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Squeezed by Turkey’s military thrust in northeastern Syria and abandoned by the United States, the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) had to make a deal with Damascus, which raises a crucial question: Is this the end of Kurdish dreams of autonomy?
Under the deal, government forces have begun to return to areas they ceded seven years ago, with Damascus making no binding pledge about the future of political and military self-rule bodies that the Kurds have built during the war. The Kurds will be in a much weaker position at any negotiating table now, and might be even forced into a zero-sum outcome politically, once the Syrian state takes the upper hand.
