Dana Nawzar

Baghdadi killed 300 people in US and Europe while Assad massacred his people only. Assad says ‘long live Syria’ while Baghdadi shouted Allahu Akbar It has never been about how many you kill, it is always about who you kill, where and what you shouthttps://twitter.com/Elizrael/status/1189486655197143046…

That is not true. Erdogan doesn’t try to create a caliphate. He tries to maintain the territorial integrity of his own nation state by embracing nationalism and fighting the independence/autonomy dreams of Kurds. So he isn’t like Baghdadi but more like you pal Modi.https://twitter.com/TulsiGabbard/status/1189514657658232833…

This is the Syria the entire world is helping to recreate: A more brutal Assad, a disintegrated society and thugs turned into animals who now see every civilian especially women a prey. But sure, Baghdadi is dead.https://twitter.com/Ahmad1618A/status/1189480409538711556…

Not only Erdogan has embraced the Kemalist TC mindset, he is also using all his credit once gained because of his neo-Ottoman ideas to use Ottoman heritage for Turkish nationalism. Soon he could very well lead MHP and IYI Party as well.

Today Erdoğan made a speech in which he basically equated Ottomans to Turks and followed that Türk is not a nation it is a cause. He is wrong. Turkey isn’t Ottoman. Turkey is a modern nation state built on racism, massacre and assimilation.

Nobody asks how come millions of Armenians, ethnically and religiously differnt, lived at the heart of Ottoman Empire for centuries but they were only massacred & didpalced at dawn of 20th century? Turkish nationalism is the anti-thesis of Ottoman values.https://twitter.com/MazMHussain/status/1189350591069327360…

Imagine, everyone was able to win in peace but all chose to lose in war. I don’t care if there are foreign conspiracies, the stupidity is native.

Today, Turkish leadership is making all kinds of concessions to all kinds of forces just for the sake of ending the pro-PKK Kurdish entity in Syria While Kurdish entities in Syria & Iraq face political irrelevance as a post-ISIS anti-Kurd regional pact comes closer.

I don’t expect Iraq, Turkey, Syria and Iran to reward Kurds. These states are based on assimilating Kurds. But the West who is loud about Kurds when it comes to using them against leaders they don’t like, what are they doing now? Words don’t prevent genocide.

Turkey’s war in Syria was to end the Kurdish entity. Yes a pro-PKK entity but a Kurdish entity nonetheless! In Iraq, Kurds were punished for demanding independence & now there are calls to end their autonomy! So again, what did the Kurds get out of all of this?

So US Congress is going to recognised the Armenian genocide, a long held demand of Armenians This bold move is amidst the popular anti-Turkey environment created by Turkey’s reckless war against Kurds But what did the Kurds get out of all of this? -except tweets & phone calls-

It’s time.https://twitter.com/jeremycorbyn/status/1189142810974404609…

Iraq was structurally designed to fail. When the decision maker is an Iraqi he has to impose his rule by force and when the Iraqi decision maker is weak, it is outsiders who make decisions and they want no good for Iraqis. Iraq is a failure but God save the Iraqis.

Every chaos will be followed by an order. In the Iraqi context, no chaos has ever been followed by a good order. Dictatorship Saddami style is unlikely but don’t underestimate the power of corrupt elites & their regional conspirators.

I see no good in chaos in Iraq. The chaos in its current form started in 1958 when a few generals supported by delusional masses influenced by Soviet propaganda conducted a bloody coup. But I am in owe for the bravery of the Iraqi people & sad their deaths are in vain, again.

The only graphic that mattershttps://twitter.com/heissenstat/status/1188868064558964736…

Erdogan’s latest war is not for himself, his vision or his base but the Old Turkey. And when Old Turkey comes back, it won’t be only Kurdish cultural gains that will be reversed but also the freedoms gained for the conservatives. A progressive return to principles is needed.

Ahmet Kaya has dedicated most of his songs to the oppressed groups in Turkey He was amongst the few voices who stood up for Erdogan when he was persecuted by 1990s Turkey Today, Turkey is racing back to the 1990s.

