JERUSALEM – President-elect Trump could be the key factor in stopping the reported Turkish destruction of the pro-U.S. Syrian Kurdish community, Fox News senior strategic analyst and retired four-star Gen. Jack Keane told Fox News’ Mark Levin on “Life, Liberty & Levin” on Saturday.
“ErdoÄŸan is a real problem here. He has a corridor in northern Syria. He backed the radical leader who took over, al-Golani, in deposing Assad because he’s been wanting Assad to go like we all did for years, but now what is he doing? Now he’s attacking the Syrian Kurds, who we support, in eastern Syria.”
Keane said, “Biden is not going to do anything about it, but President Trump has a huge opportunity, and I know for a fact that President Trump dealt with ErdoÄŸan once before over the same issue. And it stopped as a result of a phone conversation that he had with President ErdoÄŸan.”
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A masked Islamic State terrorist holding the ISIS flag in 2015. (History/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)
Keane said one of Trump’s first telephone conversations once in office will probably be with ErdoÄŸan, “if he hasn’t started talking to him already.”
He said the motivation of the Syrian Kurds in eastern Syria is not to seize Turkish territory but to ensure ISIS remains defeated and make sure “they do not rise again,” adding that the U.S. “doesn’t need to get involved in any consequential way in Syria other than to protect our own interests and make certain that ISIS doesn’t rise again in eastern Syria which they have the potential to do.”
While world leaders are largely focused on the collapse of Syrian dictator Bashar Assad’s regime, Turkey’s strongman ruler Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has mobilized forces loyal to his government to eradicate Kurdish combatants on his southern border to Syria that helped the U.S. defeat the terrorist movement ISIS.
President Trump meets with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the Oval Office of the White House, Nov. 13, 2019. (AP Photo/ Evan Vucci)
Alarm bells are ringing about the dire plight of the Syrian Kurds.
“Turkey has become too aggressive. If they get a free rein in Syria, they may covertly commit an ethnic cleansing,” warned Efrat Aviv, a professor in the Department of General History at Bar-Ilan University in Israel and a leading expert on Turkey, in a statement to Fox News Digital.
In an apparent effort to modify his jihadi movement, Ahmad al-Sharaa, the leader of the U.S.-designated terrorist movement, Hayʼat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which played a decisive role in toppling Assad’s regime, said, “The Kurds are part of the nation and have suffered great injustices, just as we have. With the regime’s fall, the injustice they faced may also be lifted.”
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U.S. forces provide military training to members of the YPG/SDF in Syria, Aug. 18, 2023. (Hedil Amir/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)
Ahmad al-Sharaa, who was until recently known by his nom de guerre Abu Mohammad al-Golani, is allied with Turkey. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced that the U.S. had made “direct contact” with HTS despite it being an outlawed terrorist entity.
Mazloum Abdi, the head of the U.S.-allied Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), on Saturday urged Kurdish parties in northeast Syria (Rojava) to generate a unified front.
“Today, Kurdish national unity in Syria has become a historic necessity in response to the challenges of this critical phase. We call on all Kurdish parties to set aside partisan interests and genuinely engage with public calls for dialogue and unity,” Abdi wrote on X.
Last week, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., posted on X, “In the past I have drafted sanctions targeting Turkey if they engage in military operations against the Kurdish forces who helped President Trump destroy ISIS. I stand ready to do this again in a bipartisan way.
“We should not allow the Kurdish forces – who helped us destroy ISIS on President Trump’s watch – to be threatened by Turkey or the radical Islamists who have taken over Syria.”
The Dutch Parliament also intervened last week to protect the Syrian Kurds, urging its government to advocate for a cessation of Turkish attacks on Kurds.
President Biden and President Recep Tayyip ErdoÄŸan talk during the G-7 summit on June 14, 2024, in Fasano, Italy. (Christopher Furlong/Getty Images)
The Kurdish-led Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (AANES) announced on Sunday in response to the ongoing attacks by pro-Turkey forces, “We are facing significant threats and dangers, and we call on the Global Coalition and the entire world to unite with us to protect Kobani.”
“The world now owes Kobani and its fighters, and it is time to stand with Kobani,” the statement continued, “calling on the Global Coalition and freedom-loving individuals to unite and safeguard the region’s dignity and humanity.”
TURKEY’S INVASION THREATS SHOULD BE TAKEN ‘VERY SERIOUSLY’: CYPRUS OFFICIAL
