Can Syria's Kurds reel in Turkey with profits from American oil deal?

Mazlum Kobane, commander-in-chief of the Syrian Democratic Forces, speaks with Agence France Presse during an interview in the countryside outside the northwestern Syrian city of Hasakah, in the province of the same name, on Jan. 24, 2019.  Photo by DELIL SOULEIMAN/AFP via Getty Images.

By Amberin Zaman, originally on Al-Monitor.com

As further details emerge about the deal struck between an obscure American oil company and the Kurdish-led autonomous administration of northeast Syria, it is increasingly clear that the accord is as much about political brinkmanship as oil. Mazlum Kobane, the commander in chief of the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), is the brains behind it. In sealing the 25-year-long accord with Delta Crescent Energy, Kobane hopes to achieve a set of ambitious and interlinking goals.

The first is to cement the US military presence in northeast Syria by bringing in a US oil company, an idea that has been floating around for some time. It’s no accident that when President Donald Trump said he was keeping US forces in northeast Syria in the wake of Turkey’s October incursion, it was “for the oil.”

Read more: https://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2020/08/syria-oil-deal-delta-kurds-sdf-kobane-backstory-turkey.html#ixzz6XYkS62eF