brent: u.s. president trump announced the withdrawal of u.s. forces from northern syria to make way for the turks. with that, the u.s. is practically handing over its ally, the kurds, to be slaughtered by the turks. there is blowback in washington. democrats and republicans say this is abandoning an ally that helped defeat isis. for trump, this is simply a transaction. services rendered by the kurds, services paid in full by america first. i'm brent goff in berlin. this is "the day." ♪

>> [translated] following our conversation with president trump, the withdrawal has started. >> [chanting] >> [translated] this is considered the safest area. islamic state displaced people and forced them out of their homes. >> we don't know what's going to happen. we are preparing for the worst. >> [translated] any further turkish aggression against the region will destabilize northern and eastern syria and will be an opportunity for islamic state to regenerate and reorganize itself. brent: also coming up, bringing cities to a standstill in the fight to slow down climate

change, activists staged blockades around the world today. will it prompt leaders to take action? >> what do we want? >> climate justice. >> we at extinction rebellion are interrupting the flow of normality, because it is that flow carrying us towards disaster. brent: to our viewers on pbs in the united states and around the world, welcome. we begin with how not to treat an ally and how to make your enemies happy. that is how much of the world sees the decision by u.s. president donald trump. u.s. forces in northern syria are going home, leaving behind the kurds to defend for themselves. the kurds are not just allies. they are the reason u.s. forces were able to quickly push back islamic state. on the ground, they destroyed the caliphate. today in a move that surprised even the pentagon, trump

appeared to give his blessing for the turkish military to fill the void created by the departing americans. the turks view the kurds as terrorists and want them away from their border. with the u.s. gone, the kurds may have no choice but to as russia or iran for help. that would be a disaster for u.s. foreign policy, a policy trump tried to justify with tweets today. the u.s. president posting this. it is time for us to get out of these ridiculous, endless wars, many of them tribal, and bring our soldiers home. we will fight where it is to our benefit and only fight to win. turkey, europe, syria, iran, iraq, russia, and the kurds will have to figure the situation out and what they want to do with the captured isis fighters. they all hate isis. they have been enemies for years. we are 7000 miles away and will crush isis if they come anywhere

near us. all right, that's the tough talk from the u.s. president. let's talk geopolitical implications. i am joined by daniel gary locke -- daniel gerlach, a middle east analyst and editor of a magazine that focuses on middle east issues. what did you think when you read those tweets from the u.s. president? daniel: the last one about annihilation of the turkish economy is a different story. i cannot comment on the language that trump uses here, but the pull out itself is not so surprising. trump a year ago announced the u.s. would pull out. he backtracked, but in general he did not really change his mind or policy. it was like for a moment he realized, or the people with him at the time at the defense

establishment, said it is much easier to stay because once we are out, we cannot undo the decision. let's look at the cost. staying in syria doesn't cost much. we don't lose our troops there, we don't lose a lot of money, we don't engage in active combat. it is a pretty low cost operation so let's keep a foot in the door. brent: do you think it is a mistake? daniel: from the point of view of a strategist who wants to create u.s. leverage in the region, i think it is a disaster. it was a very cost-efficient way of staying in the game. politically in general if trump says this is a ridiculous war, i don't think it is, i think it is tragic, a bad war. i understand one needs to come to terms, but i don't think this is the right policy for them if we keep u.s. foreign interests in mind. i am not a u.s. foreign policy

advisor, but i think it is disadvantageous. brent: let's look at the map to see where these things are happening. it is a complex issue. talk us through what we are looking at. we are talking about the area that is striped, which is supposed to be a safe area. daniel: that's what they dubbed it at the united nations recently. all of this is syria, a kurdish controlled area, which is largely controlled by a dominantly kurdish party and militia called the pyd and the associated syrian democratic forces, which the u.s. helped build up in order to fight isis. they are controlling this area. what turkey wants to do is create this buffer zone, establish control all along the border with turkey, and the major argument is we don't want to have an organization

