What to know about the Kurds and their potential involvement in the Iran war

BRUSSELS (AP) — Thousands of battle-hardened Kurds in northern Iraq are preparing for a potential cross-border military operation in Iran with U.S. backing, Kurdish officials told The Associated Press.

The three officials said U.S. President Donald Trump and the heads of the two main Kurdish parties in Iraq discussed the situation Sunday. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to comment publicly.

The addition of armed Kurds now, as Israel and the U.S. continue to strike Iran, would significantly challenge Iranian defenses but also risk pulling Iraq — where some of the Iranian Kurdish groups have bases — deeper into the conflict.

Here’s a look at the Kurds and their relationships in the Middle East:

Who are the Kurds?

The Kurds are among the largest stateless ethnic groups in the world, with roughly 30 million living as minorities in Turkey, Iraq, Iran and Syria. They speak their own language, with several dialects, and most are Sunni Muslims.

Although Kurds have never had their own state, they govern a semiautonomous area in northern Iraq and for years de facto ruled much of northeastern Syria. Many have waged insurgency campaigns seeking to establish their own nation called Kurdistan.

The 9 million Kurds in Iran live mainly in a stretch of land along the country’s western borders with Iraq and Turkey. They have a long history of grievances and rebellions against both the current Islamic Republic and the monarchy that preceded it.

Before the war, Amnesty International said Kurds face “systemic discrimination” in Iran and that in the past “security forces killed or injured many unarmed Kurdish cross-border couriers (kulbars) with impunity.”

What is the Kurdish opposition in Iran?

A number of Kurdish opposition groups have taken up arms against Iranian authorities over the years.

Some have established bases in neighboring Iraq, which was a point of friction between Tehran and the central Iraqi government in Baghdad until 2023, when they reached an agreement to disarm the Iranian Kurdish groups.

In the run up to the current war, five Iranian Kurdish groups formed a coalition dedicated to overthrowing the Islamic Republic and establishing the Kurdish people’s right to self-determination. On Thursday, a sixth group joined.

“For the first time, all major Kurdish parties have come together as one in a new coalition — a historic step toward shaping a new future for Kurds and a democratic Iran,” said Abdullah Mohtadi, secretary general of the Komala Party of Iranian Kurdistan.

But joining with the other Iranian opposition groups to oust the authorities in Tehran might prove difficult.

What is the Kurds’ history with the US?

Kurds have rarely come out on the winning side in their interactions with U.S. presidents.

In 1975, President Gerald Ford failed to protect the Kurds from a routing by Iraqi forces.

In 1988, President Ronald Reagan did not stop Iraqi forces from using chemical weapons against the Kurds.

In 1990, President George Bush encouraged the Kurds to rise up against Saddam Hussein after he invaded Kuwait but then stood aside as Iraqi forces brutally crushed the rebellion.

And in January, Trump allowed Syrian forces to seize Kurdish territory won during the Syrian civil war and in bloody battles against the Islamic State group.

Where does Turkey stand?

It is unlikely that Turkey, a key member of NATO and potential host to war refugees, would accept Western weapons transfers to Kurdish guerrillas even if their targets were in Iran.

Turkey has fought a brutal military campaign since 1984 against an armed Kurdish insurgency that has claimed tens of thousands of lives and spilled into neighboring Iraq and Syria.

On Thursday, Turkey voiced opposition to Iranian Kurdish dissident groups’ possible involvement in the conflict in Iran, warning of greater instability in the region.

Turkey considers the main Kurdish dissident group, PJAK, a terrorist group with links to separatists fighting Turkey. Turkey’s defense ministry said Thursday that PJAK’s activities “negatively affect not only Iran’s security but also the overall peace and stability of the region.”

What’s the situation in Iraq?

Violence has already erupted across the Kurdish lands sprawling across the border between Iran and Iraq.

As Israel and the U.S. have struck targets across Iran, Iranian forces and its allies in Iraq launched missiles and drones targeting U.S. military bases and the U.S. Consulate in Irbil as well as the Iranian Kurdish groups’ bases.

Khalil Nadiri, an official with the Kurdistan Freedom Party based in northern Iraq’s semiautonomous Kurdish region, said Wednesday that some of their forces had moved to areas near the Iranian border in Sulaymaniyah province and were on standby.

In January, the group said it carried out raids inside Iran during a massive crackdown on protests. State media then labeled them “terrorists,” without offering any evidence to support the claim, a crime Iran punishes with death.

Officials with Iraq’s Kurdish regional government and Iraqi Kurdish political parties, meanwhile, have said they do not want attacks to be launched against Iran from their territory, fearing a harsh response.

Peshawa Hawramani, spokesperson for the Kurdistan Regional Government, said in a statement that “allegations claiming that we are part of a plan to arm and send Kurdish opposition parties into Iranian territory are completely unfounded” and that the Iraqi Kurdish parties do not want to “expand the war and tensions in the region.”

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Associated Press writers Suzan Fraser in Istanbul, Qassim Abdul-Zahra in Baghdad, and Stella Martany and Rashid Yahya in Irbil, Iraq, contributed to this report.