Danny Gold

Young male and female fighters in the Kurdish militia known as the Popular Protection Units line up in formation in front of supporters in Ras Al Ayn, Syria. Some see the border city as indicative of what could come if the Assad regime falls, where rebel groups with competing agendas attempt to fill the vacuum of power.

RAS AL AYN, Syria -- Yilmaz fears a visit to his cousins and friends on the other side of town will end with him assassinated by a sniper's bullet.

Syrian dictator Bashar Assad's forces were forced out of this divided border city months ago. Despite a tenuous cease-fire, the presence of different rebel groups who previously clashed and now coexist side by side has left many on the edge, fearing another breakout of war.

Yilmaz ran afoul of the Popular Protection Units (YPG), the country's most powerful Kurdish militia, when he became affiliated with the rebel Free Syrian Army (FSA). Some of his friends and relatives call him a traitor for siding with the FSA.

During the last phase of fighting, one of his cousins who, like him, had been an FSA activist, was killed by a YPG sniper. He knows the killer could be someone he spent his childhood with, or sees at family functions.

"Maybe my friends will kill me," the Kurdish former peace activist says. "Maybe one from them killed my cousin. It's complicated."

Some see this city as indicative of what could come if the Assad regime falls, where rebel groups with competing agendas attempt to fill the vacuum of power.

Danny Gold

A young rebel mans a checkpoint on a road leading to Ras Al Ayn, Syria.

Ras Al Ayn lies at the edge of Kurdish territory in the northeastern province of Hasakah near the border with Turkey. Though it is a majority Kurdish city, is it home to Christians, Chechens, Armenians and Arabs, and was once celebrated for its diversity and tolerance. It was one of the province's first city's to protest for the revolution.

Accounts differ on how the fighting started in Ras Al Ayn. In November, the FSA along with Islamist rebel groups like Jabhat Al Nusra and Ghuraba Al Sham attacked regime soldiers, eventually forcing them out. That coalition then clashed with the YPG.

A truce was eventually established, but quickly broken as the YPG and FSA again fought battles all over the city. After roughly two weeks of fighting, Syrian Christian dissident Michel Kilo arranged a cease-fire that has now held for nearly two months.

The city has still not recovered. Many residents fled during different phases of the fighting. While some semblance of normal life has returned, buildings still lay in ruins, many pockmarked with bullet holes. There is rarely electricity and water is scarce. Schools and hospitals have been ransacked and closed for months. Graffiti touting the different groups is spray-painted everywhere, and armed men from the rival factions are a constant presence.

Danny Gold

Weeks of fighting between rival factions have left homes and businesses in the Syrian city of Ras Al Ayn damaged, many beyond repair.

For some civilians caught in the crossfire, it's hard to draw a distinction. Alongside a road near where some of the most intense fighting took place, a group of Syrian-born Chechens relay stories of looting. "The Free Army and the YPG, they steal everything. We did not see freedom fighters, only thieves," said Tamer, a 47-year-old undertaker. "There isn't a difference between all these groups."

Outside a small cluster of shops near where a Syrian regime airstrike hit months ago, a butcher named Ahmed Shaabi laments that he has not been able to work for five days due to a lack of electricity. "This city has gone back a century," he said.

Rashid Abdullah, a construction worker sitting with Shaabi, thought the fighting in Ras Al Ayn played right into the hands of Assad. "It's wrong, it's all wrong. Our fight is with the regime," he said.

The Kurds make up roughly 10 percent of the Syrian population. The most powerful Kurdish political party, the Democratic Union Party (PYD), has sought to keep the war from encroaching in its territory, leading to a de facto truce of sorts with the regime.

This has drawn the ire of many rebel groups. They accuse the YPG, which is often seen as the political party's military wing, as being agents of the Assad regime. The YPG in turn accuses the FSA of being agents of Turkey and overrun with Islamists.

In Ras Al Ayn, this distrust resulted in months of conflict and nearly 300 deaths. 

Complicating things even further is the presence of a small brigade of Jabhat Al Nusra, the al Qaeda-affiliated Islamist group that is thought to be the most powerful jihadi faction. While JAN and the FSA often fight as allies, they've also clashed. The YPG claim to make no distinction between the Islamists and the FSA. 

