Jun 2, 2010
May 1, 2010
Jewish buildings in southern Kurdistan
One of the few original buildings in the Jewish quarter in Silêmanî (Sulaimaniyah), iraqi Kurdistan 
Near Zarvia Dji, "The Land of the Jews" - outside Akre.
Apr 25, 2010
Dec 28, 2009
Israel-Kurd free online!
The newly established Israel Kurd magazine has released its first issue online as a PDF file.
Please share and read!
READ ISRAEL-KURD Issue nr.1! (.PDF FILE)
IsraelKurd.com (English) IsraelKurd.com (Kurdish)
Appeal from an Israel – kurd organization to the world public opinion about the current situation in Turkey in general and Kurdistan in the private
The Time at which all the politics and leaders in the free world trying and take steps opining doors for democracy prevails and promotion of human rights, the time we still remember what the Nazis committed crimes against Humanity, we believe that the current crimes are binging with the Kurdish people at this moment.
The Turkish government practice immoral Rights of the Kurdish people in Turkey and immoral the rights of leaders elected by the people and arresting them in prisons with have no rights, and to losing most basic rights of citizenship without respecting basic laws of Human Rights in the world, here to be an appeal to the leaders of the world and to the free world nations led by the United Nation and the United state of America and European Union, tell them you want to make the Kurdish people and the liberation movement as a terrorist movement such as Taliban, al-Qaeda, hamas and Islamic jihad and Lebanon Hezbollah terrorist’s.
For a nobility that we would kindly ask you to all humanitarian duty and responsibility of historical incident to you that you intervene with all power you have to stop these crimes and violations and un democratic practice against Kurdish people as soon as possible , do appeal to Turkish government to stopping this indiscriminate against Kurdish nation.we believe that
the middle east does not need to be a forty million kurds people, rather than the exercise of democratic rights and humanitarian action to change movements and extremist groups who suffer from the world, we as a people are going take the same sufferings
Once again, this humanitarian appeal and an entrepreneur directed to the international conscience to take action to contain and resolve this, salute and thank all stakeholders who interact with human conscience with the issue that people sympathize with the oppressed and suffering with our best wishes and appreciation to all of you.
26-12-2009 Dawood Baghstani President of Israel- Kurd Organization http://www.israelkurd.com/en/
Aug 11, 2009
Kurds inviting Kurdish Jews back to Kurdistan from Israel
(Newspaper "Israel Kurds")
Is no longer strange that the eye is the Star of David on top of the first page of a newspaper or magazine, issued in the autonomous province, and he frowned a banner headline that read versions of those calling for the return of Jews to the region. Some of these calls were published and promoted by the magazine "Israel Kurds" by the Kurdish people in Arbil, the capital of the province.
And promote the magazine explicitly to accept the return of Jews to the region they are Kurds, and publishes statistics on the presence of more than 150 Kurdish Jew.
Reactions to the grass-roots level in the Kurdish street, ranging from indifference and welcome.
In a report aired by Al Arabiya television said the Kurdish people: "I am the owner of the library and bring all the magazines and publications of the time before and after the Intifada."
Another says that if the rights of Jews in the region are welcome, and easy for them, considering that this is normal if an Israeli or an Israeli.
While a third say that the call was unusual, they are human beings and we are humans and we will visit them as tourists and they come to their country.
Even among some of the Islamists, they do not see in it a provocation to the feelings of Muslims but just a suggestion.
For his part, said Farhad Awni headline the Kurds that the issuance of the magazine and its call for the return of the Jews in accordance with the law, which does not allow the existence of barriers to the press and freedom of expression even though the street, in conformity with the official opinion of the federal government refuses to establish relations with Israel.
Contrary to those views in a Jewish neighborhood in Erbil, where the buildings still reflect the footprint of building the Jewish people through some of the fear of such a return in the near future.
The woman in the age of them, "When I lived in the region has not a Jew, and came back and started to remember the Jewish area, and he said this was my home and I heard that the Jews to get out of the region said that we will get back in the day, and I do not have a home and need-to-house."
Aug 9, 2009
Discords over Kurd-Israel ties
“Kurdish leaders have repeated several times, if Iraq has relations with Israel, that relation directly incorporates Kurds,” head of KDP foreign relations Safin Dizayee said. We are committed to the Iraqi constitution as it put foreign relations directly to shoulders of the Iraqi foreign ministry, he added.
Having relations with a democratic country like Israel is not a sin and most of the Arab countries have relations with it, Kurdish writer and journalist Zirak Kamal said.
Those who say that Kurds have relations with Israel have no evidence as “there is no relation between both’, college instructor Marif Omer said. Relations is built according to development and economic interests, so there is nothing dangerous in that, Omer said.
AKnews
Jul 20, 2009
Bengio: Israel has no clear Kurdish policy
Bengio: Israel has no clear Kurdish policy
By Hawar Abdulrazaq
Ofra Bengio is senior research fellow at the Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and Africa Studies and senior lecturer in the Department of Middle Eastern History at Tel Aviv University. She is the author of Saddam's Word: Political Discourse in Iraq (1998) and co-editor of Minorities and the State in the Arab World (1999) and The Turkish-Israeli Relation: Changing Ties of Middle Eastern Outsiders (2004).
She says in an interview with Rudaw that Israel has no clear policy towards the Kurds and that the Kurdish government fears for an Arabic backlash, if they establish clear relations with Israel.
Is there are relation between Iraqi Kurds and Israel?
According to different sources there are certain ties between Israel and the Kurds but these are mostly through third parties. In fact certain business transactions had existed even under Saddam Hussein who benefited from certain goods coming from Israel but which did not carry the name Israel.
Does the Israeli government has a clear policy towards Kurds?
I do not think there is clear Israeli policy towards the Kurds because the Kurds themselves are ambivalent about such relations and because Jerusalem does not want to antagonize Turkey.
Do you think it’s love or ignorance that Kurds living in a Muslim region still like Israel?
