ANA ASHUR Media and Translation Desk
Citizens reveal a dangerous plan to replace Assyrian Christians with Israelis in northern Iraq in the so-called Nineveh Plain
Baghdad - 27-06-2010
Reports by international organizations concerned with human rights, in particular the United Nations' High Commissioner for Refugees confirm that Christians make up more than 30% of the refugees fleeing Iraq due to persecution they suffered following the 2003 U.S. invasion, that is a high percentage and a great loss for the country, especially that Christians (Chaldean Catholics Church, Church of the East for the Assyrians, and Syrian Orthodox) are indigenous Iraqis who have lived on this land for thousands of years ago before they were Christians and they had a big role in civilizing as well as building the Iraqi society's culture and forming its mosaic nature (diversity and plurality).
Al-Furat Today conducted a poll in which citizens expressed their views agreeing that there is an attempt to empty Iraq of its Christian citizens and that this is a dangerous plot involving internal and external powers in order to achieve more than one political agenda:
- The first point is to consider Iraq, a country which rejects the peaceful co-existence among its religious factions, and then to corner the country so that certain ethnic factions would gain more affluence at the expense of the real patriotic belonging of the Christians.
- The second point is represented by giving those powers the right to make demographic changes in order to facilitate the integration of non-Iraqi groups which infiltrated from neighbouring countries, in reference to intelligence reports which outlined a Kurdish - Israeli plot to replace Iraqi Christians with Iraqi Jews from Israel and Iranians in the Nineveh Plain.
A number of citizens, "Christians and Muslims" revealed some of the persecution, torture, and invasions which befell the Christians forcing a large group of them to flee during the last seven years.
Younadam Giwargis from Baghdad said: "The phenomenon of persecuting Christians began few days after the fall of the former regime, which came in the form of bombing liquor stores, chasing female students forcing them to wear the veil or forcing them to enter Islam un willingly, even though the Islamic religion says (no compulsion in religion), the situation evolved into bombing Churches and killing the clergy".
Mrs. Dina Ammanuel (also from Baghdad) said: "The security conditions, chaos, political and religious blocs helped in spreading the phenomenon of killing Christians, persecuting, displacing, or invading the sanctity of their homes, which led to the migration and the flight of large numbers of them from Baghdad and other provinces to their villages in northern Iraq or outside Iraq altogether".
Samir Farhan from Basra confirms: "The phenomenon spread from Baghdad to Basra, the practices became broader and the situation worsened under the hegemony and rising influence of Iran whereby the city in few years became a hell for the Christians and Sabaean Mandaeans".
In Mosul, Bihnam Audisho said: "Several Christian families received threats from their neighbours that they were going to displace them in the event that the former regime fell. Indeed, persecution and forced displacement took place at the hands of extremists and they are still going on". Audisho sees that :"Christians in the city are victims of a conspiracy aiming at chasing them out of Mosul forcing them to relocate to the "Nineveh Plain" to achieve well known political goals" in reference the Kurdish Administration's benefits from this matter.
Sahira Younis, a Mosul resident said that: "What happened against the un armed, peaceful Christians, took place infront of the coalition and Iraqi security forces and it resembles an un declared obliteration with the collaboration of many factions in order to empty Iraq of its Christian groups in order to establish a sole religion country with the collaboration of many factions inside and outside, especially that the majority of Christians have scientific abilities and they have given a lot to their home country Iraq.
The majority of Iraq’s Christians, are Assyrians, affiliated with different Churches and since the U.S. led invasion in March 2003, they have been subjected to severe acts of violence and as they form the weakest link in the Iraqi mosaic, they've been continuously ignored and marginalized by the local and foreign authorities which are governing Iraq at present in addition to being obscured by the
media.
ANA ASHUR - Assyria National Assembly (c) 2010 All Rights Reserved.