Danny Gold

Photos of Kurdish rebels killed in battles line the walls at a house of martyrs in Ras Al Ayn, Syria.

On the YPG-controlled side of town in late March, a small crowd has come out for the opening of a house of martyrs, a community office dedicated to those killed in the fighting. Giant posters of slain fighters line the walls. Politicians and military commanders give speeches as a group of 20 young fighters, some who barely look out of high school, line up in formation clutching rifles and rocket-propelled grenades. When the ribbon is cut, the families of the deceased line up and greet the soldiers.

Not far away, a group of Free Syrian Army fighters known as the Mashaal Tammo brigade occupy a large house. One of the only mixed Arab and Kurdish fighting groups, the brigade is made up mostly of onetime peaceful protesters who, unlike the PYD, wanted to join the revolution early on. They eventually turned to the FSA.

"We took up arms and the reason was the PYD," says Marwan, a Kurd from Qamishli who fights with the brigade. "The PYD didn't give the people aid or anything, they pushed the people around."

The PYD has faced accusations of kidnapping and assassinating Kurds from opposing parties, including Kurdish activist and political leader Mashaal Tammo, for whom the brigade is named. Some Kurds see them as another authoritarian force trying to take control. They see the FSA as the only true proponents of the revolution.

Yilmaz is still focused on the revolution, but he's seen the toll it's taken on his city and grown weary. His only hope now is that the factions will focus their attacks on the regime.

"I hate what's happened in Ras Al Ayn," Yilmaz says. "The people, the civilians, so many of them have been killed. It's not the FSA's fault, it's not the YPG's fault, it's war. Just let peace stay in Ras Al Ayn."

Slideshow: Syria uprising

/

A look back at the conflict that has overtaken the country.

Launch slideshow

Related: 

• Is end in sight for one of world's longest-running conflicts?
• After decades of oppression, Kurds get 1st taste of freedom
• Full Syria coverage from NBC News

Danny Gold

Flags with the face of imprisoned Kurdish leader Abdullah Ocalan dot the crowd at Newroz celebrations in Diyarbakir, Turkey, on Thursday.

DIYARBAKIR, Turkey -- The dancing, singing and picnics marking Kurdish New Year were last week punctuated by a message from an imprisoned icon, whose image graced thousands of T-shirts and flags at the celebration.

Guerrilla leader Abdullah Ocalan's statement expressed a willingness to halt violence and negotiate with the Turkish government. It also offered a glimmer of hope that a conflict which has claimed 40,000 lives since 1984 may soon come to an end.

Shortly after Ocalan's announcement was read to hundreds of thousands of Kurds gathered in this southeastern city for Newroz festivities, Turkish fighter jets boomed overhead. To many, their message was clear.

"We trusted the Turkish government before," said Ilyas Dalgia, a 27-year-old from a nearby village who works in tourism. "This is the last time, and only because Ocalan says."

For now, most Kurds will put their trust in the man that many call "Apo," or uncle, and who has been held in an isolated prison on an island for the past 14 years.

Ocalan is leader of the banned Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), designated as terrorists by the United States, European Union and Turkey.

His statement called for a new era of negotiations with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and offered a cease-fire and the withdrawal of guerrilla fighters to outside Turkish borders. The move comes after a particularly bloody year in the insurrection, which is one of the world's longest-running conflicts.

Yet in the streets and political offices in the Kurdish region, heavy skepticism remains as to the extent to which the Turkish government is willing to commit. Thirty years of fighting and generations of oppression have left the Kurds with very little trust in the government, and repeated failures in past negotiations have left a bitter taste.

The Kurds are an ethnic group which lives mainly in an area straddling the borders of Turkey, Iran, Iraq and Syria. Iran and Iraq officially recognize internal regions as Kurdish.

They make up an estimated 15 million of Turkey's population of around 80 million people. They have long suffered discrimination and oppression at the hands of the Turkish government.

