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Syria 'Safe Zone': 3 Options for Turkey

Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan at the UN Headquarters in New York on September 24, 2019. (AP)
Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan at the UN Headquarters in New York on September 24, 2019. (AP)
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Syria 'Safe Zone': 3 Options for Turkey

Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan at the UN Headquarters in New York on September 24, 2019. (AP)
Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan at the UN Headquarters in New York on September 24, 2019. (AP)

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has renewed his demand to establish a safe zone, devoid of the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) and Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), 30 kilometers deep into northern Syria.

Erdogan first made his intentions clear in 2013 and then presented a detailed map of his vision before the United Nations in 2019. His plan was rejected by the United States, Europe and Russia. Ankara managed, however, through various exchanges and military incursions to establish pockets of control in the area.

This was achieved through four military operations: Euphrates Shield in Jarablus in northern Aleppo in 2016, Olive Branch in Afrin in Aleppo's countryside in 2018, Peace Spring in Tal Abyad and Ras al-Ain east of the Euphrates River in late 2019 and Spring Shield in Idlib in spring 2020.

The process also demanded a series of agreements: Ankara, Moscow and Tehran signed an agreement over Idlib in Astana in 2017; Ankara signed a number of understandings with Moscow in 2018 and 2020; Ankara signed an agreement with Washington over the Manbij "roadmap" in 2018 and another one on the Peace Spring region in October 2019.

These deals allowed Turkey to establish its zones of influence that take up around 10 percent of Syria, or roughly twice the size of Lebanon. Turkey, along with Russia and Iran, which control 63 percent of Syria with the regime, is one of the main players in the war-torn country. Added to them are the United States and its allies, who back the Kurdish Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which hold 23 percent of northeastern Syria.

Turkey's incursions in Syria have prevented the Kurds from establishing their own state, similar to the Iraqi Kurdistan Region. It partially succeeded in driving out the YPG and PKK from its southern borders and prevented dramatic demographic changes in northern Syria. Ankara, Tehran and Damascus are in agreement over barring the establishment of a Kurdish entity. Syria, Iran and Turkey had in the 1990s also stood against the establishment of the Iraqi Kurdistan Region.

What has changed?
Erdogan believes that the war on Ukraine has granted Turkey a unique and major negotiations position with Russia, the US and Washington.

Washington supports Sweden and Finland's bid to join NATO and in order for that to succeed, it needs the approval of all members, including Turkey.

Moscow opposes the bid and is banking on Turkey's veto to that end.

Through the series of tradeoffs and understandings in Syria, and Ankara and Moscow's bilateral military, economic and political relations, Russian President Vladimir Putin succeeded in using his special ties with Erdogan in making a main breakthrough in NATO's southern front. Turkey's Incirlik base near the Syrian border lies just dozens of kilometers away from Russia's Hmeimim air base in western Syria.

Days ago, as NATO was preparing to hold a summit in Spain next month, Erdogan raised his tone and threatened to wage a new incursion in northern Syria with the aim of establishing a "safe zone" and driving out the YPG.

Turkish intelligence and allied Syrian factions have been preparing for the new battle. Shelling along the frontlines has also intensified in recent days, namely in the Peace Spring region covering Tal Abyad, Ras al-Ain and the area east of the Euphrates, the areas near Manbij in the Aleppo countryside, and in Tal Rifaat.

Each of these three zones has its own risks should Turkey choose to attack:

- Red zone. The US has deployed its forces, patrols and drones in the area east of the Euphrates to stress that it is there to protect its allies - the SDF - and repel the Turkish army. The US informed Ankara, through its UN ambassador, of its rejection of any military attacks.

Russia, meanwhile, has used the Turkish threats of an offensive to justify reinforcing its strategic deployment near American forces east of the Euphrates.

This has forced Turkey to backtrack somewhat with Erdogan clearly stating that the new offensive would not include the area east of the Euphrates, but it will cover the region west of the river, specifically Manbij and Tal Rifaat.

- Yellow - grey zone, covering west of the Euphrates in Manbij, where an old American-Turkish agreement called for the withdrawal of the YPG and PKK. Washington and Ankara also agreed to deploy joint patrols in the area and form a local council.

The US assurances to the YPG included Manbij and Washington believes that any threat to the Kurdish force will undermine the war against ISIS.

