From Ancient Sumer to Kurdistan of Iraq

Updated: April 11, 2024

Author Sheri Laizer
Exclusive to Ekurd.net



Impressions made from Sumerian cylinder seal (and section of the seal itself far left) with: 4.2 x 2.5cm (seal). Photo: Courtesy of the Yale Babylonian Collection. Photography by Klaus Wagensonner (seal) and Graham S. Haber (impression). [1]Sheri Laizer | 



Ziggurats – The Meeting Place of Humanity with the Cosmos

To get behind the three major monotheistic religions and tap the mindset of the earliest civilizations of ancient Mesopotamia I felt that I had to be there –both mentally, and if possible, physically. In 1982, a year into my intense research into ancient Sumerian culture, Iraq was entering her second year of war against fundamentalist Iran. Hours spent using my reader’s card for the British Library, that was still then part of the British Museum gave me access to Sumerian art, literature, and the Sumerian cosmos but I wanted to go to Iraq.

The personnel of the Iraqi Embassy, and the Iraqi Cultural Centre were also most hospitable and encouraging of my ‘Ziggurats’ [2] book endeavour to revive what it was like to live there around 2300 BC. At the time, Saddam Hussein’s government was producing high quality publications in English like Ur Magazine.

When I began my research, let us remember that there was as yet no Internet, no Smart Phones, no instant online searches. Work was done through reading whatever published texts were available and examining artefacts. I typed my book, Ziggurats on a golf ball typewriter. Corrections were made with Tipex or white corrector ribbon on a spool. Communications for official purposes, like following up on the progress of visa applications went off by telex.

Ziggurats, a book by Sheri Laizer.

My requests made in this way to Baghdad in 1982 did not produce a reply despite the assistance of the Iraqi Cultural Centre or therefore the longed-for visa because of the war with Iran. I decided in view of that to carry out my physical placement in the Valley of the Kings in Egypt. It was an excellent choice. On the west bank of the Nile, I stayed in a very simple hotel for two Egyptian pounds a day. I read the books I had lugged there with me surrounded by palm trees and village culture and slowly wrote the book. It seemed obscure to people at the time and I set it aside, getting caught up in modern politics in the Middle East after moving north from Egypt to Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories to escape the increasing heat of southern Egypt. From there, I went on to Turkey and travelled in Turkish Kurdistan with Kurds I met there and later, in London. This led to my books on Kurdistan and a number of books and articles translated with Kurdish writers. Still, ‘Ziggurats’ laid on one side untouched in its original typed ms.

I had made three photocopies of the typed ms. of Ziggurats, held together by comb binding. One copy had gone to the Iraqi Cultural Attaché, another went to Peter Gabriel with whom I shared all my work, and the final was kept safe with the original ms. at home in Battersea, south London. Of all the things I have lost in the intervening decades, fortunately I did not lose that manuscript.

Ultimately, I obtained a tourist visa to Iraq a year after the ceasefire was signed between Iraq and Iran in October 1989 on a government sponsored tour aimed at showcasing reconstruction. An international group of journalists, we were taken to the ancient site of Babylon, the devastated south of Basra and Faw, to Kirkuk, Mosul, Erbil, Amadiya and Sulaymaniya as well as the historic sites of Baghdad like the inspiring split-onion dome Martyrs monument. My visa had been granted because of my Sumerian work – my Kurdish association naturally remained in the shadows.

In October 1989, therefore I at last inhaled the scents of Mesopotamia and felt that I had come home. I knew it so well from the work I had been doing. I had come to understand the Sumerian gods to represent the natural forces and astral bodies evoked by the Sumerian cosmologists, kings, artists and poets in an age when female deities were equal to men. Enheduanna, the high priestess of Ur was the first female author recorded back in the 23rd century BCE. [3]

In this way, the setting for my narrative, Ziggurats, paid homage to the ancient human mind – an enlightened culture that brought written language, law, art and science into human time. It was also that research that led me to political Kurdistan.

Human time and the study of the cosmos

In ancient Mesopotamia, along with the Sun, the Moon, the stars, and heavenly constellations, the five visible planets were recognised and studied by the priests and dignitaries of the temples and palaces. The texts intertwined astronomical, astrological, and religious aspects concerning the Moon and the planets into an overall organic astral body of knowledge. Astrology and celestial divination developed into firm lore. The Moon, the Sun, and the planets were interpreted as manifestations of divinities.

The Mesopotamians also developed a calendar from around 3000 BCE divided into years and months, evidence that they studied the Moon from the earliest times. The Sumerian and Akkadian names for the Moon god, Nanna/Sin, appear in cuneiform since approximately 2500 BCE. Akkadian names for the five planets, Mercury (Šiḫṭu), Venus (Dilbat), Mars (Ṣalbatānu), Jupiter (the White Star), and Saturn (Kayyāmānu), first appear in tablet texts from around 1800–1000 BCE when the phenomena of the Moon, the Sun, and the planets were interpreted as signs by the gods to communicate with human beings. Later Babylonian scholars between ca. 600-100 BCE reported lunar and planetary phenomena in astronomical records and ephemeris form in order facilitate predictions with time-based methods still in use by astrologers today. After the end of the 5th century BCE, Babylonian astronomers introduced the zodiac and developed new methods for predicting lunar and planetary phenomena known as mathematical astronomy. They developed horoscopy and other forms of astrology that use the zodiac, the Moon, the Sun, and the planets to predict events on Earth. [4]

They also discovered the 360-degree circle and devised the sixty-minute hour, additionally using a water measure of periods of double-hours…

Sumerian records of Erbil

The city of Erbil (Urbi-Lum) grew up on the flat Erbil plain and is mentioned in Sumerian sacred writings under the name of Urbi-Lum (Urbilum) or Arbilum, and Orbelum, followed by successive variants. The modern name أربيل Erbil is derived from Arba-Illu, with alterative renderings as Arbailu, Arabales, Arbira, Urbel, Arbail, Arbira, Arbela, Erbil/Arbil. The name Urbi-Lum was adduced by the Sumerian King Shulgi of the third dynasty (2000 BCE).

UNESCO has noted: “Written and iconographic historical records document the antiquity of settlement on the site…since pre-Sumerian times in several written sources. Archaeological finds and investigations suggest that the mound conceals the levels and remains of several layers of previous settlements, while the immediate and wider setting has revealed traces connected to the early development…It preserves over thirty metres of archaeological deposits going back to the very early beginnings of urbanisation in Mesopotamia. [6]

Erbil: Veneration of the goddess of love and war, Innana/ Ishtar

The Temple of Ishtar (Sumerian Inanna) that completed the top level of the sacred man-made hill that became the citadel in Erbil was typical of the sacred Sumerian sites within city centres. From around 3000 BCE, Urbi-Lum had come under Sumerian rule enduring until the rise of the Akkadian Empire (2335–2154 BC), in which the Sumerians and Akkadians, who spoke a Semitic language became one nation. [7]



Named as the Stele of Ishtar parading upon a lion from the Neo-Assyrian period 8th century BCE. (Louvre) from Tell Amar in the Erbil plain. Photo: Louvre.fr [8]Erbil was captured in 2150 BCE, by the Gutian King of Sumer, Erridu-Pizir. [9] King Shulgi subsequently sacked it during his 43rd year on the throne [10], and his Neo-Sumerian successor, Amar-Sin, sacked it anew and incorporated it into the greater Ur III state. [11]



