German marxist newspaper fails to mention the truth when it reports on its ideological comrades in Syria
The German daily junge Welt hails the dissolution of the SDF into Syria’s army as “mission accomplished” — without mentioning the group’s record of war crimes and its role as a US proxy force.
Stefan H. Heuer
August 27, 2026
The German daily newspaper junge Welt (young world; jW) today published an article on a topic that, for 15 years, has had my special interest: Syria.
By self-determination, the jW is a Marxist newspaper. Founded within the Soviet occupation organisation in Central Germany known as the “GDR” after World War II, the jW was the official publication of the “FDJ,” the youth organisation of the ruling Marxist party “SED” at the time. Following the merger of the GDR with the West German US-led occupation structure to form the present-day Federal Republic of Germany, the jW is now run by a cooperative. In principle, I appreciate this newspaper’s coverage of Syria and all the other countries that have been “blessed” with democracy and freedom by the “Western Values” serving U.S. and NATO (Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Sudan, Mali, Serbia, Somalia, Lebanon and, indeed, Syria), even though I by no means share the paper’s ideological stance.
The recent article (jungewelt.de) now deals with the fate of the Kurdish-dominated “SDF” forces after the fall of Syria into the hands of Western-Arab-Russian supported jihadists under their frontman Al-Jolani, who now poses as “president” of Syria, authorised by no Syrians other than Trump, his Arab vassals, Putin and the EU.
The SDF is being disbanded and its fighters — who, from 2015 onwards, had spent nine years fighting against the regular Syrian Arab Army and murdering civilians — are being integrated into the “Syrian” army, which today is not a Syrian army but a gang of HTS-approved terrorists, now costumed as soldiers. Right from its formation, the SDF had been cooperating with the USA, which in fact is the main instigator of aggression against Syria between 2011 and 2024.
My dear friend Arabi Souri delivers an understanding of the role of the SDF in Syria:
“SDF — The abbreviation is used by a Kurdish-run militia working under the US command in northeastern Syria to carve out a pro-Israeli enclave state out of the Syrian territories which controls the main water resources, oil fields, and fertile land of the country. Kurdish SDF along with FSA Terrorists both work for the USA. SDF took advantage of another US militia ISIS claiming to fight it and has worked successfully as Trojans to lure a Turkish occupation of Syrian lands. Commanders of the SDF came from the Iraqi Qandil Mountains and their weapons and logistics from USA with full support from Israel.” (syrianews.cc/encyclopedia/sdf)
However, this article of jW seems to me personally to be overly sympathetic and one-sided, dealing with the Kurdish terrorist groups in the Middle East that are ideologically aligned with the jW line. Isn’t it strange that a Marxist newspaper, that usually correctly reports and criticises the genocide in Gaza and the aggression by the illegal Jewish entity occupying Palestine against Syria, Lebanon and Iran, turns a blind eye to the fact that these militias have performed acts of atrocities and war crimes and were run by exactly those powers the jW generally rightfully criticises? Well, by knowing that those who were behind the construction of the ideology of Marxism and Communism also were behind the foundation of the illegal entity “Israel” on stolen land, this gains some logic.
With my article “Useful Idiots: Reactionary Leftists Propagate The Destruction of Sovereign Nations“, I had already written about this phenomenon. There I stated: “[…] the Kurds in Syria and Iraq in fact are separatists, insurgents, using terror and land-theft for achieving their aim of a Kurdish state on annexed land. By this, they do play into the hands of those powers who perform genocide and who oppress the Palestinians to secure the further existence of the Zionist entity.”
That said, I am merely an interested observer looking at the events in Syria from the outside. I am therefore sharing this article, in English translation, with my Syrian friends and anyone else who is interested, and I leave it to them to judge both the article itself and the events described therein.
Translation:
Mission accomplished
Eleven years after their foundation, the “Syrian Democratic Forces” are dissolved and integrated into the Syrian army. This follows a plan by the U.S.
