The latest phase of the war in Aleppo is not, for Kurds, merely a military or tactical development. It has become a stark warning, laying bare at the realities of a new era. The lessons to be drawn from this moment do not come from theory or abstract political hopes, but from the lived experience itself.
Trump has driven the final nail into this system’s coffin
First of all, it has once again become clear that the international system no longer offers Kurds any protective, balancing, or binding framework. The order of law, alliances, and multilateralism built after the Second World War has, in practice, ceased to function. This collapse has not only enabled the arbitrary violence of regional actors, but has also normalized the silence of great powers, their shameless indifference, and a culture of impunity. Everyone is now forced to move forward by accepting one stark reality: the Western-led order built after the Second World War on international law, multilateralism, and alliances has effectively collapsed, and Donald Trump has driven the final nail into this system’s coffin.
What unfolded in Aleppo has also laid bare a fundamental shift in the nature of the war being waged against the Kurds. What is confronted is no longer a conventional conflict. A new war doctrine is in force, one that deliberately erases the lines between frontlines and rear areas, between civilians and combatants, and between law and lawlessness. Hospitals, neighborhoods, water sources, and even women’s bodies have been transformed from protected spaces into instruments of psychological warfare. The objective is not merely to seize territory, but to wound collective memory, degrade symbols, and permanently break the will to resist.
The threat now comes not only from frontlines, but from negotiating tables
In this context, the example of Aleppo has made one reality unmistakably clear: Kurdish areas can now be targeted at any moment, and that threat no longer comes only from the frontlines, but also from political bargaining tables. What has unfolded in Sheikh Maqsoud (Şêxmeqsûd) and Ashrafiyah (Eşrefiyê) is a rehearsal for a broader campaign of pressure and dismantlement aimed at Rojava as a whole. To frame these events as a “local clash” is therefore both incomplete and misleading.
One of the defining features of this new war doctrine is the open legitimization of proxy violence. States pursue their objectives through jihadist and paramilitary structures without assuming direct responsibility, allowing brutality on the ground to deepen while political accountability is deliberately blurred. The barbarity directed at Kurdish women fighters in Aleppo is not an anomaly, but the latest expression of a long historical continuity. The line that connects the century-long policies of the Republic of Turkey toward the Kurds with the practices of ISIS, Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), and similar jihadist formations is not a coincidence, but a shared political mentality.
Ziyad Halab’s cry marks the moment the world ceased to be an address
The rupture created by this process cannot be reduced to physical destruction alone. The unrecorded cry that rose after Ziyad Halab will be written into modern Kurdish history as a threshold moment. It will remain as a point of rupture in Kurdish memory, marking a historical crossing. That voice was not a call for help, nor merely an expression of mourning; it was the sound of a moment in which the world itself had ceased to be something that could be appealed to. “Bila alem giş bimire” (let the world collapse) does not mean making peace with death. It is a cry of parting with false guarantees, with the expectation of salvation from outside, and with the lies that have long sustained those hopes. For that reason, it was not simply an emotional outburst, but, in the final analysis, a cold and lucid statement of reality.
One of the most fundamental truths to emerge from this moment is that defense cannot be understood as a purely military matter. In Aleppo, one of the decisive elements of resistance was the will of the neighborhood residents and their collective resilience. This showed that social organization, local legitimacy, and civilian endurance are just as vital as military capacity. Defense is therefore a comprehensive capacity, one that brings together arms, society, healthcare, communication, and memory into a single, inseparable whole.
A fundamental reorganization has become unavoidable
The same process has also exposed the unpreparedness of Kurdish politics. This is not a problem confined to the military or diplomatic sphere alone; it points to the necessity of a deep reorganization on mental, political, and organizational levels. At this stage, what matters is not intention, but time. For the Kurds, the real danger is not making the wrong move but delaying the right one. Every postponed decision will, in practice, be a decision made by others.
One reality must be underlined with clarity: after the 1 April Agreement, only internal security forces with no defensive mandate beyond individual weapons were left in the area. In contrast, Damascus and Ankara moved in a synchronized and coordinated manner, deploying more than forty thousand jihadist fighters, hundreds of tanks, and modern military hardware into the field. This was not an accidental or spontaneous military development, but part of a pre-planned scenario aimed at producing a political, social, and psychological rupture among the Kurds and pushing them into a deep, multi-layered crisis. The objective was not merely to seize territory, but to trap a deliberately disarmed society in a spiral of helplessness, despair, and submission. What unfolded was therefore not a security operation, but a deliberate attempt at liquidation through the breaking of collective will and the engineering of an internal crisis. That this intervention took place at a moment when the Kurds and Kurdistan were becoming an increasingly decisive balancing force in the Middle East only underscores the strategic nature of the process.
Finally, the Aleppo process has shown that the era of “waiting,” “hoping,” or “relying on external balances” has come to an end for the Kurds. It has also made clear that so-called strategic integration processes, designed by hostile powers to keep the Kurds in a passive position and functioning, in essence, as traps, must now be rejected. The period ahead will be one of realism grounded in self-reliance, anticipation of risks, recognition of multi-front threats, and a people-centered approach.
This realism is not pessimism; it is the most practical path to survival and victory. In every critical turning point of our recent history, the Kurdish people have stood ahead of politics and given direction. That trust, placed by society in its leadership, must not be betrayed.
For this reason, what happened in Aleppo should not be recorded as a “rupture,” but as an end. The order built on international law, Western values, multilateralism, and alliances is not merely malfunctioning for the Kurds; it has lost its legitimacy altogether. The final nail in this system’s coffin was not driven by a single individual or a single period. It was the collective silence as hospitals were bombed, women fighters were humiliated, and civilians were targeted in Aleppo. The world ended there in silence.
Moving forward on cautious expectations is no longer possible
At this point, it is no longer possible to proceed with half-measures or cautious expectations. The Kurds must openly assert a radical political will that, by taking all scenarios into account, can drive their adversaries into crisis. Neither the Republic of Turkey, nor the Syrian Arab state, nor the Shiite Arab power structures in Iraq, nor the clerical regime in Iran has any intention of offering the Kurds a fair, lasting, or meaningful solution. All these structures, through different means but toward the same goal, seek to keep the Kurds manageable, divisible, and, when necessary, disposable.
To ignore this reality is no longer merely a political mistake; it is an existential risk. Liberation cannot be entrusted to the goodwill, internal balances, or temporary interests of these powers. What is required instead is a radical break that disrupts all their strategic calculations, shatters their predictability, and renders their familiar playing field obsolete. This radicalism is not rhetorical bravado, but the courage to clearly and unequivocally declare the will to self-determination.
We have a society capable of carrying itself
Once again, we must act for collective reasons and refuse to allow our enemies to exploit our weaknesses. An enemy is never strongest in its own power, but in spaces where we are weak. For that reason, internal fragilities, fragmentation, delays, and indecision are no longer secondary problems; they have become direct existential risks.
The era of being drawn into integration schemes designed by others must now come to an end. For the Kurds, the issue is no longer about negotiating better terms but about rejecting the game itself. This reality can be reduced to a single principle: we must take responsibility for our own fate. That is not isolation; it is a declaration of strong political will.
There is no world that will protect us, and waiting to be protected has become an illusion. What exists is a society capable of carrying itself. And the will that sustains that society has declared in Aleppo that it will not retreat and will never surrender. That is the lesson of Aleppo.
The world has changed. The Kurds must meet this change not with romanticism, but with a cool-headed, rational mind and a collective will.