By the 18th century BCE, Erbil features in a list of cities taken over in conquest by Shamshi-Adad of Upper Mesopotamia and Dadusha of Eshnunna [12] during their campaign against the land of Qabra. Now, Qabra is believed to be the site just south of today’s Erbil city called Kurd-Qaburstan, dating back to the Bronze Age a 118-hectare site with an 11-hectare central mound 17 metres high surrounded by an 84-hectare walled town lower down. The site is located at an important point midway between the Upper and Lower Zab rivers, and sits near a pass traversing the hills between Makhmur and Erbil, near to where, of current interest, the terror group, ISIS, has been regrouping since being expelled from Mosul late in 2017. The defeat and capture of Qabra by the two kings mentioned above are recorded on two stone steles, one retained by the Iraq Museum in Baghdad and the other still held in the Louvre. [13]


View from the lower town of Kurd-Qaburstan situated to the west of the mound. Photo: krieger.jhu.edu [14]

Shamshi-Adad installed garrisons in all the cities of greater Urbi-lum. During the 2nd millennium BCE, Erbil became incorporated into the Assyrian Kingdom from where its military forces embarked on their campaigns of conquest eastwards. [15]

A most intriguing letter on the dying Sumerian language and its use in ancient Erbil at the Qabra (Kurd-Qaburstan) site written to the King of Mari, Yasmah-Addu (1795-1776 BCE) has come down to us today:

“You wrote me to send you a man who deciphers the Sumerian in these terms: “Take for me a man who deciphers the Sumerian and speaks Amorite”. Who deciphers Sumerian and lives close to me? Well, should I send to you Šu-Ea who deciphers the Sumerian? […] Iškur-zi-kalama deciphers the Sumerian, but he holds a position in the administration. Should he leave and come to your house? Nanna-palil deciphers the Sumerian, but I must send him to Qabra). You wrote me this: “May someone send me a man from Rapiqum who can decipher the Sumerian!” There is no one here who reads Sumerian!” [16]

For centuries thereafter Sumerian was lost. Now, huge strides in deciphering the cuneiform texts in which Sumerian was written have been made and their content revealed to modernity.

Middle Assyrian Empire (1365 – 1077 BCE)

The Assyrians used the name arba’ū ilū (Arba-Illu), meaning ‘four gods’ according to Assyrian etymology and the oral tradition. Ishtar (Sumerian Inanna) remained one of the most important in the region under the Assyrians along with Assur, their patron god, whilst the identities of the remaining two gods are not now known. Under Assyrian King, Shalmaneser I (in power between 1273 – 1244 BCE) Erbil was an important provincial capital and a safe and secure part of the Middle Assyrian Empire.

King Shalmaneser I, boasted, “I built the Egašankalamma, the temple of Ishtar, the Lady of Arbil, my Lady, together with its ziggurat.“ [17]

The Kurdish name for Erbil is Hewlêr, which is believed to derive from the ancient Greek meaning “Temple of the Sun” from the Greek helio and may be associated with the Kurdish sun-worshipping religions, Mithraism, Zoroastrianism and of the Yazidi beliefs.

From the many sherds of pottery discovered on Erbil’s mound, or ancient tell, archaeologists believe Erbil was probably occupied since Neolithic times and certainly during the Copper Age (Chalcolithic or Eneolithic period), because fragments found there resemble the earthenware uncovered in the Jazira and in Anatolia from both the Ubaid and Uruk periods.

Erbil’s citadel site is believed to be the oldest continuously inhabited town in the world.

What is visible of Erbil city’s mound and citadel today is of much later date. The ziggurat and temple of Ishtar lie as dust beneath the Ottoman Turkish fortified settlement constructed in a sequence of alleys and cul-de-sacs that fan outwards from the Great Gate. A line forming a wall of tall 19th century house-fronts and habitations made of clay brickwork evoke the former grandeur of the fortress that dominated the city below. The elegant residential structures dating from the 18th – 20th centuries are being reconstructed and preserved by UNESCO with the co-operation of the Kurdish authorities. [18]

Dur Kurigalzu – the site northwest of Baghdad known today as Aqar Quf

(dedicated toEnlil- the Sumerian god of Enlightenment, storm and wind who decreed the fates)

The author, Sheri Laizer, gets to visit the ziggurat at Dur Kurigalzu in 2021 after many visits to the Erbil citadel. Photo: Sheri Laizer/via Ekurd.net

Dur Kurigalzu is a Kassite site and a significant part of its ziggurat remains visible. Dur is Akkadian, and means ‘fortress’, so it is the fortress of King Kurigalzu (now known as Aqar Quf). The ziggurat temple and surrounding city ruins lie some 30 kms northwest of Baghdad on the site of ancient Parsa dating back to the 14th-15th century BCE and the Kassite Kingdom of Kurigalzu I (1400 -1375 BCE) who from his seat there ruled over all Mesopotamia.

It is believed that the Kassites arrived in Mesopotamia from the Zagros mountains. They then rebuilt the cities of Nippur, Larsa, Susa and Sippar. The ziggurat at Aqar Quf was restored to its first level by President Saddam Hussein. Since regime change was imposed by the US-led invasion in the spring of 2003, Dur Kurigalzu has been neglected like the ancient Persian arch of Ctesiphon and the sprawling ruins Babylon that I also visited. Once highly frequented by locals and tourists, the sites are now the domain of stray dogs and bored military guards.

King Kurigalzu I’s impressive capital was later taken over by the Assyrian Kings. In the 1940s, Seton Lloyd and Taha Baqir led an Iraqi-British team at the site and discovered some hundred clay tablets as well as the fragments of a statue decorated with texts in Sumerian representing King Kurigalzu I. The dig also exposed the ruins of the 3,500-year-old ziggurat.

Dedicated to the Sumerian god, Enlil, the god of enlightenment, the ziggurat is among the best preserved of the Mesopotamian temple ziggurats, lying far to the north of the Sumerian city sites built between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers at the head of the sweet water marshes of Dhi Qar.

Enlil was the head of the Sumerian pantheon, a forerunner of the monotheistic God. His command was supreme and unalterable, and the destinies of men lay in his hands. He was the god of air, wind and earth, of the breath of life. From the Sumerian also came the story of the Flood and the creation myth of Man created from earth. Enlil divided the earth with a hoe, breaking the hard surface of the ground for seeds to grow. Men also came forth from the opening of the earth.

Worship of Enlil and of Inanna/Ishtar continued down through the Akkadians, Babylonians, Assyrians and Hurrians and he would also have been on the gods of Erbil, likely one of the two no longer known in addition to Ishtar and Assur. The Assyrians had also continued to worship the main four Sumerian gods, Enlil, An (Anu) Enki the god of water and wisdom and added their patron deity, Assur. Merchant traders would swear by the names of Ishtar, Ashur, and Nisaba that they were speaking the truth. [19]


Part of a Sumerian clay tablet depicting the god Enlil with his ring of power. Stele of king Ur-Namma, fragment showing the god Nanna seated on a throne, in front of the king (mainly lost). Found in 1927 in Ur. Penn Museum. 

