A move to divide Syria’s eastern Deir ez-Zor into four administrative sections to give the local Arab population more control under the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) was announced shortly before US Deputy Special Envoy to Syria David Brownstein’s visit to the oil-rich, much-suffering region.

A murky Jan. 30 apparent assassination attempt against the co-chair of the Deir ez-Zor civil council, Ghassan al-Youssef, still hangs heavily, however. Some residents of the Arab region say they believe the SDF planned the attack to get rid of Youssef, who is a leading proponent of the plan.

Youssef told Al-Monitor in mid-March during a brief visit to the capital of the Kurdistan Region of Iraq that his convoy had been fired upon when he was leaving Raqqa after speaking to local and tribal officials.

“It was around 5:30 p.m. in the evening and I was coming back from Raqqa, about 25 kilometers (15.5 miles) from the city on the road to Deir ez-Zor. Men at the checkpoint that is not usually there — what we refer to as a 'flying checkpoint' — opened fire on me and my escorts. I was in an armored car and there was another armored car behind me, but my guard [who was also his relative but in an unarmored vehicle] was shot and killed.”