Posted on 11/05/2017 1:23:12 PM PST by Texas Fossil
As can be seen in the region every day, it is not realistic to expect the Assyrians to be quiet and accept their "fate" under the tender mercies of Shiite or Sunni rule.
The future Assyrian regional government could be an independent state or autonomous region like the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in Iraq. Even if it is city-state like Vatican City, it would be monumental in stopping the annihilation of Assyrian people and could also serve as a safe haven for other persecuted minorities.
"Thank God that Jews, a historically persecuted people just like us, now have Israel... After centuries of persecution, is it not the time for Assyrians and other persecuted Christians to finally have their own government?" — Sabri Atman, founder of the Assyrian Genocide and Research Center.
When ISIS invaded Iraq and its Nineveh Plain in 2014, one of the most victimized peoples were Assyrians, a Christian community indigenous to the region.
After the defeat of ISIS, some of the displaced Assyrians from the Nineveh Plain finally returned to their homeland, but today, they are fleeing their homes as their towns once again become a battleground -- this time between Iraqi and Kurdish forces.
The Assyrian-Syriac-Chaldean people have inhabited the Middle East since the beginning of recorded history. We might now, however, be witnessing the disappearance of this community. The end of the Assyrians in Iraq means the eventual end of the Assyrians altogether.
Christians are also increasingly facing threats from Shiite Iran as, after its gains against ISIS in Iraq and Syria, it attempts to expand its influence in the region.
"Iran is aggressively establishing schools and mosques and libraries and other structures within the main Christian towns," said human rights lawyer Nina Shea, who once served on the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom.
A UN- and US-protected region is needed in northern Iraq to help restrict the empowerment and Iranification of Iraq, according to experts in the region Andrew Doran, Robert Nicholson, Mark Tooley, and Stephen Hollingshead. They argue that U.S. Ambassador Nikki Haley should call on the UN and US coalition allies to establish a protected zone for genocide victims in northern Iraq:
"The UN has a duty to protect Northern Iraq's indigenous peoples. It can also promote stability and security in the Middle East by preventing Iranian expansion to the Mediterranean Sea. Such a zone would also be a bulwark against Iranian-backed militias in Northern Iraq.
"What is required for administrative, juridical, and economic functions to take hold in these communities is to be liberated from the immediate threat — Iran. The presence of a multinational coalition force would likely be sufficient to deter Iranian aggression.... There are already U.S. and other coalition forces on the ground in northern Iraq. The force required to deter external aggression would be small. It is also worth noting that these communities in Northern Iraq were rarely covered in the news from 2003 until 2014, when ISIS conquered them. This is because they were peaceful, productive, and proven allies of the United States. They have suffered much for that alliance. This is no time to abandon them to Iran."
"The Assyrian homeland is in northern Mesopotamia, present-day Iraq, where the ancient cities of Assur and Nineveh were built," writes the scholar Hannibal Travis.
"For 300 years, Assyrian kings ruled the largest empire the world had yet known. The Assyrian Church of the East records that the Apostle Thomas himself converted the Assyrians to Christianity within a generation after the death of Christ. Christianity was 'well established and organized' in Mesopotamia by the third century CE."
Today a stateless and persecuted people, Assyrians have been continuously brutalized by Muslims in the region -- Turks, Kurds, Arabs, and Persians.
Every fifty years, there has been a massacre of Assyrians, according to the Assyrian International News Agency (AINA).
According to a report by the Center for the Study of Genocide and Human Rights of Rutgers University:
"The Assyrian people have been repeatedly victimized by genocidal assaults over the past century... Massacres, rapes, plundering, cultural desecrations, and forced deportations were all endemic. Around 750,000 Assyrians died during the genocide, amounting to nearly three quarters of its prewar population. The rest were dispersed elsewhere, mostly in the Middle East.
"Unfortunately, the persecution of Assyrians did not end with the collapse of the Ottoman Empire. From August 8-11, 1933, in the newly established state of Iraq, Assyrian villagers in the northern Iraqi town of Simele were brutally murdered. Some 3,000 men, women, and children were killed by Iraqi soldiers and Kurdish irregulars."
As a result of continued persecution and discrimination, the Assyrians in Turkey, Syria and Iran, once sizable communities, have almost completely been exterminated, apart from those who have fled to the U.S., Australia, Europe, Canada and Lebanon.
The situation of Assyrians in Iraq is beginning to resemble the previous situation of those in Turkey, Iran, and Syria. Given all of the persecution to which Assyrians have been exposed and the lack of any support or protection from the West, the only way for Assyrian-Syriac-Chaldean people to survive is to have a protected "enclave" in the Nineveh Plain. As can be seen in the region every day, it is not realistic to expect the Assyrians to be quiet and accept their "fate" under the tender mercies of Shiite or Sunni rule.
Muslims make up a majority of the population in 49 countries around the world today. Regrettably, the proven hatred of many Muslim fanatics in that part of the world will not magically disappear. It is also delusional to argue that an Assyrian autonomy would somehow "destabilize" a region of chronic, bloody instability.
