Walat Khalil, a surgeon at Al Amal Hospital in the Kurdish-majority city of Kobani in Syria, has been working non-stop for more than 10 days.
With no running water or fuel, and only limited access to food and medicine, he has been treating civilians injured in clashes between the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), a well-armed Kurdish organisation in the north-east that was once among the most powerful in Syria, and Syrian troops.
His latest patients include three children younger than eight and a girl, 13, with shrapnel in her chest. “We’re doing what we can to help,” Dr Khalil said.
The surgeon has been volunteering at the hospital since the clashes broke out, treating patients free of charge. “The fate of the city is tied to my own,” he said.
Kobani is one of the last pockets controlled by the SDF in the north-east. Government forces have regained much territory from the group, which once controlled about 25 per cent of Syria, in a lightning offensive that has reached the town’s outskirts.
Situated on the border with Turkey in Aleppo province, the city has been isolated by the violence, with closed roads cutting off supplies to 400,000 residents, while war damage to the main dam in the area, the Tishreen, has led to power cuts.
The Syrian army's swift takeover came as negotiations stalled over the integration of the semi-autonomous region administered by Kurdish-led authorities.
Talks between SDF commander Mazloum Abdi and Syria’s President Ahmad Al Shara, who has made the country’s reunification a priority, have since resumed, after a four-day US-backed ceasefire was extended by 15 days on Saturday.
Under siege
Despite the truce, residents of Kobani contacted by The National said clashes were continuing, describing a “siege” on the city and a disastrous humanitarian situation.
“What ceasefire?” Dr Khalil asked. “There is still a siege, war and injuries. Clashes are continuing. We can hear the sounds in the city.”
Several breaches of the ceasefire terms have been reported by both sides in recent days.
On Sunday, a UN-led humanitarian convoy entered Kobani carrying food, fuel, medical supplies, hygiene items and winter kits, the first such delivery since the siege was tightened. But Dr Khalil said it was not enough. “Some aid has arrived but needs are immense,” he added.
Rula Amin, spokeswoman for the UN refugee agency, told regional broadcaster Kurdistan24 that conditions in Kobani were “extremely difficult”, with a lack of “all basic necessities”.
Many of those trapped in the city had fled fighting in other areas, she added, which a number of Kobani residents confirmed. “Families are sleeping in their cars,” a member of the Red Crescent told The National.
Figures for Kobani itself are not available but violent clashes are estimated to have displaced about 170,000 people across the provinces of Aleppo, Hasakah and Raqqa.
A severe winter storm that swept the area last week, blanketing Kobani in snow, has exacerbated the humanitarian situation, with families unable to heat their homes.
“I’m not reassured,” the Red Crescent staff member said. "There is a ceasefire in name but we have not seen a ceasefire. I’m afraid for our children."
Speaking from the Red Crescent offices in Kobani, the staff member said there was no electricity. “My personal situation is very bad,” they added.
Establishing communication with residents has been challenging, with exchanges at the mercy of a sporadic network. The National was unable to call and hours often passed between sending questions and receiving replies on messaging apps.
Symbolic city
Kobani endured a months-long siege in 2014 into 2015 as it fought fiercely against ISIS, a battle that marked the extremist group’s first decisive defeat in Syria. Four years later, the SDF, with the support of the US-led international coalition, pushed ISIS out of its last territorial holdings in the country.
But war has never left Kobani. Turkey and its allied groups on the ground, operating under the umbrella of the Syrian National Army, have waged a low-intensity campaign involving drone strikes and sporadic shelling on the city’s outskirts. Turkey considers the SDF a terrorist organisation and says its presence in border areas poses a security threat.
In late 2024, that long-running pressure campaign morphed into a more direct military advance, as Turkish-backed forces moved towards Kobani after taking nearby areas and striking key infrastructure, including the Tishreen Dam. Violent clashes took place on the outskirts of Kobani but the fighting spread into the city itself.
Fighting at the dam was still continuing when The National visited Kobani a year ago. Kobani still bore the scars of the ISIS siege, with an entire neighbourhood known as "the museum” lying in ruins.
During that visit, Commander Zanarin Kobani of the Women's Protection Units (YPJ), an all-female Kurdish fighting force within the SDF, showed The National sprawling underground networks carved out over the years in an effort to evade Turkish drone strikes.
“As much as there is an above-ground Kobani, there is an underground Kobani,” she said.
If diplomatic efforts fail, clashes on the Kobani front are expected to escalate. So far, violence during the Syrian army's advances has been relatively contained, largely because the areas taken over are Arab-majority, where SDF rule was contested, and reports of discrimination and mass arrests rife.
But in Kobani, resistance is expected to be fierce.
“If we come under attack, we are ready to defend ourselves,” Cmdr Kobani told The National a year ago, almost to the day, from her command room hidden in snaking tunnels deep under the city under siege.
