What is happening? Who is doing this? And why does the criminal’s reach seem longer than the reach of the law? In Kurdish areas, as in other parts of Syria, people are voicing these concerns and speaking of families confronted with extortionate monetary demands and threats they have no idea how to face. Individuals in Syria have effectively been forced to guard themselves—acting as their own police officers, security guards, and investigators—while the authority meant to shoulder this responsibility often merely arrives after tragedy has already struck.
People are exhausted from being asked to endure everything with patience. They have been patient through war, poverty, instability, and fear. Are they now expected to be patient with kidnapping and extortion as well? Must citizens accept that their lives can be turned into bargaining chips in the hands of a gang or group of criminals, only to watch the issue conclude like just another item in the news?
No. This is not something people should have to accept.
The authorities who consider themselves responsible for security are required today to move past the language of justification and adopt the language of action. We do not want to hear that the situation is difficult, the region is sensitive, the borders are vast, chaos has accumulated, or resources are limited, while simultaneously being asked to trust that security is being safeguarded. Citizens are fully aware of all these realities. If there are networks practicing kidnapping, extortion, and ransom demands, the relevant agencies must actively track down and dismantle them. If there are security lapses, authorities must acknowledge and rectify them. And if individuals are involved or complicit, they must be held accountable, whoever they are and whatever positions they hold.
Leaving everything in a gray zone—where people do not know what happened, who did it, who was held accountable, and who escaped—does not generate security.
Security, ultimately, is not defined by a proliferation of checkpoints, uniforms, or official statements issued after every incident. Security means that a person feels there is a law above everyone, and that anyone who targets people’s lives will not find an open path ahead. Security means that people know the state, or the governing authority on the ground, will not leave them isolated when danger approaches. However, when citizens become the weakest link—forced to pool money to rescue a child or remain silent out of fear that speaking up will bring further harm—that is not a picture of security, no matter how we attempt to label it otherwise.
Therefore, the responsibility falls squarely and inescapably on the authorities. They are not expected to claim they can prevent every crime at every moment; that would be unrealistic. Rather, they are required to treat these crimes with the seriousness they deserve, investigate them with clarity, disclose what they can to the public, pursue those involved, and put an end to the growing sentiment among people that someone can kidnap, extort, demand ransom, and then disappear into the shadows without being reached by the hand of justice.
People in this country are weary of waiting—waiting for the war to end, waiting for stability, waiting for electricity, waiting for a livelihood, and waiting for life to return to some semblance of normality. What this wait must not turn into is waiting for fear itself: a citizen sitting at home anticipating bad news or looking at a phone as though it carries the next impending tragedy.
Addressing kidnapping, extortion, and ransom demands is not an attempt to defame a region, demonstrate hostility toward any party, or inflate fear. On the contrary, ignoring this phenomenon is what truly harms the people, the place, and anyone claiming to care for community security. Acknowledging the problem is the first step toward confronting it. People do not want new promises, nor do they want to hear statements after every incident that merely soothe anger for a few hours. They want to see that someone is investigating, pursuing, and holding perpetrators accountable, and that human life is not something that can be abducted and negotiated over in the dark.
The fear people live with today is not merely the fear of an unknown criminal; it is the fear of finding themselves entirely alone when disaster strikes. This is perhaps the harshest element in everything occurring: that an individual feels compelled to manage alone, protect their children alone, raise funds alone, and negotiate with criminals alone, leaving public institutions to merely observe what unfolds after the crime has already run its course.
This should not be the reality of living in Syrian Kurdistan, nor anywhere else. People have every right to ask: Who protects them? Who is pursuing these criminals? And why do such incidents recur without citizens ever feeling that there is a hand stronger than that of the kidnapper and extortionist?
Note: This text is translated from the original Arabic version… Read the Arabic version:Click here
