Latest news with #Assyrians
Rudaw Net
3 hours ago
- Politics
- Rudaw Net
US Congress hosts first Assyrian Martyrs' Day ceremony
Also in Culture I don't want a celebration Sweden Kurdish magazine aims to promote Kurdish literature Young people showcase musicial skills in Shingal Kurdish Arts and Culture Festival kicks off in Berlin A+ A- WASHINGTON DC - For the first time, a ceremony commemorating Assyrian Martyrs' Day was held in the United States Congress, honoring victims of the 1933 Simele massacre and calling for full recognition of atrocities committed against the Assyrian people. The event was supported by Congressman Abe Hamadeh and attended by Assyrians and representatives of the Kurdistan Regional Government. 'This is the very first time ever at the US Congress to commemorate the Assyrian Martyrs Day. We had the support of Congressman Abe Hamedeh in putting this together. It's very important. We need complete recognition by the US Congress of all the massacres and genocides committed against the Assyrians,' Sam Darmo, founder of Assyrians for Justice, told Rudaw on Wednesday. Assyrians annually commemorate the Simele massacre of 1933, when thousands were killed by the Iraqi army. Between August 7 and August 11, the armed forces of the Kingdom of Iraq attacked 63 Assyrian villages located in what are now the provinces of Nineveh and Duhok. The campaign left around 3,000 Assyrians dead, according to a 2003 report from the International Federation for Human Rights. Chorbishop George Toma, rector of Saint Andrew Assyrian Church in Illinois, said the commemoration ceremony honors 'the holy ones of our Assyrian nation whose blood was spilled not for crimes, but for their faith, their heritage, and their very identity.' Sara Hormuz, an Assyrian American human rights advocate, was among the speakers at the event, opening with remarks on Assyrian history, genocide, and the resilience of the community. 'Assyrians are resilient and we're not a dying civilization,' she said. Assyrians are one of the oldest ethnic groups in Mesopotamia and northern Iraq, tracing their history back more than 6,700 years. Religiously, they are now predominately Christian and locally split along Chaldean, Syriac, and Ashuri sects.
Shafaq News
7 days ago
- Business
- Shafaq News
The Largest ever: 30 billion Dinars allocated to revive Kirkuk's identity
Shafaq News – Kirkuk The Kirkuk Citadel and the Ottoman-era Qishla, two of the city's most prominent historical landmarks, are set to undergo the largest restoration project in Kirkuk's history, the Directorate of Antiquities and Heritage announced on Friday. The project, backed by 30 billion Iraqi dinars (approximately $20 million) in government funding, is part of a broader effort to preserve the city's cultural identity and boost its tourism sector. The Kirkuk Citadel is one of the oldest archaeological sites in northern Iraq, with a history spanning over 3,000 years and linked to civilizations such as the Assyrians, Babylonians, Sasanians, and Ottomans. The Qishla, built during the Ottoman period as a military and administrative center, still retains much of its architectural character despite years of neglect. Raaed Akla al-Obaidi, director of the Antiquities Department in Kirkuk, told Shafaq News that the project follows official approvals from the Ministry of Culture, Tourism, and Antiquities. The ministry emphasized that renovation work must be handled by a specialized firm with solid experience in restoring historical structures to ensure the preservation of the Citadel's original arches, decorations, and architectural details. Obaidi noted that companies from Turkiye, Iraq, and Egypt have submitted bids for the restoration work. A technical committee will review these proposals and select the most suitable according to international heritage preservation standards. The directorate has completed all technical and engineering assessments for the Qishla building and submitted them to the ministry in Baghdad to allocate the necessary funds. The project's financing will come from emergency allocations, as confirmed by the Minister of Culture in recent meetings with provincial heritage officials. 'All technical and administrative requirements for the Citadel's rehabilitation have also been completed,' Obaidi said. The restoration will include key landmarks within the complex, such as the church, mosques, religious schools, traditional houses, gates, fortress walls, and the 'Green Dome.' According to recent assessments, these structures require between 40% to 70% restoration work. Sarmad Mohammed Jameel, head of Kirkuk's Tourism Directorate, told Shafaq News that the Citadel and the Qishla are not merely old stone buildings but represent the cultural and historical identity of Kirkuk, reflecting the legacy of successive civilizations from the Sumerians and Assyrians to the Ottomans. He added that the project's success would directly support the local tourism industry by attracting visitors from across Iraq and abroad. Jameel said, 'Revitalizing these heritage landmarks would help restore Kirkuk's historic stature and pave the way for cultural festivals, art exhibitions, and traditional markets within the Citadel and Qishla.'These developments are expected to stimulate the local economy and generate new job opportunities. Ali Shakir, a historian and academic, told Shafaq News that the Citadel and Qishla are central to the city's collective memory. Restoring them according to international standards, he said, could help Kirkuk regain some of its lost cultural vibrancy. He emphasized that these landmarks are not 'silent stones' but living testimonies to the coexistence of Kirkuk's ethnic and religious communities. Shakir added that the Qishla, with its distinct Ottoman architecture, could be repurposed into a cultural center, museum, or tourist site that connects younger generations to their city's past, helping raise public awareness about the importance of preserving heritage.