Any Turkish attack in this zone will lead to instability and raise demands in the US Congress for Washington to impose sanctions on Ankara that were imposed after the 2019 offensive.

Erdogan certainly wants to avoid more economic pressure, a year before presidential elections. He may, however, increase pressure in Manbij to reach a new settlement against the YPG.

- Green zone that covers Tal Rifaat, also west of the Euphrates. This area is, in theory, held by Russia, Iran and the Damascus regime. A Turkish incursion here may be easier than the other two zones. All Ankara needs is a green light from Moscow, just as it did for the Euphrates Shield, Olive Branch and Spring Shield operations.

At the time, Russia extracted a price from Turkey in Syria. This time around, Turkey's request for control of Tal Rifaat from Russia will be met with Moscow's demands over Ukraine and Sweden and Finland's NATO bids or perhaps that Ankara normalize ties with Damascus and agree to the deployment of Syrian border guards on the Syrian-Turkish border.

The coming days will reveal Turkey's true intentions: Is it seeking better negotiations conditions ahead of the NATO summit or is Erdogan seeking to impose a new reality on the ground before flying to Spain? Moreover, how will this clash play out with the UN Security Council seeking to extend the cross-border aid deliveries through Turkey before the July 10 deadline?

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Why Greenland Is Strategically Important to Arctic Security

Houses covered by snow are seen on the coast of a sea inlet of Nuuk, Greenland, on March 7, 2025. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka, File)
Houses covered by snow are seen on the coast of a sea inlet of Nuuk, Greenland, on March 7, 2025. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka, File)
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Why Greenland Is Strategically Important to Arctic Security

Houses covered by snow are seen on the coast of a sea inlet of Nuuk, Greenland, on March 7, 2025. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka, File)
Houses covered by snow are seen on the coast of a sea inlet of Nuuk, Greenland, on March 7, 2025. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka, File)

Location, location, location: Greenland’s position above the Arctic Circle makes the world’s largest island a key part of security strategy.

Increasing international tensions, global warming and the changing world economy have put Greenland at the heart of the debate over global trade and security, and US President Donald Trump wants to make sure his country controls the mineral-rich island that guards the Arctic and North Atlantic approaches to North America.

Greenland is a self-governing territory of Denmark, a longtime US ally that has rejected Trump’s overtures. Greenland’s own government also opposes US designs on the island, saying the people of Greenland will decide their own future.

The island, 80% of which lies above the Arctic Circle, is home to about 56,000 mostly Inuit people who until now have been largely ignored by the rest of the world.

Here’s why Greenland is strategically important to Arctic security:

Greenland’s location is key

Greenland sits off the northeastern coast of Canada, with more than two-thirds of its territory lying within the Arctic Circle. That has made it crucial to the defense of North America since World War II, when the US occupied Greenland to ensure it didn’t fall into the hands of Nazi Germany and to protect crucial North Atlantic shipping lanes.

Following the Cold War, the Arctic was largely an area of international cooperation. But climate change is thinning the Arctic ice, promising to create a northwest passage for international trade and reigniting competition with Russia, China and other countries over access to the region’s mineral resources.

Security threats

In 2018, China declared itself a “near-Arctic state” in an effort to gain more influence in the region. China has also announced plans to build a “Polar Silk Road” as part of its global Belt and Road Initiative, which has created economic links with countries around the world.

Then US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo rejected China’s move, saying: “Do we want the Arctic Ocean to transform into a new South China Sea, fraught with militarization and competing territorial claims?”

Meanwhile, Russia has sought to assert its influence over wide areas of the Arctic in competition with the US, Canada, Denmark and Norway. Moscow has also sought to boost its military presence in the polar region, home to its Northern Fleet and a site where the Soviet Union tested nuclear weapons. Russian military officials have said that the site is ready for resuming the tests, if necessary.

Russia's military has been restoring old Soviet infrastructure in the Arctic and building new facilities. Since 2014, the Russian military has opened several military bases in the Arctic and worked on reconstructing airfields.

European leaders’ concerns have been heightened since Russia launched a war in Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022.

Last year, Russian President Vladimir Putin noted that Moscow is worried about NATO’s activities in the Arctic and will respond by strengthening the capability of its armed forces there. But he said that Moscow was holding the door open to broader international cooperation in the region.

US military presence

The US Department of Defense operates the remote Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, which was built after the US and Denmark signed the Defense of Greenland Treaty in 1951. It supports missile warning, missile defense and space surveillance operations for the US and NATO.

