By Dr. Adnan Buzan

The real question today is not whether the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) integrated into the new authority in Damascus or not. Political agreements, after all, are not sacred texts, and handshakes captured by cameras do not necessarily mean that peoples have emerged as winners from history. The question that must be asked clearly, harshly, and without fear of the answer is this: Who actually benefited from this integration? And who paid the price?

Once again, we are confronted with a Syrian scene that has become painfully familiar: leaders negotiate, parties rearrange their positions, officials obtain posts, and military forces redistribute influence, while ordinary people remain exactly where they have always been. The poor become poorer, the hungry become hungrier, and the people who were told that the war was being fought for their dignity find themselves, once the battle is over, searching for the most basic conditions of life.

Not long ago, I said to the people of eastern Euphrates—from Kurds, Arabs, Assyrians, and others—that they could no longer afford the luxury of escaping reality. I said that their true destiny would not be built in Damascus, Ankara, Erbil, or distant capitals, but here, on the land that brings them together. Your neighbor, who lives beside you and knows your hunger, your fears, and the future of your children, is closer to your destiny than a politician beyond the borders who raises the banner of nationalism and then leaves you alone when disaster begins.

It was a simple truth, yet it has always collided with an old disease of Syrian politics: turning identity into a weapon, nationalism into a wall, sectarianism into a political project, and tribalism into a rifle, while the human being remains the final victim.

Since the establishment of the modern Syrian state, there has been a clear political, economic, and social difference between eastern and western Euphrates. The issue was never merely about language or abstract national identity. It was about the nature of life, interests, geography, and history. Eastern Euphrates has its own social structure, its interconnected communities, its resources, its problems, and its distinct political memory. Yet there have always been those who sought to convince its people that the solution was to forget their own reality and sacrifice their local interests for grand slogans—slogans whose makers they do not even know, nor those who ultimately benefit from them.

And that was the catastrophe.

Instead of asking himself, as an Arab living in eastern Euphrates: What connects me to my Kurdish neighbor with whom I have lived for decades and generations? What brings together the people of this region? How can we build an administration that protects everyone? How can we prevent the return of the centralism that marginalized us all? How can we preserve our resources and secure the future of our children?—there were those who convinced him that his real enemy was his neighbor.

And instead of the Kurd asking: How can I transform my political and military strength into genuine constitutional guarantees for my people? How can I protect Kurdish rights without losing my natural partners in the region? How can I build a common political project that does not turn into partisan rule?—other calculations prevailed. Narrow interests won, and the larger project gradually turned into a network of positions, arrangements, and privileges.

And so politics did what it has always done when peoples fail to see the truth: it pushed people into conflict, and then the leaders sat down afterwards to divide the results of the war among themselves.

Today, after everything that has happened, people have every right to ask: What did we gain?

If this integration granted some leaders new positions, did it grant the Kurd clear constitutional guarantees for his rights?

If it gave certain officials positions within state institutions, did it give the Arab of eastern Euphrates a better life?

If political parties received their share of power, did the people receive their share of dignity?

And if military forces reorganized themselves under new titles, did genuine security return to the people?

A position is not a homeland. A ministry is not bread. And a military rank is not a guarantee for the future of a hungry child.

This is the truth that many are trying to escape.

The leaders may have integrated, negotiated, or redistributed their positions. Some forces may have achieved political, partisan, or personal gains. But what about the people who were told that this entire conflict was being fought for them? What about the Kurd who still asks about his true place within the state? What about the Arab who discovered that nationalist slogans do not feed his children? And what about all the people of eastern Euphrates, who have once again found themselves outside history and at the very bottom of the list of those who benefit?

It was very easy to mobilize people with slogans.

They were told: This is a battle for nationalism.

They were told: This is a battle for the state.

They were told: This is a battle for identity.

They were told: This is your enemy.

But after all of this ended, no one asked them: Where is your share of victory?

Was this the victory you promised them—that they would eventually find themselves gathered around garbage bins, searching through scraps for something to satisfy the hunger of their children?

This is the tragedy.

How many times have people carried a flag without knowing who created it? How many times have they fought in a battle without knowing who would decide its outcome? And how many times have sons died, only for those who never fired a single bullet to appear afterwards and speak of “victory”?

There are those who pushed members of certain tribes into bloody conflicts, those who fueled division between Kurds and Arabs, those who invested in fear and hatred, and those who turned political identity into a profitable business. These are the people who must be questioned today, rather than allowing responsibility to hide behind entire communities.

