After the SDF: What comes next for Syria's Kurds?

Analysis: The SDF's dissolution marks the end of a 14-year experiment in Kurdish self-rule, but struggles over language, security, and political power remain

14.09.2026

By Cian Ward*

Source:https://www.newarab.com/analysis/after-sdf-what-comes-next-syrias-kurds

Damascus, Syria - The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) were dissolved by their commander-in-chief, Mazloum Abdi, on 25 August, bringing an end to Rojava, a 14-year-old experiment in autonomous self-administration in northeast Syria.

Abdi is to take up a new role as a special adviser to President Ahmed al-Sharaa, whilst the senior leadership will occupy various positions within the government.

Sipan Hamo, the former head of the YPG - the primary fighting force of the SDF - had already taken up a position as Deputy Defence Minister for the Eastern Region. Ilham Ahmed, the head of the SDF’s civilian administration, is reported to have been offered a position in parliament.

The dissolution comes seven months after a surprise government offensive in January against the SDF, which saw the armed group lose large swathes of its northeastern territory and be forced into an integration agreement.

Since then, the integration has been advancing on the ground, with this latest development being “largely symbolic” according to Alexander McKeever, a researcher and author of the This Week in Northern Syria newsletter.

“Although the SDF is technically dissolved, on the ground its military and civilian structures continue to operate,” he explained to The New Arab.

“They work in parallel to the government structures that are increasingly visible as integration continues.”

The future for female Kurdish fighters

As part of the dissolution, Mazloum Abdi announced that the SDF’s military had been entirely integrated into the Ministry of Defence.

However, there was one major oversight. Seated next to Abdi during his meeting with al-Sharaa was Nowruz Ahmed, the commander of the YPJ - the SDF’s all-female fighting force.

The YPJ were prohibited from joining the Ministry of Defence because the “government simply has a perspective that women don’t belong in the military,” says McKeever.

Following the announcement, the YPJ released a statement about a meeting with the Ministry of Interior saying, “it was emphasised that the YPJ could be integrated, as a distinct organised force, into the Ministry of Interior”.

There had been previous reports that the YPJ had been offered a role as a counter-terror unit within the Ministry of Defence, but this was denied by Ruksan Mohammed, the YPJ spokesperson, a week before the announcement.

She acknowledged that previously they had been offered to integrate into the Interior Ministry as administrative staff, which they rejected outright.

“It should not have reached a point where the dissolution was announced before a solution to the YPJ issue was found,” Muaz Al-Abdullah, a Middle East Research Manager at ACLED, a conflict tracking organisation, told The New Arab.

“It reflects the balance of power between the two sides, where Damascus is largely able to dictate terms in negotiations.”

However, this strategy presents a danger, he adds, “it will ultimately give a group of trained fighters the reasoning to go against the government either as a group or as lone wolves”.

What role for the Kurdish language?

Another bone of contention surrounds the future role of the Kurdish language within the northeast’s education system.

Many Kurds fear a return to the situation under the Assad regime, before the ‘Rojava Revolution’ in 2012, in which “the state did not recognise Kurdish identity as a legitimate part of Syrian identity. Kurdish language instruction and Kurdish cultural expression were banned,” explains McKeever.

As a result, al-Sharaa has sought to assuage Kurdish fears. In January, following the offensive against the SDF, he announced the recognition of Kurdish as a ‘national language’.

However, McKeever notes that this does not make Kurdish an ‘official’ language of Syria. Syria doesn’t currently have a full constitution, with the law either operating on old Assad-era mandates or 2025’s constitutional declaration.

“Full recognition of Kurdish as an official language may come with the drafting of the constitution but, for now, we cannot know,” he says.

As part of the integration agreement between the SDF and the government, Damascus has stipulated a one-year transition period in which Kurdish language classes are offered for three hours per week, alongside one hour for an elective class on a number of topics like women's history, sociology, or philosophy.

The system for the years after has yet to be decided upon. However, for the last 14 years, Kurdish has been the medium of education and so the disagreement between the SDF and Damascus “comes down to whether there will be a fully translated curriculum”.

