The Role of the Kurdish Factor in the Syrian Civil War

Abstract

The Syrian civil war is one of the most important problems which the international community is currently facing, but which remains unsolved since its beginning in March 2011. The high level of complexity of the conflict, the multiplicity of participants and difficulties in recognizing their true intentions make finding possible solutions less probable as the months go by. All this chaos results in the underestimation of the Kurdish factor, which is often, especially because of the increasing role of radical Islamic groups, belittled by some commentators and analysts. Moreover, the lack of unitary organizational structures that can be recognized as a representation of the interests of the Kurdish community living in the territory of Syria, its internal divisions, and the disability in creating the commonly accepted leadership makes regarding the Kurds as a uniform and internally coherent party in the war impossible. The aim of the paper is to present the role of various Kurdish organizations participating in the conflict and analyze the connections and divisions which make the Kurds unable to create a homogenous.