Turkish-backed fighters in the rebel Syrian National Army suffered a number of casualties in the northeast Syrian town of Ras al-Ayn on Tuesday, where a car bomb was detonated in a marketplace. At least 17 people were killed and 20 wounded, many of them from the rebel group.



There was no claim of responsibility, but observers are expecting that this was another strike by Kurdish people resisting the Turkish-led invasion of Kurdish territory. In recent weeks, car bombings have become increasingly frequent in the area.



Turkish officials have been quick to blame specific Kurdish factions, particularly the YPG/PKK, for these attacks, and are trying to present them as vindication for long-standing claims that the Kurdish groups are effectively terrorists.



And yet the YPG was not using car bombs generally, or indeed at all, before Turkey started invading Kurdish towns and cities, an offensive that was in no small measure about Turkey’s government’s very real problems with the Kurds.



Desperation in the face of a foreign invasion has put the Kurdish groups in a position all-too-common with people living under occupation, adopting terrorist tactics to resist the enemy forces.





Author: Jason Ditz Jason Ditz is news editor of Antiwar.com. View all posts by Jason Ditz