British Mandate Independent Kingdom of Iraq During July 1933, about 800 armed Assyrians headed for the Syrian border, where they were turned back by the French. While
King Faisal had briefly left the country for medical reasons, the Minister of Interior,
Hikmat Sulayman, adopted a policy aimed at a
final solution of the "Assyrian problem". This policy was implemented by an Iraqi-Kurd, General
Bakr Sidqi. After engaging in several unsuccessful clashes with armed Assyrian tribesmen, on 11 August 1933, Sidqi permitted his men to attack and kill about 3,000 unarmed Assyrian civilian villagers, including women, children and the elderly, at the Assyrian villages of
Sumail (Simele) district, and later at
Suryia. Having scapegoated the Assyrians as dangerous national traitors, this massacre of unarmed civilians became a symbol of national pride, and enhanced Sidqi's prestige. The British, though represented by a powerful military presence as provided by the
Anglo-Iraqi Treaty of 1930, failed to intervene or allow the well-disciplined
Assyrian Levies under their command to do so, and indeed helped whitewash the event at the
League of Nations. The Assyrian repression marked the entrance of the military into Iraqi politics, a pattern that has periodically re-emerged since 1958, and offered an excuse for enlarging conscription.
Republic of Iraq In the early 1970s, the secularist
Ba'ath regime initially tried to change the suppression of Assyrians in Iraq through different laws that were passed. On 20 February 1972, the government passed the law to recognize the cultural rights of Assyrians by allowing
Aramaic be taught schools in which the majority of pupils spoke that language in addition to
Arabic. Aramaic was also to be taught at intermediate and secondary schools in which the majority of students spoke that language in addition to Arabic, but it never happened. Special Assyrian programs were to be broadcast on public radio and television and three Syriac-language magazines were planned to be published in the capital. An Association of Syriac-Speaking Authors and Writers had also been established. The bill turned out to be a failure. The radio stations created as the result of this decree were closed after a few months. While the two magazines were allowed to be published, only 10 percent of their material was in Aramaic. No school was allowed to teach in Aramaic either.
Pre-invasion Iraq Reports from various sources "indicate a better human rights situation overall in the Kurdish-controlled areas of Northern Iraq than exists elsewhere in the country" (AI 2000, 135; U.K. Immigration & Nationality Directorate Sept. 1999; USDOS 25 Feb. 2000) Also, according to the reports, "while freedom of speech, religion, movement, and press are strongly restricted throughout Iraq, these freedoms do exist to a certain extent in parts of the Kurd-controlled area "(USDOS 25 Feb. 2000). However, reports regarding isolated human rights abuses continued in 1999. The US State government reported that in 1999 Assyrian Christian Helena Aloun Sawa was murdered, and according to AINA, "the murder resembles a well-established pattern of complicity by Kurdish authorities in attacks against Assyrian Christians in the north". The murder was investigated by a commission appointed by the
KDP but no results of the investigation were reported by year's end. Education in any language other than Arabic and Kurdish was prohibited by the government in Baghdad. Therefore, Assyrians were not permitted to attend classes in Syriac. In the Kurdish-controlled northern areas, classes in Syriac have been permitted since 1991. However, according to some Assyrian sources "regional Kurdish authorities refused to allow the classes to begin." However, details of this practice were not available, and Kurdish authorities denied the accusations. In 1999, the Kurdistan Observer claimed that "the Central Government had warned the administration in the Kurdish region against allowing
Turkoman, Assyrian, or
Yazidi minority schools."
Post-invasion Iraq After the
2003 Invasion of Iraq by
US and its
allies, the
Coalition Provisional Authority disbanded the
Iraqi military, security, and intelligence infrastructure of former President
Saddam Hussein and began a process of "
de-Baathification". This process became an object of controversy, cited by some critics as the biggest American mistake made in the immediate aftermath of the Invasion of Iraq, and as one of the main causes in the deteriorating security situation throughout Iraq. Social unrest and chaos resulted in the unprovoked persecution of Assyrians in Iraq mostly by
Islamic extremists (both
Shia and
Sunni) and
Kurdish nationalists (ex.