The future Assyrian Regional Government could be an independent state or autonomous region like the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in Iraq. Even if it is city-state like Vatican City, it would be monumental in stopping the annihilation of Assyrian people and could also serve as a safe haven for other persecuted minorities.
All the Assyrian activists, politicians and scholars with whom Gatestone spoke asserted that the Assyrians should have a right to self-rule and security in the Nineveh Plain.
Yacoob Yaco, for instance, an Assyrian MP and political chair of the Nineveh Plain Protection Units (NPU), said that Assyrians are willing to defend their homeland. "For us to be able to do that effectively, the leading countries of the world must help us determine our fate, and to have our own political and military entity."
Joseph Baba, the Western Regional Director for the Assyrian American National Federation, told Gatestone:
"We would like to help establish a political structure in Nineveh Plain -- a secular republic -- that is pluralistic and respects the ethnic and religious diversity of the Nineveh Plain. The Assyrian government would also cooperate with its neighbors and others to bring peace to the region and open the door to endless business opportunities for many Western countries to invest."
"Forced displacement, persecution and genocide have caused the drastic decrease in our population," said Anahit Khosroeva, an Assyrian historian specializing on genocide studies, who is based in Armenia.
"The international community just closes eyes on all these...The West should not continue ignoring Assyrians and Yazidis. Every inch of this land and every line of history tells who this territory belongs to. We deserve a state."
David William Lazar, the Chairman of the American Mesopotamian Organization, called for "the establishment of three new provinces in the districts of the Nineveh Plain, Talafar and Sinjar. "The current Iraqi constitution allows the proposed region to have its own parliament and executive branch similar to the region under the control of the Kurdish authorities."
"The world should not expect us to be protected by any other forces but our own," Juliana Taimoorazy, a leading Assyrian activist and the Founding President of the Iraqi Christian Relief Council, told Gatestone. "We have been betrayed by both the Iraqi military and the Kurdish Peshmerga, over and over again."
She called on the Kurdish government to recognize Assyrian rights. "There are also Assyrians living under Kurdish rule. We ask the Kurdish government to honor Assyrians under their rule by recognizing our identity, flag, schools, churches, and language."
In an interview with Gatestone, Sabri Atman, the founder of the Assyrian Genocide and Research Center (Seyfo Center), said:
"There are two options. Either Assyrians in Iraq will have their own government in Nineveh and will be a free nation, or they might be extinct in a few decades. In order to stop the latter from happening, the Assyrian administration in Nineveh should be protected by the UN and the US. Thank God that Jews, a historically persecuted people just like us, now have Israel. The Assyrian claim for autonomy has never been realized. After centuries of persecution, is it not the time for Assyrians and other persecuted Christians to finally have their own government?"
All Christians in Iraq and in Syria are not the same, Nor are the governments in those countries.
Within the KRG (Kurdish autonomous zone) of Iraq there were historically ancient Christian Communities. Predominantly Assyrian Christians and Chaldean Christians. The divide is both by language, ancestry and sect.
How complex?
Religious composition of Nineveh Plains:
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DCr4AGRXcAAofjP.jpg
Most Assyrians are members of the Assyrian Church of the East, with others including the Syriac Orthodox Church and the Chaldean Catholic Church.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assyrian%E2%80%93Chaldean%E2%80%93Syriac_diaspora
I’ve said it dozens of times, we (Bush) made a huge mistake by not flattening Iraq, dividing it into new countries along ethnic lines, and walking away.
Turkey earned the award of a newly minted Kurdistan on its border for its last minute perfidy in denying our troops access, and these people could use a homeland, even a flattened one!
Oh. Wait. Somebody did. The word "Soviet" means "Regional".
As in Union of Soviet (Regional) Socialist Republics.
I agree. Strangely, so did Joe Biden.
I think the calculation was that the Shiite portion of Iraq would happily be ignored by Iran, and then they would pressure the remaining Sunni and Kurdish areas, gradually swallowing them.
As it was, the Shiite region was put in charge of the supposedly united Iraq (although the Kurds had a lot of independence), but they abused that status. Not good for team spirit, as it showed when the Army in US armor turned tail at the initial sight of the ISIS junior varsity in pickup trucks.
The Iraq Kurds have a regional autonomous zone in Iraq. The US was instrumental in forming it.
The article if you read it, poses both options.
The intent of the article was protection by whatever means the endangered Christians in Iraq.
The sad truth is, Bush was the greatest disaster for Iraqi Christians at least since the Mongol invasions of the 1200’s. Within a few years of the 2003 invasion, Iraq’s Christian population had collapsed by more than half. There was no postwar plan whatsoever to protect them in even a basic manner. I doubt God or history will look upon this kindly.
Still a good idea for the present day to do it, but as anyone who has ever trained a dog knows, one should not wait years between the undesirable behavior and the swat on the nose.
The messages should have been a) you f with us, and we will track down YOU personally and kill your sorry butt, and your whole famn damily, b) we will destroy everything you hold dear, c) your entire country will simply cease to exist and, d) all this will happen sooner than you can imagine.
With a side of: and if you get in our way of doing a) through d) to the offending power, we will reward your country with a brand new hostile country with loads of sympathizers in your country right smack dab on your border or something equally creative...
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