Mitzgeen Murshed, 25, a surgeon from Kobane received his medical degree at the University of Damascus. Like the doctors at Martyr Xebat Hospital, the doctors at Sehida Sarya field hospital all work as volunteers because of lack of funds.
The pharmacy inside Sehida Sarya military field hospital in Hassaka. Prior to the war, the building was a driving school for Syrians. It’s been transformed into a field hospital since 2015, treating fighters who come from the frontline with the Islamic State south of Hassaka and across to the recently liberated village of Shadadi. The pharmacist says the clinic is struggling to treat fighters due to medicine and medical equipment shortages.
A Kurdish YPG fighter from Qamishli lies in bed recovering from a gunshot wound to the abdomen.
Portraits of martyred YPG fighters hang inside the halls of Xebat Hospital.
Fighters in the YPG are given a nom de guerre when they enlist in the organization. Walet, 20, from Qamishli, recovers from injuries due to an improvised explosive device (IED) going off in a home in Shadadi that the YPG recently liberated from the Islamic State. He joined the YPG in 2014 to fight the Islamic State.
Fighters in the YPG playing backgammon in an outcare medical facility. The YGP is the Kurdish-Syrian offshoot of the Kurdish militant organization Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) which operates in Turkey. Both organizations share the same ideology, derived from the PKK’s leader Abdullah Ocalan whose portrait can be seen in the left-hand corner.
Surgeon General Dr. Yousef Rostam examine a patient for internal bleeding from a gunshot wound in the back.
Fellow fighters and medical attendees pull three wounded fighters out of the back of a van, improvised into an ambulance, at Sehida Sarya field hospital.
Doctors and fighters rush to bring the wounded fighters into the medical facility after an IED went off as the fighters were clearing a house in Shadadi.
A fighter cries out in pain after arriving at Sehida Sarya field hospital.
The Kurdish initials of the People's Defence Forces (HPG), which is the military wing of the PKK, once tagged, is now painted over inside a bedroom of a recovering YPG fighter.
An injured YPG fighter in an outpatient medical facility in northern Syria.
The building that houses Sehida Sarya field hospital was used as a driving school prior to the war. It has slowly turned into a hospital since 2015.
Shergar - Kurdish for revolution - is a commander in the YPG at the age of 22. He is recovering from an IED explosion that caused damage to his arms and face.
Injured female fighters from the YGP’s female counterpart - the Women’s Protection Units (YPJ) - make up only five percent of the wounded fighters in the Qamishli medical hospital, according to the surgeon general. All injured female fighters asked not to have their faces shown.
Adnan, 26, is an Arab YPG fighter from Hassaka who is recovering from wounds related to a car bomb along the frontline. Adnan defected from Syrian regime. According to the Assad Bashir regime, military conscription is mandatory in Syria.
A new CT scanner at Martyr Xebat Hospital in Qamishli, the most advanced hospital in the Kurdish held area of Syria. The medical device took sixteen months of negotiations to travel from Japan to northern Syria. Because of the war, there is limited access into northern Syria and securing permission for medical equipment is difficult.
Martyr Xebat Hospital, the central military hospital for fighters of the People’s Protection Unit (YPG) in Qamishli, Syria. Funds for the hospital come primarily from local donations and foreign Kurdish donors according to Dr. Hamgeen Suliman, the surgeon general who manages the hospital. While nurses and cleaning staff receive a small salary, all doctors at the hospital work as volunteers because of the lack of funds.