Posted on 01/10/2017 7:49:16 AM PST by Texas Fossil
I dropped out of school to join the fight against tyranny. I learned much more than I had expected. “The Jews and the Kurds, we are alone in the Middle East,” a fighter named Zagros told me as I was leaving Syrian Kurdistan. “Go back to Israel and tell the Kurdish Jews in Israel that they are welcome back here in Kurdistan.”
I had been there for almost six months fighting ISIS alongside Kurdish soldiers. A year before, I had been a graduate student at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem studying politics and sociology. But after I saw the horrible images of the rape and destruction of Yazidi communities in Iraq, and without any previous military training, I put down my studies and went to Syrian Kurdistan to fight.
I was not alone in this. There were many foreign fighters participating in the Kurdish struggle, and we were now on our way back home, waiting at a transit camp in the beautiful forested mountains of Iraqi Kurdistan. Zagros, who temporarily helped run the camp, was a local and an experienced fighter. As we stepped outside the tent, he told me that his village used to be home to many Jews.
Jewish history in Kurdistan goes back many centuries. Kurdistan is part of the land in which the Babylonian Talmud was crafted. Many prominent rabbis and prophets lived and died there. Before every Shabbat, Jews around the world recite the candle lighting blessings from the Siddur written by Nachum the Mede, a Kurdish Jew. In the 17th century, the very first female rabbi, Asenath Barzani, was born in Kurdistan... Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s first defense minister, Yitzhak Mordechai, was a Kurd. >more
(Excerpt) Read more at thetower.org ...
Very worthwhile read for anyone who is interested in the very long history of this conflict. The roots of it are ancient.
“The roots of it are ancient.”
Good reason to carefully evaluate our interests there, and generally default to staying out of it. Long-running family feuds are a bad thing for new neighbors to get involved in.
The roots of any history are ancient. That does not mean things don’t change. Read the article, it puts things in current perspective.
I initially thought about posting the entire article. But on examination the source is based in DC. So, I excerpted it. Would have preferred not to.
Understand your impulse to avoid involvement in old feuds. That is a valid concern.
When you do not understand history of events you cannot put them in perspective of today.
Shouldn’t have to excerpt from a .org domain.
Kurds deserve a country of their own as much as anyone else. And I hope to live to see a lot of it sliced out of Turkey.
Thank you for posting this article. I would encourage ALL FReepers to go to the linked article & read it in its entirety. Other than Israel, the Kurdish people are one of the few bright spots in the Middle East. It would be well if we all could understand them better.
Before opening the link, please know that the article is long on Kurdish politics & culture, but short on battle & tactics. It seems to come from a social sciences POV instead of a military one. I was fooled by the title.
Unfortunately, as I’m sure you know, many of these Islamists terrorists do not leave us alone if we leave them alone. Hence, it becomes in our interest to support the most peaceful and reasonable groups. It’s worth noting, by the way, the Kurds are Sunni Muslims, and they are definitely on our side.
My friend in Rojava who sent me the link to the article was in Kobani. Knows what the battle was.
The author was only there for a relatively short time but gave me missing pieces of perspective that I had not been able to connect. This is not the first article I had read about Kurdish history.
Not all Kurdish groups are the same. That is conveyed by the author.
I have no Kurdish ancestors nor connection there. But I am a history student. Especially those who will fight for freedom. That is my interest in this.
That struggle has been a lifelong obsession with me.
Thanks, I should have thought of that.
It would have been better if I had posted the HTML with images. I did not know the source and was just being cautious.
agree totally
you said: “the Kurds are Sunni Muslims”
That is largely true, but this article and input I have had over the past year indicate that certain groups of Kurds are more than 50% non Muslim. There is history of religious tolerance going far back. That is probably part of why the Turks hate them. (only part)
I’m not sure about why the Turks hate them, but they sure do. They call them Mountain Turks and pretend that they’re not a real ethnicity. Of course, the Kurds have had trouble with all the other nations in that part of the world where they live - Iran, Iraq, Turkey, and Syria. Turkey is most famous, though they won’t admit it, for their genocide in WWI against the Armenian Christians. I’m less certain of the idea that there are other faiths beyond Islam among the Kurds. By the way, the Arabs and Islamist celebrate Saladin and his military success during the Crusades. They forget (or deny is probably more correct) to mention that he was a Kurd.
simply search: Kurds Christians Jews
I won't try to persuade you one way or the other, but there is evidence of religious tolerance that goes far back in history.
If you have Jewish friends who have connections in government, ask them about Kurds.
Here is the problem: If any ME nation embraces religious tolerance they are immediately ostracized and punished. Jews & Non-Muslims are the enemy to them. So we must be careful how we present the positions of those who are in fact receptive to other religions than Islam. It can cost friends their lives. I watched it happen to young people in Iran during the #IranElection phase on Twitter. (please don't flame me about Twitter)
Definitely worth reading. I was only making sure other readers realize that unlike the title, very little of the actual “fighting” was imbedded in the article.
As a former fighter, that’s what I would have found more informative.
I like the Kurds but never forget:
1. They were the main executioners in the Armenian genocide.
2. The reason the Yardizs and Christians were such easy prey for ISIS is that they were not allowed to weapons or form militias under Sadam or the Kurds.
3. Their leadership are socialists answer communists.
We may need greater cultural awareness of the Shia vs Sunni split. Yes there are indeed “peaceful Muslims” who mean us no harm; yes there are “jihadist Muslims” who will go to great lengths (suicide included) to do us harm. Once our culture identifies a bright & labeled division between the two, we’ll do better at addressing the latter.
I wasn’t doubting you. I know that the no-fly zone in Iraq’s Kurdish area, what’s now called the the Kurdish Regional Government, is very pro-American and very much like Europe or the USA, which is to say tolerant of different people. Many of the Special OPs guys really liked their time there.
I like the Kurds but never forget:
1. They were the main executioners in the Armenian genocide.
R- (there is an honest dispute if this is correct. And if you talk to the Armenians they have very good relationships.)
2. The reason the Yardizs and Christians were such easy prey for ISIS is that they were not allowed to weapons or form militias under Sadam or the Kurds.
R- (Sadam was the one who did not allow them weapons. I think the Kurds simply defied the ban)
3. Their leadership are socialists answer communists.
R- (If you read the article, it addressed this. I'm convinced they are communal, but not communist. There is a difference. And their structure is like City States. Total local control. That leaves them in danger when Nation States attack them.)
Yep, they respected them. The Kurds will fight.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.