Arab Times
16-07-2025
- General
- Arab Times
The tragedy of Manushak and the cleric
In the late 1950s, the late Amir Abdullah Al-Salem learned that the British planned to request the allocation of Area G1 as a military base. He immediately ordered the Ministry of Defense to relocate from its original site in Safa Square to Area G1, as it was then known on maps. I was reminded of this while reading a letter from Iraqi-Armenian immigrant Manushak Dikran, who wrote, 'We lived in Iraq in the city of K3, a small station established by the British to oversee the oil pipelines running from the north to the Mediterranean ports via Syria. Its residents were a diverse mix of Iraq's various communities. Omar was friends with Sargon, Ali was close to Ashur, Hussein was inseparable from Minas, Boutros, and Othman. They all shared games, daily life, studies, and even religious celebrations. The city had two schools, one for girls and one for boys, separated by a single wall. It had only a mosque and a church. No one paid attention to each other's sect or questioned the presence of different faiths. All religious rituals took place either in the mosque or the church, which was attended by Chaldeans, Assyrians, Armenians, Syriacs, Catholics, and Orthodox alike. Priests from each sect were rarely present, usually only on holidays or very special occasions. Muslim women, dressed in their black abayas, often arrived at the church before others, joining in prayers, weddings, and celebrations. Similarly, Christians would visit shrines to offer sacrifices and vows. Despite the station's nearly 500 houses, everyone shopped at the same bakery, the same grocer, and the same butcher. No one paid attention to the concepts of halal or haram. There was only one hospital, and if Ahmad needed blood, Minas would donate for Mohammad, Omar for Ali, and so on. We grew up and eventually left the station, whether in search of education, jobs, or to find a spouse. Wherever we went, we carried with us the unique values and morals of K3 that shaped us. It was no surprise that nearly all who emigrated achieved notable financial or professional success. One day, Hormuz, a resident of K3 living abroad in America, decided to create a website to reconnect with his family and friends. With great effort, he succeeded in bringing them back together. He gathered news about nearly everyone, their addresses and thousands of family photos, after almost three decades of separation. This reunion sparked lively and joyous gatherings, celebrations, and weddings attended by people from various countries. At one such event, Hormuz was elected as the station's mukhtar, for life.' --- This is a true story... K3 still exists in Anbar Governorate. However, the situation has changed, as the original inhabitants have since been displaced. My friend and reader Nizar Malak from Canada commented on Manushak's message, saying, 'I was deeply moved by it and am familiar with K3. It is located near the Syrian border, and Kirkuk's oil, originating from northeastern Iraq, passes through it. Armenian billionaire Gulbankian played an instrumental role in facilitating the oil exploration agreement between the Iraqi government and Western oil companies there.' Manushak's story reminded him of his close lifelong friendship with Philip Bidavid. They had been more like brothers for 60 years. Their bond never broken, and neither had ever offended the other. Yet, neither had ever asked about the other's religion. Manushak wondered why such human relationships were now being destroyed. I told him to look for those who benefit, perhaps a dictator or a religious leader.
