On October 6, clashes intensified between Kurdish YPG fighters and Islamic State for the control of Kobani, a town in Northern Syria close to the Turkish border.
Backed by tanks and heavy artillery attacking from three directions, the Islamic State advanced on the town, and heavy street battles are taking place. Based on the IDs found on their bodies, most of Islamic State fighters killed during the clashes are reported to be Turkish, Saudi Arabian and Tunisian.
There are also reports of many civilian casualties due to indiscriminate shelling by the Islamic State.
The Turkish government, a member of NATO, claims to be against the Islamic State. In fact, it has facilitated IS’s siege of Kobani by sealing the northern border to the town, preventing residents and the YPG from receiving supplies, arms and military volunteers. It is clear that Turkey’s government would like to use the Islamic State attacks to wipe out the Kurdish semi-autonomous zones, and then use this as a pretext for full-scale intervention against Syria.
The Kurdish opposition party in Turkey, People’s Democratic Party (HDP) released a statement that called on the people of Turkey to take to the streets to protest the recent Islamic State attacks and the policies of the AKP government of Turkey.
Responding to this call, people in Turkey took to the streets in solidarity with the Kurdish resistance against the Islamic State. Demonstrations in major cities including Istanbul, Ankara, Izmir as well as many other smaller towns were held. In Istanbul, thousands marched to Taksim square amid slogans “Murderer ISIS, comprador AKP!”
In Kadıköy, İstanbul, police attacked the protesters with tear gas, rubber bullets and water cannons. There were sit-ins held in the centers of Ankara and Izmir. In Suruç, a border town close to Kobani, there were reports of the police shooting tear gas into people’s homes. In Cizre, another town close to the Syrian border, the offices of the ruling Justice and Development Party, AKP were set on fire.
Turkey’s ruling AKP has played a vital role in the rise of Islamic State as AKP provided it with arms, logistics, training and funds. The 500-mile long border with Syria has in the past served as a staging area for groups including the Islamic State to launch attacks in Syria including the Rojava region where the town of Kobani is also located. For more information on Turkey’s AKP’s role in supporting IS, please see here.
The Communist Party of Turkey released a statement in solidarity with the Kurdish resistance which said:
“In Kobani, humanity is resisting against the barbarity that imperialists have brought back from the dumpster of history. It is not only Kobani or Aleppo but the whole of humanity’s universal values that are under the attack by these ferocious, murderous jihadists… Along with the Islamic State, the President of Turkey Tayyip Erdoğan, Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu and their government of war [who] use the IS terror in Kobani to blackmail the Kurdish people. […]
“Islamic State is a barbarous organization which has committed crimes against humanity. Equally, AKP goverment of Turkey has also committed crimes against humanity time after time, they have the blood of the people of the region on their hands. Islamic State and AKP are not two separate entities. AKP government has supported, funded and fostered Islamic State[…]
“It is peace, equality and freedom that the peoples of the Middle East are in dire need of, not the lies and plans of imperialists and their clients in the region. The path to the peace in the Middle East goes through the struggle against imperialism and its subcontractors under different masks. It will be the people in the region unifying their struggle against imperialism that will establish that peace. It is also this unified struggle that will destroy the jihadist death squads, as well as all other imperialist subcontractors.
“Long live Kobani resistance! Bijî berxwedana Kobanê!
“Long live the brotherhood of the people!
“Long live socialism!”
Protests spread to more cities and towns in Turkey, police and Islamic State supporters murder protesters
On October 7, as the protests in Turkey spread to many other cities and towns, there are reports of deaths and injuries from Muş, Mardin and Diyarbakır provinces. While some protesters were killed by the police shooting live ammunition into the crowd, some are reported killed by Islamic State supporters as they shot into the protesting crowds.
A total of 14 people have been reported killed, and two are in critical condition. Curfew has been declared in Diyarbakır, Batman, Mardin, Van (Erciş) and Siirt, provinces in south east Turkey with a majority Kurdish population.
Islamic State in Kobani: Pushed as a pretext by AKP for escalating the military intervention in Syria
As AKP’s police were shooting and murdering Kurdish protesters in Turkey, in a brazen show of hypocrisy, Tayyip Erdoğan, the newly elected president of AKP was visiting the Syrian refugees in Gazianteep. During that visit, in an interview he gave to the press, referring to the U.S. airstrikes in Syria, he said:
“I am calling on to the West. Aerial bombing will not solve the problems. We now have this Islamic State terror organization which got strong in Syria. As we speak, Kobani is about to fall. We want three things: One, there should be a no-fly-zone, two, establish a safe zone parallel to that region and three, moderate groups in Iraq and Syria should to be trained and armed.”
The hypocrisy and shamefulness of these words are beyond limits. Erdoğan, the leader of AKP, the main force behind the rise of Islamic State, is now pretending to be its enemy in words, while helping it in deeds.
It doesn’t take much to realize that the ultimate target of the actions he proposes is not the Islamic State but the Syrian government — which has been in the crosshairs of the AKP and U.S. imperialism for years.
It is not enough that AKP has been harboring reactionary rebel groups including the Islamic State in Turkey near the Syrian border. Erdoğan is now asking for that safe harbor to be extended into Syria and to have it protected by a no-fly-zone.
All these measures would greatly help armed opposition groups fighting the Syrian government in northern Syria, including Al-Nusrah and ironically the Islamic State itself, which has suffered heavy losses as the Syrian government scores critical victories in Aleppo and Raqqa in the north.
AKP’s drive for war with Syria is also reflected in the words of another warmonger: the Turkish PM Davutoğlu. In an interview held with CNN’s Amanpour on October 6, he said : “Turkey would be willing to put its troops on the ground in Syria if others do their part,” adding, “If there is a need of intervention in Kobani, we are saying that there is a need of intervention into all Syria.”
On Oct. 3, the Turkish parliament with majority votes by AKP deputies had already passed a resolution for military intervention in Syria and Iraq under the pretense of fighting the Islamic State.
US imperialism takes advantage of the IS violence to
pressure secular Kurdish force PYD into cooperation with FSA
The Islamic State violence in Kobani is also being used by the U.S. imperialists as a means to pressure the secular Kurdish force PYD into cooperating with the reactionary and imperialist-backed opposition groups within FSA in Syria.
According to a recent article published in Foreign Policy, Kurdish sources indicate that as a precondition for Western military support in Kobani, the U.S. administration is pushing the PYD to distance itself from the Assad government and to work with the FSA and improve ties with Massoud Barzani (the current leader of the Kurdistan Democratic Party in Iraq who has deep ties with imperialism).
There has been an actual but limited cooperation between PYD and the Syrian government for the defense of Al Hasakah against the Islamic State, a strategic town situated in North Eastern Syria, close to both the Turkish and Iraqi border.
Here in in the heart of imperialism, all revolutionary and progressive people should express full solidarity with the Kurdish people in Kobani who are valiantly defending their home, men and women against the Islamic State as well as the people of Turkey who are out on the streets in support of Kobani despite the brutal police terror by AKP government.
We also realize their fight is not simply a fight to defend Kobani, but a fight to defend human dignity and core progressive values and principles such as secularism and equality for women. Long live the Kobani resistance!