While Ocalan once called for the establishment of a Kurdish country, the PKK has tempered demands to greater autonomy, including constitutional rights allowing Kurds to openly express their cultural identity.

According to Kendal Nezan, president of the Kurdish Institute of Paris, the Kurds have fought various powers throughout history -- from the ancient Assyrians to the Ottoman Empire -- to create an independent Kurdistan, but the last Kurdish principality collapsed in 1847. He describes the Kurdish people as a "victim of ... geography, of history."

Massacre
At 27 years old, Ilgias has never known peace times in the southeast region of Turkey. Like most Kurds his age, he has friends who have either gone up to the mountains to join the guerrillas or been imprisoned. "If this chance does not go well, one million will go to the mountains," he says with the typical bombast of young men.

The sentiment, though, is echoed by many in the region who feel that this is the last in a string of many chances for peace. Many are asking whether this is just one more mark in an endless cycle of unfruitful peace talks.

Previous efforts have failed, having catastrophic results. In 1999, Ocalan issued a similar call for withdrawal, and hundreds of Kurdish guerrillas were massacred as they crossed into Iraq. For some, these incidents speak louder than statements from Erdogan.

Danny Gold

Journalist Ozgur Amed is not optimistic about the peace process.

"It won't be so easy. Maybe something will change, but I don't believe the government. If they want (to make peace), they can do it easily," said a 26-year-old local journalist who goes by Ozgur Amed.

Amed has been arrested three times and currently awaits sentencing on two trials, a fact of life he finds so commonplace it takes three days of conversation for him to bring it up. In 2012, Turkey was ranked number one by the Committee to Protect Journalists in imprisoning journalists after jailing dozens of Kurds for alleged ties to terrorism.

Like many others in Diyarbakir last week, Amed had to flee his village as a child after Turkish forces razed it for alleged support of terrorists. During the 1980s and 1990s, thousands of villages were deserted as the war raged. 

Despite his skepticism, he still thinks the people have little choice but to cling to the prospect of peace. "In Diyarbakir, the people are tired. Their neighbors, their families are in prison," he added. "They're so tired. "

In recent months, violence between the PKK and the Turkish government reached the highest point in at least decade. In a November report, the International Crisis Group estimated that 870 people had been killed in the conflict in the past 18 months. In late December 2011, the Turkish military bombed a group of Kurdish smugglers it mistakenly thought were guerrillas crossing the Iraq border. Thirty-four civilians were killed and massive protests, often violent, rocked the country. Later in the year, hundreds of Kurdish prisoners waged a 60-day hunger strike that only ended when Ocalan called it off.

With the January assassinations of three Kurdish women in Paris, one a founder of the PKK, it seemed as though 2013 would proceed in the same manner. Yet the past few months have been marked by progress.

The Turkish government has openly acknowledged that it has been negotiating with Ocalan. It has allowed the Kurdish language to be spoken in courts and allowed the Peace and Democracy Party (BDP), the most powerful Kurdish political party, to meet with Ocalan. Prisoners on both sides have been released.

Danny Gold

Firat Anli, a local politician, was recently released after serving three years in a Turkish jail. "When you are working for human rights, the government says you are a terrorist," he said.

Firat Anli, mayor of a municipality in Diyarbakir, was released in February from a Turkish prison after serving three years on terrorism charges. In recent years, the Turkish government has imprisoned thousands of activists, journalists, lawyers and politicians on charges that they were connected to the outlawed Union of Communities in Kurdistan (KCK), an umbrella organization of Kurdish parties that oversees the PKK. "When you are working for human rights, the government says you are a terrorist," he said.

So many of his colleagues had been arrested that Anli had actually called the police department two months earlier to request that they not come to his house if they planned to arrest him, but rather call and he would turn himself in. His request was ignored, but Anli was happy that his children were sleeping. He says he now feels like a foreign person in his own city.

"We are living in a tragedy," he said. "We grew up with 30 years in war. This has given us trauma. Forgetting this is not so easy. No one can tell us to forget."