Otago Daily Times
09-07-2025
- Otago Daily Times
Of trade, empires and pygmy hippos
Did you know that Cyprus once had pygmy hippos? Of course you did. But do you know what happened to them? We did. As I have just discovered in a little museum on the next-to-last day of a holiday in Europe. Hippos found their way to Cyprus a couple of hundred thousand years ago, perhaps swept over with a flood from what is now Turkey. And having arrived they set about shrinking to fit their new home. By the time human beings reached the island, some 190,000 years later, the average Cypriot hippo was about the size of a large dog. And that dog seemingly made good eating, because it wasn't long before the hippo was extinct. There's a pygmy hippo skeleton in the museum, which I can study at leisure because I have the place to myself. Everybody else in this hot little tourist town is at the beach. As it happens I mainly came in for the relief of air-conditioning, but while cooling down I took the chance to study a little of the story of Cyprus — and what an instructive thing it proved to be. Cyprus is at the eastern end of the Mediterranean. As we tourists bask on the soft sand, or drink in the hot bars, or dive off boats into sapphire water, we tend to forget that this is the closest land mass to the miseries of Gaza and not that far from Iran which the Americans so love to bomb. This is a volatile part of the world, and always has been. How the first people reached Cyprus is not known but it was probably on a raft of reeds. There's a reproduction of such a thing in the museum. It does not look seaworthy, but then it only had to fluke the journey once, and that was Cyprus populated and the mini-hippo doomed. The early people lived simply. They fished and ate hippos and got by in the warm climate for a few thousand years and wrote nothing down. Time simply passed and people lived and died. Gradually more visitors arrived and settled. They developed pottery and learned to smelt copper. Links were established with the mainland of what is now Greece that prove fundamental to the island's identity. But Cyprus lay close to many different centres of power, and that proved both its glory and its curse. The prize exhibit in the museum is a trading ship. It's a replica of one found on the sea-bed in the 1960s, along with its cargo of pottery amphorae, which would have been used to transport wine and olive oil. Such vessels began to ply the eastern end of the Mediterranean about 3000 years ago and the first great sailors and traders to make use of them were the Phoenicians from what is now Lebanon. But the Phoenicians didn't bring only trade. They brought empire. Cyprus was just too juicy to resist, so they colonised it. And in doing so they set a pattern that has persisted. After the Phoenicians, the Assyrians conquered Cyprus, followed by the Egyptians, then the Persians, then the Egyptians again. Around the time of Christ, Cyprus inevitably became part of the greatest Empire the world has seen, and it remained more or less Roman until the Arabs overran it in the seventh century. Soon after that it became part of the Byzantine empire, run out of Constantinople, formerly Byzantium and now Istanbul. In the 12th century the Crusaders took Cyprus by force, ostensibly for Christianity. Richard the Lionheart gave the island to the Knights Templar who sold it to the French who later lost it to the Venetians. Othello, the Moor of Venice, was commander of the garrison here, defending the island against the Ottoman forces. In time, the Ottomans won and they held Cyprus until the outbreak of World War 1, when the British annexed it — which explains why Cypriots drive on the left and use British-style plug sockets. Eventually the British handed it over to Greece, in accordance with the population's wishes, only for the Turks to invade in 1974 and occupy the northern half of Cyprus where they remain to this day, much to the resentment of most Cypriots. And the moral of the story is that there is no moral of the story. It is simply a tale of take-what-you-can, of might-is-right, of endless greed and theft and violence from a species that, alone on this little planet, preaches the opposite. Ask the pygmy hippos. • Joe Bennett is a Lyttelton writer.
Newsweek
26-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Newsweek
Trailblazing Play 'Iraq, But Funny' Is Both Hilarious and Heartfelt
Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources. It is not every day that the Assyrian language, the modern version of what Jesus Christ spoke, is heard in theatres, but "Iraq, But Funny," a satirical play showing at Chicago's Lookingglass Theatre, is changing that. The unique production, written by Second City alum and Chicago native Atra Asdou and directed by Forbes 30 Under 30 recipient Dalia Ashurina, two female Assyrian Americans, is showing through July 20, and is making its mark in more ways than one. "I wrote this play to get some of the stories that have lived in my family out and onto paper, and because there was a lack of comedies in traditional American theatre about Iraq and Assyrians, written by Assyrians or Iraqis. I wanted to show a side of our people audiences here rarely get to see, and I wanted to make us all laugh, too," Asdou told Newsweek. She also stars in the play. Atra Asdou in "Iraq, But Funny," by Ensemble Member Atra Asdou and directed by Dalia Ashurina, from Lookingglass Theatre Company, now playing through July 20 at The Joan and Paul Theatre at Water Tower Water... Atra Asdou in "Iraq, But Funny," by Ensemble Member Atra Asdou and directed by Dalia Ashurina, from Lookingglass Theatre Company, now playing through July 20 at The Joan and Paul Theatre at Water Tower Water Works, 163 E. Pearson