considered a terrorist organization by turkey, because it is an proxy of the kurdish workers party, which is conducting guerrilla operations in turkey. we don't want them to control the border, do cross-border operations, and we don't want them to deliver weapons inside turkey. the point here is he also marketed this idea to the west by saying, i am also going to settle syrian refugees here. that is an interesting point. brent: he wants to get rid of syrian refugees in his country. daniel: we are back now in the biblical times, when a government could just displays an entire people and say, you have got to live there regardless of where you are originally from. brent: he wants to repatriate them, but does not want to send them home. daniel: that does not mean these people are from these areas. a lot of syrians fled to turkey, but not from these areas. these are areas that are not

historically kurdish, but there is a kurdish majority in some parts. the idea for erdogan is to settle syrian, arab, sunni population to do some engineering or to divide the kurdish majority. bear in mind, turkey as a whole and the erdogan government are not anti-kurdish in the sense they are against the kurdish people. there are kurdish people inside turkey who are for erdogan. he is fighting the kurdish organization. brent: i want to remind our viewers how things were a year ago in the eyes of the u.s. president. here is what he saidid last summer.. pres. trump: we get along great wiwith the kurds. we are trying to help them. that i is their terriritory. i want to help them. they fought with us, they died with us. lost tens of thousands of kurds, died fighting isis.

they died for us and with us and for t themselves. they died for themselves. but t they are greatat people, d we don't forget. i don't forget. brent: i want to bring in now stephen cook, a senior fellow for middle east studies at the council on foreign relations. his latest opinion piece is titled the united states is done caring about syria. he joins us from washington. how do you explain the words of trump we heard from one year ago with what trump announced today? >> i think it underlines what we have known through almost three years of the trump trump presidency -- of the trump presidency, which is there is no consistency or process in the president's foreign policy. there is only what moves the president at a particular moment and what moves him to take to

twitter to make pronouncements about foreign policy. at the time he made those statements about the kurds, he might have believed it. but it is also clear that he has, from the time he began running for president, made it clear that he wants to withdraw the united states from places in the middle east which he sees there is no interest for the united states. so it is perfectly consistent with what he announced earlier today about the withdrawal of the united states from syria. to him this is a local problem and it is for local actors to work out. for him, the islamic state has been defeated and it is time for even a small number of american forces to come home. brent: we know it hasn't been defeated completely in the way trump would like us to think, and he has been getting some blowback. u.s. senator lindsey graham from south carolina is upset with the president.

this is what he tweeted today. he said, we will introduce bipartisan sanctions against turkey if they invade syria and will call for their suspension from nato if they attack kurdish forces who assisted the u.s. and the destruction of the isis caliphate. a few minutes later, trump tweeted, as i stated before, if turkey does anything that i in my grade and unmatched wisdom considered to be off limits, i will destroy and obliterate the economy of turkey. those are strong words from both sides. make sense of this. are the kurds going to be slaughtered by the turkish army? or is congress going to step in to fix what they think trump just broke? steven: i think it's important to recognize there may be bipartisan support for

sanctioning turkey on this issue. that's not necessarily going to stop the turks from going into syria to take care of what they believe to be a festering security problem from the turkish perspective. they are not wrong. wpg is an affiliate of the pkk, which has been waging a terrorist campaign against turkey for 35 years. they very well may be -- there very well may be a military confrontation between kurdish fighters and the turkish military, regardless of what the u.s. congress does. i should point out a couple of things about senator graham's statement. there is no mechanism by which nato members can throw another member out. turkey would have to decide on its own that it was withdrawing. the other thing that is important to recognize is the same senator graham a few weeks ago was offering turkey a free-trade agreement, was trying

to get turkey back into the f-35 prograram, which it had bebeen kicked out of over the purchase of a russian air defense system. there has been a lot of enabling of turkey in washington that has led president erdogan to believe that the united states will always fold because there will always be people in washington who say turkey is too important, we have to incentivize them rather than punish them to be a partner of the united states, rather than punish them for undermining american foreign policy. brent: daniel, if this continues, what are the kurds going to do? whose arms are they going to run into now that the americans are gone? daniel: first of all, though the turks are preparing this military campaign, it may be that erdogan is bluffing. he has done that before on multiple occasions. he has said we are going to go in and they didn't.

