Iran War Strengthened Central Governments Against Kurds
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- Gönül Tol of the Middle East Institute argues the 2026 U.S.-Israeli war with Iran unsettled Ankara, arriving in the middle of negotiations to disband the PKK, with initial U.S.-Israeli calls for Iranian Kurds to rise up echoing Washington's earlier arming of PKK-linked groups against the Islamic State in Syria.
- Iranian Kurdish uprising did not materialize, and the war instead created dynamics that strengthened the hand of central governments in Turkey, Syria, and Iraq against their own Kurdish populations — a development Ankara welcomed after cultivating closer ties with Damascus and Baghdad.
- Turkey benefits from the interlinked nature of Kurdish politics across borders, with Erdogan recently announcing efforts to speed up the PKK's disbandment, using the weakened position of Kurdish groups in neighboring countries as leverage in negotiations.
- Erdogan now has a stronger incentive to reduce domestic vulnerabilities through the Kurdish opening, though Tol notes a slim risk that regional instability could push Ankara back toward securitization.
- Albert B. Wolf of Habib University was set to contribute analysis, but the remainder of the expert roundup is gated behind a War on the Rocks paywall, limiting the available perspective to Tol's Turkey-focused assessment.
- The three catalysts named in the article — Assad's December 2024 fall, the PKK's 2025 decision to dissolve and negotiate with Ankara, and the 2026 Iran war — are presented as a chain of events that collectively reshaped Kurdish prospects for autonomy across Turkey, Iraq, Syria, and Iran.
Why it matters: The 2026 Iran war inverted expectations: rather than empowering Iranian Kurds as the U.S.-Israeli calls initially suggested, it consolidated state power against Kurdish autonomy movements across the region, giving Erdogan concrete leverage to accelerate PKK disarmament while his neighbors' Kurdish populations were weakened.