St. at Michigan Ave. in Chicago. More Photo Courtesy of Sandro Miller Through Asdou's smart and hilarious re-telling of world history narrated by TEG or The English Gentleman, she takes the audience through a crash-course of the Brits' mess of an involvement in Western Asia, also known as the Middle East, via multiple jabs at the British Empire—notorious for its colonization and dismal human rights record. "Iraq, But Funny"—four and a half years in the works and voted into this season by the Lookingglass Ensemble—fixates on five generations of Assyrian women (no, they're not the same thing as Syrian), who take ownership of their own stories throughout the play. "I joke and say it took me four and a half years to write, but this is a story 100, even 6,775 years in the making. We cover over 100 years in the play, and my [Assyrian] ancestors have been around for 6,775 years," Asdou said. Assyrians are indigenous to the Middle East and the play covers their survival of genocide in the early 20th century to the modern era. James Rana, Susaan Jamshidi, Gloria Imseih Petrelli, and Sina Pooresmaeil in "Iraq, But Funny," by Ensemble Member Atra Asdou and directed by Dalia Ashurina, from Lookingglass Theatre Company, now playing through July 20 at The... James Rana, Susaan Jamshidi, Gloria Imseih Petrelli, and Sina Pooresmaeil in "Iraq, But Funny," by Ensemble Member Atra Asdou and directed by Dalia Ashurina, from Lookingglass Theatre Company, now playing through July 20 at The Joan and Paul Theatre at Water Tower Water Works, 163 E. Pearson St. at Michigan Ave. in Chicago. More Photo Courtesy of Ricardo Adame "I hope audiences have a greater understanding of how we got to where we are politically and socially, and how they can choose better for their own lives, even in small ways. I hope Assyrians feel a sense of freedom from the ways they've been taught life has to be," director Dalia Ashurina told Newsweek. "I hope non-Assyrians feel seen in people they may have never heard of before. I hope everyone laughs." Asdou's quick wit and razor-sharp dialogue (she integrates audience members into the show) are both entertaining and refreshing. One moment theatregoers are laughing and the next they are faced with heartfelt scenes featuring jinaneh, which Asdou described as "mournful folk songs a singer improvise[s] and sings at a funeral, to help people grieve through their loss." The jinaneh you hear during the play sound like you're listening to prayers. "I wrote them as poems with the intention for them to be jinaneh. Our Assyrian language coach, Ninawa Chimon, helped to edit my Assyrian translations. And our brilliant musical composer, Avi Amon, composed the music for the show. With the help of our director Dalia Ashurina and sound designer Christie Chiles Twillie, we made sure the songs were delivered as intended. Turns out, it takes a village to deliver a folk song," Asdou said. Atra Asdou in "Iraq, But Funny," by Ensemble Member Atra Asdou and directed by Dalia Ashurina, from Lookingglass Theatre Company, now playing through July 20 at The Joan and Paul Theatre at Water Tower Water... Atra Asdou in "Iraq, But Funny," by Ensemble Member Atra Asdou and directed by Dalia Ashurina, from Lookingglass Theatre Company, now playing through July 20 at The Joan and Paul Theatre at Water Tower Water Works, 163 E. Pearson St. at Michigan Ave. in Chicago. More Photo Courtesy of Ricardo Adame Humor becomes the means to which some communities make sense of their challenging circumstances, especially through war and conflict. How else does one mentally combat constant warfare than to find the humor in it all? According to one study, humor has been found to help alleviate mental health issues post-conflict and is considered to be an "effective coping mechanism, a way of fighting back and taking control." Taking control of one's narrative is a central theme highlighted in IBF. The play's stellar cast includes Gloria Imseih Petrelli, Susaan Jamshidi, James Rana, and Sina Pooresmaeil, whose pronunciation of Assyrian words are praiseworthy aside from their powerful acting. The play is predominantly in English. This isn't Chicago's first theatre production showcasing contemporary Assyrian voices and stories, a rare feat in a city home to the world's largest population of Assyrians outside their homeland, an estimated 100,000—forced to leave their ancestral land due to ongoing religious and ethnic persecution. Esho Rasho's solo coming of age show "Dummy in Diaspora," (directed by Karina Patel) at the Jackalope Theatre in February 2025, highlighted his queerness in a usually conservative Assyrian upbringing. And Iraqi-born Assyrian Martin Yousif Zebari's "Layalina," (directed by Sivan Battat) debuted at the Goodman Theatre in March 2023, taking audiences from Baghdad, Iraq, to Skokie, Ill. through the lens of an Assyrian family making sense of their newfound home. Assyrian culture is being re-introduced to the arts through these stories taking life on stage—moving audiences past the iconic stone-carved lamassu (protective deities) of antiquity—and humanizing an ancient people that have endured a great deal. Next to take center stage is "Gilgamesh, the Opera," inspired by the world's oldest work of literature, "The Epic of Gilgamesh." The production, commissioned by The Assyrian Arts Institute and produced by Nora Betyousef Lacey, is set to premiere on March 28, 2026, at the Cerritos Center for the Performing Arts, in Los Angeles, Calif. "I hope 'Iraq, But Funny' continues to be there for audiences all over—to remind us all of our humanity and allow us to feel seen and see others, as we belly-laugh through the horrors," Asdou said. "Iraq, But Funny" runs until July 20 at Chicago's Lookingglass Theatre.