As two non-Arab peoples the Israelis and the Kurds see eye to eye on certain things. The Kurds of Iraq may take the Israeli experience as a model. Israelis on the other hand have great sympathy with the sufferings of the Kurds which were persecuted by the regimes in Iraq. They would like to see them prospering in their autonomous region. Officially Israel has nothing to do with the way the Iraqi state develops. It is an entirely Iraqi business.
America has softened it’s stance towards Iran. Do you think they will so far as given up on Iran’s nuclear program and the normalization of U.S and Iran's relations?
The American policy has not yet crystallized. It is still in the stage of trial and error and there is therefore great ambivalence and ambiguity in its declarations and policies. It certainty does not want to see Iran going nuclear but on the other hand does not know how to tackle the problem. as to Obama relations with Israel it is not as strong and as intimate as that of Bush but things may change in the future. For now Jerusalem and Washington do not see eye to eye on the means to solve the Iranian issue but Developments in North Korea might change The American soft approach.
After Erdogan’s angry statements towards Israel and his support to Hamas, is Israel thinking of replacing Turkey with the Kurds as their strongest alley in the region?
Relations between Israel and Turkey have suffered of late a severe crisis. Still neither of the two seems willing to give up altogether their strategic relations due to certain common dangers emanating from Iran for example. Relations between Israel on the one hand and Turkey and the Kurds on the other need not be mutually exclusive. Turkey has relations with Israel and the Palestinians and Israel can have relations with Turkey and the KRG. In fact it is the KRG which is reluctant to have such relations for fear of the reaction of the Arab world and especially of the Arabs of Iraq. In spite of the toning down of anti Israeli rhetoric's in Baghdad the possibility of it having relations with Israel seem far fetched now. The same is true for an Israeli consulate in Irbil.
How do you see the Kurdish future?
The Kurdish movement appears to be in a better shape now than any time in the past. The Kurdish experiment in Iraq is quite successful and the Kurds of Turkey are also gaining more and more rights. There are strong voices in Turkey for peaceful solutions of the Kurdish problem there while Ankara has been the lifeline for the KRG. The Kurdish situation is in a great flux in the region but it seems that their gains in Iraq for example cannot be taken from them any more.
Jul 13, 2009
Nahariya back to Kurdistan
Eddie wave Published: 18.06.09, 15:37
Cshgis Mordechai Ben Menashe, Nahariya -72 year old, the passport Israeli policeman at the airport customs of Irbil, northern Iraq, it was for the most natural thing to do. For Ben Menashe, Northern Iraq is a second home and visiting there is not more from a visit to Roots. Customs cop, something surprised submitted her passport, a question in English what exactly does Ben Menachem name.
Mordechai, without be confused, said her straight Kurdish, a tone of irony, that when living there, is not yet born. "Clerical Hmoftat, she saw that I understand the language, she called the officer pulled be confused without the visa stamp and put me on the Israeli passport."
Thus, for two weeks, turned Ben Menashe along with three other friends dragging him from the country, across the North of Iraq, makes a good time, and the health of the clean air Kurdistan, already planning the next visit to Iraq.
"I knew that there will be problems. I have contacts there I save over the years. I knew that they were willing to give everyone one has an Israeli passport, which says he was born in Iraq, to visit there."
Ben Menashe's story at first sounds like a thousand stories night and night, but his apartment in Nahariya, he shows pride and the Israeli passport stamp can not be confused
About identity: Iraqi Republic, in English and Arabic.
Scattered on the table numerous pictures, some meaningful special מקברי צדיקים northern Iraq. Ben Menashe was born 72 years ago Bkozing 'kilometers, then a small town with 25 thousand inhabitants, the city is developed with approximately - 300 thousand inhabitants. His father, Avraham z "l, who was the owner of a gold shop in the city and died in Iraq, Sarah, immigrated to Israel in 1951, through Cyprus with nine children.
The family settled in Afula and Mordechai married with a beautiful wife passed Nahariya. Ben Menashe remember well his childhood in Iraq and after 58 years in the country. He speaks Kurdish and Arabic, is rooted in what is happening there, up to date trip to North Iraq was not, apparently, the last. During the conversation with him it became clear that there has already visited Cssdam Hussein controlled the country.
Between Jews Kurds have good relations, which lasted hundreds of years. Always these two minorities were Hnrdfim Ocrto alliance in Iraq. Even today, according to the Menashe Jews Kurds consider their alliance. Took a picture of one of the pictures belong to a visit last appears respectable, dressed in clothes of traditional Kurds.
Ben Menashe no satisfaction in the cities visited Kurdish north of Iraq, and he also visited the cities Mosol, softening, etc., Arab towns in Israel where love is not really flush. "Kurds have given him four soldiers will be accompanied by us in the cities of the Arab. There is much in קברי צדיקים, grave of the Prophet Daniel, Hanania's help. Visited them all."
Not afraid? Though Iraq is still at war.
"I do not remember even one moment of fear. Not really. Kurdish region received us like kings. Dynasty even invited us to the district to visit. In the Arab soldiers accompanied us and it was fine. While we were there was an explosion and the north - 24 people were killed. But the officer who accompanied us said assumption assumptions tadpole not Hurt ".
Jul 8, 2009
Jun 20, 2009
Jews in Khanaqin, southern Kurdistan
A typical wealthy house of old Khanaqin town. This one is near the old " Seray" just a street across from the river Elwen. It belonged to a jewish family. They were uprouted in late 1940es by the Arab iraqi government. In 2005 the neighbours still remebered them. They had sold the house to Ghazi Agha Bajalan.
May 11, 2009
Apr 13, 2009
Apr 8, 2009
Editor's Column about the Jews in Kurdistan
Editor's Column
Enduring voices
April 9, 2009
I was exchanging e-mails recently with a reader about a column I wrote defending endogamy — that is, marriage between two Jews. “A bigot is one strongly loyal to one’s own social group, yet irrationally and prejudicially intolerant or disdainful of others,” he wrote. “If this paper’s chief editor is not a bigot — as he hopes — after reading this [column], I’m left wondering what he thinks he is.”
