Hasakah at a crossroads: Real integration, or recreating ‘security squares’?

PARIS/QAMISHLI — The Syrian government and the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) are taking slow, simultaneous moves towards implementing the January 30 integration agreement, most recently withdrawing their respective forces from lines of contact near Hasakah city and the nearby towns of Tal Brak and Tal Hamis. 

Limited implementation of some of the agreement’s administrative clauses is underway, with Nour al-Din Issa Ahmad—whose name was put forward by the SDF—appointed governor of Hasakah province on February 13. On the security side, dozens of members of Damascus’s Internal Security Force entered Hasakah city and Qamishli earlier this month. 

The presence of government security forces in the two northeastern Syrian cities is limited to what is known as the “security square” in each, a situation that echoes the presence of Assad regime forces prior to December 2024. 

The January 30 agreement, and the steps that have followed, appear to indicate that the fraught relationship between Damascus and the predominantly Kurdish forces has entered a new phase, and that the two sides are more serious about implementation than under past agreements. 

However, realities on the ground—and diverging statements by officials on both sides regarding administration of border crossings and the authority of their security forces—reveal a deep gap in how the agreement is being interpreted, and indicate that what is unfolding is more complicated than a smooth transfer of power. 

The SDF continues to control most neighborhoods in Hasakah and Qamishli, as well as the local administration, while Damascus’s presence is limited to certain points. The question, as integration proceeds, is whether it is a process that will lead to unified state institutions, or a modified form of power-sharing that entrenches self-rule alongside government-controlled security squares.

‘We feel let down’

“We don’t feel the state has come in,” said Adnan al-Said (a pseudonym), an Arab resident of Qamishli. For him, little has changed, as despite the entry of some government security forces, “the SDF is carrying out provocations,” he told Syria Direct on condition of anonymity for safety reasons. 

“The agreement is not satisfactory. We feel let down by the government—it sold us out,” al-Said added. “The agreement, which is shrouded in ambiguity, is being implemented slowly.” 

Al-Said condemned the appointment of Governor Nour al-Din Ahmad, also known as Abu Omar Khanika, for what he considered “his and his family’s history of committing violations against the people of the area.” Ahmad was previously the director of the Alaya prison in Qamishli. 

“The state, which entered the region and got the oil fields and crossings” is the main beneficiary of the agreement, al-Said said, accusing Damascus of treating northeastern Syria as “an area of resources, as if wealth is more important than people.” 

Researcher Samer al-Ahmad, also an Arab from Hasakah, voiced a similar view. “People do not look favorably upon the agreement. It is mysterious to them, and came at a time when the SDF was on the back foot, and had lost more than half the province,” he said. 

“Some Arab areas are still under SDF control, and these areas are suffering major security violations and harassment, amid silence from the government,” he told Syria Direct. Meanwhile, areas Damascus has entered are dealing with “instability and a lack of basic services,” leading to “a state of dissatisfaction.” 

With the hardening of “ceasefire lines” under the agreement, parts of the Hasakah countryside now controlled by Damascus are cut off from “hospitals, large service institutions and markets,” al-Ahmad explained. Residents who relied on Qamishli and Hasakah find “the roads are cut off for them, and they cannot transport their sick or reach alternative markets.” 

Despite the importance of services and the need to reopen roads, al-Ahmad stressed the importance of “ensuring the protection of civilians entering Qamishli and Hasakah, which are both controlled by the Kurdistan Workers’ Party [PKK],” he said. Al-Ahmad was referring to the SDF, which he also accused of “carrying out arrests and kidnappings in areas it controls.” 

“Arrests and harassment of Arabs in Qamishli continue,” al-Said said. He logs out of his social media accounts and deletes some WhatsApp messages “before going out into the street, for fear of arrest,” he added. 

For weeks, the SDF has enforced a nightly curfew in Qamishli city, but “the curfew is only applied in Arab neighborhoods,” al-Said said, “while our Kurdish people go out in demonstrations, raising weapons and the flags of the SDF and PKK.”

On the days government forces entered the two cities—January 2 and 3—“the SDF imposed a strict lockdown, stopping us from going out to the point that anyone who leaned their head out the window risked being shot or arrested,” he said. 

While the agreement discusses integrating the SDF into Syrian state institutions, for now “we see a completely different reality, as SDF forces and armored vehicles raise their own flags, and PKK flags, even more than before, and prevent people from raising the Syrian flag,” al-Said said. “We are forbidden from raising our country’s flag in our own homes, and even on social media.” 

But for Elin (a pseudonym), 18, who is Kurdish, “the unknown future” is what troubles her. “I don’t know if they [the Syrian government] who want to come and take control of the region will protect us or kill us,” she told Syria Direct. “What worries me is not knowing my fate and the fate of the Kurds” in the region. 

Up until last month, Elin was a first-year student at the Faculty of Law at Raqqa city’s al-Sharq University, an institution established by the SDF-backed Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (AANES). When the SDF withdrew, she had to abandon her studies and move to her sister’s house in the Hasakah province city of al-Malikiyah (Derik). 

