Analysis , | 01/23/2026 : Kurdish Autonomy in Northern and Eastern Syria Is Under Threat

The de facto autonomy of Syrian Kurds that has existed since the summer of 2012 is in acute danger. The only question that remains is how it will end: through a bloody massacre or through integration into the Syrian state under massive pressure. Abandoned by their US allies, the Syrian Kurds are currently receiving a great deal of solidarity within their own community. But without air support, the territory cannot be defended militarily against Syrian forces and their Turkish supporters in the long term.

Attack and Uprising

After Syrian transitional government troops captured the Kurdish neighbourhoods of Aleppo in early January, events in north-eastern Syria came to a head on Sunday. On 10 January, Kurdish police forces were transferred from the last remaining Kurdish neighbourhood of Sheikh Maqsood to the remaining SDF-controlled areas east of the Euphrates. Thousands of Kurds from Aleppo fled to Afrin and the Kurdish areas east of the Euphrates.

The defeat in Aleppo was evidently taken as a signal to revolt by Arab tribes who had long been dissatisfied with the rule of the Kurdish-dominated Democratic Administration of North and East Syria (DAANES). The Arabic-speaking areas in the province of Raqqa and the regions north of the Euphrates in the province of Deir ez-Zor, conquered by the “Islamic State” (IS) between 2015 and 2019, had long been considered crisis areas. The fact that they were conquered by the Kurds in the first place was mainly due to their US allies urging the Kurds to defeat IS once and for all, forming a military alliance with the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) to this end in 2015, which included Arab units in addition to the Kurdish People’s and Women’s Defence Units (YPG and YPJ) and their Christian allies.

On Saturday, 17 January, the leadership of the Arab Shammar tribe in Syria, which had been one of the most important Arab allies of the YPG and YPJ for years, officially withdrew its support for the DAANES and recognized the transitional government in Damascus. Together with the Shammar, other important Arab tribes in the province of Deir ez-Zor, such as the Al-Mashahda, also defected from the SDF. Other Arab tribes in the region, such as the Al-Uqaydat, were already considered hostile to the SDF. 

The situation in Deir ez-Zor had been precarious for quite some time.

Early on Sunday morning, the Damascus government finally began taking over the Arabic-speaking areas of DAANES. While units loyal to Syrian transitional president Ahmed al-Sharaa crossed the Euphrates in the early hours of Sunday morning in the province of Deir ez-Zor, attacking the area previously controlled by the SDF, fighters from various Arab tribes took over areas along the Euphrates. To prevent an attack on Raqqa, the former “capital” of the “Islamic State”, the SDF blew up an important bridge over the Euphrates that had only been rebuilt in 2024. At the same time, however, an Arab uprising broke out in the city itself. By noon, the SDF had largely lost control of the eastern Euphrates Valley, the oil wells in the province of Deir ez-Zor, and large parts of its Arab units.  Overt the course of the afternoon, the SDF was then forced to withdraw from Raqqa. 

Within a few hours, the most important Arab regions of the DAANES were under the control of Arab tribal units acting in alliance with the transitional government in Damascus. Entire units of Arab Kurdish allies disbanded.

Conservative Arab Tribes 

The situation in Deir ez-Zor had been precarious for quite some time. Since the SDF conquered the area from Islamic State between 2017 and 2019, DAANES rule there had been based on an alliance with local Arab tribes, which cooperated with the Kurds less out of political conviction than out of opportunistic considerations. Some of the Kurds’ Arab allies had illustrious political careers. 

The Deir ez-Zor region has always been one of the most conservative regions in Syria, much more strongly influenced by tribes than the west of the country. Both the social structure and the Arabic dialect of the region are more similar to those of central Iraq than to the Arabs in western Syria. Politically, there was already sympathy for Iraqi Baathism under Saddam Hussein here in the 1990s  and later for the jihadist uprising in Iraq, whose supply routes ran through this very region. Some of the Arab tribes in the region were among the first to cooperate with the “Islamic State”, although they switched sides again when it was in their interest to do so. 

No one could ever be sure of the loyalty of these tribes. Illustrative of the political loyalties in this region is the career of Ahmed al-Khbeil, alias Abu Khawla, who began his career as a criminal, then built up a brigade of the Free Syrian Army (FSA) in 2013, defected to IS, fled to Turkey after his brother was murdered, and joined the SDF as an ally of the Kurds in 2016 before being arrested for criminal activities in 2023. His arrest caused tensions between Arab tribes and the SDF at the time, and led to several minor skirmishes in the region. 