Photo: Creative Commons/penn.museum/wikimedia

The lowest terrace of Enlil’s temple ziggurat was restored, and the structure’s mud-brick core rises above the surrounding plain with its palm trees and dusty scrub to a height of around 170 feet. It is flanked to the south by the ruins of three temples, several sanctuaries and the King’s former palace whose corridor walls had been decorated with numerous male figures, most likely thought to be dignitaries of the palace based on surviving works of sculpture. [20]

(Coming shortly: Part Two – The Ahwar and southern Mesopotamian temple ziggurats city sites with the most important at Ur, as below, courtesy of UNESCO) partly restored by Saddam Hussein.)

1 IMAGES: Courtesy of the Yale Babylonian Collection. Photography by Klaus Wagensonner (seal) and Graham S. Haber (impression).
2 Unir is the most common Sumerian word for ‘ziggurat’, and literally means “high-up (nir) amazingness (u(g))”. A literary term also exists for ‘ziggurat’, hursanggalam, which means “skillfully crafted (galam) mountain (hursang)”. Urbi-Lum (Erbil) had its own ziggurat and temple and is recorded in the Sumerian texts.
3 https://the-past.com/feature/prayer-and-poetry-enheduanna-and-the-women-of-mesopotamia/
4 https://oxfordre.com/planetaryscience/display/10.1093/acrefore/9780190647926.001.0001/acrefore-9780190647926-e-198#acrefore-9780190647926-e-198-div1-1
5 See archaeological study at 

https://www.gemaart.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/PAPER_Citadel-Research_Novacek.pdf

6 https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/1437/

7 The term ‘Semitic’ denotes a group of languages that include Arabic, Hebrew, Aramaic and the ancient languages of the Akkadians and Phoenicians termed as Afro-Asiatic languages. In contrast, Sumerian (Emegir meaning ‘native tongue’ and the literary form, Emesir) is a non-Semitic, lone or isolated language spoken since around 3000 BCE. Gordon Whittaker [30] postulates that the language of the proto-literary texts from the Late Uruk period (c. 3350–3100 BC) is really an early Indo-European language which he terms “Euphratic” (from the Euphrates river region) or Proto-Euphratean or Indo-European. See Gordon Whittaker at https://www.academia.edu/3592967/Euphratic_A_phonological_sketch from which the words, *ĝȹdȹōm dluk-ú- ‘the sweet earth’ → Ga2-tum3-dug3(u)44 ‘(mother goddess of Lagash)’… h2ner- ‘charismatic power’ → ner ~ nir ‘trust; authority; confidence’, parik-eh2- ‘courtesan, wanton woman’ > Eu. *karikah2- → kar(a)- ke3 / 4 ~ kar-a-ke4 ‘sexually free woman; (epithet of the goddess Inanna)’19 (metathesized from *karika) etc.
8 https://collections.louvre.fr/en/ark:/53355/cl010136226
9 Douglas Frayne, “Gutium” in “Sargonic and Gutian Periods (2234-2113 BC)”, RIM The Royal Inscriptions of Mesopotamia Volume 2, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, pp. 219-230, 1993 ISBN 0-8020-0593-4
10 Potts, D. T. (1999). The Archaeology of Elam. Cambridge University Press. p. 132. ISBN 9780521564960.
11 See a collection of papers on pre-Islamic Erbil at https://www.researchgate.net/
12 Eshnunna was also occupied through the Akkadian period and Ur III. Areas of the Northern Palace date to this period and show some of the earliest examples of widespread sewage disposal engineering including toilets in private homes. George, A. R. “On Babylonian Lavatories and Sewers.”, Iraq, vol. 77, 2015, pp. 75–106
13 Aruz et al. 2008; Beyond Babylon: Art, Trade and Diplomacy in the Second Millennium B.C. New York: 2008, Metropolitan Museum of Art cited in https://sites.krieger.jhu.edu/kurd-qaburstan/about-the-site/ and Ismail and Cavigneaux 2003

14 https://sites.krieger.jhu.edu/kurd-qaburstan/about-the-site/

15 Villard, Pierre (2001), “Arbèles”, in Joannès, Francis (ed.), Dictionnaire de la civilisation mésopotamienne, Bouquins (in French), Paris: Robert Laffont, pp. 68–69, ISBN 978-2-221-09207-1

16 https://lostscripts.hypotheses.org/1306 /

(English translation by Marie Young from D. Charpin).

17 Ishtar’s temple and ziggurat had pre-existed such that the King had rebuilt it or undertook a new construction there.

18 https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/1437/

19 K.R.Veenhof and Dr.Edhem Eldem, 2008, p. 103
https://www.ancientpages.com/2019/05/03/ancient-ziggurat-of-aqar-quf-dedicated-to-god-enlil/

Sheri Laizer, a Middle East and North African expert specialist and well known commentator on the Kurdish issue. She is a senior contributing writer for Ekurd.net. More about Sheri Laizer see below.

The opinions are those of the writer and do not necessarily represent the views of Ekurd.net or its editors.

Copyright © 2024 Ekurd.net. All rights reserved

How Kurds Missed Their Opportunity to be an Independent Nation

 THE BARZANI KLAN RUNS IRAQI KURDISTAN

Published: April 20, 2024

April 19, 2024

Author Rauf Naqishbendi
Exclusive to Ekurd.net

Retired US Lt General Jay Garne raises arms with PUK leader Jalal Talabani, left, and KDP leader Massoud Barzani, in Dukan, Sulaimani governorate, Iraqi Kurdistan on April 22, 2003. Photo: AP

After the American Invasion of Iraq, the climate matured for independent Kurdistan. It was the responsibility of Kurdish leaders to react, preparing the nation and leaving America with no choice but to submit to our national demand. But our national agenda took a backseat to the leader’s personal gains, prejudices, and tribal ambitions. For over sixty years of current leaders’ reign, they added nothing positive to our lives, but they detracted enough to be lamented for generations to come.

We must understand that independent Kurdistan must be a divine miracle given enormous stumbling blocks in a way. But the American invasion of Iraq was God’s long-awaited gift bestowed upon Kurds. That was one of a rare opportunities in the life of our nation; and made Kurds’ dream for independence come to fruition should Kurdish leaders were to pursue it prudently. The role of leadership is to prepare the nation for all occasions; study risks and plan for emergencies, react to opportunities, march, and galvanize the nation toward its aimed destination. But our leaders went after their personal gains ignoring our national ambition. They accumulated wealth beyond anyone’s imagination to become one of the wealthiest people not only in Kurdistan but the world. They engaged in the assassinations of journalists, suffocating the voice of their opposition, and expanding their criminal enterprises.

Kurdistan occupiers for centuries have been persistent to our subjugation to their dominion, but the American invasion of Iraq rendered them irrelevant on this occasion. Iran and Syria were on American Hit List, and Turkey an old American friend, when America called for its assistance when invaded Iraq, it refused to assist and proved itself perfidious.