Greenland also guards part of what is known as the GIUK (Greenland, Iceland, United Kingdom) Gap, where NATO monitors Russian naval movements in the North Atlantic.

Thomas Crosbie, an associate professor of military operations at the Royal Danish Defense College, said that an American takeover wouldn't improve upon Washington’s current security strategy.

“The United States will gain no advantage if its flag is flying in Nuuk (Greenland's capital) versus the Greenlandic flag,” he told The Associated Press. “There’s no benefits to them because they already enjoy all of the advantages they want.

"If there’s any specific security access that they want to improve American security, they’ll be given it as a matter of course, as a trusted ally. So this has nothing to do with improving national security for the United States.”

Denmark’s parliament approved a bill last June to allow US military bases on Danish soil. It widened a previous military agreement, made in 2023 with the Biden administration, where US troops had broad access to Danish air bases in the Scandinavian country.

Danish Foreign Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen, in a response to lawmakers’ questions, wrote over the summer that Denmark would be able to terminate the agreement if the US tries to annex all or part of Greenland.

Danish armed forces in Greenland

Denmark is moving to strengthen its military presence around Greenland and in the wider North Atlantic. Last year, the government announced a roughly 14.6 billion-kroner ($2.3 billion) agreement with parties including the governments of Greenland and the Faroe Islands, another self-governing territory of Denmark, to “improve capabilities for surveillance and maintaining sovereignty in the region.”

The plan includes three new Arctic naval vessels, two additional long-range surveillance drones and satellite capacity.

Denmark’s Joint Arctic Command is headquartered in Nuuk, and tasked with the “surveillance, assertion of sovereignty and military defense of Greenland and the Faroe Islands,” according to its website. It has smaller satellite stations across the island.

The Sirius Dog Sled Patrol, an elite Danish naval unit that conducts long-range reconnaissance and enforces Danish sovereignty in the Arctic wilderness, is also stationed in Greenland.

Mineral wealth

Greenland is also a rich source of the so-called rare earth minerals that are a key component of cellphones, computers, batteries and other high-tech gadgets that are expected to power the world’s economy in the coming decades.

That has attracted the interest of the US and other Western powers as they try to ease China’s dominance of the market for these critical minerals.

Development of Greenland’s mineral resources is challenging because of the island’s harsh climate, while strict environmental controls have proved an additional hurdle for potential investors.

Features

Protest-Hit Iran Warily Watches the US After its Raid on Venezuela

Iranians protest a 22-year-old woman Mahsa Amini's death after she was detained by the morality police, in Tehran, Sept. 20, 2022, in this photo taken by an individual not employed by the Associated Press and obtained by the AP outside Iran. (AP Photo/ File)
Iranians protest a 22-year-old woman Mahsa Amini's death after she was detained by the morality police, in Tehran, Sept. 20, 2022, in this photo taken by an individual not employed by the Associated Press and obtained by the AP outside Iran. (AP Photo/ File)
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Protest-Hit Iran Warily Watches the US After its Raid on Venezuela

Iranians protest a 22-year-old woman Mahsa Amini's death after she was detained by the morality police, in Tehran, Sept. 20, 2022, in this photo taken by an individual not employed by the Associated Press and obtained by the AP outside Iran. (AP Photo/ File)
Iranians protest a 22-year-old woman Mahsa Amini's death after she was detained by the morality police, in Tehran, Sept. 20, 2022, in this photo taken by an individual not employed by the Associated Press and obtained by the AP outside Iran. (AP Photo/ File)

Iran faces a new round of protests challenging the country's theocracy, but it seems like the only thing people there want to talk about is half a world away: Venezuela.

Since the US military seized Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, a longtime ally of Tehran, over the weekend, Iranian state media headlines and officials have condemned the operation. In the streets and even in some official conversations, however, there's a growing question over whether a similar mission could target the country's top officials including the supreme leader, 86-year-old Ali Khamenei.

The paranoia feeds into wider worries among Iranians. Many fear that close US ally Israel will target Iran again as it did during the 12-day war it launched against Tehran in June. Israel killed a slew of top military officials and nuclear scientists, and the US bombed Iranian nuclear enrichment sites. Khamenei is believed to have gone into hiding for his protection.

“God bless our leader, we should be careful too," said Saeed Seyyedi, a 57-year-old teacher in Tehran, worried the US could act as it did in Venezuela.

