{"id":57229,"date":"2021-04-07T19:02:20","date_gmt":"2021-04-07T19:02:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/npasyria.com\/en\/?p=57229"},"modified":"2021-04-08T13:33:53","modified_gmt":"2021-04-08T13:33:53","slug":"it-was-a-mistake-members-of-turkeys-syrian-national-army-on-the-invasion-and-occupation-of-afrin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/npasyria.com\/en\/57229\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cIt was a mistake:\u201d Members of Turkey\u2019s \u201cSyrian National Army\u201d on the Invasion and Occupation of Afrin"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Lindsey Snell<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

In January 2018, Turkey launched Operation Olive Branch, a military offensive the Turkish government said was necessary to clear the northern Syrian town of Afrin of terrorists. Turkey claimed the targets included both ISIS and the YPG, the Kurdish, US-backed armed forces which Turkey considers an offshoot of the PKK, a designated terrorist organization in many countries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A month earlier, most of the Syrian opposition known as the Free Syrian Army (FSA) became part of a collective named the Syrian National Army (SNA), which was under the direct control of the Turkish government. The Afrin invasion was the first major operation undertaken by the SNA.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Turkish Air Force bombarded Afrin, and the SNA began a ground invasion. Ultimately, hundreds of civilians in Afrin were killed, and hundreds of thousands were displaced. Afrin, once a peaceful and diverse town, devolved into a chaotic hell of warring factions and civilian oppression.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Male and female Asayish in Afrin in 2016 (Lindsey Snell)<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
Street sign placed in Afrin by the Ahrar al-Sharqiya faction of the SNA in 2019, ordering women to wear head scarves and loose clothing. \u201cChoose your look freely, but don\u2019t disobey God.\u201d<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Mustafa Khaled (an alias) is a former SNA leader who would rather not disclose the name of his faction. Khaled left the SNA a few months after the invasion of Afrin. \u201cI am one of many who left the SNA because of what happened in Afrin,\u201d he said. \u201cParticipating was a mistake, and Turkey lied to us about why we were going there. There was no ISIS in Afrin; Turkey just wanted to control Afrin. But within a year, most of the fighters who quit went back to the SNA. There is no other way for men to earn a living in Syria.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Khaled speaks candidly about the damage Turkey and the Turkish-backed SNA factions have inflicted on the local population of Afrin. \u201cFrom the first day of the invasion, the Kurdish civilians were deliberately displaced. Turkey has brought in Arab and Turkmen people to replace them. The fruits of the labor of the Kurdish people were stolen. The factions would loot everything from civilians\u2019 homes and often, they would sell the home itself, without any papers or permission from the real property owners.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Khaled said the SNA factions devised an informal system for the sale of stolen homes. \u201cThe factions would make a simple, fake contract and sell a stolen house for around $2000. In reality, the cheapest house in Afrin probably costs more than $10,000. But it doesn\u2019t matter, because the homeowners can\u2019t do anything about it.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hussam Arshami (an alias), a Hamza Division militant living in Afrin, witnessed the SNA\u2019s home sale scheme when a friend bought a house in 2019. \u201cThe house was sold for $3,000 by one of the factions. After, the rightful owner of the house tried to go to the SNA police to file a case against my friend,\u201d he said. \u201cThe SNA police aren\u2019t part of any faction, and are supervised by Turks, so people in Afrin thought they would be fairer than the factions. Two days later, the man disappeared. We later learned that the faction who sold the man\u2019s house had kidnapped him and threatened to kill him if he didn\u2019t withdraw the case. So, the man withdrew the case.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Afrin in 2020. SNA source.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Musafa Khaled says that more than half the houses in Afrin are occupied by people who are not the real owners. \u201cThey\u2019re not the real owners, and they didn\u2019t buy or rent the homes from the real owners,\u201d he said. \u201cKurdish civilians in Afrin who have managed to remain in their homes are forced to pay regular bribes to whichever SNA faction controls the area they are in. But even paying the factions does not guarantee security.