America has never favored Independent Kurdistan. But the American invasion of Iraq had ashamed America in the sight of the world and was ready to make concessions to save its faith; besides American casualties were piling up; the economic cost was exuberance; and support for the war at home was fading away as more and more dead and lame soldiers delivered home. At the same time, the Iraqi government was unstable and incapable to fight insurgency and was crippled. That was when Kurds could have taken advantage of the situation and acted accordingly. But their leaders failed them miserably. When they reacted with the referendum of independent Kurdistan, it was too late as they rushed to action and caused the Iraqi government to re-assert its authority over the country’s internally disputed territories, particularly Kirkuk.

It has been six decades since Kurds took arms and fought against Iraq for free Kurdistan. Kurds sacrificed their lives and properties, supported the revolution, endured death, imprisonment, destruction, genocide, and gave everything they had in support of the revolution. Looking back in history, Kurds would have been better off without this bloody and futile revolution which became an instrument to fuel the greed of the two Kurdish dynasties and divide the nation.

                              Members of the Barzani clan and close supporters. Photo: Ekurd.net/SM/FB/AFP

After all the atrocities committed by the two ruling dynasties, they perceived they were immune from prosecution. Considering what had happened recently in the United States, proves their assumption is invalid. They accumulated wealth by robbing the nation and expanding their criminal enterprises, for example, please visit Michael Rubin from American Enterprise Institute, his article titled “Did the Barzanis kill a US government employee in cold blood?”

According to Mr. Rubin The Kurdistan Victims Fund, a charity incorporated in Wyoming, filed a lawsuit against the Kurdistan Regional Government Barzani’s family for (A) Murder of a United States Agent (B) U.S Immigration fraud and perjury (C) Extrajudicial murders and disappearance (D) Genocide and human rights abuse (E) torture of a U.S. citizen (F) illegal exile of Kurdish citizens (G) international narcotics trafficking.

I heard similar lawsuits have been filed against Barzani’s family in the EU, but I couldn’t confirm it. Based on Mr. Rubin’s analysis, Masrour Barzani, son of Masoud Barzani can’t evade prosecution based on legal precedents before the United States Supreme Court. Let it be known to Talabani’s and Barzan’s clan there will be no hideout places for them, and people in Kurdistan will follow them no matter where they land.

For Iraq to re-assert its control over Kurdistan is dreadful. But how these two dynasties have been bleeding Kurds for six decades is even more tragic. Assuredly, they will not be forgiven, and people will not let them escape unpunished. Unarguably, nothing good comes from the two ruling dynasties, and no good can happen during their reign. Therefore, these corrupt leaders and Mafia thugs must be toppled, let the new page of our history start, and let us give their opposition Goran, New Generation, and others a chance to shape our future.

Regardless of what happens people will not be silenced, and nothing can take away their inspiration for freedom and liberty. The last sixty years of the two dynasties have been deplorable and futile episodes of our history. Let us hope the future years will be different with a new leadership unifying Kurdistan, devoted to our wellbeing and our interest rather than compromising our national inspiration for their own personal gains; and with their creativities transforming our nation from its primitive status to one of the advanced societies. This transformation will be long in the making and painful. Sadly, I will not see it, but I pray my children and grandchildren will.

Death of Kurdish Independence and the Beginning of Kurdish National Nightmare

 April 19, 2024

Massoud Barzani, the tribal leader of the Barzani clan, and the head of the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) (left) with PUK party president Bafel Talabani in Erbil, Iraqi Kurdistan, February 24, 2024. Photo: Barzani’s Pess Office/X/via Ekurd.net

Rauf Naqishbendi | Exclusive to Ekurd.net

Barzani and Talabani’s dynasty complacently thought they could drill oil and natural gas forever without challenges. The most they shared with people was paying public employee wages which is a small fraction of the proceed and a lion share of proceed from oil and revenue sharing with Iraq funneled into their bank accounts abroad.

They ignored the needs of people and social services. As a result, the education system, healthcare, infostructure and social services in general suffered. They felt secure and invincible for they had American’s backing, but now they can’t drill oil and American will not be able to protect them as Iraqi government is about bringing back Kurdistan under Iraqi government control. As a result, their reign is in doubt and so is the fate of the nation.

Good leadership is a conrnerstone of achieving economic health and social justice, integrity is in the core of leadership. These leaders acted like Mafia thugs and corrupt authorities involved in power abuse, looting natural resources, assassinating, and jailing their oppositions. When a nation is ruled by wicked authorities like these, it warrants the collapse of society with tragic consequences.

Lina Barzani, the daughter of Sirwan Barzani, who is the nephew of Massoud Barzani and the managing director of Korek Telecom, a company worth over $2 billion, with millions of subscribers and close to 3,500 towers across Iraq, Erbil, Iraqi Kurdistan region, 2023. Photo: X/via Ekurd.net

Since American invasion of Iraq money has been flowing to Kurdistan unprecedented from Iraqi revenue sharing, American fund for the reconstruction of Kurdistan, and oil-for-food. Where did that money end up? Here is an example where some of that money is landed:

As reported by Shan Press, the daughter of Sirwan Barzani admitted her family’s investment in America as the followings:

27 companies, 14 hotels, 6 manufacturing companies, 287 cafeterias, 540 condominiums, 48 restaurants, 8 swimming facilities, a bank, and holding company and several hospitals.


Sirwan Barzani, the nephew of Massoud Barzani and the managing director of Korek Telecom, September 2023. Photo: Barzani’s office/via Ekurd.net

Those abovementioned enterprises are owned by only one member of Barzani’s clan, and there are dozens of them. Add to that Talabani’s clan who is also complicit, should we sum all the stolen money we talk about hundreds of billions of dollars.

After American invasion of Iraq, President George W. Bush initiated an agreement for Baghdad to share the revenue of oil with Kurds. His formula was 20% of Iraqi’s oil revenue to be allocated to Kurdistan region, about $20 billion at that time; accordingly, $10 billion check to be written to both Talabani and Barzani.

From Left: Masrour, Massoud, US president George W. Bush, and Mansour Barzani, October 25, 2005. Photo: Barzanis’ fb

The problem with that agreement was it didn’t stipulate checks and accountability but rather left it to vices natural to men. This is an example of how America exported corruption to Kurdistan as it can be traced wherever America engaged. Should George W. Bush be at the helm, that fund would have been deposited into people’s account rather than Talabani’s and Barzani’s account; and have a group of respected citizens along with the United Nations representatives to monitor the allocation of that fund.

Kurds has been suffering at the hand of these two clans and their leaders for many decades. The deep-seated smoldering resentment would have exploded to topple authoritarian mobs, but their actions has been muted by brutalities of authorities who have been willing to gun down any numbers of people to maintain the status quo.

Iraqi government encumbered Kurdish authorities from selling oil & gas, as a result Kurdish authorities are left without revenue. Now it has been months public employees have not paid their salaries. This has resulted in financial difficulties for people. For lack of a private sector, the government is primary employer, and the public employee’s wages trickle down through the economy supporting the region.



Thousands of teachers protest over unpaid salaries in Sulaimani, Iraqi Kurdistan, Jan 3, 2024. Photo: Screengrab/Rudaw TV

Recently, Iraqi supreme court ordered federal government to pay Kurdistan public servants, the Supreme Court said the central administration would pay government workers, employees at public institutions, that means the Kurdish Regional Government will not be involved. That will discard the shadow payroll whereby thugs of Barzani and Talabani have been enrolling their family members and cronies to draw salary from multiple departments.

