‘US drops Kurds like hot potatoes after ISIS power wanes’
The Americans have finished with the Kurds, now they can pack up and go. This is what happened in Iraqi Kurdistan, and in Syrian Kurdistan the same situation will be repeated, says award-winning Iraqi Kurdish journalist Hiwa Osman.
US President Donald Trump has apparently promised he will “not provide weapons to the YPG [People’s Protection Units],” according to Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu, who was present during the phone call between the US president and his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
YPG is considered to be a terrorist organization affiliated with the Turkish Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) by Ankara. However, Kurdish YPG fighters are currently battling Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS) in Syria.
RT discussed with several experts what the significance of the US ending its support for Kurdish forces would be.
Hiwa Osman, an award-winning Iraqi Kurdish journalist and commentator, said that “it will mean the end of the Kurdish enclave in Northern Syria.”
“At the same time it will not come as a surprise to many of us. The US policy has always been one for the status quo in the existing countries. The Kurds have been wishfully hoping for the support or the thought that the US can become an ally with them away from the capitals of the countries that they live in. In Iraqi Kurdistan the situation was very clear. In Syrian Kurdistan it is only a matter of time for the US support to stop,” he continued.
In his opinion, “this will mean the end of the effective force that fought ISIS all along. And it will free Turkey to come and attack the YPG or bomb various bases.”
“It seems that governments are a lot more important than people for the US. This has been the policy all along,” Osman told RT.
According to Osman, “the coalition that the US has put together – the purpose of it – was just to end ISIS. The Kurds proved to be a very good fighting force in this. They have finished with them, now they can pack up and go. This has been the situation in Iraqi Kurdistan…The Kurds were an effective force on the ground in the fight against ISIS. When ISIS disappeared, they were dropped like hot potatoes. The same situation in the Syrian Kurdistan will be repeated, I believe…The Kurds do not seem to be learning this lesson from history.”
Dr Hawraman Ali, specialist in Kurdish affairs and lecturer at Ishik University in Erbil, told RT that “the US abandoned the Syrian Kurds and they will face a bitter fate.”
“The YPG and the Kurds have sided the US and there are all these other anti-US forces in the region such as the Syrian government that sided with Russia. The US abandoned the Syrian Kurds and they will face a bitter fate. The ones who will pay the price will be the Kurds,” he said.