'We want to believe our eyes'
Still, Anli maintains a cautious optimism for peace. He brings up Nelson Mandela as an example, saying that now the legal, democratic means are the only way. He is hesitant, though, of being too optimistic until concrete steps are taken. "We don't just want to believe our ears, we want to believe our eyes," he said.

Anli says that PKK fighters will not immediately come down from the mountains and become farmers simply because Turkey has said it wants peace.

"This doesn't mean the PKK and Ocalan will give up their guns," he said. "In the Middle East, if you have no guns you have no power, and you will be destroyed."

Abdullah Demirbas, mayor of another municipality in Diyarbakir, spoke of instability in the Middle East -- especially in Syria, where a Kurdish militia affiliated with the PKK has gained a foothold -- of contributing to the change of heart of both parties regarding a peaceful solution. "Both the Turkish side and the PKK have realized it's impossible to make progress by killing," he said.

Danny Gold

A young boy wraps a flag with the face of imprisoned Kurdish guerrilla leader Abdullah Ocalan across his back at a Newroz festival in the Kurdish city of Batman in southeast Turkey.

For Demirbas, the halting of violence is especially urgent. One son is about to join the Turkish military, as service is mandatory. Another went to the mountains to join the PKK four years ago. Every time he hears a Turkish military jet roar overhead, he fears it is on its way to kill his son. He says his heart is "crushed in three parts," one in the mountains, one in the military, and one in the jails with many of his colleagues and friends. 

A day before Ocalan's announcement in Ali Pasa, a poor neighborhood whose narrow streets and strong PKK support usually deter police from entering, a group of tough looking young men loitered by a small park. Graffiti swearing allegiance to the PKK and "long live Apo" littered the walls. The young men said they would only believe Turkey wants peace when Apo is free.

Teyfik Karakoc, 50, lingered outside a small shop nearby. He, like the others, has seen his share of suffering and is ready for it to be over.

"Our hope is to stop the killing," Karakoc said. "All of us, like everyone, we want peace, but we don't see anything." He then paused as a Turkish military jet flied overhead, drowning out his words.

"It is not so easy to say we forgive you," he added, as the jet disappeared.

Related:

After decades of oppression, Kurds get taste of freedom as Assad's troops flee

'Pushed aside': Turkey's Kurds lose hope

This story was originally published on Wed Mar 27, 2013 4:29 AM EDT

Danny Gold

A new member of the Kurds' Popular Protection Units (YPG) stands in front of a crowd waving Kurdish flags in Qamishli, Syria. The Kurds are the largest ethnic group in the world without a homeland, totaling more than 30 million people.

DERIK, Syria -- From the roof of the new home he is building on the outskirts of the Kurdish controlled city of Derik in northeast Syria, Bashir Said Mohammad can count a dozen or so other structures in different stages of completion. "All this building has happened after the revolution," he says. "Before we were not able to build. You would go to the regime and they would say no, because we are in the Kurdish areas."

In the Kurdish areas of Syria, known as Rojava, people have wasted little time seizing on the opportunities a tentative retreat by President Bashar Assad's government forces three months ago has afforded them. But while a burgeoning civil society independent of Assad's regime continues to grow, the Kurds are desperately trying to avoid the devastating violence that has battered cities like Aleppo and Homs.

The Kurds are the largest ethnic group in the world without a homeland, totaling more than 30 million people. Spread out between parts of Iraq, Syria, Iran and Turkey, they have been subjected to decades of oppression aimed at erasing their cultural identity in all four regions. Kurds make up around 10 percent of the population in Syria, totaling about 2 million, but have been treated as second-class citizens for generations.

In July, Assad forces made a hasty retreat from a number of Kurdish cities and towns in northeastern Syria. Despite a few skirmishes, the situation has remained relatively peaceful.

Though prices have risen, Derik's cafes are still full and people linger in the streets with little fear. Kurdish flags now fly from shops and houses, Kurdish police forces known as Asayish patrol the streets and community organizations known as People's Houses, "mala gels" in Kurdish, have been set up to solve disputes and act as de facto government institutions.

The Kurdish language, which as little as two years ago was forbidden, is now taught in state schools. Delkesh Resol, a 22-year-old former door-to-door salesman, was preparing one recent Sunday morning to teach a Kurdish language lesson to high school students despite a warning from the regime that language classes were to have stopped the previous Thursday.