Gradually, Iraqi government will regain control of Kurdistan, at the end, Talabani and Barzani will be at the edge of demise. Thanks to Barzani and Talabani, not only the independent Kurdistan but the notion of autonomous Kurdistan is a dead dream without hope of resurrection in the foreseeable future.

Kurdish authorities were in their mission to abuse power and accumulate wealth with impunity and felt invincible for they had American backing. Surely, America counted on Kurds to be a beacon of freedom in the Middle East and has invested it’s hope and money knowing the rise of a democratic Kurdistan would justify its invasion of Iraq. For a few years after American invasion of Iraq, Kurds were well-respected internationally and gained sympathy from the western world for keeping their country safe and fighting terrorism. But American faith on Kurds soon evaporated after they found Barzani’s corroboration with ISIS and genocide of Yazidi Kurds; and knowing that Kurdish authorities are not only undemocratic but further one of corrupted and dictatorial authorities. Now, knowing their demise is near Barzani clan pleading for American support. Any American support to these abominable authorities is betrayal of Kurds; and investment in a country whose failure is warranted due to the wicked leaderships and lack of support from their own people.



Jalal Talabani (L) with Mala Mustafa Barzani (R), 1960s. Photo: Creative Commons/wikimedia

Now you Talabani’s and Barzani’s have invited these dreadful and sorrowful days to the life of Kurds. You both know your end is neigh, and you betrayed your people. At the end, you may not be able to exit as your ancestor did, hopefully you will be judged in a court of law. If not, like your ancestors Mustafa Barzani and Jalal Talabani will be forced to flee the country with your treasures hoarded abroad and leave your people at the mercy of their enemies. Congratulations on how you did so well for yourselves; and left your people with grievances and teras of sorrows in their coming days and years. Last but not least, nothing new under the sun, it’s Kurdish history keeps on repeating itself.

Rauf Naqishbendi is a retired software engineer in the San Francisco Bay Area. A long-time senior contributing writer for Ekurd.net. His memoirs entitled “The Garden Of The Poets”, recently published. It reads as a novel depicting his experience and the subsequent 1988 bombing of his hometown with chemical and biological weapons by Saddam Hussein. It is the story of his people´s suffering, and a sneak preview of their culture and history.

The opinions are those of the writer and do not necessarily represent the views of Ekurd.net or its editors.Read more about Independent Kurdistan state

Copyright © 2024 Ekurd.net. All rights reserve

TAJÊ: Against femicide, be the voice of self-defense

The Freedom's Movement of Êzidî Women launched a new international campaign against femicide.


WOMEN CAMPAIGN AGAINST FEMICIDES
ANF
NEWS DESK
Wednesday, 13 March 2024

The Yazidi women's liberation movement TAJÊ has launched an international campaign against femicide and for the self-defense of women worldwide.

This campaign, which kicked off on 8 March, aims to bring together voices of women and women's organizations until August 3, the tenth anniversary of the genocide and femicide in Shengal.

TAJÊ invites everyone to participate using a variety of methods, such as photos, videos, texts, songs, poems, rallies and demonstrations.

The manifesto for the campaign names five central demands of the Yazidi women's movement. TAJÊ demands that femicide be recognized as a war crime and that all perpetrators and supporters be convicted. Women's right to organized self-defense must find social and institutional acceptance. The massacre committed by ISIS in Shengal ten years ago must be officially classified as genocide at all levels and prosecuted accordingly. TAJÊ also calls for the recognition of the self-administration and security forces established in Shengal after 2014 as the legitimate representation and defense of the community. The cessation of all attacks on Yazidi society, especially the air raids by the Turkish state, is also called for as necessary for survival.

The manifesto reads as follows:

"To the women of the world,

As TAJÊ (Tevgera Azadiya Jinên Êzidî), the Freedom's Movement of Êzidî Women in Şengal, we send our warmest greetings and respect to all the fighting and resisting women in the world. To all those women standing up against the violence against our bodies and souls. To all those women organizing to make a better life possible. To all those women defending their lives, lands and cultures.

The times we live in are marked by brutal wars and inhuman violence. As women, we are beaten, raped, sold, killed and burned. Our lands are occupied and nature destroyed. However, with every new attack, our global resistance and struggle against war, violence and femicide is growing. This gives us hope and strength. Our pain and our resistance is one.

For us as Êzidî women, the year 2024 is a special year. It marks the 10th anniversary of the genocide and femicide committed by the so-called Islamic State (Daesh) in Şengal. On August 3rd, 2014, tens of thousands of Êzidî were murdered, abducted and taken as slaves. Children were forcibly recruited as child soldiers. On top of that, hundreds of thousands of inhabitants of Şengal were expelled from their homeland. Our holy places were blown up and tens of buildings were detonated. However, despite all the difficulties and dangers, hundreds of families remained on the soil of Şengal, took up weapons and resisted against Daesh. They participated in the offensive to liberate Şengal and created their own protection forces, called Yekîneyên Berxwedana Şengalê (YBŞ; Şengal Resistance Units) and Yekîniyên Jinên Şengalê (YJŞ; Şengal Women's Resistance Units).

In all massacres and genocides, women are the ones suffering most. The assimilation and killing of women are frequently adopted as a means to wipe out the identity, culture and belief of a society. When, in 2014, women fell into the hands of Daesh, they were raped, sold as slaves and/or forced into marriage with jihadist fighters. Until today, 2.941 persons, most of them women and children, still remain in the hands of Daesh. The genocidal and femicidal attacks against Şengal are a cruel wound in all our hearts. We assess these attacks as the brutal face of patriarchal violence and therefore as attacks against all women.

We do not accept that, so far, no state and institution has judged Daesh and its accomplices, such as the Turkish State or KDP, for the systematic attacks carried out against the people of Şengal. On August 3rd, 2014, Şengal’s security was under the responsibility of the KRG (Kurdistan Regional Government) and its ruling party, KDP (Kurdistan Democratic Party). However, when Daesh attacked the first villages, 12,000 PDK-peshmerga left Şengal without shooting a single bullet and delivered our people to Daesh. We demand that the responsibility of all forces will be proved and convicted.

The genocide and femicide of August 3rd, 2014 caused lots of pain, trauma and deep losses within our community. However, today this pain is the soil for our resistance. Many fighters have lost their lives for the sake of defending our land and people. We call them Şehîds. They are our light and hope.

After 2014, the people in Şengal organized in all fields of life based on the thoughts of Abdullah Öcalan. As Êzidî women we built the Freedom's Movement of Êzidî Women in Şengal called TAJÊ with the philosophy of JIN JIYAN AZADÎ. With proudness we can say that the mothers of Şengal are at the forefront of our resistance. We are organized in women's councils and work in the fields of culture, health, economy, press and diplomacy.

Our history is a history of struggle and resistance but also a history of 74 genocides. It taught us that we cannot trust in the protection of other forces. After the genocide of August 3rd, 2014, we therefore built our own protection forces, YBŞ, YJŞ and Asayîş Êzidxan (a security structure to meet the daily security needs of the population). YJŞ is a woman’s-only military force and our greatest honor. Today, as Êzidî women, we know how to self-defend. This is our revenge against all the pain we suffered.

