From ... in Protest Environmental — Mar 4, 2025

Turkish attacks on Tishreen water dam are an ecological threat to the whole region

Ed note: To give the following post some context, Make Rojava Green Again is an organisation that describes itself as the following: We, the Internationalist Commune of Rojava, want to contribute to the ecological revolution in Northern Sy

Ed. note: To give the following post some context, Make Rojava Green Again is an organisation that describes itself as the following:

We, the Internationalist Commune of Rojava, want to contribute to the ecological revolution in Northern Syria. To this end, we have started the campaign “Make Rojava Green Again”, in cooperation with the Ecology Committee of the Cizire Canton.

The first practical project of the campaign has been the construction of the Internationalist Commune campsite and its academy with ecological ethos. Today, all the buildings are finished, hundreds of trees have been planted and our academy – the Academy Şehîd Hêlîn Qereçox, named in honor of our internationalist fallen comrade Anna Campbell – already saw many different educational pursuits in its role of introducing internationalists to Rojava as well as creating a place of reflection and discussion on the topic of ecology. The practical work continues on the site through taking care of the garden as well as maintaining the different young orchards installed in the last years. Through the practical work and the ideological discussions, the ultimate goal is to strengthen awareness and environmental consciousness, pushing to build up a free and ecological society.

To find out more about Rojava, its social-ecological philosophy and ethos, and its current struggles against various forms of attack and oppression from outside forces, go here to download its latest report, and here to see the latest news.

Please see here for a previous longer article about Make Rojava Green Again’s purpose and projects on Resilience.org.

The Tishreen Dam (Kurdish: Tişrîn) lies on the western most point of the lands of the Democratic Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria, also known as Rojava. A few kilometers away are the defense positions of the multi-ethnic military alliance, the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).

For months now, this picturesque landscape of the banks of the Euphrates River has become a war zone. Thin traces of white haze cross the sky. Thunderous explosions cut the air as Turkish fighter jets fly over the Euphrates with a thunderous noise and drop their bombs on the surrounding hills and the dam itself. The earth trembles and dust is whirled up several stories high into the air. The peaceful quiet of the river, before only disturbed by the splashing of water and the screeching of a few birds, is gone with the roar of fighter jets and the bombs that fall continuously day and night. But the new sounds of Tishreen are not just those of destruction.

Credit: Panoramic view behind “October Dam” in Syria. By Own work – Own work, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=22317649

With every bomb, every attack, the battle cries of the hundreds of men, women, and children keeping watch on the dam, give their answer with chants of “We are not afraid!”, “Long life the resistance of Tishreen!” and “Long live our leader Apo [Abdullah Öcalan]!”. For over 50 days now thousands of people have traveled to the dam to keep a continuous protest against the attacks and to protect the dam from collapse. A different city in North and East Syria sends a new convoy of protestors every few days, allowing people to maintain the struggle as they take shifts and rotate between cities. The protestors call on the international community to support them, but to act we must understand how and for this lets understand in detail the situation.

Since the fall of the dictator Assad on 8^th December 2024, peace has not returned to battered Syria, but rather another war has broken out that is only being paid attention to by a very small number of international media outlets. The so-called “Syrian National Army”, an alliance of various Islamist militias supported and commanded by Turkey, has been trying to invade the region of Kobane in northern Syria. In doing so, they are encountering determined resistance from the SDF, who are defending the democratic achievements of the autonomy built up since 2012 from both Turkey and from the new rulers in Damascus.

The democratic project in northern Syria has been a thorn in the side of the Turkish state for some time because it is based on the ideas of the Kurdish Freedom Movement and it’s leader, Abdullah Öcalan. The Turkish state considers these ideas to be greatest threat to its power and is using every means necessary to destroy it, and is not afraid of causing humanitarian and ecological catastrophes in the process. This fascist and genocidal mentality is clear across time, from supporting ISIS, to its cross-border ground invasions into Northern Syria in 2016, 2018 and 2019, and now as it tries to seize the opportunity of the fall of the Assad regime and bombs civilians and a dam in the attempt. Turkey’s attempts to destroy the Autonomous Administration goes far beyond military tactics. It wages an ecocide on the entire region, attacking the nature and civilian infrastructure to prevent the people from feeding, warming, and housing themselves.

For a long time now, the Euphrates south of the Turkish-Syrian border has been carrying less and less water. The Turkish state is deliberately restricting the flow of water in the Euphrates, particularly since the outbreak of the Syrian civil war in 2011. As part of the “Southeast Anatolia Project” developed in the 1970s, the Turkish state built 22 dams along the courses of the Tigris and Euphrates. The construction of the numerous dams not only destroyed Kurdish cultural heritage through flooding, such as the 12,000-year-old city of Hasankeyf, but also brought about geographical change. Such water dams result in serious interference with the ecosystems and on the other hand, are massively restricting the water supply to Iraq and Syria. Since this part of the so-called Fertile Crescent is actually considered one of the most fertile regions in the world due to the rivers Euphrates and Tigris, the drying out of the soil is a painful consequence of one-sided political hostilities on the part of Turkey.

Now a new war has begun and the heaviest fighting is currently taking place within sight of the Tishreen Dam. Bombs and artillery shells are exploding again and again along the access roads. Large cracks line the asphalt. Behind a chain of hills, the 40-meter-high, concrete-gray Tishreen Dam rises above the riverbed of the Euphrates. After almost 8 years of construction, the dam was completed in 1998 and has supplied large parts of the country with electricity and water ever since. While the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria was on the advance, the dam fell into the hands of the terrorist militia in 2014. A year and a half later, it was liberated by the multi-ethnic SDF. However, the jihadists left a trail of destruction behind them. The turbines could only be put back into operation after lengthy repairs but now the turbines are idle again. The engineers cannot go to work because the risk of being caught in one of the numerous explosions is too great. However, the Tishreen Dam is of vital importance for large parts of the country. At peak performance, it could supply the entire north of Syria with electricity. Each of the six turbines inside the dam has an output of 105 megawatts, so we are talking about 630 megawatts in total. This means that only 1-2 turbines can be operated in parallel. Turkey, on whose territory the river originates, has been using the cutting off water supplies as a deliberate means of exerting pressure for years.

