The following statement was issued by a group of students at Amir Kabir (Polytechnic) University in Tehran, protesting an admission of guilt by the Iranian government for downing Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752 with a missile on 8 January 2020. The flight was shot down in what one Iranian official called an “unforgivable mistake” and another said was due to “human error in a time of crisis.” This occurred after the 3 January US assassination of IRGC major general Qassem Soleimani in Iraq and the 7 January Iranian attack of the al-Asad airbase in Iraq housing American and Iraqi soldiers.

This most comprehensive account up-to-date, based on interviews with local political actors, presents a critical examination of political structures and organizing strategies implemented in North and East Syria. It pays a special focus to ongoing challenges the autonomous administration faces, including the incorporation of non-Kurdish communities, and limitations of the political system, as it is currently implemented, in reaching the goal of a directly democratic governance.

In this second part of the interview, Debbie Bookchin and Emre Şahin share their thoughts and observations on how the revolution has impacted everyday life in Rojava.

Scholars Laura Fantone and Andrej Grubacic discuss what’s at stake in Rojava and why the U.S. left should come to its defense.

What's Next for Kurds? The Kurds of northern Syria lost faith in the U.S. following President Trump’s decision to withdraw troops from the region. Nishti Murad, a school teacher from Kobani, said America left them to die.

The Rojava revolution is under attack. Debbie Bookchin and Emre Şahin share their thoughts on this unique revolutionary process after recently visiting the region.