I was exchanging e-mails recently with a reader about a column I wrote defending endogamy — that is, marriage between two Jews. “A bigot is one strongly loyal to one’s own social group, yet irrationally and prejudicially intolerant or disdainful of others,” he wrote. “If this paper’s chief editor is not a bigot — as he hopes — after reading this [column], I’m left wondering what he thinks he is.”
I don’t think I am intolerant of anything, unless you count lactose.
But his question continues to nag at me: Why does any culture value its own transmission, and can I justify the Jewish obsession with continuity in an era of multiple identities and, the flip side, violent tribalism?
In my defense, I quoted the work of K. David Harrison, a linguist who studies dying languages. According to his Enduring Voices Project, “Nearly 80 percent of the world’s population speaks only one percent of its languages. When the last speaker of a language dies, the world loses the knowledge that was contained in that language.”
By extension, Judaism is a culture with a rich language — not just Hebrew or Yiddish but a language of ritual, of social norms, of worship, of behaviors that order its practitioners’ world — in short, a rich system of knowledge. To dedicate oneself to preserving that shows no disdain for other cultures. Consider: When colonial powers try to wipe away traces of an indigenous culture, we call it ethnic cleansing. When Jews seek other Jews in order to live as rich a Jewish life as possible, some call it bigotry.
Soon after this exchange I came upon Ariel Sabar’s beautiful new book, My Father’s Paradise: A Son’s Search for His Jewish Past in Kurdish Iraq. Sabar’s father, Yona, is the world’s preeminent expert on Neo-Aramaic, the language he grew up speaking in the Jewish quarter of Zakho, a Kurdish market town in northern Iraq. The book traces Yona’s journey from Kurdistan to Israel to southern California, where he is a professor at UCLA.
The book is an American-born, journalist son’s attempt to reconnect with a father he once dismissed as an awkward, hopelessly uncool immigrant. But it is also a rumination on language and Jewish culture, and the ways, and worth, of trying to preserve both.
For perhaps 1,700 years and until the seventh-century rise of Arabic, Aramaic was to the Levant what English is to the modern world: its lingua franca. The language lives on in the Talmud, the Zohar, the traditional wedding ketuba, and other texts. You hear it in the Mourner’s Kaddish and the Kol Nidrei prayer chanted on Yom Kippur eve.
But “lives” is a relative term — Aramaic began disappearing as a living Jewish language with the immigration of Iraq’s small Kurdish-Jewish community to Israel in the 1950s. Like Yona Sabar, Kurdish Jews made a lightning leap from the 18th century to the 20th, and the language barely made the crossing.
Ariel Sabar recreates the lost Jewish world of Zakho, where his hard-working grandparents thrived as dyers and textile merchants. Israel is a shock, and Yona’s parents and grandfather are adrift in the ramshackle tent cities and slums built to accommodate the flood of new immigrants. As Kurds, they occupy perhaps the lowest rung on Israel’s strict ladder of ethnic hierarchy. (One of the book’s heroes is Itzhak Ben-Zvi, Israel’s second president, an Ashkenazi Jew who championed the study and preservation of “Oriental” Jewish cultures.)
Out of this world Yona emerges as an unlikely scholar at Hebrew University with a rare distinction: fluency in a language that other scholars know only from the synagogue and dusty manuscripts. He soon lands at Yale and eventually becomes a lionized academic and teacher in Los Angeles. Writes Ariel: “Teaching Aramaic in America, I came to see, was how he sang God’s song in a strange land.”
Ariel, meanwhile, grows up a typical California kid, embarrassed by his father’s eccentricities and distant from his plucked Jewish roots. Ariel marries a non-Jewish woman and, while he pledges to raise their son as a Jew, disappoints the family by refusing to have the boy circumcised.
And here a reader is tempted to cluck his tongue and lament the withering of another branch on the Jewish family tree. But there is something cannier and more surprising going on in My Father’s Paradise. Ariel thinks long and hard about what we owe the past, and the future. He can’t live his father’s life, any more than his father can live in the dusty alleyways of Zakho. But he can tell the story of the Kurdish Jews, of Aramaic, and of his father’s heroic efforts to remember both.
Ariel Sabar made his choices; you and I might make others. His book suggests the various ways we can embrace diversity while adding new chapters to the cultures we inherit.
“Jews had carried a flame into the hills of Kurdistan, and they carried it out, still burning, 2,700 years later,” he writes. “My father touched another candle to it and brought it across continents. I didn’t want it to die with me. If my children ever feel adrift, unsure of who they are, I want that candle to still be burning.”
Apr 7, 2009
Jewish presence in Kurdistan
Jewish presence in Kurdistan goes back to the 9th century BC when Assyrian king Shalmeneser III settled deported Jews in the area between 858 and 824 BC. In the first century BC, Jewish teachers gave their congregations the freedom to proselytize which resulted in many Kurds converting to Judaism.
By the beginning of the 2nd century AD, Judaism was well established in Kurdistan Jewish presence continued until the middle of this century when the modem state of Israel was formed.
In the 17th Century AD Rabbi Samuel Barzani founded numerous seminaries and schools in Kurdistan. Even in this century, in the early 1900s several Jewish schools were open for both Jewish and non-Jewish Kurds. These schools remained in operation until shortly after the formation of the Jewish state in 1948. Since then many Kurdish Jews have moved to Israel where they live in Kurdish enclaves and maintain their ethnic customs.
Many older Kurds still carry memories of their Jewish neighbors and friends.
By the beginning of the 2nd century AD, Judaism was well established in Kurdistan Jewish presence continued until the middle of this century when the modem state of Israel was formed.
