According to the YPG, the Kurdish armed force in Rojava, Jamal al-Zakhlool “was forcing Afrin residents to flee their homes and was placing [Free Syrian Army] terrorists and their families in the abandoned homes.”
The YPG said that Zakhlool was coordinating with Turkish intelligence (MIT) officials and was responsible for “establishing internal security forces, civilian administration and courts in occupied Afrin.”
They allege he had been enforcing Sharia law in the canton.
According to Hediye Yusuf, a founding member of the self-declared Democratic Federal System of Northern Syria (Rojava), Zakhlool was formerly a police chief in Eastern Ghouta and his wife was killed alongside him on Thursday.
Publishing graphic photos on Friday of a deceased man they said was Zakhlool, the YPG said their forces killed him and three others in an operation on Thursday.
“Our forces will target all the elements in the Afrin Canton that are in contact or cooperation with the Turkish invasion state,” the YPG threatened.
Turkey considers the YPG and the ruling political party PYD terrorist organizations and branches of the PKK. Turkish forces, working with Syrian militias of the FSA, launched a military campaign against Afrin on January 20 with the stated aim of pushing the Kurdish groups back from the Syria-Turkey border.
Turkey declared it was in full control of the canton two months later. The YPG announced they would continue the fight, launching a guerrilla-style war.
At least 137,000 civilians remain displaced and unable to return to their homes. Hundreds of rebels and their families evacuated from the Eastern Ghouta area have been resettled in Afrin.
Turkey has been accused of demographic change.
Turkey, however, has blamed the YPG and PYD for forcing the people out of their homes and has claimed that Afrin civilians are now returning home.
On Friday, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that 4,379 “terrorists” had been “neutralized” in Afrin. Turkey uses the term “neutralized” to refer to those killed, wounded, or otherwise removed from the battle field.