However, also ten years after the genocide and femicide, the attacks against our people continue. The Turkish state, with the support of the KDP, is continuously committing air strikes against members of our military forces as well as against civilians. Dozens of our brothers and sisters have been killed in these airstrikes since 2017. Furthermore, the Iraqi state as well as the KDP are trying to abolish our self-organization and self-administration in Şengal through diplomatic pressure and their agreement of October 9th, 2020.

We claim that all suppressed people, societies and beliefs have the right to defend themselves against the danger of genocide and femicide. We consider the self-defense of the people and women of Şengal – that in other ways would be eliminated – as the only legitimate one.

As the freedom movement of Êzidî women, TAJÊ, and the Şengal Women's Resistance Units, YJŞ, we carry out an active struggle against nationalism, religious fundamentalism and especially against sexism, so that in the future no women, people or community of belief will ever again have to face genocides and femicides. We believe that in the countries we live in, we will only reach democracy, freedom and peace if we as women lead the way on the basis of self-determination and free will.

The best response against the atrocities carried out against the Êzidî women is the solidarity and worldwide organization of women.

We therefore declare that the year 2024 will be marked by raising our voices against femicide and for self-defense.

We demand:

1. That femicide will be recognized as a war crime and that all perpetrators are convicted of committing or supporting the systematic killing of women.

2. That the right of women to organize for the defense of their lives, lands and culture will be accepted by all people and institutions.

3. That the genocide of August 3rd, 2014 in Şengal will be offcially recognized as a genocide. This also indicates, that the responsibility of all perpetrators and supporters, including ISIS, KDP, Turkey and Iraq will be proved and convicted.

4. That our self-administration in Şengal as well as our protection forces YBŞ, YJŞ and Asayîş Êzidxan will be accepted as the legitimate representation and protection of our people.

5. That all attacks against our people in Şengal, especially the airstrikes committed by the Turkish state, stop.

From March 8th, International Women’s Day, until August 3rd ,the tenth anniversary of the genocide in Şengal, we will therefore collect the voices, signatures and participation of various women and women’s organization to call on all women across the globe:

Let us unite our voices in the spirit of JIN JIYAN AZADÎ. Let us raise them against femicide and for self-defense.

Together we will demand accountability for the massacres of women in Şengal and every other place on earth."

Croatia becomes third EU country to pass femicide law

In Croatia, with a population of 3.8 million, 13 women were murdered in 2022, 12 of them by a close relative, and 9 in 2023.


FEMICIDE
ANF
NEWS DESK
Thursday, 14 March 2024

Croatia became the third country in the European Union to give femicide a separate legal status.

"With these amendments, we are protecting the rights, safety and dignity of women and sending the message that violence against women is unacceptable," Croatia's conservative Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic said in late February when presenting the proposed law.

The text adopted by parliament stipulates that sentences could range from 10 to 40 years in prison, the maximum penalty under Croatian law.

The amendments to the penal code were adopted with 77 MPs voting in favor and 60 against, the official Hina news agency reported.

According to local NGOs, Croatia has the third highest per capita femicide rate in the EU.

According to EU data, 2,300 women were murdered by their husbands or family members in Europe in 2022.

In Croatia, with a population of 3.8 million, 13 women were murdered in 2022, 12 of them by a close relative, and 9 in 2023.

The government decided to propose this law after the murder of 20-year-old law student Mihaela Berak in September by a police officer with whom she had a brief affair.

Mihaela Berak's death sparked a heated debate about the failures of a system designed to protect victims and the law itself. Demonstrations were organized across the country to demand justice for Mihaela and to call for femicide to have a legal cover.

Prior to Croatia, Cyprus and Malta also gave femicide a separate legal status.

KURDISTAN AUTONOMOUS ZONE SYRIA
Women’s Protection Units (YPJ): On Societal Transformation and Revolutionary Progress

By Berivan Amuda, Hawzhin Azeez

March 5, 2024

Source: The Kurdish Center for Studies


The following is an exclusive KCS interview with Berivan Amuda, from the YPJ (Women’s Protection Units) Information and Documentation Office, which was conducted on December 8th, 2023.

The YPJ was established in 2012 and emerged from the bloody outcome of the Syrian Civil War. Since then, the YPJ has gained global renown as a women’s self-defense force, especially through their revolutionary struggle against ISIS during the siege of Kobanê. Can you define the conditions that contributed to the establishment of this revolutionary women’s movement?

Syria, like many other countries in the region, was engulfed by the Arab Spring. However, instead of the people’s outcry for a dignified life finding an answer, the oppressive systems of rule only increased the levels of violence, and a civil war broke out in Syria that has kept the country fragmented to this day. In addition to the Syrian regime, a number of international powers have intervened in Syria and stationed proxies and mercenaries in the region. None of these powers represent a solution for the people in the slightest, but rather increase misery and deepen the state of war.

The revolution in Rojava presents itself as a third alternative path, different from either the Syrian opposition or the state. However, it did not simply emerge out of nowhere: Kurds and many other groups, including Christians and Arabs, that do not belong to the elite circle of the Syrian regime, have historically been subjected to torture, assimilation, and oppression. The Syrian regime had implemented concrete Arabization plans for the predominantly Kurdish regions, such as the state-planned “Arab belt” of villages near the border with Turkey. The Kurdish language was banned in public, and children were punished with physical violence if they spoke Kurdish in the schoolyard. Thousands of civilians vanished into the torture prisons of the Syrian regime.

Against this oppression, a small part of the population of Rojava began to organize in secret, a development catalyzed by the arrival of Abdullah Öcalan to Syria in 1979. Fundamentally, organizing the people in this way became the basis for founding a system of self-administration, even if no one knew at this time that one day an opportunity like this would arise. By the start of the revolution, Abdullah Ocalan had developed a political paradigm and taught it to thousands, first in academies and after his abduction and imprisonment, by composing his prison writings. He effectively created and implemented a paradigm for women’s liberation, which had spread widely in the society of Rojava. This is certainly one aspect of the basis for the emergence of the YPJ.

On the other hand, the first women guerrillas were developed in Kurdistan’s mountains. With more and more women joining the guerrillas from Rojava and with the formation of the women’s army in 1993, women had already been developing a self-confident and influential fighting force since the mid-1990s. Their experience gave them the knowledge that they can overcome all difficulties and that no matter how few they are, if it is done the right way, they will succeed. Women in Rojava also saw the experiences in the mountains and benefited from the accumulated knowledge of the Kurdish women guerrillas.

Each woman first broke her own shackles, thus breaking the backwardness of society and dealt a blow to the mentality of the oppressive regime in Damascus and the tyranny of ISIS. At the beginning of the revolution, so many women joined self-defense units that two autonomous battalions first emerged, until the YPJ was officially founded in 2013. Of course, there were many classical or feudal reservations in society, which meant that some did not believe that women could effectively participate in their own self-defense.