In the 17th Century AD Rabbi Samuel Barzani founded numerous seminaries and schools in Kurdistan. Even in this century, in the early 1900s several Jewish schools were open for both Jewish and non-Jewish Kurds. These schools remained in operation until shortly after the formation of the Jewish state in 1948. Since then many Kurdish Jews have moved to Israel where they live in Kurdish enclaves and maintain their ethnic customs.
Many older Kurds still carry memories of their Jewish neighbors and friends.
Apr 3, 2009
David Star on Amed Wall, Kurdistan
David Star on Amed Wall, northern Kurdistan (Diyarbakir, Southeast Turkey)
Starting from the earliest times, the city was ruled by the Hurri-Mithani, Hittites and Assyrians. It was once the capital city of the Arami Bit-Zamani Kingdom. It was later occupied or ruled by the Meds, Persians, Macedonians, Seleukos, Romans, the Ilkhanide and the Akkoyunlu Seljuks. It is referred to as Amidi, Amid, Amido or Amida in different sources. In Islamic - Arabic sources it is cited as "Diyar-i Berk". In the republican era it is started to be known as Diyarbakir deriving from the copper ore existing in the area.
(The Amed wall)Apr 1, 2009
"Kurds and Jews"
Pictures from the event:
"Kurder och judar" - information in Swedish from Fredrik Malms blog
Tuesday March 31, 2009 kl. 18.30
Jewish Center, Nybrogatan 19, 2 tr. Valentin Hall
Fredrik Malm, Member of Parliament for the Liberal Party and chairman of the Stockholm section of the Sweden-Israel, speaking of politics, oppression and cultural heritage.
Many Kurds and Jews feel moral and political solidarity with each other. Thousands of Kurdish Jews emigrated in the 1950s from Kurdistan to Israel. Today, the Kurds in Iraq upon their autonomy, particularly with Israel as a source of inspiration.
"Kurder och judar" - information in Swedish from Fredrik Malms blog
KURD AND JEWS
The Jewish Friendassociation greet all welcome for a program on
Kurds - of Jews only friends in the Middle East?
The Jewish Friendassociation greet all welcome for a program on
Kurds - of Jews only friends in the Middle East?
Tuesday March 31, 2009 kl. 18.30
Jewish Center, Nybrogatan 19, 2 tr. Valentin Hall
Fredrik Malm, Member of Parliament for the Liberal Party and chairman of the Stockholm section of the Sweden-Israel, speaking of politics, oppression and cultural heritage.
Many Kurds and Jews feel moral and political solidarity with each other. Thousands of Kurdish Jews emigrated in the 1950s from Kurdistan to Israel. Today, the Kurds in Iraq upon their autonomy, particularly with Israel as a source of inspiration.
Mar 28, 2009
Israeli-Kurdish Friendship League
The Israeli-Kurdish Friendship League(IKFL) was established in Jerusalem, in 1993, by activists and scholars from Israel and the US. Its raison d'être was to foster bonds of friendship, as well as cultural and scholarly ties, between Israelis, Jews and Kurds worldwide.
Mar 1, 2009
Ben-Zion Israeli's travel to Kurdistan
Material from ynetnews.com about the journeys of Ben-Zion.
This article and the following one will feature photos from the 1930s documenting Ben-Zion's trips to Egypt, Iraq, Kurdistan and Persia. Ben-Zion was sent on a mission by the Zionist settlement, which sought to revive the growing of palms in Israel.
Ben-Zion meets with Jews in the village of Sindoor
Ben-Zion meets with Jewish families in the village of Sindoor
1934, Jews' homes in the village of Sindoor in Kurdistan 
In the city of Kirkuk, known for its oil wells (Ben-Zion is holding on to the electric pole)
In 1934, the Agency asked Ben-Zion to contact the Israel community in Mosul. In the photo: A classroom for Jewish children with the teacher holding a stick
Kirkuk
1933, Ben-Zion near Prophet Jonah's grave in Nineveh (Mosul)
That year Ben-Zion travels to the Kurdistan region in order to contact the Israel communities in the villages. This is a photo from one of the villages in Kurdistan
D. Ben-Zion meeting with Jewish families in village of Sindoor 
C. Ben-Zion standing next to 102-year-old Jew in village of Sindoor, Kurdistan
B. A convoy of camels in Kurdistan Feb 15, 2009
Feb 5, 2009
CHAK "The Kurdish people are with you" - Holocaust rememberence
The Kurdish people are with you
- CHAK (The Centre of Halabja against Anfalazation and Genocide of Kurds)
The Holocaust was the systematic murder of millions of Jewish people by the Nazi regime and its collaborators before and during WWII. The Holocaust is the most brutal genocide that history has ever witnessed, and Kurdish people join Jewish people all over the world in remembering the Holocaust.
Unfortunately, humanity has witnessed the genocide of a number of peoples both before and after WWII. Currently, the world passively watches the genocide ofthe people of Darfur. Such brutal crimes against humanity are not hidden away in our past but are real in many corners of the world today. We must do something together to stop this madness.
Kurdish people have also dealt with this most terrible of crimes: the slaughter of Ezdi Kurds by the young Turks in 1916; genocide committed by the Kemalist regime of Turkey between 1937 and 1938; the mass killing and ethnic cleansing crimes against the Faili Kurds by the Arab regimes of Iraq; the mass killings of around 8,000 Barzani Kurds in 1983; the chemical bombardment of Kurdish villages between 1987 and 1988; the chemical attacks on Serdashtin 1987; the chemical attacks on Halabja in 1988, which killed 5,000 people; and the ethnic cleansing attacks that culminated during the Anfal genocidal campaign in 1988, resulting in the disappearance of approximately 182,000 Kurds and the destruction of around 4,000 Kurdish villages.
Kurdish people are still oppressed by Turkey, Iran, and Syria, and many crimes against Kurds continue today, such as the prosecution and murder of intellectuals and human rights activists and the bombarding of Kurdish villages.While we are remembering the tragedy of the Holocaust, we appeal to the international community to do something to stop crimes against humanity everywhere in the world and make the world a more peaceful place for allpeople regardless of race, religion, faith, color, or culture.
