هذا التقرير متاح أيضًا بـ العربية
Stuck between the unfastened tongue of US President Donald Trump, who assists in keeping no secrets and techniques, and the ability of Iran’s Progressive Guard and its preemptive plans, Iraq’s Kurdistan Area has discovered itself between a rock and a difficult position. The area hosts fellow ethnic Kurds from Iran, who’ve discovered no protected haven with the exception of the geographic expanse at the different aspect of the border.
The area’s territory has grow to be a routine area for bombardment, a few of it focused on headquarters belonging to Iranian Kurdish teams primarily based in Sulaymaniyah and Erbil provinces. Trump had stated those teams won US guns to lend a hand carry down the Iranian regime, days after the outbreak of the US-Israeli warfare on Iran in overdue February 2026.
At daybreak on July 17, 2026, the headquarters of the Iranian Kurdish Komala Celebration in Iraq’s Kurdistan Area got here underneath missile assault through Iran’s Progressive Guard, killing 9 celebration participants and wounding others, in what has grow to be a nearly each day regimen since Tehran started sensing threat on its western flank specifically the Iranian Kurdish provinces bordering Iraq’s Kurdistan Area, which hosts Iranian Kurdish opposition teams and events.
The character of the repeated focused on of those events’ headquarters can’t be understood with out going again to the cases that drove Kurdish political forces to depart Iran and search shelter in Iraq’s Kurdistan Area.
The roots of the Iranian Kurdish presence in Kurdistan Area
After the 1979 Iranian Revolution and the upward push of hard-line non secular teams to energy, the Iranian Charter used to be rewritten. Despite the fact that it equipped for the status quo of political events and associations, it limited that proper at the situation that they no longer undermine nationwide harmony and Islamic requirements a situation the regime used as a pretext to pursue its combatants.
This felony framework gave the Iranian government extensive latitude to forestall the formation of ethnic events, together with Kurdish ones, at the grounds that their political calls for conflicted with the regime’s idea of nationwide harmony.
Consequently, Iranian Kurdish events a few of which predated the Iranian Revolution through many years became to underground job ahead of discovering a protected haven in Iraq’s Kurdistan Area, particularly after the 1991 Gulf Conflict, when the USA made up our minds to impose a no-fly zone and ban any army job through Iraqi forces in northern Iraq, together with the provinces of Sulaymaniyah, Erbil and Dohuk.
The Iran-Iraq Conflict from 1980 to 1988 had a significant have an effect on at the job of Kurdish teams and events within Iran, particularly amid the wave of anger that gripped the Iranian regime towards each dissenting voice. Even so, the Kurdish provinces in western Iran remained a number of the spaces maximum antagonistic to the regime on the time, profiting from improve from the opposite aspect of the border specifically the Iraqi regime, which sought to strike Iran’s interior entrance, simply as Iran used to be doing the similar.
By contrast advanced fact, the connection emerged between the 2 Kurdish facets around the border the Kurds of Iraq and the Kurds of Iran. It can’t be defined only through ethnic ties or the shared objective of organising a Kurdistan state; fairly, it took form underneath extraordinarily tricky and complicated cases.
When dozens of Kurdish villages in Iraq had been displaced on account of the Anfal campaigns led through the previous regime underneath the pretext of confronting the infiltration of Iranian forces into northern Iraq between 1987 and 1988, after which Iraqi Kurds fled after the 1991 Gulf Conflict and the outbreak of what become referred to as the Shaabaniyah Intifada by which Kurdish political and armed teams in northern Iraq additionally took phase, and which used to be no longer confined to the south about 1.5 million Iraqi Kurdish electorate moved to frame spaces in Iran and Türkiye.
An Iraqi tank with burning Kuwaiti oil wells in the back of it all over the 1991 Gulf Conflict – picture-alliance/Photoshot/J. Jordan
In contrast, Iraq used to be a haven for loads of 1000’s of Iranian Kurds all over other phases in their opposition to Iranian regimes, whether or not the previous shah’s regime or the Islamic Republic that succeeded it.
This courting went past ethnic ties and a shared goal. It used to be cast thru many years of struggling and mutual displacement, and is the reason why political and governmental forces in Iraq’s Kurdistan Area have refused to expel Iranian Kurdish opposition teams in spite of the near-daily bombardment the area faces from Iran’s Progressive Guard and Iran-backed militias within Iraq.
“Quick trigger” technique and the internationalization of the Kurdish report in 2026
The start of 2026 noticed fast safety shifts. Within the wake of the Dec. 28, 2025 protests in Tehran, the wave of safety escalation temporarily unfold to Iran’s Kurdish spaces, the place the safety products and services unexpectedly followed an means referred to as the “quick trigger” in coping with the Kurds. It’s in line with decreasing the edge of suspicion and intensifying the safety reaction thru tighter surveillance restrictions and the dismantling of interior networks.