The ongoing attacks by Turkey and its Islamist allies, which also target civilian infrastructure, are also having serious consequences for the people. There have been repeated warnings of a possible collapse of the Tishreen Dam. Destruction would not only affect Raqqa, 60 kilometers away, and the Kobane region within the self-administration, but also the cities of Aleppo, Homs and Minbic, which also receive electricity from the dam. Despite the limited water supply, all areas from the western canton of Afrin, to Aleppo and Homs to the eastern border in the canton of Cizire, could be supplied with electricity until the attacks began. Even the cities of Serekaniye and Gire Spi, which have been controlled by Islamists since the Turkish invasion in 2019, were supplied with electricity from the dam. This was intended to ensure that the civilian population in the occupied areas could continue to use their water pumps.

Since the beginning of December, 400,000 people in the Kobane canton have been without water to sustain themselves and their agriculture and electricity. In addition, there are well over 100,000 internally displaced people who have had to flee to the areas east of the Euphrates and who, in the middle of winter, are still having to stay in tents and school buildings. A continuation of the attacks on the dam will further increase the risk of a humanitarian catastrophe, the extent of which is difficult to estimate. In addition to the interruption of the electricity supply and thus the operation of water pumps, this would also result in the drying out of agricultural land. In the worst case scenario, a breach of the Tishreen Dam would also destroy the largest dam in Syria, the Tabqa Dam. This would release an enormous destructive force, the worst effects of which would be along the 1,800 kilometers of the river all the way to its mouth in the Gulf of Persia.

In addition to their great importance for power generation and the use of the dammed water for agriculture in the surrounding cantons, the Tishreen Dam and the road leading over it, as well as the Karakozak Bridge 40 kilometers to the north, are central lifelines of Syria. They connect the east of the Euphrates with the western regions. The Karakozak Bridge has also been hit by attacks by the Syrian National Army since the beginning of December. The M4 road that runs over the bridge stretches from Aleppo to Damascus in the west and through the self-administering areas of northern and eastern Syria via Mosul to Damascus in the east. By interrupting this lifeline, which has no alternative for trade, Turkey is attempting to attack the economy and thus the people’s livelihood. These targeted attacks on nature and the economy are also intended to attack the people’s political support for self-administration.

By defending the Tishreen Dam, the SDF are defending the political achievements of the democratic self-administration as well as the livelihoods of people in the entire region. The question of defending Tishreen is therefore a question of an ecological and democratic perspective for the whole of Syria. The people in the self-administrated areas have also understood this. In order to draw attention to the acute threat, they have been organizing a vigil on the dam since January 8th. In targeted bombings by Turkish combat drones and SNA artillery, dozens of civilians have already given their lives to continue these protests and hundreds have been injured, some seriously. But what weighs more heavily than the attacks is the certainty that Tishreen will also protect the Kobane region from the Islamists’ invasion and thus the encirclement of the city of Kobane. The resistance in Tishreen therefore defends the perspective of a democratic and gender-equal coexistence that transcends ethnic or religious boundaries.

Since the beginning of the vigil hundreds of people from all over North and East Syria, from Kobanê to the Cizîre region and to the Arabic cities like Raqqa and Deir-A-Zor went to the dam, knowing that Turkish war drones don’t hesitate to attack civilians, whether they are old or young. Videos of the people that are taking part in the vigil have spread across local media and beyond; Elderly women shouting courageously: “We are not afraid of your bombs!”. Hundreds of people dancing, playing theater and singing, all while bombs and rockets are falling around them. At memorials for the fallen, tens of thousands have accompanied those who fell from the bombs of Turkish drones and laid them to rest, with songs and chants of resistance. When we ask “why are civilians protecting this dam when they know the dangers it brings?”, the answers are as simple as they are short. Everyone is well aware of the ecological and humanitarian catastrophe that a damage or the occupation of the dam would bring to the entire region. But besides that, after ten years of attacks by Turkey and ISIS everyone knows what would happen if the Turkish mercenaries reach the Eastern side of Euphrates. Once again the violence and oppression would return to the cities that were liberated from the Islamic State, as can already be seen in Minbic. Because of this we meet dozens of people wounded by bombs on the dam who are just waiting to recover so that they can go again. For a lot of them, it is difficult to sit still, knowing that the resistance at Tishreen continues and they are impatient to return, and defend their land, water and society.

The struggles and resistance at the Tishreen Dam are not just a local matter, but have an impact on the entire region and are an example on a global scale of the defense of land, water and nature against the ecocide and war policies of the central states. That is why the situation at the Tishreen Dam is a focal point for all those who are fighting against the destruction of the ecology by imperialism and capitalism. Because the example of North-East Syria shows us what kind of organization of the population and armed resistance can effectively defend the basis of one’s own existence against occupation and appropriation. We can see that only through a holistic organization of society with a connection to one’s own country and on the basis of self-defense is it possible to prevent the ecological catastrophes of the present and the future. For ecological movements worldwide, this not only forms the basis for solidarity in the fight against Turkey’s war, but also an opportunity to take part in the resistance on site and to enter into a practical exchange with the organized society in north-east Syria.

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