"The US has always been after plots against Iran, especially when issues like oil, Israel are part of the case. In addition, it can be complicated when it is mixed with the Russia-Ukraine war, the Lebanese (group) Hezbollah and drug accusations.”

The US long has accused the Iranian-backed Hezbollah of running drug-smuggling operations to fund its operations, including in Latin America, which the group denies.

‘Please pray’

Immediately after Maduro’s seizure, an analyst on Iranian state television claimed, without offering evidence, that the US and Israel had plans during the war last year to kidnap Iranian officials with a team of dual-national Iranians. Even for conspiracy-minded Iranian television, airing such a claim is unusual.

Then on Sunday night, the prominent cleric Mohammad Ali Javedan warned an audience at prayers in Tehran University that Khamenei's life was in danger.

“Someone said he had a bad dream that the leader’s life is in danger," Javedan said, without elaborating. "Please pray.”

However, Iran is roughly twice the size of Venezuela and has what analysts consider to be a much stronger military and robust security forces. The memory of Operation Eagle Claw, a failed US special forces mission to rescue hostages held after the 1979 US Embassy takeover in Tehran, also haunts Washington.

Then there's the political situation in Iran, with its theocracy protected by hard-liners within the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, who answer only to Khamenei.

They could launch assassinations, cyberattacks and assaults on shipping in the Middle East, warned Farzin Nadimi, senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy who studies Iran’s military.

And crucially, Iran also still has fissile nuclear material.

“In the grand-strategy scheme of things, they need to think about the day after,” Nadimi said of anyone considering a Venezuela-style raid. “Iran is a much more complex political situation. They have to calculate the costs and benefits.”

Not just the Iranians

Others wonder what part of the world the US might take interest in next, while critics have warned about setting a dangerous precedent.

“The regime in Iran should pay close attention to what is happening in Venezuela,” Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid posted on social media on Saturday.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu did not directly link Maduro's detention to Iran but acknowledged the protests sweeping Tehran and other cities, saying: “It is very possible that we are standing at the moment when the Iranian people are taking their fate into their own hands.”

Hours before the US action in Venezuela, US President Donald Trump warned Iran that if Tehran “violently kills peaceful protesters” the US “will come to their rescue.”

On Monday, Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei denounced the comments by Trump and Netanyahu as an “incitement to violence, terrorism and killing.”

US Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Republican who had been close to Trump but resigned Monday after a falling-out with the president, directly linked the Venezuela operation to Iran.

“The next obvious observation is that by removing Maduro this is a clear move for control over Venezuelan oil supplies that will ensure stability for the next obvious regime change war in Iran," Greene wrote on social media.

‘Make Iran Great Again’

US Sen. Lindsey Graham, a Republican, put on a “Make Iran Great Again” hat during a Sunday segment on Fox News. He later posted an image showing him and Trump smiling after the president autographed a similar-looking hat.

“I pray and hope that 2026 will be the year that we make Iran great again," Graham said.

Features

Iran at a Critical Crossroads Testing the Survival of its Regime

Burning debris lies in the middle of a street during protests in Hamedan, western Iran, Jan. 1, 2026. (AFP/Getty Images)
Burning debris lies in the middle of a street during protests in Hamedan, western Iran, Jan. 1, 2026. (AFP/Getty Images)
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Iran at a Critical Crossroads Testing the Survival of its Regime

Burning debris lies in the middle of a street during protests in Hamedan, western Iran, Jan. 1, 2026. (AFP/Getty Images)
Burning debris lies in the middle of a street during protests in Hamedan, western Iran, Jan. 1, 2026. (AFP/Getty Images)

Iran is confronting one of the most consequential junctures since the founding of the republic in 1979. The pressures bearing down on the system are no longer confined to economic sanctions or familiar forms of external coercion, but now cut to the heart of the governing formula itself: how to ensure the regime’s survival without accelerating the very forces that threaten to undermine it.

At the center of this moment lies a stark existential dilemma. A permissive response to internal unrest risks allowing protests to spread and harden into a protracted campaign of political attrition, while a sweeping security crackdown would heighten external dangers, at a time of mounting international hostility and unprecedented US warnings.

Caught between these two paths, Tehran finds its room for maneuver shrinking to levels it has rarely faced before.

Passing protests or structural shift?