This used to be mirrored within the arrest of eleven leaders of the Kurdistan Loose Existence Celebration (PJAK) in Kermanshah. Estimates issued through Iranian Kurdish opposition teams and events point out that Kurds accounted for roughly 51 p.c of all political detainees in Iran in 2024 by myself. Additionally they crowned annual execution lists on fees together with “membership in banned parties” and “enmity against God,” in line with rights organizations such because the Hengaw Group for Human Rights.
Participants of the Kurdistan Loose Existence Celebration
Legitimate Iranian fears had been mounting because the regime armed with the reports of nations within the area in coping with nationalist actions watched the rising wave of anger in provinces whose citizens make up about 10 p.c of the rustic’s overall inhabitants. Maximum Iranian Kurds are Sunni Muslims, divided amongst other highbrow and celebration faculties, and maximum are living within the provinces of Kurdistan, Kermanshah, Ilam and West Azerbaijan.
The killing of the younger Iranian Kurdish lady Mahsa Amini marked probably the most defining moments within the historical past of members of the family between the Kurds and the Iranian regime. In 2022, she used to be arrested through the morality police at the pretext of violating hijab regulations, then died in custody amid accusations that she were tortured, triggering some of the greatest waves of standard protest Iran had observed and just about changing into a sweeping revolution.
Mahsa Amini had traveled from Kurdistan province in western Iran to Tehran to talk over with kinfolk ahead of her tale become the spark for protests that unfold around the nation and a brand new signal of deepening pressure in members of the family between the Iranian regime and the Kurds.
Those ancient components have made Tehran extra apprehensive that Kurdish spaces may grow to be a comfortable western flank from which protests are introduced and in which armed Kurdish opposition factions certain to the regime through many years of bloody struggle — would possibly infiltrate.
The map of armed teams and the formation of the “February 2026 coalition”
The map of Kurdish political forces is marked through variety, cut up between nationalist teams and others which can be secular and leftist, whilst the objective of organising a Kurdish entity in Iran is sort of a commonplace denominator amongst them, guided through the revel in of Iraq’s Kurdistan Area.
A number of the maximum outstanding of those teams is the Kurdistan Democratic Celebration of Iran (KDPI), based in 1945 within the historical Republic of Mahabad underneath the management of Qazi Muhammad. This is a reasonable democratic celebration recently led through Mustafa Hijri, with about 2,000 opponents. It advocates federalism in Iran and is headquartered in Koysinjaq in Erbil.
As for the Komala Celebration its historical past dates again to 1969. This is a secular socialist leftist celebration with about 1,000 opponents, and it additionally helps federalism in Iran. Its job is targeted amongst intellectuals and scholars within the spaces of Sanandaj and Marivan within Iran, and it has a well known headquarters within the Zargwez space of Iraq’s Sulaymaniyah province.
Different Iranian Kurdish events also are found in Iraq, together with the Kurdistan Freedom Celebration, an intensive nationalist celebration based in 1991 that explicitly requires the status quo of an unbiased Republic of Kurdistan. It’s lively within the provinces of Kermanshah, Lorestan and Ilam, and has headquarters in Erbil and Kirkuk within Iraq.
The Kurdistan Loose Existence Celebration, in the meantime, is a bunch related to Türkiye’s Kurdistan Staff’ Celebration and is designated a 15 May Organization through each Washington and Tehran.
The doorway to some of the headquarters of Iran’s opposition Komala Celebration in Iraqi Kurdistan (Turkish Left website online)
Why does Iran worry its “western flank”?
Through the language of numbers, it’s tricky for a bunch of events primarily based in a neighboring nation to pose an immediate risk to an entrenched, deeply rooted and ideological device just like the Iranian regime. The entire manpower and functions possessed through the Iranian Kurdish events in Iraq seem restricted when put next with the arsenal and beliefs the Iranian regime instructions.
The true worry stems from those events’ talent to mobilize the Kurdish provinces and switch them into dominoes that detonate interior contradictions and the minorities report. The Iranian regime believes that the simultaneous unraveling of the rustic’s nationalities, together with the unfold of chaos at the outer edge, may quantity to the coup de grace fired at its head: the Kurds within the west, the Baloch within the east, the Arabs in Ahvaz within the southwest of the rustic, and the Azerbaijanis within the north.
