According to the Jerusalem Post, since April 12, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, the PFLP-GC and its' allies in the region are working with the government of Syria to liberate the Yarmouk area of Damascus from ISIS, which controls 60% of the area.
Yarmouk has long been home to a majority of Syria's Palestinian refugees who escaped to the country following the establishment of the state of Israel. In 2012, the right-wing Free Syrian Army (FSA) and its allies, the Al-Nusra Front, an affiliate of Al-Qaeda linked to Saudi Arabian ideology, began an intense uprising there against the Palestinian population and local political organisations.
The area was soon suffering from a lack of food and supplies unknown under the Assad regime. Some commentators blame the PFLP-GC for obstructing supplies, and the group was initially criticised by the larger PFLP. However, based on the Jerusalem Post's report, along with the PFLP's connections to the Iranian government, it appears that the groups have reconciled and have come together to fight a common enemy- ISIS and the reactionary militias in the region.
The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine was founded as a secular Marxist-Leninist organisation in 1967 with the aim of creating a one-state Palestine "from the river to the sea." From the beginning, the group "wanted both men and women actively involved in the resistance." The group is considered feminist and has operated with both male and female fighters.
"The revolution changed the image of the Palestinian woman....They are also in the revolution on an equal basis—they can do whatever the revolution needs," said Leila Khaled, a former fighter for the group, in an interview with Vice.
The PFLP has also sought to support other left-wing movements who are also battling ISIS, including the Kurdish resistance, saying in 2014 that,
“All Palestinian and Arab revolutionary forces should unify their efforts to support the struggle of the Kurdish resistance...It must also be noted that the role of the Turkish state and government, one of Israel’s largest trading partners and a key military ally of the United States, has been to encourage... these reactionary armed groups (ISIS and others)."
These warnings have since been confirmed with Turkey's open alliance with the FSA and fascist nationalists armed by NATO allies like Germany against the Kurdish YPG in Afrin, Both the International Commune of Rojava and the PFLP have slammed the illegal US-French-UK airstrikes earlier this month as "imperialist," and, according to Khaled, the PFLP would like to see autonomy for the Kurds in Syria, although not a full-fledged state. She laments that the Kurdish YPG has to an extent been been used by America, although she stresses the importance of defeating ISIS.
Khaled has slammed ISIS, an organisation known correctly throughout the west as a notorious and cartoonish fascist group claiming to speak for Islam, as a US-backed and created militia.
Meanwhile, the western media has gone into overdrive condemning Assad, and are now spinning their readers' heads with speculation over alleged ISIS involvement in the Toronto massacre. The attack, which no matter what is discovered will fuel the fire of bigotry in Canada and elsewhere, occurred just hours following an white supremacist attack on refugees in Lesvos on Sunday, and the passage of a harsh bill penalising migrants by the French National Assembly under the orders of Emmanuel Macron.
Right-wing pundits like Jordan Peterson have warned of "totalitarianism" and "barbarism" in relation to Islam and have praised the IDF's actions against Palestinians. Yet the left should understand that the true forces of civilisation in the Middle East are the secular, feminist resistance fighters on the ground.