The Abandonment of Rojava: Between American Neglect and European Silence

“Jihad” al-Julani and Recep Tayyip Erdoğan say howdy do. Fascist state terrorist shitbirds of a feather flock together

Rosario Scognamiglio || In Syria , the conflict has flared up again between government forces and Kurdish pro-democracy militias, amid the increasingly deafening silence of the European media. In 2024, after themilitias led by Ahmad al-Sharaʿ led alightning advance, first conquering Aleppo and then Damascus, forcing the then President Bashar al-Assad to take refuge in Russia, part of the Western press spoke of a possible start of normalisation of a country battered by a civil war that began in 2011 and marked, among other things, by the presence of the Islamic State.

Syrian cleavages

However, this reading has turned out to be superficial. Syria remains a deeply fragmented territory, criss-crossed by linguistic, religious and cultural fault lines that make any attempt to assimilate and re-centralise political power extremely fragile and almost useless.

One of the most unstable areas today is a thin strip of territory that runs along the country’s northern border between Turkey and Iraq, crossed by the Euphrates River. It was here, between 2014 and 2015, that the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) – a Kurdish-led coalition – succeeded in militarily defeatingISIS after a heroic and bloody resistance, creating an unprecedented political experiment: the Rojava. In that area, a confederation based on cooperation between Kurds, Assyrians, Turcomans and Yazidis took shape, governed by afundamental charter inspired by principles of pluralism, gender equality and local autonomy. It is precisely in this territory that the conflict has flared up again today, marking a new phase of instability and calling into question the entire Rojava political project.Map of Syria (Le Soir)

What is the Rojava Charter

The Charter is not a simple statute that gave administrative form to the Kurdish-majority region of northern Syria. The Charter is a homogenous body of rights that established the start of a political project, with the aim of building a model of coexistence between peoples of different language and culture, radically alternative to authoritarian Middle Eastern states or theocratic governments.

The charter serves as an actual constitution, inspired by the democratic confederalism thought of Abdullah Öcalan, the historical Kurdish leader. The Rojava charter rejects the nation-state model and centralising power, proposing an administrative structure based on local self-government, linguistic and religious pluralism.

For the first time, Kurds, Arabs, Assyrians, Turkmen and Yazidis have been recognised as an integral part of a common project, without identity hierarchies. But the real disruptive element, for the regional context, is the introduction in the Charter of the principle of gender equality, with the introduction of male-female co-presidency in all political-administrative institutions, recognising women’s political-social autonomy unprecedented in the Middle East. It also affirmed principles proper to free-democracies and the corpus of universal human rights, such as the secularity of institutions, the protection of fundamental freedoms, the rejection of the death penalty and respect for social rights. A true Peoples’ Charter, which launched a political laboratory albeit in a fragile and war-torn context.

What is happening in Rojava today

On 10 January of this year, government forces belonging to President Ahmad al-Sharaʿ launched a large offensive against the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF)-controlled territories in north-eastern Syria . In the course of a few days, pro-government troops captured large portions of territory previously under the control of the Kurdish autonomous authorities. On 18 January, the parties agreed to a ceasefire that provides, at least formally, for the gradual absorption of the SDF into Damascus’ administrative and military structure, as well as the return of strategic infrastructure such as prisons, oil pipelines, and border crossings to central control.

However, it is an extremely fragile agreement

Several international and regional media report the persistence of armed militias deployed on both fronts and the real risk of a resumption of hostilities. The most serious tensions are registered around Kobane, the symbolic city of Rojava and the Kurdish resistance against the Islamic State. The area is effectively isolated, with a progressive encirclement by forces loyal to the new central power. Humanitarian conditions are of great concern: access to essential services is compromised, supply chains are disrupted and the civilian population is severely restricted in the availability of basic necessities.

The humanitarian emergency

Local humanitarian organisations have made urgent appeals to the international community for the UN and relevant agencies, including theUNHCR, to intervene to ensure humanitarian assistance and protection for civilians. According to figures released by international bodies, including the International Organisation for Migration, more than 134,000 people have reportedly been displaced in north-east Syria since the beginning of the government offensive. The human cost of these developments is already evident. The political project enshrined in the Rojava Peoples’ Charter, based on local autonomy, pluralism and the protection of fundamental rights, now appears progressively eroded under the military and political pressure exerted by Syria’s new central power.

US abandonment

This tragic situation in north-eastern Syria is the result of a progressive US abandonment of the region, which has left Kurdish forces without political and military guarantees and opened up space for pro-government militias to advance. The US responsibilities in the Rojava crisis are the product of a Syrian strategy that has failed in the long run, starting with the Obama administration.

Washington has used the Syrian Democratic Forces and the Kurdish resistance aspawns in a global risiko, used the SDF forces as proxies in the fight against ISIS, as mere securitisation tools, without ever recognising them as a nascent political entity. This strategy has found full continuity in the Trump administration. The tycoon is managing the Middle East theatre, more as a securitarian and stabilisation space, only formal, for the nascent new global order, making any project of true democratic construction scarcible. The United States has accepted the handing back of power in Damascus to a new government led byAhmad al-Sharaʿ, former leader of Jabhat al-Nusra, a jihadist organisation affiliated with al-Qaeda. In the meantime, the centre of gravity of US interests has definitely shifted towards theIndo-Pacific, leaving the Rojava political project without any guarantees.

European political silence

If the US can be blamed for neglect, the EU can be blamed for silence and strategic irrelevance in foreign affairs. The EU is passively watching the demise of Rojava’s democratic project, renouncing any autonomous political initiative. The statement by the French foreign minister, who declared on 22 January:‘Paris will not abandon the Kurds. We know our debt to them. They are our brothers in arms’.

But in the meantime

Old patterns and old problems are repeated. Europe appears to lack a common foreign policy strategy, continuing to be subordinate to Washington’s choices. Europe’s silence is not just a contingent choice, but the symptom of a deeper inability to conceive of the Middle East as a political and not exclusively securitarian space, thus contributing to the definitive erosion of one of the few attempts to build a pluralist, democratic order based on the values of international protection of human rights, which was emerging in that region.