- CHAK (The Centre of Halabja against Anfalazation and Genocide of Kurds)
The Holocaust was the systematic murder of millions of Jewish people by the Nazi regime and its collaborators before and during WWII. The Holocaust is the most brutal genocide that history has ever witnessed, and Kurdish people join Jewish people all over the world in remembering the Holocaust.
Unfortunately, humanity has witnessed the genocide of a number of peoples both before and after WWII. Currently, the world passively watches the genocide ofthe people of Darfur. Such brutal crimes against humanity are not hidden away in our past but are real in many corners of the world today. We must do something together to stop this madness.
Kurdish people have also dealt with this most terrible of crimes: the slaughter of Ezdi Kurds by the young Turks in 1916; genocide committed by the Kemalist regime of Turkey between 1937 and 1938; the mass killing and ethnic cleansing crimes against the Faili Kurds by the Arab regimes of Iraq; the mass killings of around 8,000 Barzani Kurds in 1983; the chemical bombardment of Kurdish villages between 1987 and 1988; the chemical attacks on Serdashtin 1987; the chemical attacks on Halabja in 1988, which killed 5,000 people; and the ethnic cleansing attacks that culminated during the Anfal genocidal campaign in 1988, resulting in the disappearance of approximately 182,000 Kurds and the destruction of around 4,000 Kurdish villages.
Kurdish people are still oppressed by Turkey, Iran, and Syria, and many crimes against Kurds continue today, such as the prosecution and murder of intellectuals and human rights activists and the bombarding of Kurdish villages.While we are remembering the tragedy of the Holocaust, we appeal to the international community to do something to stop crimes against humanity everywhere in the world and make the world a more peaceful place for allpeople regardless of race, religion, faith, color, or culture.
Kurdocide Watch (CHAK) January 2009
Feb 1, 2009
Israel hopes to colonize parts of Iraq as ‘Greater Israel’
Previously published in the Wayne Madsen Report.
By Wayne Madsen
Online Journal Contributing Writer
(WMR) -- Israeli expansionists, their intentions to take full control of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip and permanently keep the Golan Heights of Syria and expand into southern Lebanon already well known, also have their eyes on parts of Iraq considered part of a biblical “Greater Israel.”
Israel reportedly has plans to relocate thousands of Kurdish Jews from Israel, including expatriates from Kurdish Iran, to the Iraqi cities of Mosul and Nineveh under the guise of religious pilgrimages to ancient Jewish religious shrines. According to Kurdish sources, the Israelis are secretly working with the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) to carry out the integration of Kurdish and other Jews into areas of Iraq under control of the KRG.
Kurdish, Iraqi Sunni Muslims, and Turkmen have noted that Kurdish Israelis began to buy land in Iraqi Kurdistan, after the U.S. invasion in 2003, that is considered historical Jewish “property.”
The Israelis are particularly interested in the shrine of the Jewish prophet Nahum in al Qush, the prophet Jonah in Mosul, and the tomb of the prophet Daniel in Kirkuk. Israelis are also trying to claim Jewish “properties” outside of the Kurdish region, including the shrine of Ezekiel in the village of al-Kifl in Babel Province near Najaf and the tomb of Ezra in al-Uzayr in Misan Province, near Basra, both in southern Iraq’s Shi’a-dominated territory. Israeli expansionists consider these shrines and tombs as much a part of “Greater Israel” as Jerusalem and the West Bank, which they call “Judea and Samaria.”
Kurdish and Iraqi sources report that Israel’s Mossad is working hand-in-hand with Israeli companies and “tourists” to stake a claim to the Jewish “properties” of Israel in Iraq. The Mossad has already been heavily involved in training the Kurdish Pesha Merga military forces.
Reportedly assisting the Israelis are foreign mercenaries paid for by U.S. Christian evangelical circles that support the concept of “Christian Zionism.”
Iraqi nationalists charge that the Israeli expansion into Iraq is supported by both major Kurdish factions, including the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan headed by Iraq’s nominal President Jalal Talabani. Talabani’s son, Qubad Talabani, serves as the KRG’s representative in Washington, where he lives with his wife Sherri Kraham, who is Jewish.
Also supporting the Israeli land acquisition activities is the Kurdistan Democratic Party, headed by Massoud Barzani, the president of the KRG. One of Barzani’s five sons, Binjirfan Barzani, is reportedly heavily involved with the Israelis.
The Israelis and their Christian Zionist supporters enter Iraq not through Baghdad but through Turkey. In order to depopulate residents of lands the Israelis claim, Mossad operatives and Christian Zionist mercenaries are staging terrorist attacks against Chaldean Christians, particularly in Nineveh, Irbil, al-Hamdaniya, Bartalah, Talasqaf, Batnayah, Bashiqah, Elkosheven, Uqrah, and Mosul.
These attacks by the Israelis and their allies are usually reported as being the responsibility of “Al Qaeda” and other Islamic “jihadists.”
The ultimate aim of the Israelis is to depopulate the Christian population in and around Mosul and claim the land as biblical Jewish land that is part of “Greater Israel.” The Israeli/Christian Zionist operation is a replay of the depopulation of the Palestinians in the British mandate of Palestine after World War II.
In June 2003, a delegation of Israelis visited Mosul and said that it was Israel’s intentions, with the assistance of Barzani, to establish Israeli control of the shrine of Jonah in Mosul and the shrine of Nahum in the Mosul plains. The Israelis said Israeli and Iranian Jewish pilgrims would travel via Turkey to the area of Mosul and take over lands where Iraqi Christians lived.
Jan 25, 2009
Evolution of a genetic disease in an ethnic isolate: - Thalassemia in the Jews of Kurdistan
Evolution of a genetic disease in an ethnic isolate: - Thalassemia in the Jews of Kurdistan
Jan 19, 2009
Jan 7, 2009
Israel and Turkey: so different, yet so similar, yet so different...
