SDF Fighters Leave Aleppo After Ceasefire, but Syria’s Deeper Dispute Remains

# SDF Fighters Leave Aleppo After Ceasefire, but Syria’s Deeper Dispute Remains

*Event date: 2026-01-11*

By IO Digest Desk

The last fighters from the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces left Aleppo on January 11, 2026 under a ceasefire arrangement that ended several days of fighting in Syria’s second-largest city. Officials said the withdrawal emptied Aleppo of SDF fighters and returned the contested neighborhoods of Sheikh Maqsoud and Ashrafieh to government control, but the agreement did little to resolve the larger power struggle over the SDF’s place in the Syrian state.

Aleppo Governor Azzam al-Gharib told Al Jazeera that the city had become “empty of SDF fighters” after overnight evacuations coordinated by government forces. SDF commander Mazloum Abdi also confirmed that an understanding had been reached through international mediation. According to his account, the deal covered a ceasefire and the evacuation of civilians, wounded people, bodies and fighters from the affected neighborhoods to northern and eastern Syria.

The fighting that triggered the withdrawal followed the collapse of talks on integrating the SDF into the national army. Al Jazeera reported that government forces took over Sheikh Maqsoud after several days of clashes in predominantly Kurdish districts that began earlier in the week. At least 30 people were killed and more than 150,000 displaced, according to the report, underscoring how quickly an unresolved political dispute turned back into urban warfare.

Reporters on the ground said the final convoy of SDF fighters was taken by bus to Raqqa, the northeastern city that remains a major SDF center. Government forces then began security operations inside the neighborhoods, including searches for prisoners allegedly taken during the collapse of Bashar al-Assad’s regime just over a year earlier. Local officials said calm had begun to return and that security conditions were improving, but the ceasefire left major questions unanswered.

One of the most important is the role of outside mediation. Al Jazeera reported that the United States was instrumental in brokering the arrangement, reflecting Washington’s unusual relationship with both sides: it has worked with the SDF against ISIL for more than a decade while also developing close ties with Syria’s interim leadership after Assad’s fall in late 2024. That diplomatic channel may have helped stop the immediate battle, but it has not resolved the institutional dispute that caused it.

The failed March 2025 agreement to reintegrate Kurdish-led forces into Syrian state institutions remains the central fault line. The deadline passed at the end of 2025, and the SDF had refused to leave areas it had controlled since the early stages of the civil war. Analysts quoted by Al Jazeera warned that more clashes were likely because the underlying issues had not been settled and neither side was willing to compromise on fundamentals.

That leaves Aleppo’s ceasefire looking tactical rather than transformative. The evacuation ended a dangerous flashpoint inside the city, and it gave the government a visible gain in a major urban center. But with the SDF still controlling large parts of northeastern Syria and the integration question unresolved, the departure from Aleppo may mark the end of one round of fighting rather than the start of a durable settlement.