Kurds in Syria Attacked by Islamist Sharaa Regime in Aleppo (Israel Condemns)
Murad Makhmudov, Noriko Watanabe, and Lee Jay Walker
Modern Tokyo Times
A new and ominous chapter is unfolding in Syria. The Kurds now face direct military assault in Aleppo, following last year’s mass killings of Alawites and Druze — pogroms carried out by Sunni Islamist forces aligned with President Ahmed al-Sharaa.
In each episode of bloodshed, Sharaa’s forces sided decisively against religious minorities, unleashing violence that butchered thousands of Alawites and members of the Druze community. Yet despite this unmistakable pattern, the United States, Gulf powers, the European Union, Turkey, and the United Kingdom chose to deepen engagement with the very power brokers in Damascus responsible for this repression.
Christians, too, were killed last year. But the trajectory is unmistakable: the Sharaa regime is systematically targeting Syria’s minorities. After the large-scale massacres of Alawites and Druze, the regime has now turned its attention to the Kurds — a people who have already paid an immense price in the struggle against ISIS.
As The Guardian reports, the Syrian government ordered civilians to evacuate the contested Aleppo neighborhoods of Sheikh Maqsoud, Ashrafieh, and Bani Zeid, announcing the opening of so-called “humanitarian corridors” before launching military operations against the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). Maps were circulated identifying areas to be emptied — a chilling precursor to violence that echoes Syria’s darkest chapters.
Israel immediately condemned Damascus for attacking Kurdish areas in Aleppo, describing the assault as “grave and dangerous.”
Predictably, NATO member Turkey — under President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan — supports the crushing of Kurdish autonomy in northern Syria, consistent with Ankara’s long-standing campaign against Kurdish self-determination beyond its borders.
Israel’s concern is rooted in hard experience. As The Times of Israel notes, Jerusalem has openly expressed distrust of Sharaa, a former leader of an al-Qaeda affiliate. Following Assad’s ouster, Israel moved to secure the Syrian side of the demilitarized zone, citing fears that it would fall into extremist hands. Israel has also conducted hundreds of strikes in Syria, at times explicitly aimed at protecting the Druze minority from government-backed bloodshed.
Gideon Sa’ar, Israel’s foreign minister, stated unequivocally: “Attacks by the Syrian regime’s forces against the Kurdish minority in the city of Aleppo are grave and dangerous.”
He added: “Systematic and murderous repression of Syria’s various minorities contradicts the promises of a ‘new Syria.’”
Most pointedly, Sa’ar reminded the world: “The international community in general, and the West in particular, owes a debt of honor to the Kurds who fought bravely and successfully against ISIS.”
That debt is now being cynically ignored.
President Donald Trump welcomed Ahmed al-Sharaa to Washington last year and publicly praised him — signaling that the United States was prepared to overlook mass atrocities in exchange for geopolitical convenience. The slaughter of Alawites and Druze did not deter Trump, nor did it deter leaders in France and elsewhere, from extending legitimacy to Sharaa. The Kurds, it seems, are simply the next group to be “thrown under the bus.”
Meanwhile, Turkey has gone further, announcing it would provide military assistance to the Sharaa regime upon request. As CBC News reports, several factions within Syria’s new army — formed after Assad’s fall in December 2024 — were previously Turkey-backed insurgent groups with long histories of violent clashes against Kurdish forces.
The hypocrisy is staggering.
The United States, the European Union, Gulf states, Turkey, and the United Kingdom should be deeply ashamed of their overtures to Sunni Islamist actors in Damascus — forces that rule through fear, repression, and sectarian violence while actively dismantling Syria’s fragile religious and cultural pluralism.
Religious minorities, secularists, Kurds, and other marginalized communities now face an existential threat as Sunni Islamist power consolidates itself within Syria’s political order.
If the Sharaa regime succeeds in seizing Kurdish-held neighborhoods in Aleppo, the consequences will not be confined to one city. It will ignite further military clashes across Syria — and confirm that the promise of a “new Syria” was nothing more than a convenient lie told over mass graves.
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