Turkey

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Dispatches from the Great Trump Clown Parade, which would be gut-busting hilarious if it did not involve real-world dark horrors, including the displacement of some 130,000 Kurds along with deaths and woundings, and the escape of over a hundred ISIL detainees. An unprecedented bipartisan congressional resolution was passed Wednesday against […]

Kurds

Syria: why the Kurds had little option but to do a deal with Bashar al-Assad

The Conversation

By Cengiz Gunes | – When the Syrian military withdrew from the Kurdish populated regions of Syria in July 2012, they left the Kurds in charge of their homeland, what they call Rojava. Without a backer and surrounded by many hostile states and militia, few people gave the Kurds any chance of survival. Despite the […]

Donald Trump

Russians, Syrian Army take over Manbij and its US Bases, Blocking Turkey

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The Syrian Arab Army (SAA) took control of the city of Manbij on Tuesday, with Russian gendarmes taking up patrols of the city as US special operations forces abandoned two military bases in the region, which were also taken over by Russians. The SAA and the Russians appear to have […]

Kurds

Kurdish Women Fighters helped Defeat ISIL, & now are a Target of Turkish Invasion

The Conversation

By Haidar Khezri | – Kurdish fighters under attack by Turkey have described President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw U.S. troops from northern Syria as a “stab in the back.” Since bombing began on Oct. 9, Turkish military operations against the Syrian Democratic Forces in northern Syria, Washington’s staunchest and most effective allies in the […]

Kurds

Turkey’s ‘Safe Zone’ in Syria Would Be Anything But (HRW)

Human Rights Watch

Plan Increases Risks for Returned Refugees

Donald Trump

Why? 3 Possible reasons Trump is threatening Turkey with Sanctions after Greenlighting Syria Invasion

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Trump is slapping sanctions on Turkey for invading northern Syria after Trump told Turkish president Tayyip Erdogan that it would be all right for him to invade northern Syria. It is really difficult to be an analyst of foreign affairs in the age of Trump, because we try to understand […]

Featured

Trump’s Saigon Evacuation Moment, as US Troops Flee and Syrian/Russian Forces are invited in by Kurds

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – For us oldsters, one of the iconic photographs of the twentieth century was the last US military helicopter taking off from the roof of the US embassy in Saigon, with desperate people hanging off it, fearful of what would happen to them when they fell into the hands of the […]

Kurds

As Turkish troops move in to Syria, the risks are great – including for Turkey itself

The Conversation

By Mehmet Ozalp | – Turkey did not waste much time in launching an attack on Syrian soil just days after US President Donald Trump announced he would withdraw US forces from northern Syria. As this development opens a new chapter in Syria, Turkey maybe unwittingly sinking deeper into that country’s civil war. This is […]

Featured

Kurds consider Asking for Russian No-Fly Zone as Moscow demands Foreign Armies leave Syria

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – A CNN exclusive by Barbara Starr and Ryan Browne reveals that Gen. Mazloum Kobani Abdi told the US, “I need to know if you are capable of protecting my people, of stopping these bombs falling on us or not. I need to know, because if you’re not, I need to […]