'Studying in secret'
His act of defiance, which prior to the revolution would have led to a prison sentence and possible torture, did not concern him. "I'm not worried, there is no fear when you're doing something from your heart," Resol said. "Before this we knew there would come a day when we could do this (teach Kurdish in the schools), so we were studying in secret. If we need to teach Kurdish in the streets, we will."

Danny Gold

High school students in a classroom in Derik, Syria, listen to a teacher giving Kurdish lessons. Teaching the Kurdish language was previously forbidden.

The mala gel in Derik is made up of 40 members, and resolves disputes on everything from agriculture to the distribution of donations received from Kurds in Iraq. There is even a member who specializes in divorces. Additional "houses," such as the Women's House and the Youth House, handle more specialized disputes.

Despite Resol's confidence, it is still necessary to be wary of Assad Mukhabarat, or secret police, in Derik. Though the city is described as liberated, plainclothes intelligence officers still lurk the streets. Just exactly who is in power, and how much power they have, is vague.

The lack of heavy conflict and continued presence of Assad men in some of the cities have led to accusations that the Kurdish leadership arranged a secret deal with the regime, where they were allowed to take over certain areas in exchange for not forcing a third front. Others have argued that the Kurds are simply acting practically.

"The regime has not subjected the Kurdish regions to the same level of violence that it has directed against other parts of Syria," said Thomas McGee, a researcher on Syrian Kurds at Britain's University of Exeter, who spent two years living in the region and was there for the first eight months of the revolution. "Kurds have not gone out of their way to bring this upon themselves, learning from the regime's brutal reaction to the 2004 Kurdish uprising."  In 2004, Kurdish protests that began at a soccer game led to an assault by regime forces that ended with over 30 Kurdish citizens killed.

"The fact that neither the regime nor Kurds en masse have actively declared war on the other need not mean that there is collusion. Each side has their interests and is pursuing this," McGee added. "Kurds, for their part seek stability and wish to avoid escalation."

Slideshow: The lives of Syrian rebels

NBC News

People resisting the army of President Bashar al-Assad in northern Syria cope with loss and prepare for fighting.

Launch slideshow

Both sides in the Kurdish areas walk a tenuous line, in some areas existing side-by-side while trying to avoid direct conflict that seems inevitable. Regime buildings are still occupied by officials, but the people inside are said to be powerless. In Derik -- which is 90 percent Kurdish -- the mala gel is housed in a building formerly used by a youth committee of Assad's ruling Baath party. It is now adorned with photos of Syrian Kurdish martyrs and Abdullah Ocalan, the leader of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) who is jailed in Turkey. According to the State Department, "PKK terrorist activity has been responsible for the deaths of more than 30,000 Turkish citizens."

It is also next door to a local headquarters for the Baath party, where spray-painted photos of Assad family members dot the perimeter walls. In other parts of the city, these images have been defaced, as have representations of the Syrian flag.

The small city of Girke Lege, another liberated Kurdish area, lies adjacent to the oil city of Rmeilan, which is heavily fortified with Assad troops. A large Kurdish flag welcomes visitors to the city, but after a ten-minute drive down the road, an Assad flag waves above a fortress-like encampment.

'It feels like a new place'
Kana Berakat, 43, a member of the People's House in Girke Lege, recalls the two times he was imprisoned for Kurdish rights activism. At Aleppo University in 1990, he tried to organize a Newroz celebration and spent 70 days in jail. In 2009, he spent a week in jail after attending a Kurdish rights demonstration. That time, Berakat was arrested because he did not have identification papers. Berakat is one of hundreds of thousands of Kurds in Syria who had their citizenship removed in 1962 and are currently stateless.

"It feels like a new place. Before when I went shopping to get tomatoes, I was very afraid," he said. "I thought the regime would take me. Now I walk around not worried, like I am a free man, but I am worried for the future."

