The U.S. decision to withdraw from Syria will allow Islamic State to regroup at a critical stage in the conflict, Washington’s Kurdish partners said on Thursday, after Western allies expressed alarm at the sudden move, Trend reports referring to Reuters.
The U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) said President Donald Trump’s withdrawal of all U.S. troops would also leave Syrians stuck between “the claws of hostile parties” fighting for territory in the seven-year-old war.
Trump’s announcement on Wednesday upended a central pillar of American policy in the Middle East and stunned U.S. lawmakers and allies, who challenged the president’s claim of victory.
The U.S. president defended his decision on Thursday. In a series of tweets, Trump said he was fulfilling a promise from his 2016 presidential campaign to leave the Middle Eastern nation. The United States was doing the work of other countries, including Russia and Iran, with little in return and it was “time for others to finally fight,” he wrote.
The SDF, supported by roughly 2,000 U.S. troops, are in the final stages of a campaign to recapture areas seized by Islamic State militants.
But they face the threat of a military incursion by Turkey, which considers the Kurdish YPG fighters who spearhead the force to be a terrorist group, and possible advances by Syrian forces - backed by Russia and Iran - committed to restoring President Bashar al-Assad’s control over the whole country.
After three years of fighting alongside U.S. forces, the SDF said the battle against Islamic State had reached a decisive phase that required more support, not a precipitate U.S. withdrawal.
Western allies including France, Britain and Germany also described Trump’s assertion of victory as premature.
Officials said France will keep its troops in northern Syria for now because Islamic State militants have not been wiped out and pose a threat to French interests.
“For now, of course we are staying in Syria because the fight against Islamic State is essential,” Europe Minister Nathalie Loiseau said.
France has about 1,100 troops in Iraq and Syria providing logistics, training and heavy artillery support as well as fighter jets. In Syria it has dozens of special forces, military advisers and some foreign office personnel.
A British junior defense minister said on Wednesday he strongly disagreed with Trump. “(Islamic State) has morphed into other forms of extremism and the threat is very much alive,” Tobias Ellwood said in a tweet.