Yes, I agree. They seem sound so far as you can tell, and usually back their stories with quotes from sources in the US and Kurdish military. The think tank they quote above seems an entirely reputable source to use, though I'm sure chosen with care from the many somewhat reputable places you could quote from. Internal Kurdish politics with regards Iraqi Kurdistan and the the Northern Syrian cantons I don't understand very well - not that they seem nonsensical, I just don't have a good understanding of the history, different factions and so on.

My impression is the KDP / Turkey alliance stems from the Kurdish civil war in the mid 90s. Very generally it was between KDP factions and Iraqi Kurds who were to some extent allied with the PKK (a Turkish Kurdish armed group). Turkey intervened on the KDP side, presumably because they feared a PKK allied group gaining power in Iraqi Kurdistan. How the various factions have played out since then I'm not totally sure.

As you posted earlier Turkey certainly alleges the Northern Syrian regime is heavily involved with internal Turkish Kurdish groups still. Groups that Turkey is currently violently repressing, and who are killing Turks as well. I don't know how deep those links are, but to some extent they exist for sure. The Iraqi Kurdish regime has more-or-less happily co-existed with Turkey for some time, so I'm sure some powerful individuals in the two states are very friendly by now.

Just looking at a map the Turkey/Iraq border is much more mountainous than the Turkey/Syria one, so is probably historically less porous. Which might suggest why Turkey doesn't generally see so much internal threat from the Iraqi Kurds, but that's very speculative.

It's being reported by American media now that US marines have been around Manbij and that now there will be artillery support in Raqqa. The report doesn't say with which groups the US is working with, but the SDF is involved in the assault on Raqqa.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...=.7fc9b88d7b76

http://www.voanews.com/a/us-marines-...s/3756631.html

pisspiggranddad is tweetless for 2 weeks now and he's a pretty regular tweeter.

that really sucks, his interview was really good

Hopefully he's busy and/or somewhere without internet access.

Does anyone know of any good documentaries on this?

This isn't great, but not a bad watch. I'm definitely not making any claims about whether it's a fair portrayal or not.

https://cooperativeeconomy.info/

Again, no claims about how good this is, but this site has a lot of reporting on the politics and economy of Rojava as opposed to just war reporting.

Some of the allegations of removing people and not providing them with adequate care have been substantiated, but the UN issued a report yesterday saying

Which is reassuring. I think expecting there to be no problems is unrealistic, but ethnic, religious and gender equality are pretty central to the Rojava rhetoric.

http://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/HRC...ommission.aspx

http://www.avclub.com/article/jake-g...-new-fi-252751

Jake Gyllenhaal is supposedly going to star in The Anarchist vs. ISIS directed by Daniel Espinosa. It's about an American who goes to fight with the YPG. It's inspired by the Rolling Stone Article that featured, among others, Pisspiggranddad.

I don't see anything about an eta and it seems the screenplay isn't even written yet.

Twitter banned pisspiggranddad!

http://www.kurdistan24.net/en/news/1...rdistan-region

An interesting and hopeful story on booming business in Rojava. The news source is from Iraqi Kurdistan and perhaps is willfully ignoring whether the efforts are collective or not.

Have you read anything talking about the sustainability of Rojava after the civil war is over? Obviously Kurdish Iraq has been able to carve out some independence for a long time (albeit under a no-fly zone while Saddam was around), curious to see what the outlook in Syria is.

EDIT: Here's a really long pane discussion on Syria with some Rojava discussion near the end (maybe 70% of the way through):

https://tcf.org/content/report/four-...yria-round-ii/

I should just shrug my shoulders. I think Rojava and the current Democratic Federation/PYD/mixed Anarcho-Feminist/decentralized whatever model would do quite well and perhaps expand if outside powers weren't a threat, but they are. Turkey especially is opposed. The US is supportive for now, be we have deeper ties with the Iraqi Kurds (the KRG Kurdistan Regional Government). The KRG has authority in some neighborhoods in Rojava - perhaps including the one in the video. Russia and some Euros have been somewhat supportive.

If I had to guess though, the US will ultimately strongly favor the KRG. Saudi Arabia has also backed Turkey against the PYD while opening relations with the KRG. Ultimately is the PYD in any outside nation's or business' interests? What do they have going for them in outside powers' eyes now? They have some kind of democracy? Feminism? Mostly it's just that they oppose ISIS. I think every current outside power will find a reason to support someone who wants to displace them as soon as they aren't as worried about ISIS as they currently are. I'd say that a solid agreement with the KRG could put them in a position where outside powers accept the whole package, but whether the threat is peaceful or military I think the KRG will always perceive the PYD as a threat. At its heart, as I understand it, it's a revolutionary internationalist movement. There's at least the implicit incitement for sympathetic elements in Iraqi Kurdistan and Turkey and Iran and everywhere else really to join.