Dohuk Riots of 2011 aimed at Assyrians &
Yazidis). Iraqi Christians have been victims of executions, forced displacement campaigns, torture, violence and the target of Islamist groups like al-Qaeda and ISIS. Since the 2003 Iraq War, Iraqi Christians have fled from the country and their population has collapsed under the
Government of Iraq. On 1 August 2004 a series of car bomb
attacks took place during the Sunday evening Mass in churches in Baghdad and Mosul, killing and wounding a large number of Christians. The Jordanian jihadist and 1st emir of Al-Qaeda in Iraq
Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was blamed for the attacks. In 2006, an Orthodox priest, Boulos Iskander, was snatched off the streets of Mosul by a Sunni Arab group that demanded a ransom. His body was later found, with his arms and legs having been cut off. In 2007, there were reports of a push to drive Christians out of the historically Christian suburb of
Dora in southern Baghdad, with some Sunni extremists accusing the Christians of being allies of the Americans. A total number of 239 similar cases were registered by police between 2007 and 2009. In 2008, a priest called Ragheed Ganni, was shot dead in his church along with three of his companions. In the same year, there were reports that Christian students were being harassed. In 2008, the charity Barnabas conducted research into 250 Iraqi Christian IDPs who had fled to the north of the country (Iraqi Kurdistan) to seek refugee status and found nearly half had witnessed attacks on churches or Christians, or been personally targeted by violence. In 2009, the Kurdistan Regional Government reported that more than 40,000 Christians had moved from Baghdad, Basra and Mosul to the Iraqi Kurdistan cities. The reports also stated that the number of Christian families moving to Iraqi Kurdistan is growing and they were providing support and financial assistance for 11,000 of those families, and some are employed by the KRG. In 2010, Sunni Islamist groups
attacked a Syrian Catholic church in Baghdad during Sunday evening Mass on 31 October, killing more than 60 and wounding 78 Iraqi Christians. In 2011, Islamist extremists assassinated Christians randomly using sniper rifles. Two months before the incident, two Christians had been shot for unknown reasons in Baghdad and two other Christians had been shot by Jihadis in Mosul. Human rights organizations have recorded 66 assault cases on churches and monasteries until 2012, as well as about 200 kidnappings. On 30 May 2011, a Christian man was beheaded by a Salafi extremist in Mosul. On 2 August 2011 a Catholic church was bombed by Sunni extremists in the Turkmen area of Kirkuk, wounding more than 23 Christians. On 15 August 2011 a church was bombed by al-Qaeda in the center of Kirkuk. In 2014, during the
2014 Northern Iraq offensive, the
Islamic State of Iraq (ISIS) ordered all Christians in the area of its control, where the Iraqi Army had collapsed, to pay a special tax of approximately $470 per family, convert to Islam, or be killed. Many of them took refuge in nearby Kurdish-controlled regions of Iraq. After Saddam Hussein's fall in 2003, the
Assyrian Democratic Movement was one of the smaller political parties that emerged in the social chaos of the occupation. Its officials say that while armed members of the
Assyrian Democratic Movement also took part in the liberation of the key oil cities of Kirkuk and Mosul in the north, the Assyrians were not invited to join the steering committee that was charged with defining Iraq's future. The ethnic make-up of the
Iraq Interim Governing Council briefly (September 2003 – June 2004) guiding Iraq after the invasion included a single Assyrian Christian,
Younadem Kana, a leader of the Assyrian Democratic Movement and an opponent of Saddam Hussein since 1979. Assyrians in post-Saddam Iraq have faced a high rate of persecution by
fundamentalist Islamists since the beginning of the
Iraq War. By early August 2004 this persecution included church bombings, and fundamentalist groups' enforcement of Muslim codes of behavior upon Christians, e.g., banning alcohol, forcing women to wear
hijab. The violence against the community has led to the exodus of perhaps as much as half of the community. While
Assyrians made up only just over 5% of the total
Iraqi population before the war, according to the
United Nations, Assyrians are over-represented among the Iraqi refugees (as much as 13%) who are stranded in
Syria,
Jordan,
Lebanon, and
Turkey. A large number of Assyrians have found refuge in ancient Assyrian Christian villages in
Nineveh Plains and
Kurdistan Region. This led some Assyrians and Iraqi and foreign politicians to call for an Assyrian Christian autonomous region in those areas. In 2008 the Assyrians formed their own militia, the
Qaraqosh Protection Committee to protect Assyrian towns, villages and regions in the north. In 2008 the Assyrian Archbishop Paulos Faraj Rahho of the Chaldean Catholic Church in Mosul was assassinated by some Kurds while some have claimed assassins were hired by local Arab tribes. Rahho was a defender of Assyrian self-administration. Some observers have claimed that Kurdish KDP forces often used to practice their shooting on important Assyrian cultural heritage sites. Kurdish KDP security forces have been criticized for human rights abuses, abuses "ranged from threats and intimidation to detention in undisclosed locations without due process." In 2015, the local
KDP security forces arrested and detained political activist
Kamal Said Kadir, for having written articles on the Internet critical of the KDP. He was sentenced to 30 years in prison. Some activists have claimed that membership in Kurdish parties is necessary to obtain "employment and educational opportunities" in Iraqi Kurdistan. The US State department report said that "Kurdish authorities abused and discriminated against minorities in the North, including Turcomen, Arabs, Christians, and Shabak", and that Kurdish authorities "denied services to some villages, arrested minorities without due process and took them to undisclosed locations for detention, and pressured minority schools to teach in the Kurdish language". Christian minorities in Kirkuk also "charged that Kurdish security forces targeted Arabs and Turcomen". Assyrians have criticized the kurdification of the school curricula, and have complained about the confiscation and occupation of Assyrian lands, and "that the Kurds invent new and impossible laws when the legitimate owners ask for their lands".
