Clashes erupted in Aleppo between Syrian security forces and the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) stationed in the Sheikh Maqsoud and Ashrafieh neighbourhoods of the city, on 6 January.
The fierce fighting lasted for five days, resulting in around 23 civilian deaths and the injury of over 100 others. More than 155,000 residents of the neighbourhoods concerned, inhabited by a mixture of Kurds, Arabs, Syriacs, and Turkmen, both Muslims and Christians, were displaced.
The Syrian Ministry of Social Affairs prepared 64 temporary shelters in Aleppo to receive displaced families, who were evacuated with the assistance of the Syrian security forces.
The most recent round of negotiations between the SDF and the transitional government had been held in Damascus on 4 January. The talks focused on establishing a timetable for integrating SDF forces into the central government army, but they yielded no results.
The preceding round, however, produced a preliminary agreement on incorporating SDF members into government forces on an individual basis, while exploring the possibility of retaining the structure of certain units. This could apply, for example, to the SDF’s Women’s Protection Units (YPJ), the all-female counterpart of the male-dominated People’s Protection Units (YPG), since the equivalent does not exist within the Syrian military.
Nevertheless, the failure of the 4 January round to achieve any tangible progress on the stalled agreement suggests that sharp differences over both technical details and substance persist. Against the backdrop of already tense relations between the two sides, the situation in the flashpoint neighbourhoods of Aleppo, which are still controlled by SDF security forces, then escalated to breaking point.
Both sides have traded accusations for initiating the clashes. Nevertheless, recent months have seen flareups of shelling, sniper fire, or the bombing of Syrian government security checkpoints. The latter have been interpreted as messages notifying Damascus of the SDF’s ability to disrupt the stability the government has been working to establish.
The SDF was formed in October 2015 from a mixture of Kurdish forces and Arab tribal fighters, with support from the US, to serve as the main ground force against the Islamic State (IS) group in Syria.
But the mixed Arab-Kurdish composition did not help calm popular resentment towards the SDF among the Arab populations in the areas it recaptured from IS, fuelled by the mandatory conscription imposed by the SDF in areas that fell under its control.
Following the fall of the regime led by former Syrian president Bashar Al-Assad in December 2024, the SDF hoped to retain its autonomous administration in northeastern Syria. It banned Syrians from celebrating Al-Assad’s ouster and retained its security checkpoints separating its areas from government-controlled territory.
It was also deeply suspicious of the new Syrian authorities, because of their backing by Turkey, which claims that the SDF is organisationally part of the Kurdistan Workers Party the PKK, which Turkey has designated as a terrorist organisation.
Nevertheless, pressured by its backer the US, the SDF signed an agreement in principle to integrate its forces into the new Syrian army. Signed on 10 March 2025, this contains loosely worded provisions regarding guarantees for Kurdish rights within Syria in exchange for the incorporation of the SDF into Syria’s new institutions. Details regarding implementation were to be worked out through further negotiation rounds.
The agreement came as a lifeline for both sides. It allowed the SDF to appear flexible, able to adapt to the changes underway in the new Syria, and therefore able to retain US support if it became part of the state.
For the new government, it helped it to save face and divert attention away from the wave of massacres and other human rights offenses committed by Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS), the main group behind the transitional government and its allied factions in early March.
Although the agreement had given the two sides until the end of 2025 to finalise the details for settling outstanding differences and agreeing on a timetable for integration, the deadline was never met.
The Syrian authorities had concluded similar agreements with allied militia factions across the country with the aim of ending the military disunity and anarchy that prevailed throughout the civil war. The factions that became part of the new power structure in Damascus officially dissolved themselves on 29 January 2025 and merged into the newly formed ministries of defence and the interior.
In contrast, Syrian Druze armed factions rejected integration and avoided reaching a similar agreement. In July 2025, they clashed with government forces in Suwayda, leaving dozens of dead from both Druze and Arab tribal communities.
These events, coming only months after the minority Alawite massacres by government-linked forces in March, heightened Syrian Kurdish fears of similar atrocities being perpetrated against Kurdish civilians in the event of an SDF confrontation with government forces.
