In less than a week, there have been three armed border clashes in the Baneh and Sardasht regions, leaving several members of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) dead and fueling heightened tensions across Kurdistan. These incidents appear to be unfolding in the shadow of a recent Iranian regime drone strike against Kurdish opposition forces.
On July 19, drones attributed to Iran struck a Toyota vehicle in the village of Shiwa Gozan, near Penjwen in Başûr (Southern Kurdistan). The attack martyred Semko Kobani, a member of the Eastern Kurdistan Defense Units (YRK), and seriously injured another individual. The targeted attack drew widespread criticism and speculation in the media and political circles, especially given Tehran’s increasing militarization of Kurdish areas.
- In the days following the drone attack, a wave of border clashes erupted across Iranian Kurdistan.
- On July 20 (Tir 30, 1404), Sina Satarvand, a border guard in Baneh, was killed in an armed confrontation.
- The following night, Sajjad Adib and Ali Badaq, two more border force members, were killed in a separate clash near Sebedlu in Baneh. Several others were reportedly injured.
According to local sources, a third clash involving heavy gunfire broke out this afternoon in the border area of Sardasht.
While no Kurdish group has claimed responsibility, many observers believe these operations could be seen as indirect retaliation for the drone strike—a violent act carried out amid the chaos following the 12-day war between Iran and Israel. This conflict was followed by a dramatic increase in the repression, arrest, and harassment of civilians in Kurdish regions, a well-known tactic of the Iranian regime to divert attention from its internal crises.
Further details are expected to emerge regarding the recent clashes in Rojhelat (Eastern Kurdistan). However, civil society and local sources are increasingly pointing to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and the Islamic Republic’s militaristic approach as the driving force behind this instability. They accuse Tehran of using Kurdish border regions as scapegoats for its mounting political and security failures.