Who was inciting?

Who was financing?

Who was distributing weapons?

Who was manufacturing the language of hatred?

And who disappeared when disaster began, only to return when the time came to divide power?

Many of those who created the chaos have escaped into new positions, while the people have remained where they were, trading accusations among themselves—exactly as the saying goes: the murderer escaped, while the members of the household remained arguing over who opened the door.

Here, everyone must confront the harshest truth: the Kurd did not benefit from having his name exploited for partisan interests, nor did the Arab benefit from being mobilized in the name of nationalism for projects that brought him nothing.

Those who once shouted in the name of Arab nationalism—what did they offer the people of eastern Euphrates when they needed bread, work, and dignity? And those who raised the banner of the Kurdish cause—what did they offer the Kurd when the cause itself was turned into a means of protecting the party, influence, and positions?

The most dangerous thing that can happen to a people is for their cause to become a political career. At that point, the homeland becomes a ladder. Blood becomes political capital. Identity becomes a passport to power. And the masses are reduced to nothing more than fuel.

Today, the people of eastern Euphrates must ask themselves, with courage: What is our real place in the new Syria? Are we truly partners, or are we merely inhabitants of territories wanted when their resources, geography, and military importance are needed? Has the state truly changed, or have only the names of those sitting in its offices changed?

A state that demands your loyalty does not become just merely because it changes its flag or its rhetoric. A state that does not recognize you as a full citizen, does not protect your rights, and does not grant you a genuine role in determining the future of your region may raise a thousand slogans, but it will remain a centralized state that views the periphery as territories to be administered, rather than communities whose will must be respected.

Here, Kurds, Arabs, Assyrians, and all the people of the region must finally understand a lesson that has been delayed for far too long: No one will build eastern Euphrates except its own people.

Damascus alone will not do it.

Nor will the political parties alone.

Nor will the tribes alone.

Nor will the military forces alone.

Nor will nationalist slogans.

What can protect the future of the region is for its people to agree that their shared interests are greater than the hatred that politicians have planted among them.

An Arab living in Hasakah, Deir ez-Zor, or Raqqa does not need to hate a Kurd in order to be Arab.

A Kurd does not need to fear an Arab in order to remain Kurdish.

And an Assyrian does not need to become anyone’s subordinate in order to preserve his existence.

This region does not need one nationalism to erase another, nor a party that swallows society, nor an authority that replaces one form of authoritarianism with another. What it needs is a new social and political contract—one that declares that people matter more than parties, that bread matters more than slogans, that dignity matters more than positions, and that partnership matters more than domination.

As for those who still live within the illusions of the past and continue repeating the same slogans after witnessing their consequences, they must ask themselves a simple but painful question: What remains of everything you once defended?

Has your life become better?

Are your children safer?

Is your dignity protected?

Have your communities become more prosperous?

Do you now have a genuine voice in determining your own future?

If the answer is no, then why do you continue applauding those who benefited while the people are left to pay the bill?

The problem is not that peoples make mistakes once; all peoples make mistakes. The problem is continuing to repeat the same mistake while those who led them into it change their positions, their names, and their slogans—and remain permanently at the front of the line when the gains are distributed.

The time has come for the people of eastern Euphrates to understand that their future will not be built upon mutual hatred. Those who pushed you to hate one another may sit together tomorrow at the same table, shake hands, and divide the positions among themselves, while you remain in the streets arguing over who betrayed whom and who emerged victorious.

Do not allow politicians to reconcile over your heads after you have fought each other at their command.

This is the question that must remain open:

Who benefited from the integration?

If the answer is: the parties, the leaders, and those who obtained positions, then this is not a national partnership.

And if the people have not gained their rights, dignity, security, and bread, then all these agreements are nothing more than a redistribution of power.

As for the Kurds, Arabs, and all the people of eastern Euphrates, their greatest political mistake would be to repeat the same experience: to divide themselves for the sake of others, fight for the sake of others, and go hungry for the sake of others—only to discover in the end that those others had been negotiating their price from the very beginning.

Enough of seeking victory through the defeat of your neighbor.

Your neighbor is not going anywhere.

Politicians, however, will leave when their interests come to an end.

And the final question—the harshest one—remains:

After all these years of blood, slogans, divisions, and promises... have you finally learned who was benefiting from you?

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