By Nick Brauns
The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) are a thing of the past. On Tuesday evening, their Commander-in-Chief, Mazlum Abdi, announced in Damascus the dissolution of the military alliance which, as the defence force of the autonomous region of Rojava in north-eastern Syria, had still controlled around a third of Syria as recently as last year.
With the completion of the “integration” of the SDF as brigades into the Syrian army, the SDF’s previous mission has come to an end, Abdi explained following a meeting with Syria’s Islamist President Ahmed Al-Scharaa. He expressed the hope “that today marks the beginning of a real transformation — from the battlefields to the sites of reconstruction, from the era of arms to the era of peace, and from the unification of Syria to the rebuilding of Syria.”
The former SDF units will be stationed in the Kurdish settlement areas of Hasaka, Qamishli and Derik, as well as in Kobani. The Women’s Protection Units (YPJ), whose incorporation into the army is strictly opposed by the ruling Islamists, are to be integrated into counter-terrorism units of the Ministry of the Interior, reported the Kurdish media agency Rudaw, citing “sources.”
Abdi is now to become an adviser to Al-Scharaa on Kurdish affairs, whilst the former spokesperson for the Autonomous Administration, Ilham Ahmed, is to be co-opted into the Syrian Parliament, reported the Arabic news portal Al Majalla. Furthermore, it has been agreed to recognise Kurdish as the official language and the language of instruction for several subjects in the Kurdish regions of the country.
Ilham Ahmed, spokesperson for the Rojava Autonomous Administration, and Mazlum Abdi, Commander-in-Chief of the SDF, met with President Ahmed Al-Scharaa at the Presidential Palace on Tuesday, prior to the dissolution of the SDF.
The SDF, which at its peak comprised up to 100,000 Kurdish and Arab soldiers as well as small contingents from Christian minority groups, had played a decisive role in the victory over the jihadist group “Islamic State” (IS) around ten years ago. More than 10,000 SDF fighters lost their lives in the process. The formation of the military alliance, centred on the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) and Women’s Protection Units (YPJ) as its battle-hardened, disciplined core, was significantly supported by the US government in 2015. This was because, out of consideration for its NATO partner Turkey, Washington did not want to provide its military aid against IS directly to the YPG, which Ankara classifies as a terrorist organisation due to its links to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). Furthermore, Washington hoped that this would enable it to better contain and moderate the Kurdish rebels with their anarchist and feminist ideals.
With the overthrow of President Bashar al-Assad by the jihadist alliance HTS in late 2024, the SDF — which had also controlled the Syrian oil fields — lost its value to Washington as a means of exerting pressure on Damascus. A US-brokered agreement to integrate the administration and defence forces of the autonomous region into the Syrian state prevented impending massacres and mass expulsions following a lightning offensive by government forces on the autonomous territory in January this year. By that point, the majority of the Arab SDF units had already defected to the side of the Islamist government.
With the dissolution of the SDF as an independent military formation, the dream of many Kurds of a self-governing autonomous region appears, for the time being, to have come to an end. Whilst the Kurdish side is now being fobbed off with rather vague assurances regarding language rights and a few posts within the state apparatus that are subject to the whims of the unelected president, Al-Scharaa has taken a decisive step closer to his goal of controlling the whole of Syria. “This is true integration: one army, one government, one state,” enthused the US Ambassador to Ankara and Special Envoy for Syria, Tom Barrack, on the online platform X in the early hours of Wednesday morning. “As US President Donald Trump’s Middle East plan progresses, a united Syria for all is emerging,” Barrack added, making it clear who is pulling the strings behind the scenes.
End of translation
I need to say that it does not satisfy me to see that the final statement in my 2017 article seems to have proved true: “The Kurds […] seem to enjoy being pawns in the game of satanic genocidal monsters…”
They fought against a unified Syria under the presidency of Bashar al-Assad. With al-Jolani and his cronies, the Kurds now may have exactly the sort of regime in Damascus that suits them.
Stefan H. Heuer, M.A.
Historian, born in 1964. Has worked as a lecturer in adult education and, among others, in human resources development for a US-American company in Germany.
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