“I no longer have a university, like many al-Sharq University students. I’m afraid my studies and effort won’t be recognized. We’re living in an unknown future, and don’t know the fate of our education,” she said. 

Security squares 2.0? 

With government forces present only at specific locations with limited powers, the term “security squares” has resurfaced, shorthand for the debate over what Damascus’s security presence actually represents: a step towards true integration, or the reproduction of a fragile, stopgap security model. 

“What is happening resembles the security squares in the days of the Assad regime,” al-Said said. He hoped Damascus’s security force would “deploy in the Arab neighborhoods of Qamishli, and that the state would fully restore its real control.” 

Hasakah province, “with its various components, is a miniature Syria,” he added. “We want the state to stand at the same distance from everyone, and for every Syrian to have their full rights.” 

Since entering Qamishli at the start of the month, “it seems as though government forces are encircled inside their positions,” al-Said said. “Their forces can’t leave the security square without Asayish [the SDF’s security forces] supervision. Even when they go out to shop, they do it without their weapons, and under Asayish supervision.” 

Researcher al-Ahmad held that “the agreement is still in a dormant phase, and represents a temporary truce, a stage of testing intentions.” 

Each side has moved to “implement some surface-level and non-essential points, such as bringing a small security force into Qamishli and Hasakah, raising the Syrian flag, appointing a governor and talking about withdrawing military groups,” he explained. However, “the core of the agreement—integration, removal of PKK elements from Syria and the strong, effective entry of the state—has yet to begin.”

“The government completely rejects the security squares model, but it appears the SDF is trying to entrench it,” al-Ahmad added. “The continuation of this dispute may ultimately lead to the failure of the agreement.” 

“Despite the mutually positive rhetoric on integration, implementation is proceeding slowly,” said Kurdish political writer and researcher Ibrahim Murad, attributing this to “a lack of trust between the two sides.” This mistrust is linked to “past experiences that saw violations in other parts of Syria,” he explained. “Political memory makes any new agreement need guarantees and oversight mechanisms to prevent a repeat of past scenarios.” 

Commenting on the idea of limited security squares or zones, Murad explained that, in the past, this approach “was of a tactical, limited nature aimed at managing some administrative or service aspects within temporary balances.” The current process, “if actually completed, is supposed to be strategic, leading to a genuine political partnership for Kurds in the future Syrian state, rather than temporary security arrangements.” 

Murad emphasized that “the ongoing process can be described as preliminary technical steps” and can only become a strategic transformation if three key elements are addressed: “accelerating implementation on the ground, resolving outstanding humanitarian issues and enshrining rights within a constitutional framework that guarantees a sustained partnership in the future state.” Without that, “the path remains fragile and vulnerable to disruption at the first political or security test,” he added.

For his part, military researcher and defected officer Rashid Hourani said the agreement “is proceeding according to plan, and there is mutual understanding between the government and the SDF about each of their roles.” 

He pointed to “the measured advance of the Syrian army into SDF-held areas, accompanied by a national discourse calling for the unification of Syria, recognizing the SDF as an organization and the Kurds as a social component,” alongside confidence-building measures such as Decree 13 and the appointment of a Hasakah governor from within the SDF. 

“The current situation cannot be compared to the security squares in the days of the previous regime,” Hourani told Syria Direct. “The security, military and civilian institutions in the current SDF areas operate within the plans and programs of Syrian state institutions, and are not independent as they were under the previous regime.” 

“Granting some institutions, such as the Asayish, a measure of independence is a temporary matter imposed by the transition and integration phase,” he added. “The cooperation that currently exists between the Syrian government and the SDF is complementary, and differs from the hostility and vigilance between the SDF and the defunct [Assad] regime.” 

Hikmat Habib, a member of the AANES Foreign Relations Office, said the current agreement “represents a complementary integration of our security, administrative and political institutions with the current government.” He ruled out any similarity to the “security squares formula” under the Assad regime, which was “fragile and prone to violations.” 

“We are serious about a true and complementary integration,” Habib added to Syria Direct, pointing to concrete progress in past days, including the entry of some government security forces. Such steps, he said, show “we are extending our hand for a complementary integration in order to reach a form of decentralization that Syrians in general, and the people of the Jazira in particular, aspire to, given their diverse components, nationalities, ethnicities and religions.” 

Future of institutions

Amid the debate over security arrangements, civilian institutions in Hasakah are in a tense waiting period. The future of employees, and what integration will look like, remains ambiguous, even though the agreement points to “the integration of Autonomous Administration institutions into Syrian state institutions, with civilian employees remaining in their positions.”

Ilham (a pseudonym), an accountant at an AANES institution in Qamishli, does not know whether she will stay or leave if local institutions are merged with the government under the agreement. 

“We are going through great uncertainty, and don’t know what will happen to our jobs,” she told Syria Direct under condition of anonymity. “We asked our managers about the future, but they don’t have a clear answer.”