From Turkishdiary.blogspot.com
Israel and Turkey: so different, yet so similar, yet so different...
Turkey has recently condemned Israel's offensive in Gaza. Ankara has even decided to suspend its mediating efforts between Israel and Syria.
It would be easy to dismiss such a position as just solidarity with the Muslim brothers and sisters in Gaza. Not that it would be wrong. But I would like to change the perspective in the issue, noticing that Israel and Turkey, two long-standing allies, have more in common than one could imagine. And that is what I am going to highlight right now.
Both Turkey and Israel are countries which are strongly defined by their main religions, and yet both are convinced secular countries. In both cases religion identifies largely with ethnicity (with the important exceptions of Kurds, of course, where ethnicity is predominant, and Alevis, who are not considered as a religion minority). Which has brought discrimination and / or war against religious and / or ethnic minorities. The modalities are different, but the similarities are striking.
Both Turkey and Israel are countries which have been artificially created by the international community. Israel, through the partition of Palestine into two states decided by the United Nations in 1947; Turkey, through the Treaty of Lausanne, which in 1923 replaced the 1920 Treaty of Sèvres, actually reintegrating a series of territories which had been previously stripped off it, and frustrating the Kurds' hopes for an independent State (hopes that had been fed by the Treaty of Sèvres). I should add that the international community has not little responsibility in the Armenian genocide.
This may be little more than a curiosity, but I think it's significant. Both countries have compulsory military service. In Israel, it applies both to men (3 years) and women (2 years); in Turkey, it's mandatory only for men (15 months). I admit I don't know what the consequences of this are in Israel (where a limited amount of conscientious objection exists anyway), but I know in Turkey for a long time this situation helped PKK recruit militants, since many Kurds did not wish to be sent to fight against their own fathers or brothers, preferring rather fight at their side.
Both countries are just a few weeks away from the next electoral rendez-vous. On February 10, Israelis will vote for the next government (and, for those of you who can read French, I suggest that you go through this interesting article by Le Monde); on March 29, municipal elections will take place in Turkey.
Let me focus on this last point. The key issue in Turkey's local elections will be the Kurdish majority regions (what PKK and in general militant Kurds refer to as “Kurdistan”, a word that in Turkey can bring you straight to prison). On the subject, I can recommend you this article on the Christian Science Monitor.
Now, what has been the big news in Turkey in the last few days (apart from Nazim Hikmet's rehabilitation)? I quote from Reuters:
Turkey has launched its first 24-hour Kurdish-language TV station
Which brings me to the conclusion:
Israel is moving towards elections → Israel bombs Palestinians
Turkey is moving towards elections → Turkey gives more rights to Kurds
Of course Kurds are not satisfied, and they are not completely paranoid in considering this decision as a way by the government to get as many votes as they can, in short a propaganda move. It is also true that Ankara has quite a double-face attitude: while PKK is considered a terrorist group, soon after Hamas won the elections the AKP government welcomed to Turkey Khaled Meshal, the exiled Hamas leader. And they never uttered a word about the rockets fired against Israel.
Nonetheless, one cannot help noticing that making propaganda through opening up to minorities is a more democratic way than bombing civilians. So, what are the main differences in this situation? Why do two similar countries in two similar situations act in such different ways?
First of all, Turkey is a EU candidate. It is true that in the last few years the great reform impulse that marked the first period of the AKP government has slowed down, if not thoroughly stopped. And the new nationalistic vague has not helped in that sense. It is also true that this government is struggling hard at least to show a nice image of itself, which is surely not enough, but it's helping improvement. And improvement is never easy, especially for a proud people like Turks. The journey is still long, but the path is the right one.
Now, this doesn't mean of course that Israel should be a candidate to the EU, but at least it shows that the EU can actually have a role in international politics. More than that: personally, I think we have a responsibility in that sense.
But in all this story we must not forget one decisive point: in Turkey Kurds vote. In Israel Palestinians don't.
Jan 3, 2009
Jews Undercover - Iran
Jews Undercover - Iran (Journeyman pictures clip)
It's not easy being a Jewish MP in an assembly that routinely calls for the destruction of Israel, but Iranian Jews' rights are protected by law.
Dec 29, 2008
Fredrik Malm (fp) on the road to peace in the Middle East: The Palestinians should learn from the Kurds
Fredrik Malm is a member of parliament for the Liberal Party and candidate for Parliament.
Fredrik Malm (fp) on the road to peace in the Middle East: The Palestinians should learn from the Kurds
Published: 2008-12-28, Updated: 2008-12-28
(Malm in Kurdistan)"By constantly manifest an implacable for the existence of Israel, the Hamas leadership reinforced the perception among Israelis that there is no alternative but to again and again to violence to ensure that Palestinians in Gaza moved back to square one." It provides Member of Parliament FREDRIK MALM (fp).
For three years since Israel evacuated its settlers and soldiers from the Gaza Strip. After the peace process collapse and subsequent four years of Palestinian uprising was no counterpart to negotiate. The settlers were bought out or worn out, and Israel closed the border and controlled coastal and luftfrum. But the evacuation from Gaza meant the fact that the Palestinians for the first time since the Palestinian National mevetandets birth gained control over the entire Gaza Strip.
Gaza could become the good Palestinian example. Despite the enormous misery and a mixture of hatred and fear Israel had the Palestinians a chance to lift themselves out of an existence marked by militant opposition, the death cult and extremism. A positive development in Gaza would pave the way for a new process on the West Bank. And it would undermine the Israeli krigshökarnas fear of a Palestinian state-building.
But it was exactly the opposite. Hamas won the elections in Palestine and was isolated by the outside world. They operated out rival Fatah by force and fired rockets daily into Israel. Islamic laws were introduced. Resources were channeled to military purposes with the aim to equip the new war against Israel. Palestinians have often appeared as defenseless. Hamas changed this to make the Palestinians as irresponsible. This will be their strong cooperation with and dependence on Iran, which further strengthens the threat against Israel.
