Syrian army advances risk fragile deal with Kurdish fighters

Syria’s President Ahmed al-Sharaa and President Trump spoke by phone today, pledging support for Syria’s unity and territorial integrity. In practical terms, that means integrating the Kurdish-controlled northeast into the Syrian state.

That objective has been the subject of months of quiet negotiations, held in Damascus and elsewhere, including Paris. This week, those talks produced a breakthrough, at least on paper. The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), the Kurdish-led militia that served as Washington’s primary partner against ISIS and governs a de facto quasi-state in northeast Syria known as Rojava, reached an agreement with the Sharaa-led government. Under the deal, the SDF would effectively dissolve as an organization, with individual fighters allowed to join the new Syrian army. However, a meeting between al-Sharaa and SDF leader Mazloum Abdi that occurred today reportedly produced few breakthroughs.

This outcome represents a major climbdown by the SDF. Until recently, it had insisted on retaining three SDF-led divisions within the national military. Damascus ultimately rejected that demand and both sides accused the other of dragging out negotiations. Over the past two weeks, the stalemate turned violent. Heavy fighting erupted in parts of Aleppo province and in the outskirts of the city, where the SDF reportedly suffered significant losses.

The SDF has accused government forces of serious abuses during the fighting, including executions, beheadings, and mistreatment of prisoners of war. Both sides have accused the other of releasing ISIS detainees. Evidence has also emerged, that has yet to be verified, that a Syrian army soldier threw an SDF militia member from a building. These claims underscore the deep mistrust and hostility that still defines the relationship. Although Kurdish-led, the SDF was a multiethnic force with substantial Arab participation. The Syrian government exploited that reality during its recent advance, encouraging Arab defections from SDF ranks. In cities such as Tabqah, groups of men tore down a statue of a Kurdish woman fighter and painted over images of Abdullah Öcalan, the imprisoned leader of the PKK, a terrorist group that is deeply linked with elements of the SDF.

Washington has relationships with both sides. Trump’s special envoy to Syria, Tom Barrack, has met with both President Sharaa and SDF commander Mazloum Abdi numerous times. But the SDF’s insistence on preserving de facto autonomy in the northeast has long frustrated U.S. officials, who have increasingly thrown their weight behind the new government in Damascus. The defenestration of the Kurds was in keeping with administration’s larger policy of repudiating legacy commitments in several theaters of operations. In the president’s own words, “where were the Kurds on D-Day?”

For its part, the SDF has pursued the dual strategy of engaging the government in negotiations while simultaneously stalling, seemingly in the hope that the Sharaa government would overreach or lose international support. That gamble has not paid off. A massacre of Alawites last spring, clashes with Druze factions in Suwayda, and even an incident in which an ISIS infiltrator killed three Americans in Palmyra have failed to derail Washington’s engagement with Damascus. One can imagine the dismay that the Kurds’ surrender has stirred among Alawites and Druze.

Under mounting pressure, the SDF has now pulled back from Deir ez-Zor and Raqqa into its core areas inside Rojava. But now the Syrian army has reached the city of Hasakah, which is an Arab majority city in Rojava where SDF bases are located and only one hour south of the Kurdish stronghold of Qamishli. It seems unlikely that the group will willingly surrender its arms or control of Qamishli without a fight.

At first it appeared the SDF saw this deal as a chance to regroup and go back to the negotiating table. For Turkey, that prospect is unacceptable. Ankara has repeatedly threatened to strike the northeast, though it has so far refrained from doing so while U.S. troops remain on the ground. Now the Syrian army is doing it anyway.