But women played the biggest role in the war to defend Kobanê against ISIS because of their strong willpower and convictions. With this, the YPJ became a force to be reckoned with in the eyes of the world’s public, seen as heroines defending humanity. From the beginning, the YPJ had to resist both the Syrian regime and forces such as Jabhat al-Nusra, ISIS, and Turkey. What sets the Rojava Revolution apart from everything else in history, is that the usual attitude of “let’s solve this war first and then liberate women” or “let’s establish the system and then change society” simply never existed. It is a revolution that, from day one, has truly been based on a struggle centering women’s liberation and society’s change towards an ethical and political society. So this is why it was the most natural thing to form a women’s army as a core part of this transformation.

Women in Rojava have consistently been the target of various forms of patriarchal violence, including from states such as Turkey or the Syrian regime and organizations such as ISIS and fellow terrorist groups. How do you manage to resist such oppression and what are the challenges that you continue to face in this regard?

Fascist Turkey, the Syrian regime, and ISIS. As much as each of these forces may have used different policies against women, they are all grounded in the same patriarchal and state mentalities. Certainly, horror and violence in history have always taken on different dimensions and generally reached new dimensions in recent years, especially concerning the Turkish dictatorship. However, we can generally speak of a Third World War developing in recent years, the center of which is also here in Kurdistan and in north and east Syria. Accordingly, the women of the region have experienced a great deal of violence and suffering. This includes Turkey’s war of aggression, including the use of phosphorus chemical weapons in Serê Kaniyê, and the abduction and rape of women by Turkey and its aligned mercenaries in the Turkish-occupied areas. It includes the daily horror of ISIS torturing, enslaving, raping, and killing women. There is a disastrous level of violence women have faced and continue to face. What is crucial, however, is that they resist and that they found a different ideology, a solution, in the paradigm of Abdullah Öcalan.

For the revolution in north and east Syria, this is the paradigm of Democratic Confederalism, centered on women’s liberation and ecology. With this mentality, a change has been initiated in every cell of society. While it is about defense, it is also about building a new path. The state system and the reign of terror under ISIS had their mentality defeated. For sure, this change in mentality must become a collective organization. Otherwise, there cannot be real change at the base of society.

The establishment of women’s self-defense units, as well as the organization of society, play an important role in this resistance. The situation in north and east Syria has changed from the ground up. For sure, this is not a completed process, because what we analyze as patriarchal oppression slowly evolving in a five-thousand-year-old system cannot be removed from everyone’s mind in a day. The principal challenge is the change in this mentality itself. So this is an ongoing struggle, involving organizing all women according to their strength and possibility to contribute to the defense of their homeland and the development of the women’s revolution. For sure, it is often the most difficult issue to change our mentality as women ourselves, because only if we overcome our internalized patriarchal beliefs and struggle together in the right way can we achieve success, change our society, and resist.

The YPJ is a powerful symbol of women’s resistance, courage, and agency. Can you identify one key step that women in other societies can take towards gaining greater power and visibility within their societies?

For women, in order to make fundamental change, they first have to fundamentally question a modernity that sells, exploits, rapes, degrades, and disrespects women and turns them into commodities. If we understand this, we can understand that there is a need for women to organize together and take charge of major areas of their lives. This has to happen in an autonomous way, including in self-defense. Without autonomy, liberation cannot be reached because there is simply no space where women can question and overcome patriarchal influences. For sure, there is no one specific program that you can just place into any society. You rather need to understand the true necessities and realities of all women in this society and develop an approach according to this. If today we speak of the self-defense of women, this doesn’t necessarily only mean to develop a women’s army; it can take on different forms.

So if we were to propose a concrete step to take, it would be this: for women worldwide to develop their common confederal organizations, focusing on the central issue of self-defense in the broadest sense.




Between your courageous fight against ISIS and ongoing resistance against the oppressive policies of the Turkish regime, which has been the greater challenge?

The fight against ISIS cost thousands of martyrs and great sacrifices, but the military threat of Turkey is greater because it is backed by NATO. After all, ISIS was just a proxy force used by state powers, but the powers that supported ISIS, like Turkey, remain undeterred by the defeat of ISIS. It has been proven that the YPJ and YPG were able to defeat ISIS while largely being abandoned by the world. This also shows that you can achieve anything if you are determined to and have a strong ideological basis.

Technologically, Turkey is much more equipped than ISIS was. The continuous drone war and use of aircraft is, for sure, something that harms the people of north and east Syria a great deal and costs the lives of many civilians, members of self-defense forces, and politicians. But what actually makes a major difference is the political credibility that international powers give Turkey. In front of the world’s eyes, Turkey occupied Afrin and Serê Kaniyê through brutal wars and continued ethnic cleansing and assimilation politics towards the different population groups of the region, especially the Kurdish people.

Turkey attempts to occupy and annex major parts of northern Syria, mostly Rojava and parts of Southern Kurdistan (northern Iraq). The international support that Turkey receives for this war and for its attempt to destroy the alternative that the Rojava revolution represents is what makes Turkey more dangerous than the attacks of ISIS. So in this sense, it will always be more challenging to resist Turkey. But also, the fascistic Turkish state is in a state of crisis, which makes it possible to resist and defeat it. But this will continue to require great sacrifices.

There is a powerful quote by the American Black woman and scholar Audre Lorde who states, “I am not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different from my own.” The YPJ is not solely a Kurdish women’s military organization. It is so much more than that in scope, aspirations, and objectives. What are the commonalities between women, say in Kobanê and those in Afghanistan, Latin America, Sweden, or Canada?

For sure, it was Audre Lorde’s aspiration to understand and struggle against women’s oppression while not forgetting that there are other issues to face, such as racism. Much of what she analyzed is also addressed in the writings of Abdullah Öcalan. He built his paradigm around the concept of the Democratic Nation, which allows different religious or ethnic groups to live according to their own culture and maintain autonomy, while at the same time creating common ground and the framework of an ethical and political societal life. In this framework, the YPJ is also a force that includes different societal groups, such as Yazidis, Christians, Arabs, Turkmen, and so on. Some build their own defense forces, like the Armenian Battalion or the Bethnahrain Women’s Protection Forces – an Assyrian all-women defense unit that is part of the SDF. Others took part in the YPJ, with all uniting to defend their homelands in north and east Syria.

Our approach to women’s liberation is so unique that we attempt to analyze the core of women’s enslavement by analyzing and teaching about the roots of women’s oppression that developed after the Neolithic Age. This also leads us to develop different perspectives than the ones of many feminists and critical thinkers, in the sense that we see the need to analyze even further the nature of the issue and its historical roots. If we do not do this, we can fall again into the trap of staying within the framework of liberalism or simply not succeed in developing solutions for society.

We are very aware, from the start of our struggle, that it is one for all women. Today, an average woman in the western world might see herself as privileged in some ways, but essentially, the means of patriarchal violence, whether it is war, domestic violence, exploitation as a commodity, or rape culture, target every woman in some way. It is also a reality that even a woman who may not face femicide herself will be consciously or unconsciously affected by other women facing such violence. We shouldn’t ever fall into the trap of seeing things from a solely individual point of view. The killing of women sends a clear message to all women in this sense: It spreads the message to avoid making your voice heard and to conform to a patriarchal and fascist system. The faces of ISIS attacking Kobanê or the Taliban in Afghanistan are only the most obvious and violent manifestations of the same mentality.

