Following the Ras al-Ain battle, the Kurdish leadership in northern Syria is getting ready to fight an imminent battle in the city of Qamishli. Preparations are currently underway in Turkey to infiltrate the Kurdish-majority city.

The Ras al-Ain battle was the first real infiltration of Kurds through
the Kurdish border that stretches from Afrin, northwest of Aleppo, to
the city of Derek, located in the easternmost part of the country,
straddling the Iraqi, Syrian and Turkish borders.
Three hundred militants from the Islamic jihadist group Ghurabaa al-Sham have entered the strategically located town and have stationed themselves
in Arab neighborhoods without entering the zones of the Kurdish Popular
Protection Committees affiliated with the Democratic Union Party (PYD) —
the main Kurdish power in western Kurdistan.
The Ghurabaa al-Sham group is one of the Islamic Syrian groups that
fought alongside al-Qaeda in Iraq and was used by Syrian intelligence in
the war against the American occupation before its leader Mahmoud Gul
Agassi — also known as Abu Qaqaa — was killed in a mosque in Aleppo in
September 2007. Agassi was killed at the hands of one of those who
returned from Iraq. The assassin was declared an infidel by the group,
which then shed his blood after accusing him of colluding with the
Syrian government.
According to a Kurdish leader, Turkish cadres have sent 1,000 Syrian
opposition militants to a camp near the city of Nusaybin, adjacent to
the Syrian-Turkish border and located only three kilometers from the
nearest neighborhoods of the city of Qamishli on the Syrian side.
Nusaybin, which was annexed by Turkey in 1929 under the French mandate,
witnessed a massive exodus to nearby rural areas for fear of shelling
on the city, whose population numbers 150,000 people, mostly Kurds.
According to a Syrian Kurdish opposition leader, the battle for the
strategic city of Qamishli is imminent. The PYD, which is trying to
remove itself from the battlefield, will have to change its position and
send back-up troops to the city to defend it.
The city is home to 180,000 people and is considered to be the largest
Kurdish cluster in the region and the PYD’s stronghold. It is run by a
national council of Western Kurdistan that operates under the
supervision of the Kurdish National Council (KNC), of which half of its
members are affiliated with 16 Kurdish opposition parties and share in
the decision-making process. On the other hand, the security and
military forces deployed in and around the city belong exclusively to
the PYD ranks.
The Kurdish leader added that after launching the first bombs against
Syrian army sites in Ras al-Ain, the Turks prompted armed jihadist
groups to enter the city, paving the way for other forces trying to move
from Nusaybin and travel five kilometers across the border.
These forces will weaken the PYD-dominated Kurdish military wall and
prevent its forces from moving in the area, gradually opening it to all
armed groups, including the Free Syrian Army (FSA) as well as jihadist
groups such as the al-Nusra Front and Ghurabaa al-Sham. The Syrian army
will be exhausted and forced to retreat. However, the main goal of the
attack on Qamishli is to control the city’s airport, located at few
kilometers from the Turkish border, from which the armed opposition can
be supplied directly in Syrian territory.
The US operations room in Antakya has indicated that the FSA has
launched attacks to win control of airports near Aleppo, Idlib, Taftanaz
and Meng. However, the FSA failed to capture key strategic airbases
which launch Syrian helicopters and bombers.
Along with jihadists, Turks are also playing the game to restore their
old relationships with the region’s tribes. The Kurdish security
apparatus has begun making extensive contacts with Arab tribes scattered
around Qamishli in order to build a united front against the PYD and
the remnants of the Syrian army that are still deployed in the region.
Jihadist forces stationed in Nusaybin have launched negotiations with
Muhammad al-Fares, leader of the Tayy tribe, which has 10,000
individuals living in the southern part of the city. The Syrian army
started to evacuate some of its sites in the city, and the eastern
barrier was removed at the request of the Kurds.
Fares used to have good relations with the authorities in Damascus
until recently. Fares also had good relations with the Kurdish National
Council, despite the fact that he was at the head of Arab groups that
looted Kurdish stores in the city during the Qamishli uprising in 2004.
Turks and jihadist groups have supplied Arab tribes in the villages of
Ghamr, Tannouriya al-Ghamr, Um Fursan and Hulat al-Ghamr with weapons.
These villages are located on the eastern hills overlooking Qamishli and
lie in the heart of the plains, where they are difficult to defend.