I agree with the guy in the article you linked who said anyone who thinks the PYD/SDF will just roll over into the Assad government is wrong. That won't happen. Either Assad or Erdogan trying to force what happens in Rojava is going to just result in war with no end in sight. Syria won't be united under Assad. The most likely outcome is some kind of more or less recognized Kurdish (or mixed, but not Assad controlled) Northern Syria. I think it helps that Russia seems amenable to this.

I'm definitely afraid of the "Turkey is the key" section and especially with Trump. I don't think the co-Presidents of the Confederalism are going to get the White House invite that Erdogan gets. A unified Kurdish Nation under the KRG is not the worst possible outcome for everyone involved, but it's not the Rojava Revolution. And, it might prove unstable because of ethnic and religious differences and in time it could have more conventional military conflict with Turkey and Iran.

Thanks for your thoughts. It sounds like you're pessimistic about Rojava/KRG being long-term allies? I can sort of see why, but it also seems like there's a natural line of demarcation between the two of them. (That is, if there's some kind of de facto federal system arrived at in Syria, it's hard to see the government allowing Iraq to take control of the Rojava region, and vice versa.). But I don't really know what I'm talking about.

I don't know and it's hard to trust any reports enough to be sure I think. I can't find it, but a few days ago I read something about a general who I think was part of the KRG though maybe just identified as Peshmerga who refused to engage against SDF forces and said he'd mediate. This is about something similar. So, despite the fact that the KRG leader (Barzani) has met with Erdogan and says "Any support to the PYD means support for the PKK" (PKK meaning they are terrorists), it's possible that the general population will not allow too hard a line on the Democratic Confederation of Northern Syria.

One more point on the hopeful side, there has been some kind of autonomy in parts of Chiapas for like 23 years now. And it's relatively peaceful. The murder rate in Chiapas is not much more than in the US and about 1/4 Mexico's overall rate. Not that there are a lot of similarities in the regions, but there are some and it's at least possible for an area to be left more or less alone. Maybe the PYD/Rojava could remain as a mostly autonomous region of Syria. Still, I think that requires pretty firm resistance from the US to intervention by Turkey.

http://www.startribune.com/woman-mak...uth/420302973/

This is just a human interest bit I guess, but a woman from Duluth brought $10k in cash to Rojava alone to help rebuild a library.

http://www.kurdistan24.net/en/news/e...ng-rojava--ypg

Turkish jets attacked SDF. This report says 20 YPG soldiers were killed, but another later report says 25.

http://aranews.net/2017/04/heavy-cla...rkish-attacks/

There were skirmishes today between the SDF and Turkey.

Stirring report on a women's brigade. Lots of internationals. Wish I was 22, not 57.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...-fighting-isis

Brace Beldon is back as PissPigGrandma

https://twitter.com/pisspiggrandma?lang=en

http://aranews.net/2017/06/at-least-...key-islamists/

Turkey keeps attacking in Syria. I'm not a big fan.

In local Turkey news the California Assembly voted to divest from Turkey.

http://asbarez.com/164027/california...t-from-turkey/

I still try to check on Rojava pretty much every day, but nothing has stood out as much different for a while.

All I have for this update is that PissPigGrandma is now suspended by Twitter as well.

In the last few days there's been slightly worrying signs that Turkey might be planning a move against Afrin, the area of Rojava in the NW of Syria which is unconnected to the other parts. It's separated by an area of Turkish control, or Turkish backed Syrian rebels, or however you'd like to describe them.

On the one hand it seems unlikely. As discussed the US has, if anything, stepped up its support for the SDF as a military force in recent months, so why would Turkey (who seemed weak in the Euphrates Shield operations recently) provoke a confrontation. On the other hand it's unclear to what extent the SDF in the rest of Rojava could support Afrin - they don't share a border and the SDF are reliant on the US for air power. This is west of the Euphrates, so falls under the area Russia claims as its exclusive air space and the US has supposedly said their help will not extend to Afrin. The US probably equally doesn't want a clash with Turkey.

It's mostly rumour at the moment - reports of troop movement in the Turkish area and a few attacks by their pet militias. Also reports that border crossings have been closed from the Turkish side, and then this morning an Afrin based journalist saying there is an embargo from all sides (Afrin also borders Turkey itself, regime controlled and FSA controlled parts of Syria).

Watch this space, I guess. The rumour stuff is on liveuamap, and this is a decent article from Al Monitor who always seem a fair source on the Middle East:

http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/en/o...ern-syria.html

They're basically saying that Turkey needs permission from the Russians to attack Afrin, and, as the tension mounts between the US and Russia in Syria that permission becomes more likely to be given.