But women worldwide should also develop the same sense of responsibility that many of us have already. The ones who do not see themselves as oppressed or only want a bigger role in the system of patriarchy, monopolies, and exploitation might even be the ones who are the most enslaved by modernity, unable to dissociate from its framework. We are all in need of freedom and we are all in need of developing our organization for self-defense. We also need to make our voices heard as women, when forces like the Taliban or Turkey systematically target women.

As a women’s movement that emerged within the context of the Kurdish liberation movement in Rojava, the war against ISIS, and the ongoing invasions and terrorism imposed by Turkey, the challenges faced by your movement have been immense. How has the YPJ attempted to reform and evolve in response to these obstacles?

The history of the revolution is full of vanguards and pioneers. In the most difficult situations, there were always women in our struggle standing up and finding new steps to take. What plays a major factor in this is education. Whenever we faced major challenges, we asked ourselves, “What is the aspect of our own strategical approach that we didn’t grasp or discuss sufficiently?” and then we adapt and strengthen our educational programs and methods according to this; we self-criticize. Some methods that were used against ISIS cannot be used against Turkey because it is a very different force we are facing, so for sure we have made tactical changes.

It is also possible that other international powers will intervene and attack us. So we take pride in always learning from our experiences and preparing for any possible changes. Also, we always closely monitor the historical phase that we are passing through and challenge ourselves to become an adequate respondent to it. For self-defense against major state forces, this means professionalization and, most importantly, becoming even more one with society. Without the power of society, there is no possibility of defeating attackers like state forces. For this reason, our strategic basis today is the revolutionary people’s war. That means organizing every part of ethical and political society and of daily life according to the needs of legitimate self-defense.

What have been some of the key successes of the YPJ since its inception in 2013?

If we speak about the major successes of the YPJ, we must first speak about the change YPJ’s establishment brought for women in Rojava. Women became an autonomous force, from the first battalions to the first YPJ conference and its foundation on April 4, 2013. From the beginning, the YPJ decided to be a force for all women and our struggle had a major impact on society. It is the first and only successfully established women’s army in the region. It made major contributions not only to the freedom of Kurdish women, but also Arab, Turkmen and Christian women. It was the example and practical assistance of the YPJ that made it possible to establish forces like the Assyrian self-defense force. This shows women in the Middle East a clear model for a solution, which in itself is a major success. The YPJ contributed major steps to the education of women in a new, liberated mindset. Broad and colorful systems of academies, from military education to practical skills, but most importantly, ideological education, have been developed. Many of these take place in both Kurdish and Arabic. The YPJ has changed society from the ground up; this is a major success.

There are also many military successes that we could mention, most prominently: the YPJ was involved in the liberation of Şengal, home of the Yazidi people, in 2015, after the brutal genocide by ISIS in 2014. Even if Şengal is in Southern Kurdistan (north Iraq), the YPJ saw it as its moral responsibility to come to aid the Yazidis when the world abandoned them. The YPJ most prominently played its role in the opening of a safe corridor for the fleeing Yazidi population from ISIS, saving thousands of civilians from the same fate that ten thousand Yazidi suffered under the ISIS genocide. There were also several offensives in which the YPJ took on the pioneering role of the people’s defense.

The most prominent example of this is the liberation of the city center of Kobanê in 2016, completed on January 26th. For the first time, the eyes of the world were on the Rojava Revolution, while the YPJ defeated the much better-equipped ISIS attackers with sheer willpower. Following this, the liberation of Manbij from ISIS in 2016 was a major step, as it showed that the YPJ also stood up for a predominantly Arab region, gaining the trust of all the women of north and east Syria and showing what the Democratic Nation and women’s unity can truly mean.

Another, and possibly the most known example, is the liberation of Raqqa in October 2017, when the city was completely liberated from ISIS. The YPJ played the decisive vanguard role in this offensive. For sure, this was a major defeat for ISIS since they saw Raqqa as their political epicenter; the YPJ truly broke the backbone of ISIS. This is a success that changed the history of humanity.

As 2023 draws to a close, the international system is in crisis, and the global pandemic has destroyed social, economic, and political structures, causing increasing havoc. As a result, the situation and condition of women, colonized, stateless, and oppressed peoples globally are increasingly dire. What is the message of the YPJ to such communities as they face these bleak times?

We have already said that we are facing a situation that we can name the Third World War, with the Middle East as one major center. Certainly, everywhere in the world, crises or wars are showing up, and this is mainly proof of what we are already sure of: that there has to be an alternative modernity and that we cannot live with this status quo. Whether it is exploitation or war, oppression will only continue to intensify if we do not organize. To struggle does not merely mean to wait for opportunities or to only continue with limited approaches that do not solve the root of the issues. It is essential to develop approaches that follow new methods that strengthen democratic modernity.

We have to know that this isn’t an easy way and it cannot be solved by a single issue or a one-method struggle. If we speak of the environmental crisis, for example, we have to acknowledge that it is a sign that humanity in general has to understand that life cannot continue at the current pace of capitalist modernity, and the pandemic is a part of this. So we shouldn’t fall into the trap of searching for the solution to the problem in the same places and approaches that created it.

We have to analyze the greater truth of these problems, and we as the YPJ are convinced that Abdullah Öcalan offers an important perspective on this. We clearly see the pain and despair the world is going through; everywhere in the world there is the horrifying oppression of women, exploitation, and continuing genocides. We encourage every individual to see all of this as further evidence that democratic modernity—the liberation from this oppression—can and will be reached if we struggle. We very much hope that all the resisting forces of the world can continue to strengthen their bonds and see our common ground of struggle in order to face this situation with hope.




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2 PKK-linked fighters killed in Iraqi airstrike blamed on Turkey

ByTurkish Minute
February 29, 2024

A Turkish drone airstrike in northwestern Iraq killed two members of a group affiliated with Turkey’s outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) on Thursday, Agence France-Presse reported, citing Kurdish authorities.

The fighters were members of the Sinjar Resistance Units, a group founded among the district’s Yazidi community in response to a brutal occupation by the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) radical group nearly a decade ago.

There was no immediate word from the Turkish military, which has conducted deadly strikes against PKK targets in Iraq and neighboring Syria but rarely comments on individual strikes.

“A Turkish army drone targeted a vehicle of the Sinjar Resistance Units in the region of Wardiya in southern Sinjar, killing an official and a fighter who was escorting him,” the counterterrorism services of Iraq’s autonomous Kurdish region said in a statement.

Another fighter was injured.

Sinjar and its adjacent mountains are one of the heartlands of Iraq’s Yazidi community, a non-Muslim Kurdish speaking minority that was savagely oppressed by ISIL militants when they overran the district in 2014.

The Sinjar Resistance Units were formed in 2014 with help from fellow Kurds of the PKK, which Ankara and its Western allies consider a “terrorist” organization.

The Sinjar force is also affiliated to the Hashed al-Shaabi, an alliance of mainly Shiite armed groups formed to fight ISIL and now integrated in the regular Iraqi armed forces.

Turkey frequently carries out ground and air offensives on positions of the PKK — which has waged a decades-long war against the Turkish state — in northern Iraq.

It also has over the past 25 years operated several dozen military bases in northern Iraq in its war against the PKK.

On February 20, two civilians were killed in a strike in northern Iraq that was blamed on Turkey, security and health officials said.