The Kurdish units within the SDF were never entirely sure of the loyalty of their Arab allies, even if unity and brotherhood were always emphasized to the outside world. The Kurds remained very cautious about pushing their own ideology in the region. The feminist ideology of the ruling Kurdish party, the Democratic Union Party (PYD), would have turned the conservative Arab tribes against the DAANES much earlier. Thus, the alliance remained a precarious one. 

Arab Uprising

The rapid takeover of these areas is essentially based on an alliance between these conservative Arab tribes and government troops. Although the SDF has not lost all of its Arab allies, it has lost the relevant parts of them. 

The fact that even the Shammar, along with the al-Sanadid militias that have existed since 2013 and control the Shammar tribal areas in the east of Hasakah province, have turned away from the DAANES reveals that the PYD has not succeeded in incorporating relevant Arab forces in a durable manner. There seem to be almost no Arab units left in the SDF today.

Just a few hours after the ceasire was reached, the Arab advance continued.

Formed in 2015, the Syrian Democratic Forces remained a temporary alliance of convenience that could only incorporate the Arab tribes as long as they saw it as a meaningful alternative for themselves. With the defeat of the Islamic State and the collapse of the Assad regime, the main reasons for this alliance of convenience no longer existed. The Sunni Islamism and Arab nationalism promoted by the new regime in Damascus are much more in line with the socio-political positions of the Sunni Arab tribes in the region than the socialist feminism of the Kurdish-dominated DAANES. 

Turkey, however, certainly played a role as well, as it pushed for the transitional regime in Damascus to take over the DAANES and put an end to Kurdish-dominated autonomy from the outset. The fact that DAANES responded primarily with repression to infiltration attempts from Damascus and Ankara over the course of last year did not help to improve Arab-Kurdish relations, but only reinforced the already existing alienation between Kurds and Arabs in north-eastern Syria. 

Ceasefire

After the collapse of the DAANES in most Arab areas, a ceasefire was finally negotiated on Sunday evening between Ahmed al-Sharaa and SDF commander-in-chief Mazlum Abdi. 

The ceasefire included the withdrawal of all SDF military formations east of the Euphrates, the complete and immediate administrative and military handover of the provinces of Deir ez-Zor and Raqqa to the Syrian government, and the integration of all civil institutions in the province of Hasaka into the institutions of the Syrian state and its administrative structures.

Furthermore, according to the ceasefire agreement, the Syrian government will take control of all border crossings and oil and gas fields in the region. SDF are to be fully integrated into the structures of the Syrian Ministry of Defence and Ministry of the Interior on an individual basis. Essentially, the appointment of a candidate for the office of governor of Hasakah is intended to guarantee political participation and local representation for the Kurds. So far, outgoing SDF commander Mazlum Abdi has been informally discussed for this position. 

However, the province of Hasakah only includes the eastern Kurdish-populated areas, not the region around the city of Kobani, which gained international notoriety in 2014 through the fight against IS. The district of Ain al-Arab, as the city and district are officially called in Arabic, belongs to the governorate of Aleppo. According to the agreement, the SDF’s strong military presence is to withdraw and a security force consisting exclusively of local residents is to be created. At least the agreement also stipulates the retention of a local police force for Kobani, which is administratively subordinate to the Syrian Ministry of the Interior.

The agreement also stipulated the handover of IS prisoners and camps to the Syrian government. The SDF is to submit a list of candidates for high-ranking military, security, and civilian positions within the central state structure in order to, as it says, “ensure a national partnership”.

Finally, Presidential Decree No. 13 of 2026, which includes a certain recognition of the cultural and linguistic rights of the Kurds, is expressly welcomed. The SDF undertakes to remove all non-Syrian leaders and non-Syrian members of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) from its ranks. Under the agreement, the Syrian state commits to “continuing the fight against terrorism to ensure the security and stability of the region” and to working towards an agreement on the safe and dignified return of the inhabitants of Afrin and the Kurdish neighbourhoods of Aleppo. 

Ongoing Fighting

Yet the agreement did not hold. Just a few hours after it was reached, the Arab advance continued. Both sides accused each other of violating the ceasefire. The situation was confusing. Part of the problem may have been that transitional president al-Sharaa had only very limited control over the Arab troops and that many of the fighters were recruited from local tribes, some of which had previously cooperated with IS. In any case, immediately after the capture of the former IS capital Raqqa, there were reports of excesses against Kurdish fighters and civilians.

The circumstances surrounding the release of IS fighters are disputed.

Later that morning, Arab fighters allied with Damascus reached Al-Shaddadah, the largest prison holding former IS fighters, south of Hasakah. Despite calls for help from the SDF to US troops stationed in the immediate vicinity, they did not come to their aid and after a few hours, Al-Shaddadah had to be abandoned, leading to the release of hundreds of IS fighters.

