Turkey's allies said to abuse civilians

Syria refugees report killings, threats

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan (front, upper center) and other leaders follow a military honor guard Sunday during a ceremony in Ankara commemorating Mustafa Kemal Ataturk on the 81st anniversary of his death. Ataturk is considered the founder of modern Turkey.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan (front, upper center) and other leaders follow a military honor guard Sunday during a ceremony in Ankara commemorating Mustafa Kemal Ataturk on the 81st anniversary of his death. Ataturk is considered the founder of modern Turkey.

BEIRUT -- In the month since Turkey intervened to drive U.S.-allied Syrian Kurdish fighters from a large area of northern Syria, proxy forces backed by Ankara have been blamed for a growing number of abuses against the population, undermining Turkey's stated goal of creating a "safe zone" for civilians.

More than 200,000 people have been internally displaced by the Turkish-led offensive, according to the United Nations. Families that have been scattered across eastern Syria say that Turkey's Syrian Arab proxies have carried out summary executions and beatings, kidnapped or detained their relatives and looted their houses, businesses and belongings.

The result, refugees say, is a form of ethnic cleansing -- an operation they see as designed in part to force out Kurdish residents and their sympathizers and replace them with Arabs loyal to Turkey.

Turkey opened a cross-border military offensive into neighboring Syria on Oct. 9 with the aim of pushing the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces, an amalgam of Kurdish-led militias, away from its border. The Syrian Democratic Forces had spearheaded a U.S.-led campaign against the Islamic State militant group in northeastern Syria. But Turkey had long viewed the Syrian Democratic Forces' presence near the border as a threat because of ties to a Kurdish separatist group in Turkey, the Kurdistan Workers' Party, which the Turkish and U.S. governments have designated a terrorist organization.

Turkey essentially delegated the ground offensive to a proxy force, the Syrian National Army, an umbrella group in northern Syria consisting of an assortment of rebel forces opposed to the government of Syrian President Bashar Assad. Many of the group's factions, made up largely of Syrian Arab fighters, had already fought at Turkey's behest in two previous military operations over the past three years.

It is the Syrian National Army that many residents blame for depredations against civilians that have driven out thousands.

A senior officer affiliated with the force acknowledged some human-rights violations but said the Kurdish-led forces were exaggerating the abuses.

Among the displaced is Fateh, a 38-year-old barber from the border town of Ras al-Ayn in northeastern Syria. As an Arab of Turkish origin, he was among those who could have been expected to support the incursion. But in a telephone interview from the north-central Syrian city of Raqqa, where he and his family fled, he expressed loathing for the Syrian National Army.

"Those people are filled with hatred and a lust for blood," said Fateh, speaking on the condition that his full name not be used for fear of reprisals. "They do not distinguish between Arab and Kurdish, Muslim and non-Muslim. They contacted me before the offensive and said that as an Arab Muslim, it is my duty to rise up against the Kurds and help Turkey invade my city."

A supporter of the Syrian Democratic Forces and its diplomatic and administrative wings, Fateh rejected the outreach and joined his Kurdish friends in fleeing Ras al-Ayn.

Mohammad Aref, a radiologist from the border town of Tal Abyad, said he also received a phone call, this one threatening. "Someone called me and simply said: 'We want your head,' as if stealing my home and driving me out of my city merely for being Kurdish was not enough."

Aref, who is now in Kobane, about 35 miles west of Tal Abyad, said this incursion reminded him of when Islamic State militants invaded his town in 2013. Syrian National Army members "destroyed a lion stonework at the entrance of our building, thinking it was idolatry," he said. "They took our carpets and threw them on the street to prostrate themselves on them during public prayers that they were holding."

The offensive also displaced Mikael Mohammad, the Kurdish owner of a clothing shop in Tal Abyad. He and his family are now in Raqqa, crammed with three other families in a one-bedroom apartment that was abandoned by its inhabitants.

"Let's be clear, Tal Abyad is not under the control of Turkey. It's under the control of Turkey's mercenaries," Mohammad said by phone. "They have taken over the houses of us Kurds and made them their own."

Mohammad said relatives who did not make it out of Tal Abyad have told him that families of fighters from the Islamic State group, who had escaped from a nearby internment camp, now occupy his building.

"Each one of those mercenaries acts as if he was in charge of the town," Mohammad said of the Syrian National Army fighters. "They walk into houses and proclaim them theirs. They kidnap and execute people for being 'atheists' or 'blasphemers.' And they are looting people's properties in broad daylight."

For a Syrian Kurdish aid worker from Ras al-Ayn, "the best scenario a Kurd can wish for is not being allowed to go back home." Syrian National Army fighters "believe that taking your life is doing God's work and that stealing your property is their reward for it," said the displaced aid worker, who now lives in Qamishli, a city about 65 miles east of Ras al-Ayn, and who spoke on the condition of anonymity out of fear for his safety.

The fighters' criminal behavior thrives in the absence of Turkish forces, the aid worker said. "When the Turks are around, their Syrian mercenaries refrain from looting property or harming anyone," he explained. "The Turks are aware of such human-rights violations, and they try to limit them, but not hard enough."

Speaking to journalists recently, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan defended his Syrian rebel allies, saying they were not "terrorists" but Islamic holy warriors who were "defending their land there, hand in hand, arm in arm, shoulder to shoulder with my soldiers."

A deal brokered by Moscow and Ankara on Oct. 23 effectively ceded Syrian Democratic Forces-held territory to Turkey -- a stretch 75 miles wide and 20 miles deep, from Tal Abyad to Ras al-Ayn.

Last month, the Syrian rebel forces faced strong condemnation after graphic videos showed fighters from one faction, Ahrar al-Sharqiyah, summarily executing captives on a highway it had just seized near Tal Abyad. The same group also has been accused of killing Hevrin Khalaf, a Syrian Kurdish politician, after ambushing her car south of the town on Oct. 12.

In response to the backlash, the Syrian National Army formed a committee to investigate crimes reportedly committed by the Syrian rebels. The committee is chaired by Col. Hassan Hamadeh, deputy defense minister in the opposition's Syrian Interim Government.

"We admit that we have soldiers who commit human-rights violations," Hamadeh told The Washington Post. "The Syrian National Army's lack of homogeneity renders the task of disciplining everyone harder. It's like we're patching torn clothes."

However, he dismissed most of the accusations that have been circulating online, describing them as part of a Syrian Democratic Forces-led campaign. He did not specify which accusations he views as specious.

"With these false accusations, they want to portray us as savage beasts," Hamadeh said. "Such rumors have caused many people to flee their cities and villages before we liberate them."

Meanwhile Sunday, a car bomb in northern Syria killed at least eight civilians and wounded 20 others in a town near the border with Turkey, Turkey's Defense Ministry said.

The explosion struck a town south of Tal Abyad, the ministry said. The ministry blamed Syrian Kurdish fighters for the attack, accusing them of "massacring innocent civilians."

The attack came more than a week after a similar car bomb attack in central Tal Abyad killed 13 people.

Syrian government troops fought for a second day with Turkish-led forces in an area between the towns of Tal-Tamr and Ras al-Ayn, according to a war monitor, Syria's state media outlets and activists. At least four Syrian government soldiers were killed in the fighting Saturday.

A Turkish drone struck a village north of Tal-Tamr on Sunday, Syria's state-run Al-Ikhbariya TV said. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory reported intense clashes not far from Russian patrols.

Information for this article was contributed by Asser Khattab and Kareem Fahim of The Washington Post; and by staff members of The Associated Press.

A Section on 11/11/2019

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