Effect on the Turkish peace process

The dissolution of the SDF would have been considerably harder to achieve without the parallel peace process between Turkey and the PKK.

In October 2024, Ankara announced that it was commencing negotiations with the PKK, a Kurdish armed group that has fought a decades-long insurgency against the government.

In May 2025, following a call by its leader Abdullah Ocalan, the PKK announced that it would destroy its weapons and dissolve.

Turkey considered the SDF as the Syrian branch of the PKK, and so “Turkey is the biggest winner in this whole situation,” Al-Abdullah tells The New Arab.

“The whole Kurdish situation is shifting regionally with Kurdish non-state actors increasingly having to engage with their relative states,” he adds.

“The dissolution of the SDF will only add onus on the PKK to reach a settlement with the Turks.”

However, it is regarding language rights that Turkey’s Kurds might have the most to gain from the SDF integration agreement.

“Turkey completely banned the Kurdish language, and has struggled with the Kurdish file for decades, partly as a result,” Henri Barkey, an Adjunct Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, told The New Arab.

“Whilst the deal that was signed in Syria is bad on language rights, it is far better than what Turkish Kurds have, and so they might look to Syria as a model for their own aims in negotiations.”

Managing Kurdish fears

The Syrian government is seeking to simultaneously entrench its control over the northeast whilst allaying Kurdish fears and distrust of the government.

According to analysts, many Kurds are sceptical of the government's Islamist roots, and its history of violence against minority groups, including a series of massacres targeting Alawite and Druze minorities.

For Barkey, “Sharaa can’t afford to alienate the Kurds as they have over a decade of experience organising and fighting”.

Equally, many in the local Arab communities distrust the SDF and its leadership, due to the perception that, despite the SDF’s official support for ethnic pluralism, it developed a system that centralised power in the hands of Kurdish communities at the expense of local Arabs.

The “greatest challenge” lies in knitting together a social fabric between “communities that have often lived separately for the last decade, with displaced Kurds now returning to areas with large Arab populations and displaced Arabs doing the same in reverse,” says Mckeever.

In August, a convoy of displaced Kurds, who were returning to Ras Al-Ain, were attacked by local Arabs, which triggered a day of riots by Kurds against the government in Hasakah and Qamishli.

A day later, an attack by unknown elements on a security point manned by former SDF fighters who had been recently integrated into the Ministry of Defence killed three and injured several.

“This is the same pattern that you see across Syria along these social fault lines, where you have old grievances and a lack of security,” Mckeever adds.

Whereas for ACLED’s Al-Abdullah, the primary risk is that integration “will remain political, and that Kurds won't actually be brought into the national community and so will continue to identify as Kurdish more so than Syrian”.

The government has offered senior SDF leadership positions, likely so they can play the role of “intermediary between the state and the Kurdish communities within which they still have a lot of support”.

What next?

Whilst integration is far from finished, the dissolution of the SDF has “expedited certain things on the ground,” explains Mckeever.

The government’s internal security forces, previously only deployed within the grounds of a few government compounds, have reportedly deployed to a number of Arab neighbourhoods in Hasakah city.

Equally, certain SDF internal security units have begun the integration process and will likely begin patrols under the Syrian flag.

For al-Sharaa, with integration and the Kurdish file moving from a major political issue to one more technical and bureaucratic, he can likely turn his attention to the last holdout beyond the control of the state - Suweida.

The dissolution of the SDF represents the death knell for a vision for Syria, advocated by Israel and the Druze militias in Suweida, of fragmentation.

“With the government empowered domestically and backed internationally by the US and Turkey, it will be looking towards resolving the Suweida situation,” Al-Abdullah says.

“Israel is using Suweida as a card, and will likely abandon it when its interests require,” says Al-Abdullah.

“The Syrian government now needs to be working on winning back the people of Suweida, who felt so betrayed by the government's actions against them.”

*Cian Ward is a journalist based in Damascus, covering conflict, migration, and humanitarian issues

Follow him on X: @CP__Ward

Edited by Charlie Hoyle