In the Syrian capital, Damascus, the new leader of the country hosted a national conference on unit and welcomed foreign dignitaries while the crowds gather for coffee, speaking freely for the first time for decades.
But 400 miles away in the north -eastern Syria, a region outside the control of the Damascus government, the battles that have been taking place for years have continued to infuriate. The drones buzz over the head and night while the air attacks and the fire of artillery forced thousands to escape from their homes.
The struggle there puts two opposite militias against each other: the Syrian democratic forces led by Kurds, supported by the United States, and a mainly Syrian Arab militia supported by Türkiye. And the battle has intensified only since the Islamist rebels externalized the longtime dictator of Syria, Bashar al-Assad, in early December.
Much is at stake in this conflict, including the ability of the new interim president, Ahmed al-Shara, to unify the whole country, control its numerous religious and ethnic armed groups and keep the Islamic State Terrorist Group under control, which has started to collect strength again in some parts of Syria. Neighborhood countries fear that instability from any number of factions can pour through their borders.
The fate of the Kurds of Syria is also suspended, an ethnic minority that constitutes about 10 percent of the population. Over the years, the Kurds have cut out a semi -automoma region in the north -eastern Syria.
One of the driving force behind the struggle in the north -est is the growing advantage of the Turkish government compared to the Kurds, which Turkey sees how a threat to both home and nearby Syria because some violent Kurdish factions have pushed for a separate state.
At home, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey last week marked a victory when the leader of the PKK, the Kurdish separatist movement that fought a ten -year insurrection against the Turkish state, invited his fighters to lay his arms and dissolve. Saturday, two days after the leader’s appeal, Abdullah Ocalan, the PKK declared a ceasefire in Türkiye.
Turkey has also emerged in recent months with greater influence in Syria due to its links with the rebel group that has reversed Mr. al-Assad.
The decisions of the PKK last week have reverberated throughout the North Syria -oriental. Some fighters in the Syrian democratic forces also have roots in the PKK and Mazloum Abdi, the Kurdish leader of the Syrian force, was a close follower of the ideology of Mr. Ocalan. But addressing the call of the PKK leader to disarm, he said “he has nothing to do with the SDF”
The new government of Damascus is pressing on the Syrian democratic forces to disarm and merge into a national military force, as required by all the other armed groups in the country. But so far, the Syrian democratic forces have been reluctant, fearing that doing it could threaten the autonomy of the Kurds in the northern Syria -oriental.
Abdi said he wants his troops to become part of a new national Syrian army, but he also wants that force can maintain his weapons and continue to operate in the northern Syria -oriental.
Mr. Erdogan, however, opposes any autonomy for the group. Recently referred to the Syrian democratic forces as “separatist killers”, suggesting that they were similar to the PKK and said they would have to “say goodbye to their weapons or that they will be buried” with them.
For the neighbors of Syria and many others in the international community, the concern is that if the Kurds of Syria are included in a national force, they may no longer be able to keep the Islamic State under control.
The Syrian democratic forces began to fight during the 13 -year civil war of Syria when the Islamic State took control of large parts of Syria and Iraq nearby. They won the crucial American military support – including weapons, funding and training – after showing that it is the most effective strength on the ground in Syria when it came to fighting the Islamic State.
The force led by Curi also protects the over 20 prisons in the north-eastern Syria that hold about 9,500 Hindu Islamic State Fighters and nearby fields that contain about 40,000 members of the Islamic State Fighters family.
“Syria is the most important question right now,” said Hoshyar Zebari, former Iraqi foreign minister and a Kurdish that remains in close contact with many regional leaders. Zebari said that the Kurdish question, in particular as regards keeping the Islamic State at bay, was particularly important because instability tends to pour into neighboring countries.
“We know that anything happens in Syria will not stop on the border between Syrian-Iraqi,” said Zebari, observing that during the Syrian civil war, the conflict overturned in Iraq, with the Islamic State that took control of most of the northern Iraq. Millions of Syrian refugees have fled to neighboring countries and in Europe.
The pressure is to join the new Syrian government and to defend Kurdish autonomy within Syria has put Mr. Abdi in a difficult position. He could accept the new Syrian government in the hope that this guarantees some long -term security for the Syrian Kurds. But he also faces calls from some Kurdish factions to resist a semi-independent region.
In a briefing with journalists last week, Mr. Abdi traveled a thin line. He said the Kurds welcomed the new Damascus government, but also clarified that he was reluctant to dissolve his forces and, in particular, to give the fight against the Islamic State to a new and still not tested Syrian army.
“The SDF has a lot of experience in the fight against ISIS and we have strengths to offer to the new Syrian army,” he said.
It is also not clear whether Mr. Al-Shara will be able to persuade the militias with Turkish suspended to stop attacking the Kurds.
Another great stranger is what the Trump administration will decide on the involvement of the United States in Syria. During the first term of President Trump, he tried to remove the US forces from Syria, reducing support for Syrian democratic forces and risking an opening for the Islamic State fighters to regain ground.
The Pentagon has prompted to preserve a small American force in Syria to carry out complex operations and train and control Syrian democratic forces.
But now there is fear among the residents of the north-east that support is making Many parts explode for the Kurdish guided forces in Syria. Both the Kurdish and Arabs residents of the area claim to be tired of a conflict, but the perspectives for a peaceful resolution seem remote.
Khokh, a 40 -year -old who crosses the border from Syria to Iraq with his family, said that most of the worst fights were far from their village, Deric, but that the buzz of Turkish surveillance drones was constant in recent months. He asked to be identified only by his name for concerns about his safety.
“We are afraid every day when we hear the sound of drones and planes, and sometimes my children do not go out for a week, because we are afraid of sending them to school,” he said. “My 11 -year -old daughter won’t even go to the bathroom alone.”
Many do not trust the fact that the new Damascus government will be able to keep them safe from the Islamic State or will respect their ethnic background. In the past, the Kurds have had fewer rights of the Arabs and some have not obtained citizenship.
“We don’t know what the new government will do with us,” said the sheikh Khalil Elgaida Elhilali, 75, the leader of a mixed tribe of Arabs and Syrian Kurds. “We want the war and the struggle to stop.”
For the Arab neighbors of Syria, the most urgent concern is that the thousands of fighters of the Islamic State held in Kurdish driving prisons in the north-eastern Syria remain under strict guard and that the attempted fields for their families are carefully observed.
If even a small number of the 9,500 prisoners of the Islamic State – many of whom are hardened fighters – should leave prison, would represent a serious threat.
The prisons “are temporal bombs,” said Zebari.