The evolution of the current protests raises a central question about their nature: are they a containable social wave, or a deeper expression of a shift in public mood? The spread of demonstrations to small and medium-sized cities, and the widening of their social base, reflect an advanced level of discontent, even if it has not yet reached the threshold of a comprehensive explosion.

Farzin Nadimi, a senior Iran analyst at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, argues that this wave differs from previous ones.

He told Asharq Al-Awsat that the latest protests, unlike earlier waves led by university students or low-income workers in major cities, are now driven by young people in smaller towns and supported by university students nationwide.

He described them as “more entrenched and widespread,” though not yet as large as some previous protests, noting the absence of government employees and oil workers, alongside a strong female presence once again.

This assessment aligns with the reading of Michael Rubin, a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, who pointed to three key differences defining this wave: the nature of the participating forces, the symbolism of its launch from Tehran’s bazaar, and the impact of Israeli strikes that have punctured the aura surrounding Iran.

By contrast, Michael O’Hanlon, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, cautions against overestimating the street’s ability to bring about rapid change, noting that the Iranian system is highly organized and does not hesitate to use violence to control society.

‘Political fuel’

Iran’s economic crisis is no longer a technical issue that can be separated from politics. The collapse of the currency, the erosion of purchasing power, and declining trust in institutions have turned the economy into a direct driver of protest.

With each new round of pressure or sanctions, the sense deepens that the system is incapable of delivering real solutions without making political concessions.

Alex Vatanka, a Senior Fellow at the Middle East Institute in Washington, argues that what is unfolding goes beyond anger over prices or living conditions.

He told Asharq Al-Awsat that the protests reflect a deeper shift in public opinion, in which opposition is no longer directed at specific policies but at the model of governance itself. This shift, he said, confronts the system with a difficult question: can the economy be saved without rethinking the structure of power?

The security establishment: cohesion or fatigue?

Security institutions, from the Revolutionary Guards and their Basij mobilization arm to the intelligence services, form the backbone of the system’s ability to endure. Historically, these institutions have been the primary guarantor of internal stability, but mounting pressures now raise questions about their moral and ideological cohesion.

Rubin said that cracks are widening, pointing to rumors that Tehran has turned to deploying forces from Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Forces and Afghanistan’s Fatemiyoun Brigade due to declining confidence in some Revolutionary Guard units’ willingness to carry out orders.

Vatanka, for his part, acknowledged that these institutions remain cohesive for now, but warned that this cohesion is under growing strain from economic and social exhaustion, which over time could erode morale and produce partial fractures, even if open defections remain unlikely in the foreseeable future.

From deterrence to breaking taboos

If internal challenges are pressing on the structure of power, the external environment multiplies the risks. US-Israeli escalation, coupled with the waning weight of regional allies, places Iran before a radically different strategic landscape.

Threats by US President Donald Trump to support Iranian protesters signal a qualitative shift in US rhetoric, in which the focus is no longer confined to the nuclear program, but now includes Iran’s internal dynamics as part of the pressure equation.

Nadimi said that the developments in Venezuela and the arrest of Nicolas Maduro as carrying troubling implications for Tehran, while stressing the differences between the two cases, arguing that Iran is larger and more complex, and that Washington does not believe its system can be easily overthrown without a clear internal alternative.

Vatanka, however, sees a significant psychological impact from that precedent, saying it has weakened the assumption that leaders are immune from personal targeting.

The regional network: asset or burden?

Israeli strikes in June that targeted military leaders and sovereign symbols inside Iran reflect a shift in Israel’s security doctrine, from containment to direct confrontation.

O’Hanlon said that this pattern, following events in Venezuela and attacks on figures linked to Iran’s nuclear program, has become more likely under Trump, reflecting a willingness to break taboos that once held.

At the same time, questions are resurfacing over the effectiveness of Iran’s regional network. According to Vatanka, these arms are no longer a real deterrent, but have become, given their rising costs, a strategic burden.

Rubin agreed, adding that they have drained the state treasury, although he does not rule out the system turning to them if the crisis intensifies on the domestic front.

Amid this complex entanglement between internal and external pressures, the Iranian system’s options are narrowing as never before.

Between those who see this weakness as an opportunity to rebalance the region and those who fear widespread chaos, the core question remains: Is Tehran facing a manageable crisis of governance or an existential crisis that could shape Iran and the region for decades to come?