By: Dr. Adnan Buzan
It is clear that the files of betrayal, failure, and deals made at the expense of the Kurdish people in Syria will not be closed with the stroke of a pen. Nor will the SDF and its leadership be able to bury them behind slogans, statements, and speeches about “protecting the people” and “preserving achievements.” After Afrin, and after what happened in Sheikh Maqsoud and al-Ashrafiyah, Deir Hafer, Manbij, and the Tishrin Dam, another no less serious file is now being opened: the file of Muhammad al-Jasim, known as “Abu Amsha.”
We are speaking of a faction commander whose name, and that of his faction, have been associated, according to human rights reports, with grave violations in Kurdish areas, including arbitrary detention, torture, looting, rape, identity-based killings, property seizures, and displacement, within a broader pattern of abuses suffered by the Kurds, particularly in Afrin. The question the SDF cannot evade is this: How can a person with such a record fall into its hands and then be released? And how can the cycle of arrest and release happen more than once?
At this point, this can no longer be dismissed as a minor military detail. This is where the major political suspicion begins. Those who carry weapons in the name of defending the Kurdish people have no right to treat individuals accused of abuses against that very people as though the blood of the victims were merely a bargaining chip. If Abu Amsha is truly an enemy of the Kurds, and if his faction is responsible, according to documented human rights reports, for abuses against the population, then why was he not held accountable when he fell into the hands of the SDF? Why was he released? Who made that decision? Why? And in exchange for what?
His arrest and subsequent release require the SDF to provide a clear answer. Was there a deal? Was there mediation? Was there a prisoner exchange? Were there security or political understandings unknown to the Kurdish people? These are not passing questions. They strike at the very core of trust between the people and the organization that claims to carry arms in their name.
To Mustafa Khaleel Abdi, known as Mazloum Abdi: You cannot claim leadership when you take credit for titles and victories, only for responsibility to disappear when files of bloodshed, failure, and betrayal are opened. Leadership is not photographs with international officials, political statements, or slogans about protecting northeast Syria. Leadership means answering the questions: Why was Abu Amsha arrested? Why was he released? And who made that decision?
The Kurds are tired of always being the fuel for political deals. Agreements are made behind closed doors, rival parties exchange interests, and then the Kurds pay the price: the Kurdish person is displaced, his home is looted, his land is confiscated, his city is transformed, his family is scattered—and in the end, he is told to remain silent in the name of the “public interest.”
Here, the issue becomes more serious than Abu Amsha himself. The question is: Were some of the leaders who raised the banner of defending the Kurds secretly conducting relationships and making deals in the interests of other projects, while the Kurdish people were left to bear the consequences? Tell the truth, and do not be afraid of anyone, because the people are not a herd whose purpose is to applaud. Failure to answer these questions does not exonerate anyone; rather, it deepens suspicion and makes discussion of political betrayal a legitimate matter in the public debate.
We do not need new idols. We do not need a leader who stands above questions, an organization that stands above accountability, or a force that raises the Kurdish flag with one hand while asking the Kurds to forget their blood with the other.
If the SDF arrested Abu Amsha and released him more than once, then the Kurdish people have the right to know the full truth. If there was an agreement, then this is a political and moral catastrophe. If there was no agreement, then the SDF must explain to the public why a person whose name and faction have been associated with serious violations against the Kurds was allowed to escape accountability.
History will spare no one. It will not ask about slogans; it will ask: Who betrayed Afrin? Who sold their blood, and who collected the price for it in Ashrafiyah and Sheikh Maqsoud? Who failed to protect the Kurds? Who made the deals? And who turned the blood of the Kurdish people into a price for political interests?
The SDF is not greater than the Kurdish people. Mazloum Abdi is not above accountability. And Abu Amsha is not a case that can be forgotten through release and silence.
The opening of these files has begun, and this time no one will be able to arrest the question and then release it.
Important Note:
What has been presented here is merely a small part of a much larger body of dirty files associated with exploiting the blood of the Kurds and commodifying their cause. This file is only the beginning. We will continue to open these files one by one and expose their details, backgrounds, and responsibilities in full in the stages to come, far removed from political sanctification and partisan justification, because what happened to the Kurdish people cannot be buried through silence or erased by slogans.