he is very gifted a brilliant politician. he understands very well that we should not be impressed by tweets from the u.s. president three times or 15 times a day. maybe we media people should also pay attention to that. also, he has achieved his political goals. he has achieved to divide his domestic opponents in turkey, and he has divided the kurdish-u.s. alliance. the syrian democratic forces are saying, we are being stabbed in the back. we should never have trusted the imperialists. they are not naïve. they know american support for them with expired. last year u.s. officials told them -- nothing to do with trump's tweets -- told them, sorted out withh the syrian regime because we are not going to stay here forever. they know what has been building. steven: last week in washington,

there was a kurdish delegation that the u.s. defense officials assured them that u.s. support for the kurds, the ypg, would continue. ththat may be the case that t tt happppened last year, and itit y be the case that the ypg should not trust the united states. about asas recently as last wee, the kurds were receiving assurances, underlining the point that the president is untethered from the rest of the foreign policy bureaucracy in washington. the reason why erdogan has been bluffing has been the presence of american forces. once american forces leave, the turkish political dynamics will be such that he may have to intervene in syria in order to prove the point. daniel: i see your point, but look, they are going to run into a force of about 70,000 people that can be mobilized, with

american weapons, that really have nowhere to go. this turkish offensive is going to be -- going to calm with a high risk for the turks. for erdogan, with the u.s. in the game or without the u.s., this is risky. he is a politician and not a field marshal. his military operations have been very limited. i think he will think twice. if he goes in or not, he has already achieved his political goals. that's what i want to emphasize. he has managed in a critical situation to align his own interests with the interests of russia. this is a big deal. brent: and he can bluff and still not lose anything. daniel: or playtime, make the same threat -- steven: i am not sure that's the case. brent: we are out of time, but we are going to invite both of you back because i have a

feeling we are going to talk about this again very soon. steven cook from washington, daniel gerlach in the studio. very good discussion, thank you. turkey's planned offensive has put kurds living in northern syria back on the frontline. while many prepare for the worst, they are determined to defend their aututonomy e even t means risking death. reporter: every time mohammed goes up to his roof, he fefeels uneasy. thee border to turkeyey is less than 100 meters away. from there, people watch him. occasionally gunshots are fired, but the 19-year-old kurt says it does not intimidate himim. >> [translslated] we won't leave our lands, even if they shoot at us. we would rather die. reporter: this is a border town with a turbulent history.

350,000 people live here. 60% of the population are kurds, the rest arabs. it is considered the birthplace of the kurdish militia group ypg. in 2011, they rose up against by sheer al-assad, driving his troops out of the citity. a year later, they defeated a jihadist front. hundreds of kurdish fighters died. the people here are proud of the independence they gained. >> [translated] we are happy and content more than ever before. the kurdish armed forces are keeping order here. reporter: but their independence is under threat once more. turkish president erdogan has moved troops and weaponry to the border. he sees ththe ypg as a terrorist organization that needs to be wiped out. at a party meeting on saturday, he left no doubt about his intentions. >> [translated] the operation is

imminent, maybe today, maybe tomorrow. the road will open for our peace efforts. reporter: the kurds have tried to appease erdogan. a safe zone was established along the border spanning 100 kilometers. an agreement was reached between turkey, the usa, and the kurds in september, but the ypg withdrew. now turkish and u.s. troops are patrolling the safe zone. this town lies in the middle of it. mohammed muslim is assembling metal parts for his neighbors. the curr -- the kurd has seen jihadist fighters defeated. now he fears an invasion by turkish troops. >> a safe zones should be safe, but this one isn't. it is a recipe for chaos. reporter: also worrying residents are erdogan's plans to resettle one million syrian

refugees from turkey to this town. there is talk of relocating kurds elsewhere to accommodate them. brent: the time for talking is over. it is time to disrupt. that is the message from the environmental activists extinction rebellion. the group kicked off worldwide protests warning of environmental apocalypse. the protests began in australia and new zealand with police making several arrests. in london, 270 protesters were arrested. in berlin, activists gathered at a major intersection, stopping traffic and marching toward the government district. with me are two members of extinction rebellion, annemarie botzki and maximilian hierhammer. it is good to have you for a few minutes today. i know what happened in berlin. the traffic was snarled up. you disrupted the city. but other than causing headaches for commuters, what did you achieve?