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Khaled remembers an elderly man named Abu Jawan who lived in the Al-Vilaat neighborhood of Afrin. \u201cThe Al-Vilaat area is controlled by the Ahrar Sharqiya faction (of the SNA),\u201d he said. \u201cLast summer, Abu Jawan decided to spend some time on a farm he owned outside Afrin. He took his wife and two daughters with him, and so his house in Afrin was left empty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAfter a week, Abu Jawan returned to Afrin to check on his home. Immediately, he noticed the lock on his front door had been broken. When he got inside, he saw that all of his furniture had been stolen. He went to the Ahrar Sharqiya headquarters to ask what had happened, and an Ahrar Sharqiya commander told him that the faction had received information that Abu Jawan\u2019s son was working with the PKK.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAbu Jawan\u2019s son has never worked with the PKK, and he had been living in Germany for several years at this point. Abu Jawan gave them proof of this, and the Ahrar Sharqiya commander dismissed it immediately. Abu Jawan left the Ahrar Sharqiya headquarters and went to the nearest SNA police station.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe SNA police took a report from Abu Jawan and then sent him away. Days later, Ahrar Sharqiya members came to Abu Jawan\u2019s home and arrested him. For three days, they beat and tortured this old man. When they finally released him, he fled Afrin. He abandoned not only his home in Afrin, but his farm outside of Afrin, too,\u201d Khaled said. Abu Jawan reportedly fled to Turkey and then to Europe with his family.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s always the same scenario,\u201d Khaled said. \u201cAn SNA faction arrests a Kurdish civilian and accuses him of working with the PKK. They beat him and torture him, and then, they ask his family for ransom. The prison in Afrin is filled with Kurdish civilians whose families weren\u2019t able to pay.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Khaled says the situation in Afrin has become more stable in recent times than it was throughout the first two years of the occupation. \u201cThe threats to civilians remain, but in general, I think the civilians have learned how to adapt,\u201d he said. \u201cFor example, there is a Kurdish family living in the apartment beneath mine. Three months ago, I saw a man I didn\u2019t recognize enter their home. I was worried for them, so I went and knocked on their front door.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe elderly woman of the house told me not to worry, and that the man I saw was her son, who lives in the apartment with her,\u201d Khaled continued. \u201cI was surprised. How had I not seen this man in the time I\u2019d been living above this family?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe woman told me that in the first year of the occupation, her son had been arrested three times, by three different factions. Each time a faction arrested the man, they tortured him and demanded a ransom payment from the family to secure his release. The accumulated amount they\u2019d paid for their son\u2019s release was more than $8,000. So the son decided to stay inside, only leaving the home when it is absolutely necessary.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Several months ago, leaders from several of the SNA factions who have a presence in Afrin formed the Joint Committee for the Restoration of Rights. \u201cThe Committee\u2019s main purpose is to return stolen properties to their real owners,\u201d Mustafa Khaled said. \u201cBut it\u2019s also supposed to be a way for civilians in Afrin to address other grievances.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Muhammad al-Khatib, a representative from the Jabhat Shamiya faction of the SNA, has tweeted photos from some of the Joint Committee\u2019s meetings. \u201cNot everything facing the committee of returning rights is dark,\u201d he wrote in February. \u201cWe found plenty of honest, good people that didn’t deal with illicit money or do anything unjust to others.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But despite al-Khatib\u2019s posturing on social media, Mustafa Khaled says the initiative has been a failure. \u201cI know some of the representatives from Sultan Murad [faction of the SNA] who are in this Joint Committee. They tell me they haven\u2019t made in returning homes to their owners. And they won\u2019t make progress, because this committee is just for show. It\u2019s just a way for the SNA factions to try to polish their tarnished images in Afrin,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is unclear whether the Joint Committee for the Restoration of Rights has returned a single stolen property to date. \u201cI personally know several Afrin families living in cramped apartments who are desperate to get their homes back from Sultan Murad,\u201d Khaled said. \u201cAnd they have been unable to until now.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In addition to the SNA\u2019s questionable restitution initiative, there are a number of primarily Turkish NGOs operating in Afrin. \u201cSo many organizations are coming here,\u201d Hussam Arshami said. \u201cAnd some of them do help by giving people food, or medicine. But I think some of them are there just to expand Turkish influence. And when I see photos of these NGO people with young Syrian boys, I feel like they are preparing to use them militarily in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