These days, “there is not much work,” Ilham said. “I spend most of the time with my colleagues, without tasks.” She and her colleagues were paid for January, “but we don’t know about this month,” she added. 

“The agreement holds some hope if it is actually implemented under the same conditions,” including retaining employees, but “civilians will pay the price” if it falls through, she said. 

In Qamishli, the AANES municipality still oversees basic services, without any notable change, according to municipal co-chair Berivan Omar. “There has been no change yet, and the process of integrating municipalities has not yet begun,” she told Syria Direct. 

“The municipal system in Damascus is a little different from ours,” so “it is possible some administrative divisions will change” to match it, Omar added. “So far, we are working according to the AANES municipal system, on the basis of co-presidency, which could shift to a president and a deputy,” she said. However, “our main goal is to preserve our distinctiveness.” 

“Integration will take time,” since “the possible changes are large, and require time in order to preserve what we are working on, and so that we can complement one another,” Omar said. “Integration does not mean elimination—it could be a complementary form of relationship with Damascus.” 

The January 30 agreement does not include “clear and definitive” clauses and details on municipal organization, Omar said, but “we want to discuss the municipalities’ powers in our talks with the government, because the powers held by the government are not the same as those of our municipalities.” 

“According to the directives we have received, the institutions will remain the same, with the same staff and work,” she concluded. 

Habib, for his part, said some “sovereign institutions” will report directly to Damascus, including land crossings and airports, as well as departments such as immigration and passports and the Syrian Petroleum Company operating at the Rumeilan oil fields. 

“These institutions are linked to the central [government], but they will benefit from the technical expertise of people in the region who manage operations on the ground,” he added. “The rest of the institutions, which have been administering the region for more than a decade, will be an essential part of state institutions in the coming stage.” 

“Our institutions have significant administrative experience and human capacity, which we will harness to make the next phase successful and serve the people of Hasakah,” Habib said. He stressed that management of institutions in Qamishli and Hasakah “will be based on complementary integration,” with some institutions falling under the central government and others to the provincial government, “with the participation of local people from various communities.” 

Pitfalls and traps

Despite international support for the integration agreement, “the difficulties are many,” researcher al-Ahmad said. He expects it to ultimately fall apart, meeting a fate similar to that of the March 2025 agreement, April 2025 Sheikh Maqsoud agreement and other past deals. 

“There is international pressure to make the agreement succeed, but it will not bear fruit without a radical change on the ground,” al-Ahmad said. “This requires the removal of the PKK and its affiliated gangs from Syria, because the party has influence, and is the main problem.” 

That influence has surfaced in statements by leading figures within the SDF who are considered part of what some call the “Qandil current”—those with ties to the PKK— that interpret the terms of the current agreement and its implementation in a way that does not reflect the announced texts. 

Researcher Hourani attributed this gap to what he asserted is a “pro-Iran current in the SDF that is trying to sabotage the agreement.” However, “the SDF’s retreat on the ground in Raqqa, Deir e-Zor and parts of Hasakah, along with the international and regional stances supporting a unified Syria, are factors that reduce the likelihood of the agreement’s collapse.” 

Diverging interpretations of what the agreement means amount to “traps, similar to those of the March 10, Sheikh Maqsoud and Deir Hafer agreements, which obstructed previous agreements and will obstruct this one,” researcher al-Ahmad said. 

“There is a turn by some SDF leaders towards a national Syria, and this is a positive sign if they succeed, because it poses a personal risk to them. The parent organization does not usually accept such shifts and defections,” he said, referring to the PKK. 

The Semalka crossing, the unofficial border crossing between SDF areas and the Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KRI) is one of the main points of disagreement when it comes to interpreting the agreement. While Damascus insists on controlling Semalka, statements by SDF leaders refer to a symbolic government presence and AANES management. 

Commenting on that, one senior official at the AANES Directorate of Border Crossings said Semalka “is like other institutions, there will be a number of government representatives there but the manager and all employees will be from our side.” He noted “the AANES continues to run the crossing, and a delegation from Damascus will arrive in the coming days.” 

“We hear a lot that the government will control the crossing, but there is nothing of the sort,” the AANES border official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told Syria Direct. “A number of people will be present there in the name of the government only.”

“Some institutions and bodies may change their name administratively, but they will continue in practice with the same staff managing the work within the formula of a complementary integration,” AANES official Habib said. 

Regarding the crossings, “sovereignty is Syrian, but the existing administrative structure cannot be cancelled,” Habib added. The Semalka crossing “will be managed under a new mechanism that ensures its subordination to [Damascus’s] land crossings administration while maintaining the current staff.” 

Writer Murad attributed the continued divergence of interpretations to “pending issues that have not yet been finally resolved,” leading each side to “provide its own interpretation of the agreement, commensurate with its vision and interests.” 

Amid the push and pull between the two sides over what integration will mean in practice, Elin had a “message for both parties,” calling on Damascus and the SDF to “find a solution, let us live in peace and open the universities and schools.” 

“We’re tired of this situation,” she concluded.

This report was originally published in Arabic and translated into English by Mateo Nelson. 

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