Battleground Playlist #91
What We're Listening To
By Joel Schalit
Leave it to Donald Trump to betray Syria’s Kurds. Ever since his first administration, the US president has sought to disconnect American troops operating in Rojava, the Kurdish region of northeastern Syria, from the Syrian Democratic Forces, an American-backed multiethnic army consisting of minorities led by the Kurdish People’s Protection Units, most commonly referred to by their acronyms, YPG and YPJ. To no one’s surprise, Trump finally ended the relationship in 2025.
The alliance was always an awkward one. An anticapitalist partisan group, committed to democratic confederalism and gender equality (the YPG were the men’s military group, the YPJ the women’s), often compared to the Italian resistance in WWII, the YPG/YPJ became darlings of the global left during the War on Terror. Particularly in Europe, which sent a disproportionate number of volunteers to fight on its behalf in Syria. A not insignificant number of American radicals also joined up.
This playlist compiles People’s Protection Units solidarity songs that have become commonplace in punk circles over the last fifteen years. Often recycling Kurdish slogans such as “Biji Rojava” (Long Live Rojava) and city names such as “Kobane”, the site of fierce fighting with ISIS and Turkish forces over the years, the list is a snapshot of Western identification with a regional minority, parallel with the Palestinians.
The Battleground, for its part, has frequently documented the YPG/YPJ solidarity movement in Brussels, Berlin and Torino through photographs and field recordings. “Rojava solidarity protest. Berlin, July 2020”, is included in my 2021 documentary collection, This is What Europe Sounds Like. It’s just the tip of the iceberg. There’s a lot more like this recording in my archives that I’ve yet to work through.
Photograph courtesy of the author. All rights reserved.