Assyrians have criticized that while Kurds are very well funded, the Assyrian Christians receive almost no funding for their schools. Assyrians have also said that Kurds have modified and falsified school textbooks (kurdification) and changed traditional Christian names to Kurdish names. In textbooks it was even claimed that some biblical figures were Kurdish. It was reported that the man accused of killing the Christian politician
Francis Yousif Shabo in 1993 is "allowed to walk around freely" in Kurdistan. The impunity for those who attacked or killed Assyrians in the Kurdistan region was criticized. Assyrian Christian David Jindo was one of many murdered Christian politicians. Other prominent Assyrian leaders who were killed by Kurdish nationalists include
Patriarch Mar Shimun,
Franso Hariri,
Margaret George (one of the first female Peshmerga) and Francis Shabo. Many of these figures were killed "in spite of their attempts to engage with, or work under, Kurds". The US State government also reported that in Kurdish controlled areas Assyrian schools and classes in Syriac were not permitted or even prevented in some cases. There were also incidents of mob violence by Kurdistan Workers party (KWP) against Christians in northern Iraq.
Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons The publication of
satirical cartoons of the
Islamic prophet Muhammad in the
Danish newspaper
Jyllands-Posten on 30 September 2005 led to an increase in violence against the Assyrian community. At first, the cartoons did not get much attention, but when the Egyptian media picked up on the publication in late December 2005, violence and protests erupted around the world. On 29 January, six churches in the
Iraqi cities of
Baghdad and
Kirkuk were targeted by car bombs, killing 13-year-old worshipper Fadi Raad Elias. No militants claimed to be retaliating for the pictures, nor was this the first time Iraqi churches have been bombed; but the bishop of the church stated "The church blasts were a reaction to the cartoons published in European papers. But Christians are not responsible for what is published in Europe." Many
Assyrians in Iraq now feel like "Westerners should not give wild statements [as] everyone can attack us [in response]" and "Today I'm afraid to walk the streets, because I'm Christian." It has been reported that Muslim students beat up a Christian student at Mosul University in response to the fatwa on the same day.
Pope Benedict XVI Islam controversy The
Pope Benedict XVI Islam controversy arose from a lecture delivered on 12 September 2006 by Pope Benedict XVI at the
University of Regensburg in
Germany. Many
Islamic politicians and religious leaders registered protest against what they said was an insulting mischaracterization of Islam, contained in the quotation by the Pope of the following passage: After the Pope's comments were known throughout the
Arab world, several churches were bombed by insurgent groups. A previously unknown
Baghdad-based group, Kataab Ashbal Al-Islam Al-Salafi (
Islamic Salafist Boy Scout Battalions) threatened to kill all Christians in Iraq if the Pope does not apologize to Muhammad within three days. Christian leaders in Iraq asked their parishioners not to leave their homes, after two Assyrians were stabbed and killed in Baghdad. There have been reports of writing on Assyrian church doors stating "If the Pope does not apologise, we will bomb all churches, kill more Christians and steal their property and money." The Iraqi militia Jaish al-Mujahedin (Holy Warriors' Army) announced its intention to "destroy their cross in the heart of Rome… and to hit the Vatican." Despite the Pope's comments dying down in the media, attacks on Assyrian Christians continued and on 9 October Islamic extremist group kidnapped priest
Paulos Iskander in Mosul. Iskander's church as well as several other churches placed 30 large posters around the city to distance themselves from the Pope's words. The relatives of the Christian priest who was beheaded three days later in Mosul, have said that his Muslim captors had demanded his church condemn the pope's recent comments about Islam and pay a $350,000 ransom.
Massacres and harassment since 2003 Massacres,
ethnic cleansing, and harassment has increased since 2003, according to a 73-page report by the
Assyrian International News Agency, released in summer 2007. On 6 January 2008 (
the Feast of Epiphany) five Assyrian churches, one Armenian church, and a
monastery in Mosul and Baghdad were coordinately attacked with multiple car bombs. Iraqi vice-president
Tariq al-Hashimi expressed his "closeness to Christians", whom he called "brothers" in the face of this "attack that changed their joy to sadness and anxiety". Two days later, on 8 January, two more churches were bombed in the city of
Kirkuk; the Chaldean Cathedral of Kirkuk and the
ACOE Maar Afram Church, wounding three bystanders. Since the start of the
Iraq War, there have been at least 46 churches and monasteries bombed.
Threats on population : The church was used as a prison by
Islamic State insurgents until the city's
liberation in 2017. Leaders of Iraq's Christian community estimate that over two-thirds of the country's Christian population may have fled the country or been internally displaced since the US-led invasion in 2003. While exact numbers are unknown, reports suggest that whole neighborhoods of Christians have left the cities of
Baghdad and
Al-Basrah, and that both Sunni and Shiite insurgent groups and militias have threatened Christians.
Religious official targets Youssef Adel, a
Syriac Orthodox priest with Saint Peter's Church in Baghdad's Karada neighbourhood, was killed by gunmen while travelling in a car on 5 April 2008. On 11 April, President Bush was interviewed by
Cliff Kincaid of the
EWTN Global Catholic Network; after being informed about the deteriorating situation of the Assyrians; President Bush was quoted as saying "This is a Muslim government that has failed to protect the Christians. In fact, it discriminates against them....It's time to order U.S. troops to protect Christian churches and believers." ==Statistics==