Exclusive: A conversation with the commander of the US-backed Kurdish Syrian Democratic Forces

Mazloum Abdi: Your reports are right. So, there is buildup. There is mobilization. And there are Turkish army drones covering their attacks. So, in recent days, they were trying to cross the Euphrates River and then move towards Kobani. Our forces confronted them and pushed them back. We do have information about their plans to come and attack Kobani. So, there is mobilization and plans to attack Kobani.

So, right, we are working with the global coalition and the American forces for decades now. And we are working and talking with the Department of Defense counterparts, Department of State counterparts and the White House, also. And we do know that they are working on the situation, they are pressuring the Turks, and they are also mediating between us and the Turks in order to stop this matter [to prevent any] violation from taking place on the Syrian-Turkish border.

They are doing their best to resolve this matter through dialogue. We are thankful for these efforts. Despite all this hard work, quite honestly, there is no permanent ceasefire at the moment. We just heard several minutes ago about a temporary ceasefire extension of the previous ceasefire for another week. So, we do have a ceasefire for a week now, which is good. But what we are trying to do through our partners is two things: first is having a permanent ceasefire, and addressing the Turkish security concern.

Certainly it’s been affected. So, who is protecting and guarding these facilities? They are mainly in a Kurdish compound. And those people, they are busy now with protecting their their houses and their communities. So, this leads to some impact over the protection of the camps and the prisons.

And, at the end of day, there’s stability and protection in Syria, in general, it’s not specific to one site or another for us in northeastern Syria. That’s why we are working with the American counterparts to have entire protection and stability across all of Syria. There is stability [across Syria now except] in our region.

So, that’s why we are working with the Americans in order to preserve the stability and protection in our region also, which will enable us to fulfill our commitments in regards to the prisoner camps.

Of course, this is impacting us and we saw that since the beginning of this recent, quick development in the country. And we saw how ISIS has taken and seized a cache of weapons and ammunition from the Syrian Badiya. And now we are observing them increasing in their activity in the Badiya, in the Syrian desert.

So, just before having this interview with you, like two hours ago, they attacked a security square where there is an ISIS prison. And one of our internal security forces, one police, got martyred and three others got injured. We saw them last week also, they tried to attack the same square that they attacked today.

So for sure, what’s going on, what’s happening, it’s impacting the security and the protection of these facilities. And this is something we are working hard to keep under control and in a secure position. And I will not hide the secret that we have information about ISIS plans, and we do have intelligence about ISIS plans to launch or wage attacks over facilities, which contain ISIS [members] or their families who are in prisoner camps, to free them.

Yes, for sure it’s imminent, this plan. So currently, I am confident about our ability to keep these facilities and these sites under control. Over time, I think if these attacks keep happening against us in northeastern Syria, which is enabling our forces to go and protect their families and their communities, this will head into a dangerous and risky situation.

Over the last week, our communication with HTS has been limited to security coordination with them. And that too, limited to what you can call “deconfliction” channels and coordination. So, just to not confront each other because we do have shared demarcation lines now. So, it is operational-level communication. If we are going to talk about political communication, there is no political communication.

First, because we are busy with the protection of our region and protecting our region from the Turkish and Turkish-backed factions’ attacks and assaults against us. And you see that there is security and stability in the entire country, but in the northeast, there are battles ongoing because there is no political communication on talks with HTS, so there is no delegation that has been sent by us until now to Damascus.

So, we do want that. And to be frank with you, that’s totally dependent on their side. That’s up to them at the end of day.

Based on our observations from the media and what the Israeli officials say — that it is steps they are taking for their own security — principally, we are against occupation in Syria in general. This is for the entire country. And we are for Syrian territorial integrity and unity of the Syrian terrain. And we think that all the outstanding issues between Syria and Israel could be resolved by dialogue, at the end of the day.

We are optimistic and we expect that the Kurdish situation in Syria will be better post-Assad. We witnessed during the rule of Assad that the Kurds were oppressed and they were without an identity. And there are a lot of grievances to talk about from the Assad rule of Syria. There was no [recognized] language, there was no legal existence.

And in reality, the Kurds were the real opposition in Syria, and they [were the ones] who fought against terrorism in Syria with the international coalition. And based on this, the Kurds need to take, and they deserve to take, their rights constitutionally. So, based on what we are hearing from HTS, the new administration that’s governing from Damascus now, we saw their statements to be positive and we are welcoming this statement.

So, we are optimistic. And Syria needs constructive dialogue between all its people and a real and representative political process which will lead to the new Syria where everybody’s rights will be respected constitutionally as the outcome of this political process.

We do have a lot of friends from the first term of President [Donald] Trump in Syria during his first four years. And we do have many friends from that administration and we are still talking to those people from the first term who will be in the next administration. Also, we are talking to supporters from different US institutions, like Congress, the Senate and the House [of Representatives], who are supporting President Trump’s incoming administration. And we reached out to them recently in order to ask for their support and help to stop the Turkish assaults and constant attacks against our region.

Furthermore, we sent a letter to President Trump. We are going to complete and continue preserving and having this good and strong relationship with the incoming administration. Today, there is a new situation in Syria. And based on the press conference of President Trump yesterday, he made it crystal clear that he does not see threats over the US presence in Syria and we received this positively. We see this statement is a positive sign for US presence in Syria.

We do want that the US plays a role in the political process in Syria also because, at the end of the day, we still have some concerns that some radical players in Syria [may try to control] power in Syria. We hope that the incoming administration back in DC will help the Syrians to get to a Syria that’s representing everybody. We are already working and having good relations with the incoming administration and we are going to keep up these strong and good relationships.

Thank you. So, I just would like to emphasize this message. So now, there is no war and fighting in Syria, but Kobani is in a risky situation. We’re looking for the US officials and the current US administration to exert the needed and sufficient pressure over Turkey in order to stop them from attacking Kobani and having a permanent ceasefire.

We started our collaborations and our relationship with the United States from Kobani, and from there we started a successful operation led and crowned by the physical defeat of ISIS. And now, this symbolic city is under threat and it is a moral duty for the US to also protect it.