Academics and politicians: The return of the Kurds to Afrin is true resistance and an embodiment of the epic of the era

ARK News… Academics and politicians paid the price for the return of the Kurds to the city of Afrin and its towns and villages, describing the return as a historical decision, true resistance, and an embodiment of the epic of the era, calling on the displaced in the al-Shahba camps in the Aleppo countryside to return to the land of their fathers and grandfathers, to prevent demographic change.

During the past few days, dozens of refugees, displaced Kurdish families returned to their homes in the villages and towns of the city of Afrin in Syrian Kurdistan through the Aoun al-Dadat crossing in the city of Manbij. Hundreds of people are waiting at the crossing for approval to return home.

ARK held a meeting with the Kurdish academic, Dr. Kawa Azizi, the Kurdish politician, Abdul Rahman Apo, and the political analyst, Manal Hasko, on Friday, October 20, in which they praised the return of the Kurds and called for clinging to and standing up to campaigns to bring about any change in the demographic composition.

Academic Dr. Kawa Azizi said, “In the Syrian Kurdish case, returning to the homeland in Kobani, Afrin, and Al-Jazeera is considered a challenge against all plans aimed at demographic change in Syrian Kurdistan and ending the Kurdish issue there. Return and survival represent a real struggle and we bow to them.”

He continued by saying, "We as a people are subjected to a campaign of extermination, uprooting, placing strangers in our lands and homes, expelling us from the homeland of our fathers and grandfathers, and forcing us to emigrate to diaspora countries and camps of poverty, ignorance, and humiliation. In the camps, people are exposed to various types of humiliation and forced to accept beliefs and methods of work that they do not want."

Regarding the presence of the displaced people of Afrin in the Al-Shahba camps in the Aleppo countryside, he stressed that “the presence of the Kurds in camps under the control of the PKK remains isolated and vulnerable to disagreement or the recruitment of their children into its ranks, and it remains rejected by all sides.”

For his part, the politician Abdul Rahman Apo said, “The return of our Kurdish families to their homes in (Afrin region) has never stopped since the barbaric campaign in March 2018 that wanted to uproot the Kurdish person from his roots and bring about demographic change in the Kurdish Mountain. However, the conscious Kurdish conscience has recovered.” The conspiracy and immediately began announcing the “Intifada of Return” on May 5, 2018, with their slogan being “life or death.”

He continued by saying, "The return queues continued, starting from the humiliation camps in Al-Shahba, and with their personal efforts to return despite the great dangers that await them. Until now, according to our sources, more than (60,000) sixty thousand families have returned to the embrace of the olive trees that were waiting for them despite the obstacles created by the gangs."

He urged the Kurdish politician to return, saying, "The Kurds have no choice but to return, and with their return, the olive forests that suffered during the five lean years will flourish, and the processes of coordinated demographic change taking place there will be limited. Our people in Afrin are heroes of the era in their return, embodying the epic of the era and proving their Kurdish." The projects that are taking place are all temporary, and they are the origins and vanguard of the Kurdistan Region, and history will remember them with golden letters.”

Meanwhile, political analyst Manal Hasko saw that “the PYD administration, controlled by PKK elements, trades with the displaced in the Al-Shahba camps, and prevents their return in order to preserve the declared canton there.”

He added, "The camps have become like a large prison, and the displaced Kurds have become hostages, prisoners and victims of PKK terrorism, and their children are being subjected to kidnapping and forced conscription, and they are now robbed of their decision-making power."

He stated, "Despite the obstacles, difficulties, and dangerous roads, Afrin embraces the return of dozens of Kurdish families every day."

He stressed that "the right decision, and the real resistance, is to return. Time is passing at lightning speed and it is not in the interest of the displaced to remain in the camps. We seek the suffering they suffer in the camps, and we believe that every displaced person has the right to return to his hometown and receive his property and livelihood."

After the Afrin war, which began at the beginning of 2018 and ended on March 18 of the same year, more than 300,000 Kurds were displaced to the al-Shahba camps, and they became victims of the PYD administration’s policy controlling the camps and the Sheikh Maqsoud and Ashrafiya neighborhoods in Aleppo, which prevents the displaced from making their decision to return or go to other areas. .

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