Yesterday, as Israel took the step of targeted air strikes hit the dozens of Hamas Fasteners in Gaza. Several hundred have been killed, most of them from Hamas security apparatus. The death figures horrifies and always killed several civilians even when military targets are attacked. This is only the beginning. Israel will implement some form of ground offensive in order to further smash the Hamas infrastructure. If the conflict entering the streets and houses in danger death rate soar.
But let us draw a brief parallel to another area. After the Gulf War in 1991 drove the Kurds to Saddam Hussein's army from northern Iraq and set up a self. It was the first time in decades as the Kurds, who lived in the area for millennia, also controlled it. Iraqi Kurdistan was then a larger ruin than Gaza, and had nearly 200 000 people killed in the genocide, and several million refugees returned from neighboring countries.
The Kurds had no income since the UN sanctions against Iraq also included them, and Saddam Hussein, imposed on top of that a blockade against northern Iraq where the power supply and the supply stopped. The Kurdish parties came soon in the civil strife, just as Hamas and Fatah did.
The parallels between Iraqi Kurdistan and Gaza are many. But there is a significant difference: the Kurds never used their newly won freedom to fire at Arab communities or to support the War against the rest of Iraq. Internal conflict was solved by a ceasefire and a - certainly less democratic - the separation of powers. Despite enormous problems, traumas since the wars, hostile neighbors, political leadership from the guerrillas and little educated population so kavlade Kurds up our sleeves and took the responsibility to build something. Nothing perfect, not fully democratic - but a zone of stability that does not threaten its neighbors and is seeking bilateral talks. And above all, an area that is being developed.
The Palestinian nationalism has followed an entirely different trend. Its overarching objective has been to not accept the existence of the State of Israel. With time, the PLO / Fatah have become increasingly moderate and open to negotiations, but they have lost many Palestinians support as a result of corruption and abuse of power. Instead, Hamas has strengthened the trend of Palestinian intransigence - which is also constantly growing in pace with the Israeli attacks, the daily humiliations at checkpoints, martyr propaganda in Arab media and the lack of Palestinian democratic alternative.
By constantly manifest an implacable for the existence of Israel, Hamas ledarksap enhanced sense among Israelis that there is no alternative but to again and again to violence to ensure that Palestinians in Gaza moved back to square one. And through an iron grip around the enclave it difficult for Palestinians to get even to square two.
There are essentially only one way to ultimately break this våldssprial. It is a Palestinian leadership in Gaza, which has the primary aim to develop Gaza and make life bearable for those who live there - instead of looking for new conflict with Israel. This must be done while Israel gives the Palestinians the opportunity to walk the road, something Israel has not made an effort to significantly to facilitate. By highlighting the checkpoints in the West Bank, facilitate the movement of Palestinian workers, facilitate trade and importation of supplies, so Israel can also send a signal to the Palestinians to iron grip can be easier if the Palestinians decide to walk a different path. And on the day the Palestinians choose leaders who want to walk this road, the new challenge for Israel - to accept and facilitate the process.
FREDRIK MALM
Dec 11, 2008
Articles in Kurdish about the Kurdish-Jewish relations
Fermo rêzehevpeyvînên din bixwînin:
Beşa 1:em: http://www.serwext.com/nuce.php?aid=1347
Beşa 2:em: http://www.serwext.com/nuce.php?aid=1411
Beşa 3:em: http://www.serwext.com/nuce.php?aid=1430
Beşa 4:em: http://www.serwext.com/nuce.php?aid=1459
Beşa 5:em: http://www.serwext.com/nuce.php?aid=1495
Beşa 6:em: http://www.serwext.com/nuce.php?aid=1524
Beşa 7:em: http://www.serwext.com/nuce.php?aid=1571
Beşa 8:em: http://www.serwext.com/nuce.php?aid=1579
Beşa 9:em: http://www.serwext.com/nuce.php?aid=1588&roportaj=ok
Beşa 10:em: http://www.serwext.com/nuce.php?aid=1592
Beşa 11:an: http://www.serwext.com/nuce.php?aid=1598
Beşa 12:an: http://www.serwext.com/nuce.php?aid=1599
Dostaniya Kurd û Cuhûwan (Kurdish-Jewish relations)
| MC NETKURD Aktuelbûn:13:05 - 11/12/2008 |
Têkiliyên Kurd û Yahûdiyan têra xwe kevnare ne, pişta xwe didin dema Imparatoriya Asuriyan, wextê êsîrkirin û ajotina wan bo xaka Medan.
Ji Gabar Çiyan pirtûkek nû:
Dostaniya Kurd û Cuhûwan
“Têkiliyên Kurd û Yahûdiyan têra xwe kevnare ne, pişta xwe didin dema Imparatoriya Asuriyan, wextê êsîrkirin û ajotina wan bo xaka Medan.
Hetanî berî niha bi demek kin jî hejmarek mezin ji cuhûwan, li başûr û bakurê welêt jiyana xwe didomandin. Îro hejmara wan kêm bûye. Gelek ji wan barkirine Israîlê. Hejmara Kurdên Cuhû li Israîlê bi qasî 200 hezarî ye. Kurdên Cuhû, anjî Cuhûwên ji Kurdistanê, îro li Israîlê jî li gorî toreyên welêt jiyana xwe didomînin.
Têkiliyên biratî û dostaniyê bi gelê xwe û yên cînar re, gavên însanî ne. Di vê çarçoveyê de têkiliyên biratiyê bi Cuhûwên Kurd re, û gavavêtinên dostaniyê bi Gelê Cuhû re divê xurtir bibe. Divê bi giştî bi çandên cewaz re, bi taybetî jî bi Kurdên olcewaz re, û bi gelên cînar re têkiliyên me ji gelek aliyan ve xurt bibe.
