BEIRUT, Lebanon – Kurds in Beirut gathered on the rocks and grassy banks along the city’s busy seaside corniche on Thursday for Newroz celebrations with picnics, music and dance, but for many the festivities were bittersweet, a reminder of the homes they had left behind to seek refuge in Lebanon.
The Lebanese Kurdish population is a small minority, estimated to be in the tens of thousands. But since the outbreak of the crisis in Syria three years ago, it has grown. Most Syrian Kurds forced to flee chose to go to the autonomous Kurdistan Region in northern Iraq, but tens of thousands also came to Lebanon.
At the Newroz celebrations, Kurdish tunes thumped out of a weathered sound system, as rows of men and women danced the Kurmanci, the traditional Kurdish line dance. Arms interlocked, they kicked and stepped in rhyme, before winding around in a circle. Off to the side, families lounged on blankets, many snacking on sunflower seeds.
But beneath the festive surface lurked a darker mood: Many gathered were Syrian Kurds, forced from their homes in Syria’s Kurdish northeast by politics and violence.
"In some ways, we are happy and in some we are not," said a young Syrian man in a bright yellow T-shirt, asking to be identified only as Jwan. “You don't understand how the other Syrians treat us," he explained, afraid to give his real name because he feared for the safety of family back in Qamishli.
Asked if the festival in Beirut was similar to ones back home, he almost laughed, shaking his head side to side. “In Qamishli, it’s a much bigger production," he said, explaining that back home his family would wake up early, travel out of town to set up camp in a field of tents. As they barbecued meat, visited and entertained, singers and performers stopped from tent to tent. For Jwan, this was the first Newroz away from family in Qamishli.
While Qamishli, like most of Syria's Kurdish regions, largely escaped the nearly three years of violence between government and opposition forces in Syria's civil war, recently the town has suffered attacks by Islamist fighters. All across Syria's Kurdish regions, the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) have clashed with the al-Qaeda splinter Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), both vying for the same strategically important territory in the Syrian northeast.
Jwan said his family in Qamishli was safe, but this year's Newroz celebrations are toned down. Fearing the security situation, his family is celebrating at home, instead of traveling outside the city as they had done before.
"We're wishing that next year there won't be four parts of Kurdistan," Jwan said, referring to the Kurdish communities living in four different countries: Turkey, Syria, Iraq and Iran. "Hopefully, we'll all be together instead." At this remark, one of his friends broke out in loud chants of "Kurdistan, Kurdistan." The crowd joined in, yelling above the blaring music, many waving the red, green and white flag of Iraq's autonomous Kurdistan Region, seen by many as a model for Kurdish independence.
One young man, taking a break from the dancing and still slightly out of breath, held up an index finger to make his point. “Number one, we want a Kurdish state,” said Walid Ibrahim, a 26-year-old from Hassakah. “Security will follow.”
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