French-backed YPG terrorists open fire on anti-France protests in Syria

Several protesters in Syria's Deir Ezzor region came under the fire of the YPG, the Syrian offshoot of the PKK terror organisation, as they were protesting on Sunday against the publication of caricatures that insulted the Prophet Muhammed and anti-Islam sentiments in France.

The YPG terrorists injured four people, one has been left in critical condition. Deir Ezzor has been under the terror group’s occupation since late 2017.

The protesters, including students and teachers, called for the withdrawal of French soldiers from the country.

In recent weeks, French President Emmanuel Macron attacked Islam and the Muslim community, accusing Muslims of "separatism". He described Islam as “a religion in crisis all over the world".

This coincided with a provocative move by Charlie Hebdo, a left-wing French magazine infamous for publishing anti-Islamic caricatures. They have drawn widespread anger and outrage across the Muslim world.

Insulting caricatures were displayed on some public buildings in Toulouse and Montpellier in the southern region of Occitanie in France.

The caricatures were first published in 2006 by a Danish newspaper, Jyllands Posten, sparking a wave of protests.

France and the US support for terrorists in Syria

Since 2014, Washington has backed the YPG to defeat Daesh, giving the group a central role in managing the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in the battlefields. The YPG-led SDF alliance now controls one-third of Syria with access to several oil fields and two major dams in northern Syrian territories.

Every year, the US allocates hundreds of millions of dollars for the terror group. However, the Trump administration decided to withdraw its troops from northern Syria and continue to back YPG remotely.

Especially after the US withdrawal of its troops from northern Syria, France had increased its support to YPG.

France has a history of colonising Syria. After the WWI, Syria was under French occupation for two decades until the early 1940s.  

Relations between France and the PKK have a long history, going back to the 1980s and 1990s when the late Danielle Mitterrand, the wife of former French President Francois Mitterrand, publicly voiced her support for Abdullah Ocalan, the group’s founding leader, who has been imprisoned by Turkey since 1999. 

“Abdullah Ocalan has a special place in my heart,” the former French first lady said in 1998, indicating that she had strived for Ocalan for years, being “more Apoist than Apo [Ocalan’s nickname].” 

She met with Ocalan when he was in Rome in December 1998 before his capture by Turkish special forces in Kenya in early 1999. After Ocalan’s capture, she even suggested that Ocalan should not be tried in Turkey. 

In its more than 30-year terror campaign against Turkey, the PKK -- listed as a terrorist organisation by Turkey, the US and EU -- has been responsible for the deaths of 40,000 people, including women, children and infants. The YPG is PKK's Syrian offshoot.