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Turkey Sends ‘Field Messages’ to Kurds over Independence Vote

Turkish tanks are seen near the Habur crossing point between Turkey and Iraq during a military drill launched a week before the Kurdish independence vote on September 25. (AFP)
Turkish tanks are seen near the Habur crossing point between Turkey and Iraq during a military drill launched a week before the Kurdish independence vote on September 25. (AFP)
    Ankara, Baghdad and Irbil - Saeed Abdel Razek and Asharq Al-Awsat
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Turkey Sends ‘Field Messages’ to Kurds over Independence Vote

Turkish tanks are seen near the Habur crossing point between Turkey and Iraq during a military drill launched a week before the Kurdish independence vote on September 25. (AFP)
Turkish tanks are seen near the Habur crossing point between Turkey and Iraq during a military drill launched a week before the Kurdish independence vote on September 25. (AFP)

In response to the Kurdish independence referendum scheduled for September 25 and the Syrian Kurds’ elections of bodies running local communities on September 22, Turkey sent on Monday field messages to both parties by deploying its forces at the border of the two countries.

Sources said that Ankara is deploying its forces and backing the Free Syrian Army to control Idlib and drive out Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham militants, which include factions similar to Fatah al-Sham, as a means to prevent the establishment of a “Kurdish corridor” from Syria’s Afreen to the Mediterranean.

Meanwhile, western diplomatic sources told Asharq Al-Awsat on Monday that Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu met with Commander of the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) Sipan Hamo at the Russian Hmeimim air base in Syria on September 12 to discuss ways of fighting ISIS terrorists.

Alarming the Iraqi Kurds, the Turkish army launched on Monday several military maneuvers near the border with Iraq only a week ahead of the referendum on independence.

Meanwhile, political and judicial pressure were still being used to force the autonomous Kurdistan region to postpone the vote.

Iraq’s Supreme Court ordered on Monday the suspension of the independence referendum in the Iraqi Kurdistan Region, deeming it unconstitutional. However, Kurdish officials asserted they were not concerned by decisions issued from Baghdad.

Separately, UK Defense Secretary Michael Fallon arrived in Baghdad on Monday morning before heading in the afternoon to Kurdistan where he met with President Masoud Barzani in an attempt to convince him to annul the referendum and work with the United Nations on finding alternatives to it.

Also on Monday, Khabar Turk newspaper quoted high-ranking diplomatic sources as saying that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan plans to discuss on Tuesday with French President Emmanuel Macron a three-point joint initiative to resolve the ongoing disputes between Irbil and Baghdad.

The meeting will be held on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly meetings currently held in New York.

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Israel Orders Evacuation of Area Designated as Humanitarian Zone in Gaza

A picture taken in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip shows smoke billowing during Israeli army operations in areas east of Khan Younis city on July 26, 2024, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement. (AFP)
A picture taken in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip shows smoke billowing during Israeli army operations in areas east of Khan Younis city on July 26, 2024, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement. (AFP)
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Israel Orders Evacuation of Area Designated as Humanitarian Zone in Gaza

A picture taken in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip shows smoke billowing during Israeli army operations in areas east of Khan Younis city on July 26, 2024, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement. (AFP)
A picture taken in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip shows smoke billowing during Israeli army operations in areas east of Khan Younis city on July 26, 2024, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas movement. (AFP)

Israel’s military ordered the evacuation Saturday of a crowded part of Gaza designated as a humanitarian zone, saying it is planning an operation against Hamas militants in Khan Younis, including parts of Muwasi, a makeshift tent camp where thousands are seeking refuge.

The order comes in response to rocket fire that Israel says originates from the area. It's the second evacuation issued in a week in an area designated for Palestinians fleeing other parts of Gaza. Many Palestinians have been uprooted multiple times in search of safety during Israel's punishing air and ground campaign.

On Monday, after the evacuation order, multiple Israeli airstrikes hit around Khan Younis, killing at least 70 people, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, citing figures from Nasser Hospital.

The area is part of a 60-square-kilometer (roughly 20-square-mile) “humanitarian zone” to which Israel has been telling Palestinians to flee to throughout the war. Much of the area is blanketed with tent camps that lack sanitation and medical facilities and have limited access to aid, United Nations and humanitarian groups say. About 1.8 million Palestinians are sheltering there, according to Israel's estimates. That's more than half Gaza’s pre-war population of 2.3 million.

The war in Gaza has killed more than 39,100 Palestinians, according to the territory’s Health Ministry, which doesn’t distinguish between combatants and civilians in its count. The UN estimated in February that some 17,000 children in the territory are now unaccompanied, and the number is likely to have grown since.

The war began with an assault by Hamas fighters on southern Israel on Oct. 7 that killed 1,200 people, most of them civilians, and took about 250 hostages. About 115 are still in Gaza, about a third of them believed to be dead, according to Israeli authorities.