Kobani — another Warsaw?

[alanjjohnstone]

http://dissidentvoice.org/2015/01/the-unfolding-revolution-in-rojava/ Another article to evaluate.  

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If the democratic nation is its spirit, democratic autonomy is its body. Democratic autonomy is the state by which the construction of the democratic nation comes to take on flesh and bone and is realised concretely.A short summary of this system’s essentials goes like this: The source of power is the people and it is the people who possess the power. Administration is provided for by organizations and assemblies chosen by elections. No government can remain outside or above the Social Contract established by the Administration of Democratic Autonomy and be considered legitimate. The source of the assemblies and governing bodies founded on a democratic foundation is the people. No body which acts by itself or in the interest of a single group is accepted…Political autonomy here means fundamentally the transfer of executive and legislative powers in a constitutional and participatory manner from the central state to regional bodies chosen democratically in a manner which sufficiently protects cultural and ethnic minorities living in their traditional homelands. We are talking about a model which when the Syrian Civil War was beginning found its own way (its 3rd way theory) without taking sides and demanded to govern itself using its own means and resources; a model which favors the will of a society as a political whole and a system which it develops itself……The economic pillar has been an essential part of the Rojava revolution! It defends an autonomous economic model and is working to put it into practice. Capitalism has surrounded everyone and everything, and in a century in which it is difficult to breath and where we are seemingly bereft of alternatives an exit is now being discovered through an alternative economic model and a communal economy. Dr. Ahmet Yusuf, the Economic Minister of the Efrîn Canton, made some important remarks recently at conference held on the ‘Democratic Autonomous Economy.’ He said “We take as a principle the protection and defense of natural resources. What we mean by defense is not defense in a military sense, but the self-defense against the exploitation and oppression which society now faces. There are many obstacles to restructuring the communal economy in Rojava. Systems which take capitalist systems as their reference have attempted to to obstruct our progress in the economic as well as the social spheres. We ourselves take the communal economy for our principal. We are working to create a system which combines anti-liberalism, ecological sustainability, and moral common property with communal and cultural production.”…

[Young Master Smeet]

The BBC has been very keen in reports to ensure that Allied bombing is given the credit for the liberation of Kobane (and absolutely no mention whatsoever of the politics of the Kurdish forces), the one thing that could actually forge some vague hope in the whole affair.Of course, hope is needed after the most recent Daesh murder, which sems to have been deliberately horrific.  And sucesful, Daesh want to provoke and widen the war, to drag others into their cesspit.  That Jordan has immediately responded with hits own pair of murders (presented here in the media as some sort of understandable retaliation, rather than as an act of barabrity in its own right) is not a good sign.Also, I note this other dispiriting stoy:http://www.juancole.com/2015/02/massacre-reprisals-collaborators.html

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As extremists from the Islamic State group are slowly driven out of northern Iraq, members of one of the groups that suffered at their hands – the Yazidis – began to take revenge on locals they say collaborated with them. This week several villages were looted and burned with around 70 locals kidnapped or killed.

So the cycle of violence continues.  People whose brains are to all intents and purposes identical to our own feel it is useful and sensible to execute their fellow humans and cause grief to their relatives.

[Young Master Smeet]

http://theconversation.com/the-international-media-is-failing-to-report-the-syrian-war-properly-37290(MInd, they don't report Mexico, Nigeria, Sri Lanka, Nepal, etc.)

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Towards the end of 2014, the favourite narrative (which never quite played out) could be summed up as “Assad is winning”. This year, the theme is “jihadists versus extremists versus jihadists”: this refers to both the Islamic State, which is fighting against Syria’s rebels, and to the “al-Qaeda-linked” Jabhat al-Nusra, which often fights alongside those rebels (but not always).[…]In recent months, these assorted anti-Assad groups have not only turned the tide on the Damascus regime’s forces, but have made notable advances throughout Syria. Sometimes working with Jabhat al-Nusra, they have moved into towns and villages and captured Syrian military bases.They now control most of north-west and south-west Syria, and, in January 2015, they advanced from the south towards Damascus. They have also been battling the Islamic State throughout Syria, from Aleppo Province in the northwest to Hama and Homs Provinces in the centre, to the greater Damascus area.

and

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Meanwhile, the more substantial Syrian conflict – the one with another 200 deaths daily, and 300,000 since 2011, with 4m refugees worldwide and 7m people displaced inside the country – has all but disappeared from view.

