{"id":39294,"date":"2019-05-08T22:23:26","date_gmt":"2019-05-08T22:23:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=39294"},"modified":"2019-05-08T22:23:26","modified_gmt":"2019-05-08T22:23:26","slug":"anti-kurdish-demonstrations-grow-in-syrias-deir-ezzor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=39294","title":{"rendered":"Anti-Kurdish demonstrations grow in Syria\u2019s Deir Ezzor"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

\nAMMAN:\u00a0Arab inhabitants of Syria\u2019s Deir Ezzor began a third week of protests against Kurdish rule, the largest wave of unrest to sweep the oil-rich region since US-backed forces took over the territory from Daesh nearly 18 months ago, residents, and tribal figures said.<\/p>\n

\nThe protests which erupted weeks ago in several towns and villages from Busayrah to Shuhail have now spread to remaining areas where most of the oilfields are located in the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF)-controlled part of Deir Ezzor, east of the Euphrates.<\/p>\n

\nArab residents under People\u2019s Protection Unit (YPG) who have been complaining about a lack of basic services and discrimination against them in local administrations run by Kurdish officials have been growing restive in recent months.<\/p>\n

\nThe forcible conscription of youths into the SDF, as well as the fate of thousands imprisoned in their jails, have been major bones of contention, according to residents and tribal figures.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cTheir repressive rule has turned many against them,\u201d said Abdul Latif Al-Okaidat, a tribal leader.<\/p>\n

\nThe protests took a violent turn when angry mobs took to the streets and disrupted the routes of convoys of trucks loaded with oil from nearby fields that cross into government-held areas. In some villages, SDF forces fired at angry protesters.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cNo to the theft of our oil!\u201d chanted demonstrators in the town of Greinej, part of the Arab-Sunni tribal heartland seized over a year ago by the Pentagon-backed SDF and spearheaded by the Kurdish YPG militia.<\/p>\n

\nThe YPG has long sold crude oil to the Syrian regime of Bashar Assad, with whom it maintains close economic ties and exports wheat and other commodities through several crossings between their territory.<\/p>\n

\nThe stepping up of oil sales to alleviate a fuel crunch facing Damascus has infuriated the local Arab protesters, with many holding placards saying they were being \u201crobbed\u201d of their wealth.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cWe are deprived of everything while the Kurds are selling our oil to help the regime and enriching themselves,\u201d said Abdullah Issa, a protester from Al-Tayaneh town.<\/p>\n

\nSyria\u2019s most productive fields are now in Kurdish hands since the YPG extended control over large swathes of northeastern Syria after capturing the city of Raqqa from Daesh in late 2017.<\/p>\n

\nThe Syrian regime controls areas west of the Euphrates river that are less endowed with oil resources.<\/p>\n

\nDiplomats say Washington has also in recent weeks tightened efforts to clamp down on small shipments of oil by smuggler networks that are exported across the Euphrates river to traders working on behalf of the Syrian government.<\/p>\n

\nThe SDF has not publicly commented on the most serious challenge so far to its rule over tens of thousands of Arabs.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\nThe YPG has sought to redress decades of repression against minority Kurds under Syria\u2019s Arab Ba\u2019ath party.<\/p>\n

\nSDF commander in-chief Mazloum Kobani, in remarks that seem to refer to the unrest, said his group was the only \u201cinstitution that had \u201csteered away from any form of racism.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nThe protests persisted after YPG commanders failed to make significant concessions to tribal figures who gathered at their invitation last Friday in the city of Ain Issa, two attendees said.<\/p>\n

\nAmong the Arabs demands were ending forcible conscription, releasing detainees and stopping oil sales from their region to the Syrian government.<\/p>\n

\nThe risks of wider confrontation were now growing, analysts say.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cThe protests are now more organized and wider with a higher ceiling and developing gradually to a popular uprising where people are asking to be ruled by themselves and ending Kurdish hegemony,\u201d said Feras Allawi, a political analyst from the area.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cThe response of SDF to the popular demands will dictate whether this leads to a more violent confrontation,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

AMMAN:\u00a0Arab inhabitants of Syria\u2019s Deir Ezzor began a third week of protests against Kurdish rule, the largest wave of unrest to sweep the oil-rich region since US-backed forces took over the territory from Daesh nearly 18 months ago, residents, and tribal figures said. The protests which erupted weeks ago in several towns and villages from…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":39295,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-39294","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-middle_east_news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39294","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=39294"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39294\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/39295"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=39294"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=39294"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=39294"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}