Hey, you know the world's kind of in a real scary place right now with a creeping authoritarianism and like disease and all of the horrible stories we hear about every week?

I'm Robert Evans. I'm a journalist and I cover the international fascist movement.

And in 2019, July of that year, I decided to do something a little bit different.

Instead of covering horror, I wanted to go look for hope.

And I found it in a place you might find kind of unlikely.

Northeastern Syria.

The region I visited is known as Rojava, and when the Western media covers it,

they mostly just refer to these people as the Kurds.

Since 2013, a loose alliance of revolutionaries over there have been fighting to not just drive

back ISIS, but to establish something of a utopia, an egalitarian, feminist, eco-conscious

community in a place that previously had known mostly war and terror. In the women's war,

I'll take you to this place, and I'll introduce you to the revolutionaries fighting to build it.

Brave women who battle for equality with an AK-47, with a spade, and with a pen.

Follow me as I travel to a land of war and hope, a place trapped on the edge of utopia and oblivia.

I'm Robert Evans.

Listen to the Women's War on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you hit your podcasts.