annemarie: thousands of people from germany came to berlin to block the city. we also had activists from sweden, poland, switzerland. we all came to really put the german government under pressure, to show we will not just demonstrate and be ignored any longer and we are ready to go further and do civil disobedience to put on pressure. we need action on climate emergency now. brent: if the disruptions don't get action by lawmakers, max, what are you willing to do? what is the civil disobedience going to look like? annemarie: we -- maximilian: we will stay as long as it takes and, if necessary, get arrested. if at some point we will be cleared from the streets, we will come back until our demands are met. brent: what are your concrete demands? what do you want to see german lawmakers due tomorrow? maximilian: first, we want the

german government to tell the truth about the climate crisis and how severe it really is. brent: do you think the government has not been honest about how bad the situation is? maximilian: if we look at a draft they made so far, i don't think they take it as seriously as they should. we are facing a world with four degree warming right now, and this will lead to a collapse of civilization. brent: what would this concrete action look like? i know people that are watching say, what should the chancellor and members of the bundestag, what should they do tomorrow to fight this climate crisis? annemarie: we demand the german government declares a climate emergency tomorrow, and we want them to establish a citizens assembly this week. we need a citizens assembly,

random people selected from the country, so citizens come together to discuss this emergency and come to a solution. brent: you have parliament already. isn't the parliament supposed to do the talking for the people? annemarie: it hasn't worked for the last 30 years. parliament is a great thing, but not to solve this massive crisis that is a long-term crisis. parties are working against each other but not with each other. brent: this is the thing that concerns a lot of people. you are not only saying we have a climate crisis, you are saying we have a democracy crisis and that the system is failing us. that's a lot to fix at one time. annemarie: citizens assemblies have been chosen -- have been proven to work efffficiently. they take decisions for the greater good of society. they have been established in many societies. they have worked successfully in germany before. we demand a citizens assembly on

the national level and we want the government to establish it this week to sort the crisis out. brent: so you are going to stay outside these interceptions and block traffic until you get results. most of the people out there today were younger people. there is a generation gap. both of you are young. you are actually demanding work to be done that your parents' generation should have done. that has to really get under your skin, when you think about it. your parents' generation has let you down. annemarie: yeah. it is a system. it is not anybody's personal fault, it is the system's fault. this is the part about telling the truth. the studies have not been taken serious. leading scientists have been warning for years and it has been ignored by the government. they are breaking the law by not protecting the citizens of this country.

they are breaking the law on a global, international contract level. brent: before we run out of time, how do you guys keep this protest within the realms of civility without it spilling over into political revolution? people could understand you saying you want to overthrow the system as well. annemarie: we actually want more democracy. this is what the citizen assembly is all about. it is bringing people together of all realms, a very diverse group of people, representative of the society we have in germany. they are not career politicians that are working against each other. brent: annemarie botzki and maximilian hierhammer, we appreciate you coming in. we are going to see what's going to happen the next few days. with that, "the day" is almost done but the day -- the conversation continues online. you will find us on twitter and you can follow me. whatever happens between now and

then, tomorrow is another day. we will see you then, everybody. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org]

. yeah but it is welcome to live from paris world news and analysis from france twenty four i'm margot in these abang world news headlines. do you endnd is that you all partieses to exercisese maximum restraint in northeast syria this up to donald trump personally gate turkey's prpresident a g green light. to send in troops the syrian kurds say this is a stab in the back. the country they regarded until today as a strong ally. at least fifteen people have been killed as a wave of violence swept the pool area of baghdad. it's part of the ongoing demonstrations that have seen a hundred and ten people lose