One street in Aleppo: Life goes on as death lurks around every corner

Berakat, though enjoying his newfound freedom, is concerned that as the regime continues to falter, it may one day grow desperate and unleash the troops next door. By then, though, he hopes the Kurdish militia will be strong enough to defend the Kurdish people.

Danny Gold

Bashir Said Mohammad surveys construction on a new home he began building in Derik, Syria, after the revolution started. He had been previously been denied permission because he is a Kurd.

The Kurds' Popular Protection Units (YPG) patrol the borders and act as a deterrent to both Assad forces and the rebel Free Syrian Army. Established by the Democratic Union Party (PYD), the most powerful Syrian Kurdish political group, the YPG is now distancing itself and trying to be seen as the universal defenders of the Syrian Kurds instead of the party's military wing.

Videos of YPG forces training have shown a noticeable lack of heavily artillery, but the troop numbers are said to be growing every day. The formation of a fourth brigade was just announced.

More Syria coverage from NBC News

The YPG has not hesitated to attack the regime if provoked, and has sought to prevent both the FSA and the regime from entering Kurdish neighborhoods in more contested areas like Kobane and Efrin. After a Kurdish neighborhood in Aleppo was bombed in late July resulting in the death of 21 civilians, YPG forces killed three regime soldiers and captured a number of others.

Slideshow: Behind Syrian rebel lines

Machine guns operated by motorcycle brakes? Get a glimpse at the rebels fighting against Assad's forces in Syria's mountainous Jabal al-Zawiya area.

Launch slideshow

Last week, Assad's forces bombed a Kurdish area in Aleppo. The FSA and the YPG also clashed, reportedly leaving about 20 fighters dead.

At a recent demonstration in the city of Qamishli, 50 or so new recruits lined up for military exercises. They stood silently, faces covered in scarves as to obscure their identities and surrounded by a crowd of thousands chanting slogans of support. Old women clad in hijabs and young girls in Western-style clothing waved flags, singing and dancing to songs of Kurdish freedom.

The demonstration came a few days after a car bomb exploded outside an Assad base in the city, killing four soldiers. The bombing was later claimed by Jabhat Al-Nusra, a shadowy jihadist organization with ties to al-Qaida that is fighting against the regime. The night before had seen a gunbattle at the airport between the FSA and the regime. These incidents heightened fears that the war was encroaching into Kurdish territory.

Slideshow: Syria uprising

/

A look back at the violence that has overtaken the country

Launch slideshow

Some Kurds believe the FSA means to lure the Kurds further into the conflict, forcing Assad to open up another front and possibly using the Kurdish issue to persuade Turkey to further involve itself. Others think that the regime will grow weary of the Kurdish push for more rights and eventual autonomy, and look to reassert control.

Turkey has leveled accusations that the PYD is simply a front for the Kurdistan Worker's Party (PKK), which has been engaged in a guerrilla war against the Turkish government for 30 years. Turkey has threatened to invade the Kurdish areas to root them out. PYD categorically denies that it is simply a front for the PKK, saying that they share ideology but do not take orders.

NYT: Syria rivals in deadly game of cat-and-mouse

Saleh Muslim Mohammed, the leader of the PYD, also expressed fear of the Islamist brigades and extremists said to be fighting alongside the FSA.

For now, the Kurds appear intent on staving off escalating conflict while attempting to build up enough strength to protect their newfound rights and eventually obtain a level of freedom that has eluded them in Syria.

"Violence is the last choice, but if anything happens here the YPG will answer," said Mohammed Saeed, a PYD official in Derik. "Every family here has weapons. All the Kurdish, not only the YPG, will defend themselves. Without Kurdish rights, there will be no stability."

More world stories from NBC News:

• After decades of oppression, Kurds get taste of freedom in Syria
• 'A steep fall' for BBC as child sex abuse scandal rocks the UK
• Olympic medals 'stolen' as athletes party at nightclub
• Outrage after video shows Chinese teacher abusing kindergarteners
• 'The new Afghanistan'? West turns its attention to Mali
• Hate crimes rise, far right strengthens as Greece economy sinks
• Top 10 foreign policy issues facing a new president

Follow World News from NBCNews.com on Twitter and Facebook