Gelê Cuhû mîna Kurdan, di dîroka xwe de gelek caran bi xetera qirkirinê hatiye hemberî hev: Ew jî mîna Kurdan, hatiye ajotin, kûştin, qirkirin û li cîhanê belav kirin. Lewma dîrok û tecrûbeyên wan dikare ji gelek aliyan ve ji mirovî re bibe alîkar. Her wisa rewşa herêmê, dikare şensek mezin bide me ku em nêzî hev bibin”, tê gotin di pêşgotina e-pirtûkê de.
Berî niha bi demeke kin, gerînendeyê Zarathustra News ê, rojnamevan Gabar Çiyan bi hejmarek ronakbîrên Kurd û cuhû re hevpeyvîn pêk anî bû. Çiyan, di vê xebata xwe de cî dide wan hevpeyvînan.
Pirtûk bi kurdî ye, û bê heq tê belavkirin. Kesên bixwazin dikarin bi rêya malpera EuroKurd Human Rights ê, www.eurokurd.net ê pirtûkê bixwînin û ji xwe re çap / kopiye bikin.
Zarathustra News – zoroaster@comhem.se
Nov 30, 2008
Le Cordon Jew: Kubbeh for Soup
Kubbeh/קובה למרק/كبّ/Kubeh/Kube/Kubbe
The following recepie was found at Soul and Gone!
The following recepie was found at Soul and Gone!
Kubbeh: not to be confused with kibbeh, despite being a variation of the same word for a variation on the same thing. Like kibbeh, these are made from ground meat in a chiefly bulgur shell, but they hail from the northern regions of Iraq rather than Syria, and instead of deep frying, they’re treated to a simmer in broth, making them more dumpling than mezze. In Israel, the word “kubbeh” is applied indiscriminately to both the fried and simmered variety (in Arabic, pronunciation differences between dialects leads to the discrepancy in names for the same thing), but for the sake of clarity, I’m calling these Kurdish-style dumplings “kubbeh” and the fried and raw versions predominant in the Levant “kibbeh.”
Anyway. Kubbeh are a specialty of the Jews of Kurdistan, who once formed large percentages of the population of now-infamous cities like Mosul and Arbil before immigrating to Israel en masse along with the rest of the Iraqi Jewish population in the 1940s and 1950s. My old hood in Jerusalem, centered around the Machane Yehuda market, was heavily Kurdish, home to a Kurdish-Jewish community organization that never seemed open, and dozens of restaurants, social clubs and backgammon parlors that never seemed closed. Several of the restaurants (most notably, Mordoch) specialize in kubbeh-based soups, ranging from the crimson marak kubbeh adom to the sour, green hamousta. So between Jerusalem’s Little Kurdistan and the frozen sections of Israeli supermarkets, kubbeh were never far off. But like edible hummus, Zohar Argov, responsible M16-bearing teenagers and the Divine Presence, we don’t have any here in the far reaches of Exile.
Until now.
INGREDIENTS
SHELL:
- 1 cup coarse bulgur (AKA #3 bulgur)
- 1 cup fine bulgur (AKA #1 bulgur)
- 1 cup semolina
- 1-2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
- 1 tsp salt
FILLING:
- Olive oil for frying
- Roughly 2 pounds, or around 800-900 grams, ground beef
- 4 cloves garlic, crushed lightly and chopped
- Freshly ground black pepper to taste
A few notes on the ingredients:
BULGUR: That’s right, two kinds of bulgur. Here’s the size difference:
Head to a Middle Eastern market, or order online (fine and coarse are available at Tulumba.com).
BEEF: Lean ground beef. 90/10, perhaps. Don’t be an idiot and get 95/5. That’s not meat. That’s seasoned Boca tofu crumbles. Get out of here and go back to sucking at the partially hydrogenated teat of Snackwell’s.
INSTRUCTIONS:
1) Mix the two types of bulgur together and add water to cover the bulgur by about an inch and a half. Let sit for 45 minutes, making sure that the bulgur remains covered by water the whole time.
2) Meanwhile, slowly fry the beef in olive oil on low heat. When the meat is very well-browned and dry, add the garlic and black pepper and continue cooking a few more minutes, then remove from heat and set aside.
3) Remove the bulgur to a strainer and squeeze it with your hand until all the excess moisture is pressed out.
4) Put the bulgur in a bowl and add the semolina and salt. Stir. Then add the flour and knead by hand until you get a nice stiff dough. It will look like this:
Put out a hand bowl of cold water and prepare to stand in one place for an hour or two. Maybe give yourself a little pep talk. You are a Kurdish grandmother. You are a Kurdish grandmother. You were born in a village outside of Mosul. You came to Israel in 1952. You went through a stint in a ma’abarah. You grew up in Rishon. You are disappointed in your no-goodnik son for waiting until he was thirty-five years old to give you grandchildren. You don’t particularly like the grandchildren, either.
Now, you are ready.
5) Wet your hands with the bowl of water. Your hands must be constantly moist throughout the kubbeh-making process, or the dough will crumble.
Take a piece of bulgur dough the size of a small egg, or a little smaller than a golf ball. Squeeze it (with your moist hands) into a roughly round shape.
Use your thumb to create a deep indentation in the ball, then use your thumb and (MOIST) fingertips to turn the ball into a bowl. Smooth over any large cracks in the dough that appear. You can paste a little extra dough onto particularly resilient cracks.
Fill the bowl with a tablespoon or so of your seasoned ground beef. Remember, you’ll never catch a man with thick-walled, filling-poor kubbeh.
Pinch it closed and smooth the surface so you have a perfect ball.
Now keep at it, savta. You’ll probably get 30-something kubbeh out of this. Just put them in a freezer bag and keep them frozen until you have a soup that can be aided and abetted by the presence of kubbeh (which is any soup, essentially). Drop them in frozen and let those bad boys simmer for twenty minutes.
“But Michael,” you say, “I want to know how to make an authentic Kurdish-Israeli kubbeh soup.”
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