AL-HASAKAH, Syria — At a military outpost 30 kilometers (19 miles) southeast of the city of al-Hasakah, a young woman in black military garb stands on the roof of a small building and scans the horizon with her binoculars. This is one of three main frontlines where the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces and the Syrian national army have been clashing for more than a week in violation of a ceasefire that was extended by Damascus on Tuesday.

An hour earlier, a drone struck an SDF position 2 kilometers away from here, wounding an SDF soldier. Just as she and her fellow fighters begin to share the most recent developments on the al-Hasakah front, the whirring of a drone sends everyone scrambling off the roof for cover.

Further east near the Iraqi border, heavy fighting between the SDF and government forces continued for a third night. Syria’s government and the SDF have been locked in bitter US-brokered discussions over how to integrate the Kurdish-led region’s military and civilian institutions with Damascus after more than a decade of quasi-independence under the Pentagon’s effective protection.

The fall of the Assad regime in December 2024 and the rise of Ahmed al-Sharaa, a former jihadi who declared himself interim president last year, triggered an unraveling of the US-SDF alliance as President Donald Trump — along with much of the rest of the world — embraced Syria’s new leader.