BFF   

“Syria’s Kurds appear divided and unsure whether to join the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad as they marked the anniversary of bloody clashes between the Kurdish minority and security forces in 2004. Syria’s Kurds live mostly in the north-eastern border region with Iraq and Turkey, and make up 10-15% of the population. For decades the authorities have discriminated against the Kurds for fear that they might seek self-determination. Many were denied citizenship under a controversial law in the early 1960s………”

Both branches of the Baath Party early on showed signs of racism and chauvinism, something borrowed from the European Fascism and Nazism that influenced the early creators of that party (Michel Aflaq and Salah al-Bitar, both Syrian). Syria’s Kurdish community have been a long-time victim of Ba’athist Nazi-like chauvinism and racism. Just as Iraq’s Kurds were long victims of Ba’athist tribal racism and genocide. No wonder the Kurds are insecure and not sure which side to join. The most likely sad fact is that both sides in Syria were likely racist and chauvinistic toward them (not that the other Syrians had anything special to feel superior about; they certainly did not).
The Kurds in Iraq could not be denied citizenship because there are too many of them in their own historic national homeland, and they probably have been there longer than the Arab tribes.
 
The Iraqi Baath regime also deported a couple of hundred thousand Iraqi Shi’as from the South in the early 1980s, sending them across the Iranian border. That was a big mistake: these Iraqis married and multiplied while in Iranian exile and grew to probably close to two million. And they are fluent in both Arabic and Persian, with tight family and cultural links across the border. And they are all back in Iraq now. Big stupid Baathist mistake, but then who said the Ba’ath are any smarter than other despotic Arab regimes?
Cheers
mhg


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