Alliance faces challenges in Syria

Associated Press

BEIRUT

Drawing on thousands of combatants from Syria’s mix of religious and ethnic groups, a U.S.-backed alliance called the Syrian Democratic Forces has emerged as the most effective fighting force against the Islamic State group.

But the dominant role of Kurdish fighters in the alliance is a concern for majority Sunni Arab factions and their regional backers, raising questions about the group’s future role in a broader political context in Syria.

The coalition, which focuses on fighting the Islamic State, already faces opposition from other groups fighting to topple President Bashar Assad because those groups widely distrust the Kurds.

And while the coalition has been capturing territory steadily in northern Syria from the extremists, it is hampered greatly by its inability to retake areas with a majority Sunni Arab population.

In a devastated landscape where extremists and Islamic groups largely preside, the Syrian Democratic Forces are the closest thing to an inclusive and moderate fighting force in Syria. It represents the largest of the non-government fighting forces arrayed against IS in Syria, with some estimates putting the number of fighters affiliated with the group at nearly 40,000.

“The Syria Democratic Forces are the most organized in the Syrian chaos,” said Kurdish activist Mustafa Bali, speaking from the Kurdish town of Kobani in northern Syria. He said the group has a united command stretching from the predominantly Kurdish town of al-Malikiyah in the east to Afrin in the west, with new members joining the alliance on daily basis.

The group is led by the main Kurdish fighting force in Syria, the People’s Protection Units, known as the YPG. It seeks to build on the success of the Euphrates Volcano, an alliance of Kurd and Arab factions that last year liberated Kobani from Islamic State militants.

It includes Arab forces such as the Sanadid force, mainly drawn from the Arab Shammar tribe; a Christian militia known as the Syriac Military Council, which includes Assyrians; the mainly Arab Jazira Brigades; the Seljuk Brigade, which consists mostly of Turkmen forces; and the Jaysh al-Thuwar group, which includes U.S.-backed rebels who were routed from Idlib and Aleppo provinces earlier this year by the al-Qaida branch in Syria, the Nusra Front.

Most of those groups are small and poorly equipped. Apart from the YPG, they lack military capabilities beyond defending their towns and villages.

The alliance was announced in the predominantly Kurdish province of Hassakeh on Oct. 10, a day after the U.S. said it was abandoning its effort to build a new rebel force inside Syria to combat the Islamic State group, acknowledging the failure of its $500 million campaign to train thousands of fighters.

Instead, the U.S. said it would provide support for those already fighting the IS group.