What makes this report much more unhealthy is that Iran’s Kurdish within suffers from systematic marginalization, making it fertile flooring for accepting the rhetoric of riot. Economically, Iran’s Kurdish provinces be afflicted by prime and persistent unemployment, which reached 13.7 p.c within the iciness of 2024, when put next with 7.8 p.c national, along with the area’s deprivation of the returns from its herbal assets.
Marginalization additionally extends to the linguistic and cultural spheres. The Iranian regime has practiced repression in opposition to the Kurds that peaked in 2024 with the arrest and trial of Kurdish academics on fees of educating within the Kurdish language. In 2025, the Iranian Parliament rejected a suggestion permitting instruction in non-Persian languages within the areas the place they’re spoken.
Constitutional discrimination in opposition to the Kurds and different nationalities and ethnic teams in Iran is mirrored in Articles 12 and 115 of the charter, which stipulate that the Twelver Jaafari faculty is the legit and unalterable doctrine, and require any person assuming the put up of ideally suited chief, head of the judiciary or president to imagine within the legit doctrine.
This article bars the Kurds maximum of whom are Sunni from attaining best positions, along with using the safety vetting device referred to as “gozinesh” to limit their employment in state establishments.
The gateway to the US-Israeli plan and shifts within the Western place
Iranian suspicions are intensifying and rising extra ferocious with Tehran’s walk in the park that the Kurdistan Area represents the best setting for launching a “hybrid war” led through Washington and Tel Aviv. With the outbreak of the US-Israeli assault on Iran on Feb. 28, the Kurdish report used to be thrown large open, and intelligence and diplomatic stories laid out main points of secret conferences.
US President Donald Trump held telephone calls with Iraq’s two Kurdish leaders, Masoud Barzani and Bafel Talabani, by which he instructed them explicitly that “neutrality is no longer an option in the conflict with Iran,” urging them to align with the USA in trade for incentives together with army coverage, investments within the power and gasoline sectors, and the internationalization of the area’s standing.
Coordination additionally prolonged to Iran’s Kurds, as america management and the CIA held secret conferences with leaders of Iranian Kurdish events to speak about the position those teams may play in toppling the regime. Press stories stated Trump additionally held a separate name with Mustafa Hijri the chief of the Kurdistan Democratic Celebration of Iran (KDPI), to speak about a plan to ship forces around the border deep into Iranian territory.
Communicate additionally escalated about sending medium guns to Iranian Kurdish opposition teams in Iraq’s Kurdistan Area, particularly after Trump’s well-known remark. Press stories printed that the ones guns had certainly reached the opposition Kurdish events, however that they saved them and didn’t go them into Iran. That is in line with what Hebrew stories not too long ago disclosed about Türkiye thwarting an Israeli intelligence plan to mobilize Iran’s Kurds.
The Iranian Kurdish opposition factions and teams in Iraq’s Kurdistan Area keep in mind that changing into concerned within the army and safety dimensions of the continuing warfare on Iran won’t finish smartly underneath any cases. Need by myself does no longer produce the hoped-for alternate, particularly since those teams have earlier revel in with the West. For this reason, they’ll no longer, for now, chance coming into the fray within Iran ahead of acquiring transparent promises.
Even so, on Feb. 22 those teams introduced the formation of a bloc uniting them round one central objective: “toppling the Iranian regime, achieving the principle of the right to self-determination, and establishing a democratic administrative system in Rojhelat Kurdistan,” in connection with Iran’s Kurdish provinces.
Kurdish opponents from the Kurdistan Staff’ Celebration in northern Iraq – BBC
Northern Iraq … bombardment from inside and with out
The varieties of focused on in Iraq’s Kurdistan Area are numerous. Along with the bombardment hitting the websites and headquarters of Iranian Kurdish opposition events hosted through the area normally performed through gadgets of Iran’s Progressive Guard the usage of ballistic missiles and drones Iran-backed Iraqi militias perform different operations, some focused on the ones celebration headquarters and camps, whilst others strike america consulate within the area.
The bombardment has been accompanied through public threats from Iran, together with a up to date name through Iranian Overseas Minister Abbas Araghchi to officers in Iraq’s Kurdistan Area, caution them in opposition to permitting Iranian Kurdish teams to grow to be a think about destabilizing Iran. This used to be preceded through a caution from Iran’s “Defense Council,” which threatened Erbil with focused on the area’s whole infrastructure if any flooring incursion had been facilitated.
Iranian fears are mounting. Tehran realizes that its interior entrance, alternatively cohesive it’s going to seem, harbors the seeds of chaos and accommodates sparks of vengeance inside it. From this standpoint, it sees no downside with directing its hearth towards Iraq’s Kurdistan Area, as it perspectives what’s coming as a threat that can’t wait and can’t be contained through international relations or through the candy communicate with which it has lengthy addressed its atmosphere.
