Exclusive - Panic Rocks Kurds in Qandil Mountains over Incessant Turkey, Iran Attacks

A fence surrounds a PKK camp in the Qandil Mountains. (Asharq Al-Awsat)
A fence surrounds a PKK camp in the Qandil Mountains. (Asharq Al-Awsat)
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Exclusive - Panic Rocks Kurds in Qandil Mountains over Incessant Turkey, Iran Attacks

A fence surrounds a PKK camp in the Qandil Mountains. (Asharq Al-Awsat)
A fence surrounds a PKK camp in the Qandil Mountains. (Asharq Al-Awsat)

Residents in over 20 Kurdish villages wedged between Iraqi, Iranian and Turkish borders have been living in a state of total horror and panic.

Kurds in that region have been chased down by a series of semi-nonstop Turkish airstrikes coupled with intermittent Iranian artillery shelling that have been taking out targets in the eastern plains of the Qandil Mountains since fall 2018.

Arbitrary strikes launched by Turkish warplanes on August 19, for example, severely injured four farmers who were harvesting crops at Pauli village. Large swathes of farmland filled with a variety of fruit-bearing groves were grazed to the ground.

The very same raids uprooted villagers, who fled in fear of violence, in seven neighboring communities.

Ahmed Nour, 45, reported great damage to his house.

“Turkish fighter jets keep buzzing in the skies. Targets and any movements in our villages are fired at indiscriminately. Their vengeful strikes are destroying our farmlands and have forced villagers to flee,” Nour told Asharq Al-Awsat.

Responding to Turkish claims about Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) members being hosted by Kurdish villages in the Qandil Mountains, he said: “We are farmers and our only sources of living are the crops and fields we have worked hard to grow over the last years… We have nothing to do with political parties.”

“Our villages have no armed presence, whether it is the PKK or Iranian opposition parties. Despite that, Turkish jets target our homes and fields, most of which have been burned to the ground,” Nour added.

Targeted Kurds, facing escalatory Turkish and Iranian violence, have turned to blaming regional sovereign authorities for their inaction as their homes get leveled by fierce attacks.

Soran Rasoul, 26, a livestock keeper, said: “We hold the authorities in Baghdad and the Iraqi Kurdistan Region responsible for our tragic situation, because they do not take any deterring action against Turkey’s hostility.”

Strongly rebuffing Ankara’s claims on PKK militias being present in the villages, he noted that “sovereign states should protect their citizens and territories when subjected to humiliating attacks, such as those being committed by Turkey on a near daily basis.”

“Only one or two members of each family have stayed behind to safeguard our property and fields, while Baghdad and Erbil are standing idle.”



Fireworks, Warplanes and Axes: How France Celebrates Bastille Day

France's President Emmanuel Macron (center-L) and France's Chief of the Defense Staff General Thierry Bukhard (center-R) and French Military Governor of Paris (GMP) Loic Mizon (center-Top) review troops as they stand in the command car flanked by France's mounted Republican Guard (Guarde Republicaine) during the annual Bastille Day military parade on the Champs-Elysees Avenue in Paris on July 14, 2025. (Photo by Ludovic MARIN / AFP)
France's President Emmanuel Macron (center-L) and France's Chief of the Defense Staff General Thierry Bukhard (center-R) and French Military Governor of Paris (GMP) Loic Mizon (center-Top) review troops as they stand in the command car flanked by France's mounted Republican Guard (Guarde Republicaine) during the annual Bastille Day military parade on the Champs-Elysees Avenue in Paris on July 14, 2025. (Photo by Ludovic MARIN / AFP)
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Fireworks, Warplanes and Axes: How France Celebrates Bastille Day

France's President Emmanuel Macron (center-L) and France's Chief of the Defense Staff General Thierry Bukhard (center-R) and French Military Governor of Paris (GMP) Loic Mizon (center-Top) review troops as they stand in the command car flanked by France's mounted Republican Guard (Guarde Republicaine) during the annual Bastille Day military parade on the Champs-Elysees Avenue in Paris on July 14, 2025. (Photo by Ludovic MARIN / AFP)
France's President Emmanuel Macron (center-L) and France's Chief of the Defense Staff General Thierry Bukhard (center-R) and French Military Governor of Paris (GMP) Loic Mizon (center-Top) review troops as they stand in the command car flanked by France's mounted Republican Guard (Guarde Republicaine) during the annual Bastille Day military parade on the Champs-Elysees Avenue in Paris on July 14, 2025. (Photo by Ludovic MARIN / AFP)

Swooping warplanes, axe-carrying warriors, a drone light show over the Eiffel Tower and fireworks in nearly every French town — it must be Bastille Day.