The circumstances surrounding the release of IS fighters are disputed. Sources close to the government claim that the SDF released them before their withdrawal, which the SDF denies. The SDF claims that the Arab attackers freed the prisoners. What is clear is that the SDF lost control of the prison after fighting with the Arab attackers, that the IS prisoners are no longer in custody, and that at least some of them have joined the attackers.

Failed Negotiations

On Monday, Mazlum Abdi, the commander-in-chief of the SDF, finally flew to Damascus and negotiated with Ahmed al-Sharaa for five hours. In addition to the transitional president, the Syrian foreign and defence ministers were also present.

Naturally, there are different versions of how the negotiations went. However, both versions suggest that Ahmed al-Sharaa rejected Mazlum Abdi’s demand for a five-day ceasefire so that he could discuss the results of the negotiations within his own structures, and demanded that Mazlum Abdi sign immediately, which would have been tantamount to surrender. 

The meeting was therefore broken off after five hours without result. Mazlum Abdi returned to north-eastern Syria and the SDF subsequently announced a general mobilization.

Apart from the specific course of the negotiations, it is also unclear what exactly Ahmed al-Sharaa’s motives are for his actions. Turkey certainly plays a certain role in the current escalation. However, it is completely unclear whether al-Sharaa himself wanted this escalation and is behind the unacceptable demands, or whether the local Arab forces are acting largely autonomously and outside of al-Sharaa’s control. The current escalation could also be due to relatively weak leadership — possibly on both sides: Ahmed al-Sharaa may know that he cannot enforce a real ceasefire among his own people, and Mazlum Abdi may know that he cannot enforce major concessions without consultation within his own ranks — which is why he would have needed the five-day deadline.

General Mobilization 

For the Kurdish and Christian civilian population of the region, this development is the greatest catastrophe imaginable. That same night, referring to the “historic resistance” in Kobani in 2014, the SDF General Command called for “the cities from Derik to Hasakah to Kobani to be turned into a graveyard for the new representatives of the IS mentality”, “led by the Turkish state”. It further stated: “On this basis, we call on all our young people, girls and boys from Rojava, Bakur, Bashur, and Rojhelat in Kurdistan and in Europe to unite, break through the borders of the occupiers and join the resistance.”

Both in Hasakah province and in Kobani, which has been cut off from Hasakah since Monday afternoon following the capture of Ain Issa by government troops, a general mobilization has been called. In Kobani, the situation for civilians is particularly desperate because there is no way to flee and the option of fleeing to Iraq is no longer available. Many people in the city are reminded of the desperate situation in autumn 2014 during the fight against IS. With one big difference: at that time, the world’s attention was focused on the city, now people feel abandoned. 

For the Kurds, it remains risky to integrate their own armed forces into the Syrian armed forces on an individual level without receiving any international security guarantees.

Nevertheless, volunteers from other parts of Kurdistan have now begun to flock to Syria. At the border between Nusaybin and Qamishli, hundreds of Kurds from Turkey stormed border fortifications. Volunteers came forward from the Iraqi and Iranian parts of Kurdistan. Members of a Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) anti-terror unit came to Rojava from the territory controlled by the PUK in Iraqi Kurdistan. The leadership of the Kurdistan Freedom Party (PAK), which originates from Iranian Kurdistan and had already fought against IS in cooperation with the Kurdistan Democratic Party (PDK) in Iraq, announced its intention to come to the aid of the Syrian Kurds. Solidarity demonstrations for the Syrian Kurds took place in all parts of Kurdistan. 

At the same time, Arab units continued to advance towards Hasakah. In the late afternoon, SDF fighters fled al-Hol, the largest camp housing IS women, and Syrian units took over the camp. In the course of this, some of the detained women were released, but were later recaptured, according to Syrian sources.

New Negotiations

In this situation, new negotiations took place on Tuesday evening and a new four-day ceasefire was announced, which also represents a deadline for the SDF to meet the conditions set by the Syrian transitional government. Essentially, these are the same points that were already laid down in the first ceasefire agreement on Sunday evening, with the difference that the Kurds have now been given a short deadline to consult and prepare for the handover.

Whether this will actually lead to an orderly handover and Kurdish participation in the administration of Hasakah remains uncertain. For the Kurds, it remains risky to integrate their own armed forces into the Syrian armed forces on an individual level without receiving any international security guarantees. Compared to the threat of conquest of Kurdish villages and towns, however, such an agreement is probably still the lesser evil. At least it would spare the civilian population from a massacre for the time being. However, it would also mean the end of political self-government or autonomy for the time being. Syrian Kurds would have to wage their political struggles on a different level within the Syrian state. 

Translated by Loren Balhorn.