“Turkey Is Reviving Islamic State in Rojava”
Turkey’s invasion of northern Syria is its latest effort to destroy the nascent democracy in Rojava. Where Kurdish-led forces crushed the Islamic State, its fighters are now coming back into the open.
Rosa Burç is a PhD researcher of the Center on Social Movement Studies (COSMOS) at Scuola Normale Superiore in Florence, Italy. Her research is on radical democracy and grassroots movements, currently focusing on the Kurdish movement in the Middle East. She has conducted several research visits to various parts of the Kurdish region.
Turkey’s invasion of northern Syria is its latest effort to destroy the nascent democracy in Rojava. Where Kurdish-led forces crushed the Islamic State, its fighters are now coming back into the open.
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In recent decades the Kurdish New Year has become a festival of resistance against tyranny. This year’s celebrations coincide with victory over the Islamic State.
Rojava, the site of a remarkable peoples’ revolution, is on the brink of colonization and extermination. The international left must stand against it.
Turkey’s assault on Afrin crushed a beacon of democracy in Syria. But even when Western media did mention what was happening, it presented the victims as “terrorists.”
Turkey’s war on Afrin is an attack not only on Kurdish self-determination, but on democracy and women’s liberation in the Middle East.