Obviously, Ukraine has kind of stolen the limelight, and the Russian connexion to the Syria debacle is there, but we must never let it be forgotten that it was military adventurism that led us to this pass…

[ALB]

Someone who had returned from fighting with the Kurdish YPG in Syria called in at Head Office today.  He was doing a tour of organisations to try to get the PKK taken off the NATO list of terrorist organisations. We explained that we didn't have much influence in that area! Unfortunately I didn't have a long time to chat with him but I did ask him about whether or not Bookchin's "libertarian municipalism" which the PKK has apparently embraced was actually being practised. He said that there were local areas that were run on this basis, basically providing electricity and water, street cleaning,etc and that there was no problem with food supplies. He said that there were also Christian militias and some units of the Syrian Army fighting ISIS in the area. Interesting firsthand account anyway.He referred us to a news item about someone from Canada who have fought alongside him:http://news.nationalpost.com/news/canada/canadians-who-travelled-abroad-to-fight-isil-get-little-scrutiny-upon-return-suggesting-canada-isnt-keen-on-stopping-them

[ALB]

I ask him about whether or not Ocolan's scheme for moneyless self-governing communes was being implemented. Here's his reply:

Quote:

I am not that well read on Ocalon I must admit, but my time in villages and towns the dollar is very much king as is the Syrian pound, believe it or not, but you need a small wad of them to buy a coke. From what I saw there is no monopoly on goods, from the basics to smart phones prices are affordable and reasonable even in a state of war when it would be easy to exploit the situation for profit, this to me though is a speaks more of the character of the people rather then the policies, while I am sure there is a black market I was never offered anything illicit even as a "rich Westerner". Civil projects are raised on their merits rather then their profit margin such as agriculture and small industry, construction, machine works ect, all positions of power in these companies are granted on election of the workers so the best people to perform given tasks are not promoted past their ability and can resign or be replaced if needed.

[ALB]

Interesting interview here will one of the commanders of the Kurdish YPG. They are  fighting not only against ISIS but also against the Al-Nusrah group which the Western media say are "moderates" but are actually part of Al Quaeda, motivated by the same Sunni muslim extremism originating from Saudi Arabia as ISIS:http://www.syriahr.com/en/2015/10/the-general-commander-of-peoples-defense-units-ypg-in-an-interview-with-sohr-we-view-al-hasakah-as-a-nucleus-of-the-new-democratic-syria/Here is the spiritual leader of the Al-Nusrah group preaching religious war against the Shiites and Alawites:http://www.syriahr.com/en/2015/09/al-muhaysin-addresses-the-mothers-of-the-sunni-apostates-in-the-regime-army-either-to-make-your-sons-defect-from-the-regime-army-or-their-destiny-is-going-to-be-captives-then-killed/Some moderates ! 

[Young Master Smeet]

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/30/opinion/the-kurds-democratic-experiment.html?_r=2

Quote:

For a former diplomat like me, I found it confusing: I kept looking for a hierarchy, the singular leader, or signs of a government line, when, in fact, there was none; there were just groups. There was none of that stifling obedience to the party, or the obsequious deference to the “big man” — a form of government all too evident just across the borders, in Turkey to the north, and the Kurdish regional government of Iraq to the south. The confident assertiveness of young people was striking.

She goes on to note how Rojava is being slowly crushed by Turkey and US indifference.  I doubt it will survive Russia's intervention, but it will continue to bleed even after then.

[Young Master Smeet]

Ah, hands up whop knew there was fighting going on in Turkey:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2015_PKK_rebellionParticularly in Cizre:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_CizreSadly spokespeople for the Kurds are talking of how building trenches round their districts make people feel safer, which means, I fear, that this revolution will fail under force of arms:https://rojavareport.wordpress.com/

[alanjjohnstone]

There are two old threads on Rojava. I opted for this one.Seems the libertarian Bookchin-inspired revolution has dropped out of attention so i was pleased to read this articlehttp://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2016/08/rojava-libertarian-myth-scrutiny-160804083743648.htmlHowever, it wasn't as rosy picture as some of the earlier reports depicted.

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