outcry against the Syrian regime. Arab members of the Syrian opposition suggested that the PKK may have killed Tammo, perhaps on behalf of the regime. This claim is fuelled by rumors that the PKK is under the direction of the Syrian military intelligence and is able to play the “Kurdish card” in its “cold war” with Ankara.

Abdullah Bedro, the strongest tribal leader in the Kurdish region of Syria, was another victim of assassination. The PKK denied its involvement in the crime, but when a PKK leader’s body was discovered at the scene of the clash in which Bedro was killed, the PKK had to admit its involvement in the assassination (Zaman, February 15). The PKK was further accused in the killing of Dr. Serzad Hac Resid, another anti-Assad politician and an Aleppo-based representative of the Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYDKS). Dr. Resid was involved in distributing video footage concerning the brutality of the Assad regime (Zaman, February 17).