France celebrated its biggest holiday Monday with 7,000 people marching, on horseback or riding armored vehicles along the cobblestones of the Champs-Elysees, the most iconic avenue in Paris. And there are plans for partying and pageantry around the country, said The Associated Press.

Why Bastille Day is a big deal

Parisians stormed the Bastille fortress and prison on July 14, 1789, a spark for the French Revolution that overthrew the monarchy. In the ensuing two centuries, France saw Napoleon’s empire rise and fall, more uprisings and two world wars before settling into today’s Fifth Republic, established in 1958.

Bastille Day has become a central moment for modern France, celebrating democratic freedoms and national pride, a mélange of revolutionary spirit and military prowess.

The Paris parade beneath the Arc de Triomphe so impressed visiting US President Donald Trump in 2017 that it inspired him to stage his own parade this year.

What stood out

The spectacle began on the ground, with French President Emmanuel Macron reviewing the troops and relighting the eternal flame beneath the Arc de Triomphe.

Two riders fell from their horses near the end of the parade, and it was unclear whether anyone was hurt. Such incidents happen occasionally at the annual event.

Each parade uniform has a touch of symbolism. The contingent from the French Foreign Legion was eye-catching, its bearded troops wearing leather aprons and carrying axes, a reference to their original role as route clearers for advancing armies.

The Paris event included flyovers by fighter jets, trailing red, white and blue smoke. Then the evening sees a drone light show and fireworks at the Eiffel Tower that has gotten more elaborate every year.

What’s special about this year

Every year, France hosts a special guest for Bastille Day, and this year it’s Indonesia, with President Prabowo Subianto representing the world’s largest Muslim country, which also a major Asian economic and military player.

Indonesian troops, including 200 traditional drummers, marched in Monday’s parade, and Indonesia is expected to confirm new purchases of Rafale fighter jets and other French military equipment during the visit. Prabowo, who was accused of rights abuses under Indonesia's prior dictatorship, will be treated to a special holiday dinner at the Elysée Palace.

“For us as Indonesian people, this is a very important and historic military and diplomatic collaboration,'' the commander of the Indonesian military delegation, Brig. Gen. Ferry Irawan, told The Associated Press.

Finnish troops serving in the UN force in Lebanon, and Belgian and Luxembourg troops serving in a NATO force in Romania also paraded through Paris, reflecting the increasingly international nature of the event.

Among the dignitaries invited to watch will be Fousseynou Samba Cissé, who rescued two babies from a burning apartment earlier this month and received a last-minute invitation in a phone call from Macron himself.

‘’I wasn't expecting that call,'' he told online media Brut. ‘’I feel pride.''

What’s the geopolitical backdrop

Beyond the military spectacle in Paris are growing concerns about an uncertain world. On the eve Bastille Day, Macron announced 6.5 billion euros ($7.6 billion) in extra French military spending in the next two years because of new threats ranging from Russia to terrorism and online attacks. The French leader called for intensified efforts to protect Europe and support for Ukraine.

‘’Since 1945, our freedom has never been so threatened, and never so seriously,″ Macron said. ’’We are experiencing a return to the fact of a nuclear threat, and a proliferation of major conflicts.″

Security was exceptionally tight around Paris ahead of and during the parade.

What else happens on Bastille Day

It’s a period when France bestows special awards — including the most prestigious, the Legion of Honor — on notable people. This year's recipients include Gisèle Pelicot, who became a global hero to victims of sexual violence during a four-month trial in which her husband and dozens of men were convicted of sexually assaulting her while she was drugged unconscious.

Others earning the honor are Yvette Levy, a Holocaust survivor and French Resistance fighter, and musician Pharrell Williams, designer for Louis Vuitton.

Bastille Day is also a time for family gatherings, firefighters' balls and rural festivals around France.