Today is the birthday of Ahmet Kaya. He was one of the most famous singers in Turkey in 1980s/90s. He was popular until the moment he announced he will sing in Kurdish, a taboo in 1990s Turkey. He was degraded, defamed, declared a traitor and had to leave and die in exile.https://twitter.com/AhmetKayaGam/status/1188689074380558336…

Let’s admit it: There is no Turkey, Iraq or Syria! A country is a feeling before being borders & many inside these countries do not have that feeling of belonging. Middle East can’t be divided because we are too similar. The only way forward is a union which maintains diversity.

The system of Muslim wilayat which was basically an administrative decentralisation worked for over a 1000 years and kept peace in Middle East! We need a return to that spirit if we want not to suffer one by one in isolation.

It’s actually a good thing that there is no ‘Iraqi identity’ but then alternative which is division across ethnic and sectarian lines is no better. We need a different model which bypasses the artificial border model to a confederation of regions!

The most important thing for Kurds in Iraq right now is the Syria situation while the most important thing in Iraq is the protests. And while the Shia parts are in absolute revolutionary mode and the Sunni parts are silent. That is what happens when a dumb Brit draws maps.

The symbolism here is huge. Our dogs, our humans, and our nature suffer.https://twitter.com/FARED_ALHOR/status/1188755425929416705…

We as Muslims take pride in the fact that we ran world’s largest & most ethically sound caliphate for over 1,400 years protecting minorities & freedoms while harbouring scientific progress. So when any lunatic with a Twitter following calls himself a caliph, we don’t even laugh.

And this is exactly why Muslims are outraged when media uses Islamic terms to describe these groups. No matter how hard people try, Islamic terms such as jihad and caliphate will never be hijacked. And frankly it doesn’t matter if people don’t get it. We do.

Imagine, calling yourself a caliph and claiming ‘Islamic State’ brand and yet when you are killed, 99.99% of Muslims are either happy or not sad! From the most secular Muslims to the Al-Qaida, Baghdadi’s death is seen a good thing.https://twitter.com/ajaltamimi/status/1188423706747559937…

All in all, Kurds didn’t choose to fight ISIS for fun. Kurds don’t die for fun. It’s a false orientalist notion which some Kurds accept out of stupidity. Kurds fought for survival. They made territorial gains while doing so but they lost it all as ISIS came to end. A sad end.

As the war against ISIS evolved, Kurds became the international coalition’s main partners in Iraq and Syria. They made great territorial gains. With the gains, Kurds grew more confident. In Iraq, they started talking independence & in Syria they set autonomy/federalism as a goal.

So it was the danger of the fall of Erbil, the capital city of Iraqi Kurdistan, and the famous Kobani resistance which triggered the first alliance between Kurds and international powers. The war was imposed by ISIS and Kurds fought for survival.

And in Syria, ISIS attacked Kobani, on Turkish borders. Kurds defended heroically but were about to be wiped out from the city amidst Turkey watching. But huge international pressure led to Turkey allowing Peshmerga forces go to Kobani & airdropping of ammunition to YPG.

The scenes of thousands of families fleeing Sinjar and the horrible stories of rape and slaughter had tremendous effect in mobilising international opinion. But the first actual international intervention and from air came when ISIS was about to take over Kurdish Erbil in Iraq.

And let me be clear: the international community led by Obama did absolutely nothing to stop ISIS’s slaughter against the Shia in Iraq! Many in the Gulf and in the West actually cheered ISIS in the beginning. The tide turned with the Sinjar massacre.

In its early days, ISIS was introducing itself as a Sunni group with a strong anti-Iranian and anti-Shia rhetoric. They slaughtered many Shia soldiers in a large massacre and marched towards Baghdad & Karbala. Their attack against Kurds caught many including Kurds by surprise.

In both Iraq and Syria, it was ISIS who first initiated attack in absolutely unprovoked way! Out of nowhere, ISIS attacked Sinjar and marched towards Erbil in Iraqi Kurdistan and did the same against Kobani in Syria.

In Iraq, Masoud Barzani was in a conflict w/ Maliki/Baghdad. When ISIS took over Mosul, they were seen as Sunni rebels rather than terrorists. But even after their nature became clear, Barzani, in a rare wisdom, said that Kurds were not going to start a fight with them.