The government was therefore keen to handle the situation in Sheikh Maqsoud and Ashrafieh delicately and transparently. Syrian Army Chief of Staff Ali Al-Naasan went to Aleppo to oversee steps to restore calm, stabilise security conditions, and prevent rights abuses.
Government forces were reported to have displayed a high degree of professionalism and efficiency in their use of new techniques designed to avert civilian harm while focusing on military targets. The Ministry of Defence declared a two-day grace period for civilians to evacuate the two neighbourhoods through humanitarian corridors on Wednesday and Thursday.
It then extended the grace period for an additional six hours on Friday to allow SDF forces wishing to withdraw without fighting to depart towards northeastern Syria.
Later that Friday, the Syrian Foreign Ministry released a lengthy statement detailing how it had handled the situation in Sheikh Maqsoud and Ashrafieh as a limited law-enforcement operation in response to a violation of the security arrangements of the 1 April 2025 agreement between the SDF and the Syrian government regarding the administration of security in the neighbourhoods.
The ministry denied having conducted a “military operation,” insisting instead that its objective was to end military activity within residential areas in the light of recurrent civilian casualties during oubreaks of hostility.
It also denied any intention to discriminate against Kurds or conduct demographic engineering, stressing that its priority was the safe evacuation of civilians in cooperation with humanitarian organisations and that its hope was that civilian life could return to normal in these residential quarters as soon as possible.
Meanwhile, the SDF appeared unprepared for the severity of the clashes and for them to last several days. Previously, a single mortar shell fired from the two neighbourhoods into other parts of Aleppo, or the bombing of a government security checkpoint, had been sufficient to prompt the authorities to intensify contacts with the SDF leadership to swiftly contain the escalation.
This time, however, the government appeared determined to end the SDF’s military presence in Aleppo and with it the type of blackmail the SDF has employed whenever negotiations stalled.
The SDF has denied government accusations that it is responsible for igniting the clashes. Initially the SDF refused the truce and evacuation of its fighters on Friday, but then it agreed to it the following day after US mediation.
US envoy Tom Barrack met with Interim President Ahmed Al-Sharaa on 10 January, urging him to announce a truce in Aleppo. Barrack subsequently issued a statement offering balanced support for the Syrian government’s efforts to unify military forces in the new Syria while preserving the equal rights of all Syrians, whether Arab, Kurdish, or another affiliation.
He also offered US mediating services should the two sides request it.
According to the Syrian government, dozens of SDF fighters surrendered and withdrew from Ashrafieh, making it possible to transfer this neighbourhood to government control without intense fighting. The SDF denied this claim, maintaining that its fighters continued to resist.
Later, senior SDF official Ilham Ahmed welcomed US mediating efforts, and soon afterwards the SDF gradually began to withdraw its forces. It also announced the death of several of its security and military leaders during the fighting, notably Ziad Qaddour and Waddah Bilal.
Then, just as this crisis was nearing its end, with the new Syrian army assuming control of Ashrafieh on Saturday and Sheikh Maqsoud on Sunday, and civil defence forces preparing to secure the route for the residents’ return to their homes, drones exploded at the Aleppo Governorate building and the nearby neighbourhoods of Al-Furqan and Al-Firdous.
The Syrian government claimed that the suicide drones were launched from SDF-controlled areas on the eastern outskirts of Aleppo. The SDF denied responsibility for the drones, which the government described as Iranian-made suicide drones.
In the view of some analysts, the recent clashes in Aleppo have put the implementation of the 10 March integration agreement out of reach, at least in the short term, and raised the spectre of more such confrontations in Raqqa, Deir ez-Zor, and Hasaka.
Others disagree, arguing that the developments in Ashrafieh and Sheikh Maqsoud have merely deprived the SDF of its ability to use its presence in Aleppo as leverage. A third view adds that the negotiations may become easier now that the clashes have eliminated SDF hardliners who had obstructed integration.
What is clear is that last week’s events revealed the relative discipline and professionalism displayed by government forces. The contrast with the SDF’s more erratic and reactive approach with its escalatory posturing reflects the divergence in the two sides’ understanding of the requirements of the current phase in the Syrian transition.
* A version of this article appears in print in the 15 January, 2026 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly
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