Turkey Declares Its Goal is to Eliminate Kurdish Militias in Syria

The Kurds have been the most effective ally of the U.S. in the campaign to destroy ISIS in Syria. The Kurds in Iraq also helped the American military to defeat ISIS in that country as well. Now the Kurdish militia (YPG) in Syria are threatened with destruction by Erdogan, who backed the jihadist rebels of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham and has already been seizing Syrian territory where the population is predominantly Kurdish. Antony Blinken tried to dissuade the Turks from attacking the Kurds at his recent meeting with Turkey’s foreign minister, Hakan Fidan, but to no avail. And now the Kurds have had to divert their forces from fighting ISIS to defending themselves from attacks by the Turkish army. More on Turkey’s announced “strategic goal” to destroy the Kurdish militia, YPG, can be found here: “Turkey seeks to purge pro-US Kurdish force that helped defeat Islamic State in Syria,” by Benjamin Weinthal, Fox News, December 13, 2024:

Just hours after meeting with Secretary of State Antony Blinken and discussing the fight against the Islamic State in Syria, Turkey’s foreign minister sent a shocking message to Washington by saying his country’s goal is to eliminate the main fighting force of the Syrian Kurds, which defeated ISIS in tandem with the U.S..

According to Turkish media, Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said in a live broadcast on NTV that “the elimination of YPG is [Turkey’s] strategic goal.” He also noted the country’s Kurds must be protected.

Asked about Fidan’s comments, the State Department referred Fox News Digital to comments made earlier on Friday after Blinken’s meeting with Fidan in Turkey.

The statement said, in part, “Secretary Blinken emphasized the importance of U.S.-Turkish cooperation in the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS mission in Syria.”

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken meets with Turkish Minister of Foreign Affairs Hakan Fidan Dec. 13, 2024, in Ankara, Turkey.  (Getty Images)

The U.S. has a long-standing military alliance with the Syrian Kurdish military organization, The People’s Defense Units (YPG), in Syria. The YPG is part of a broader organization known as the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and played a key role in dismantling the Islamic State in Syria.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has seized on the collapse of Syrian dictator Bashar Assad’s rule to gobble up territory controlled by the pro-American Syrian Kurds, risking hard-won gains against the Islamist [sic] State terrorist movement.

The Kurdish military forces in Syria, the YPG, have had to turn their attention to defending the Syrian Kurdish territory from Turkish troops. That has relieved the pressure on the ISIS fighters who still exist, in scattered pockets, throughout the Syrian desert and who may have an easier time of it as they attempt to reorganize and regroup.

Erdoğan’s campaign to purge the SDF in northern Syria has created a dangerous security situation in the fight against the Islamic State (ISIS), according to Gen. Mazloum Abdi, the SDF’s commander in chief.

In an exclusive interview Thursday, Mazloum told Fox News’ Jennifer Griffin, “We are still under constant attack from the Turkish military and the Turkish-supported opposition, which is called SNA. Eighty drone attacks a day we have from the Turkish military. There is intensive artillery shells. This situation has paralyzed our counterterror operation.”…

It is these unceasing Turkish attacks — eighty drone attacks a day — on the Syrian National Army (SNA) that Blinken addressed in his meeting with the Turkish foreign minister, trying — and failing — to persuade the Turks to stop attacking the Kurds, whose military have been so effective against ISIS. Now Erdogan has to be persuaded to get with the American program using more than words.

The U.S. on Wednesday brokered a cease-fire between the pro-Turkey Syrian National Army (SNA), the Syrian opposition (TSO) and the SDF….

But how long will such a ceasefire last? It appears not to have held at all. Three days later, the Turkish army was again attacking the Kurdish fighters in the SDF.

Uzay Bulut, a Turkish-born political analyst, told Fox News Digital, “Erdoğan’s imperial ambition in Syria has not changed. Land grab and demographic change have always been Turkey’s plan in Syria. Turkey’s military campaigns against Syria have brought nothing but instability to the region and severe persecution of minorities.

“To prevent further abuses, massacres or forced displacements against Christians, Kurds and Yazidis and to stop the spread of jihadism in the region, the Trump administration should get involved diplomatically to protect religious and ethnic minorities, particularly defenseless Christians, in Syria.”

Syria’s Christian population could be as low as 2.5%, down from 10% before the civil war started in 2011. Christian and other ethnic and religious minorities face persecution from the radical Islamist Sunni terrorist organization Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) and its extremist allies.

“The ongoing jihadist assault against Syrian Kurds and Christians is led by the al Qaeda offshoot, HTS,” Bulut said. “HTS forces are backed by the government of Turkey and have brutalized and displaced religious minority communities in Idlib since 2017. HTS aims to install Islamic rule in Syria.”

Uzay Bulut has grave doubts, despite the soothing assurances of the leader of HTS, Mohamed Al-Jolani that minorities will be protected, that HTS wants to establish Islamic rule throughout Syria. In Idlib Province, , where the HTS has been governing since 2017, Christians and Shia (including Alawites) have been subject to brutal rule, causing many to flee the area. There is no reason to think that HTS rule over all of Syria will be different.

The Trump administration will undoubtedly make clear to Erdogan that the attacks on the Kurds in Syria have to stop, so that they can go back to helping suppress ISIS in Syria, and also to preventing the takeover of their territories in eastern Syria by HTS and other Islamic jihadist factions. And if Erdogan refuses? Then Trump has many ways to change Erdogan’s mind. One is to slap crippling tariffs on all Turkish imports to the United States. A second is to deny Erdogan’s military the ability to buy American weapons. A third is to put sanctions on individuals — Turkish government officials and military men — who are involved in the attacks on the Syrian Kurds. A fourth would be to airlift weapons to the Kurds — not American soldiers, which Trump has made clear he will not do — so that they can better defend themselves against Turkish forces. A fifth would be to threaten Erdogan with expulsion from NATO if he continues to fight the Kurds who have done so much to prevent an ISIS takeover in Syria. And the US should be prepared to follow through on that threat. After all, Erdogan has become the odd man out in NATO, the military alliance’s only Muslim member. And far from pledging loyalty to his Western partners, Erdogan has expressed his belief that there may eventually be a war between “the crescent and the cross,” and he left no doubt which side Turkey would be on. He has even hinted that he would be just the man to lead his fellow Muslims.

The Kurds in Syria can be helped, and Turkey hindered, in myriad ways, none of which would require the sending of American troops. But much can be done without involving American boots on the ground. Let’s not abandon the Syrian Kurds, our closest ally in the fight against ISIS, to Erdogan and his criminal crew.