According to a Turkish leader, Turks are trying to drag the Arabs of
Ghamr into battles. These tribes came from the Euphrates basin to
Qamishli, following the construction of the Euphrates Dam. They were
accommodated in 40 villages stretching along 240 kilometers, from Derek
to Sari Kanye, along the section of the Turkish-Syrian border known as
the Arab belt.
The Turks have also been trying for weeks to gain the support of the
Shammar tribes — led by Hamidi Bin Daham al-Hadi — and the Shammar
al-Jarba branch, which maintains good relations with Saudi Arabia.
However, its leader is still on the fence and has complained of Kurdish
infiltration of Western Kurdistan.
He said that the wing of the Yekiti Party led by Ismail Hami, as well
as the wing of the Kurdistan Freedom Party (Azadi) led by Mustafa Juma,
are in contact with the Turks and are working with them through the KNC.
He added that they may participate in the battle, in addition to the
Salahuddin battalion supervised by Salah Badr al-Din, which mostly
consists of Kurdish members.
The Kurds are being subjected to political and military blackmail over
the battle they fought in Ras al-Ain, and the battle to enter Qamishli,
which is currently under preparation.
During the battle of Ras al-Ain, PYD forces did not intervene in the
fights between Ghurabaa al-Sham and the Syrian army, out of fear that
they would be accused of siding with the regime. They are already
accused of that, because they did not take part
in the fighting in Aleppo and prevented the armed opposition from
entering their areas. The Ghurabaa al-Sham also exhibited great
cleverness by not attacking the Kurdish neighborhoods, which facilitated
the fall of the town.
However, the neutral Kurdish position, fearful of accusations of
cooperation with the regime, led to the loss of Ras al-Ain and the
penetration of the Kurdish wall.
The Kurdish leaders fear that some of the refugees in Deir al-Zour, who
amount to nearly 12,000 families, would join the attack force that is
under preparation.
To avoid once again facing the dilemma of choosing between fighting to
defend the Kurdish towns and cities under the pretext that the attackers
are targeting the Syrian army, and the inevitable fall of these towns
and cities if the Syrian army is defeated at the hands of jihadist
groups, a Syrian Kurdish leader said: “We tried to remove this excuse
from the attackers by controlling the area in which units of the Syrian
army are still stationed. We told the regime officials in the area that
the exit of their units from the area would make it easier for us to
defend it politically on the grounds that it does not have a military
presence by the regime, while maintaining the service institutions of
the state and presence of Syrian flags.”
The Kurdish leader added, “The directors of security branches and
military officials asked to stay and take part in defending the city. We
asked them to get out of the city and remove the checkpoints, but they
are still stationed at the airport. A battalion consisting of 1,000
Syrian soldiers headed to Ras al-Ain as helicopters continued to survey
the area. We believe that they will not be able to move freely in the
area without the heavy use of aircraft. Thus, in recent days the Turks
have deployed a network of missiles and air-defense systems.”
The Kurds persuaded the regime security branches to withdraw from
Derek, as they had from the strategic town of Tel Tamer, which lies 40
km from Ras al-Ain along the highway to Aleppo. A meeting held at the
church in the city of 50,000 residents led to the formation of
self-defense units.
On whether the Kurds and popular protection units are capable of
defending Qamishli and preventing its downfall, the Kurdish leader said:
“We will not repeat the mistake of Ras al-Ain. We will fight in the
city, whether or not the Syrian army units fight in the city or withdraw
from the airport. If the Turks do not pave the way for an artillery
attack on Qamishli as they did in Ras al-Ain, we will be able to defend
the area. There is no other choice but to defend it, because seizing it
would lead to the dismemberment of western Kurdistan, open the door to
attacking Afrin and transform the whole region to a battlefield, which
is what we have so far tried to avoid.”
In other news — citing AFP, AP and Reuters — Secretary-General
of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) Abdul Latif al-Zayani said in a
statement that Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov will hold talks in
Riyadh today [Nov. 14] with his counterparts in the GCC on the conflict
in Syria. Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said
that Tehran will set up a meeting between the parties to the Syrian
conflict next Sunday [Nov. 18] to hold a “national dialogue.”
Paris has bucked the consensus of its European allies by formally declaring its recognition of the National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces, confirming that it “will consider arming the opposition once a transitional government is formed.”
Washington considered the coalition the “legitimate representative of
the Syrian people.” However, it avoided recognizing it as a
“transitional government,” as France did.
In an interview with the TV channel Russia Today, Syrian Deputy Foreign
Minister Faisal Mekdad said that the new coalition is an
American-Qatari project that is being used by external forces to destroy
Syria.