ANDA employee at a Turkish-supported elementary school in Afrin.<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Instagram is rife with pictures of employees from Turkish NGOs posing with Arab children in Afrin. One employee from ANDA, a Turkish-based NGO boasting partnerships with Turkey\u2019s ruling AKP political party, shared a picture taken at a Turkish government-supported elementary school in Afrin. In it, the employee and school children are making the hand gesture associated with the Grey Wolves, a Turkish nationalist movement which has been banned and labeled a terrorist organization in several countries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Children\u2019s books on Ottoman Empire figures in Turkish and Arabic. ANDA.<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

In addition to two orphanages in al-Bab and Afrin, ANDA opened a cultural center in al-Bab which offers Turkish language classes. Pictures on ANDA\u2019s Instagram account show that among the aid offered by the NGO are cartoonish children\u2019s books about famous figures from the Ottoman Empire in Arabic and Turkish.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
ANDA general president Okan Tosun\u2019s Twitter cover photo.<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The Twitter cover photo of ANDA\u2019s general president, Okan Tosun, is a map of the territories formerly under the control of the Ottoman Empire. According to the map, which many Turkish nationalists believe reflect the territory present-day Turkey should control, Afrin is part of this territory. In a February interview with The Independent (T\u00fcrk\u00e7e), Tosun said that part of ANDA\u2019s work is to \u201cemphasize human rights violations experienced in captive Turkish provinces,\u201d among them Crimea, Iraq\u2019s Kirkuk, Cyprus, and Western Thrace, which refers to territory in present-day Greece.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYes, of course, Turkey wants to expand influence here,\u201d Mustafa Khaled said. \u201cIf I look around my street, I see more signs in Turkish than I do in Arabic. The schools here teach children Turkish. And the NGOs here are Turkish. But I don\u2019t think they\u2019re here just to spread Turkishness.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAny Syrian living in Afrin\u2014but not just Afrin, now, Ras al-Ain and Tel Abyad, also\u2014has to register for a special ID card from Turkey that Syrians in other free areas, like Idlib, don\u2019t need. You can\u2019t send your child to school or get electricity without this card. I can\u2019t prove it yet, but I think, somehow, this is a way for Turkey to claim each of us as IDPs, living in this \u2018safe zone\u2019 they created. I think they\u2019re using this to take money from the EU for us, because we know Turkey gets money for the EU for hosting Syrian refugees. So, it could be that this EU money is paying the Turkish NGOs in these parts of Syria.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

@LindseySnell spoke to disillusioned fighters in Turkish-occupied #Afrin, #Syria, who testify to Turkey\u2019s baseless invasion of the region and the abuse, arrest, theft from, and torture of the local population by Turkish-backed militants.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":57230,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pgc_sgb_lightbox_settings":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[39,10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-57229","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-home","category-reports"],"yoast_head":"\n\u201cIt was a mistake:\u201d Members of Turkey\u2019s \u201cSyrian National Army\u201d on the Invasion and Occupation of Afrin - North press agency<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"@LindseySnell spoke to disillusioned fighters in Turkish-occupied #Afrin, #Syria, who testify to Turkey\u2019s baseless invasion of the region and the abuse, arrest, theft from, and torture of the local population by Turkish-backed militants.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/npasyria.com\/en\/57229\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"\u201cIt was a mistake:\u201d Members of Turkey\u2019s \u201cSyrian National Army\u201d on the Invasion and Occupation of Afrin - 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