Herbol is under the control of the coal companies and the rulers of the region.
The village, its houses, cemetery and church were formally buried under the mounds of excavation of the coal mines. A tough struggle for Petrus followed. He planted thousands of trees in the village. Despite receiving open threats, he even began construction of houses on his ancestral land. Videos posted on the Internet show that several houses were partially completed.
Petrus placed a sign at the entrance of the village. He said in an interview he gave to Al-Jazeera "you are welcome to Aksu-Herbol Village. Within the boundaries of the village: It is forbidden to hunt, to cut trees, to burn fire."
Baysal stated that the threats became increasingly intense and that Petrus appealed to the Governorship of Şirnak, the District Governor of Silopi and the prosecutor's office dozens of times for the threats he received.
While on the one hand, the village was struggling with the coal companies to protect its trees, Petrus draw the attention of the state on him too.
A great fire in July 2015 burned the village completely.
The government rejected the claim that the fire was started by soldiers. Petrus told journalists that he had witnessed the fire being started by soldiers. The Newspaper Evrensel cited him saying: "The return of some peasants to the village made the state act this way. I witnessed the lightning bullets being thrown by the soldiers."
Petrus was not afraid to speak the truth. This was confirmed in an interview on AssyriaTV with Simon Poli, himself a returnee from Sweden to Midyat, and who knows Petrus quite well. Simon said because Petrus was trying to save the village, he made some people angry, namely, the coal companies, the village guards and the rulers of the region
Nurcan Baysal ends her article by saying that this brave man, the last Assyrian-Chaldean in Sirnak, is now under arrest for being a "member of a terrorist organization." The state, hand in hand with the rulers of the region, regards even one Assyrain as too much for Şirnak.

I have been on the brink of divorcing my Chaldean husband for the past few years due to emotional and financial abuse but I have held myself back from doing so because of the judgement I will face from the Assyrian community.

Also, my parent’s judgement and I don’t think they mean to judge per se but they will feel the shame from the community and that’s what they will be afraid of. I have a daughter too, so single motherhood is highly judged by our community.

Wondering if anybody has been in my situation and how do I finally release myself from this prison I feel like I am in?

Do people agree with the fact that there is no nation in diaspora. I believe it 100% but I don't know how others are not seeing it. Moving back to the homeland is the only answer no matter what. If we stay in diaspora, there will literally be a million of us just lost to different countries.

If we stay in diaspora, there will be no "Assyrians" in 50-100 years due to language loss, intermarriage, and generational change. The first generation Assyrians will always be strong but by the 3rd generation at the latest, Assyrian nationalism is gone.

Promises by Iraqi Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi to encourage the return of Iraq’s Christians and the Chaldean–Syriac–Assyrian people to their ancestral towns, provide access to residential land allocation projects, and support investment in the health and education sectors have been welcomed by some Assyrian groups.

But According to Mor Nicodemus Daoud Matti Sharaf, Syriac Orthodox Archbishop of Mosul, the underlying causes of migration must be addressed before encouraging people to return.
Calling on Christians to return without addressing what forced them to emigrate will not produce any results,” he said, adding that the continued neglect of Christian concerns and the lack of equal citizenship remain among the community’s greatest challenges.

many civil society activists interviewed for the report said they consider the large-scale return of Christians who have settled abroad and acquired foreign citizenship to be unrealistic in the near future.

https://syriacpress.com/blog/2026/07/20/iraqi-civil-society-organization-nirij-return-of-christians-to-their-homeland-can-only-be-achieved-through-building-a-civil-democratic-and-pluralistic-state/

Like St. John Demascene for example and others

My father is fully South East Asian,
My mother is Half Iraqi Arab half Assyrian

my grandma moms side is fully Assyrian from Syria (I believe) and my grandfather on my moms side is part Iraqi Bedouin Arab (from Anbar) and part Assyrian lives in Baghdad for generations (excluding grandma)

Though there is abit of a problem, my mom refuses to believe she isn’t fully Arab, mainly because she lives in the gulf region which might’ve made her not like the Assyrian heritage due that they are not Muslims, she doesn’t hate them, she’s just in denial about her Assyrian heritage. Also both grandparents are Muslims (I don’t know if that matters or not)

Me personally I’m not a Muslim, and I do identify as part is Assyrian but I don’t know I’m counted as one, please let me know!!

No major question, just what the title is asking. I would like to know how many of yall lnow how to read either script. I am also wondering which script is better to learn.

Syriac is the main script used by assyrians in real life however imperial aramaic is much better for texting online sinces its the only script available on keyboard.

Hello guys. I came across this song from a YouTube wedding video, I've been trying to find the song for 2 hours but I couldn't.

The song has been found: ta khlete by michael hido

Would it be:

ܐܢ** ܬܡܘܬ ܩܕܡ ܕܬܡܘܬ، ܠܐ ܬܡܘܬ ܟܕ *ܬܡܘܬ
ʾen tmūṯ qḏām d-tmūṯ, lā tmūṯ kaḏ tmūṯ.*

Im unsure about the verb mut.
In Syriac, the standard verb is:
ܡܘܬ (mwt)
But is the second-person singular imperfect form:
ܬܡܘܬ (tmūṯ

In that case, is then tmut correct?

I’m Assyrian-American. Born in the US. Looks like I’m ~97% Assyrian :)

#

Shlomo, well, as the title says.

I am looking for someone that can speak syriac aramaic, i want to learn it, but internet is really meh for it and language discord servers dont help so much about it, a lot of language but no aramaic.

Can someone help me pls? :ccccc tawdi

This senator contributed to the destruction and millions of deaths worldwide. The same Graham who:

Voted for Iraq War (2002): https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/vote_menu_107_2.htm

Backed Libya intervention: https://www.alquds.com/en/posts/249738-with-the-passing-of-lindsey-graham-one-of-the-most-prominent-architects-of

Supported Yemen war: https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/Senator-Lindsey-Graham-Israel-supporter-dies-after-brief-illness

Now getting a statue in Erbil: https://shafaq.com/en/Kurdistan/Erbil-plans-statue-for-US-Senator-Lindsey-Graham

https://www.rudaw.net/english/categories/kurdistan/934886

Hello ! I've been starting to learn about syrian history, mostly focusing on Assyria as of now, but i'm having trouble understanding which language is a dialect of another dialect/language and whatnot 🥲

Basically, from my understanding, before Assyria, most people in that region spoke ancient semitic languages. Then, when Assyria came by, akkadian became the "usual" language (maybe with an assyrian dialect being spoken? some sources say so while others don't mention that at all); while akkadian was the most widespread language, aramaic was also growing rapidly. Here is where my problem lies : what exactly is surayt? Some sources say it's a mix of akkadian and aramaic, others say it's a dialect of aramaic alone, and others say that it's a dialect of akkadian alone 🥲 🥲 And if i'm honest i don't even know if my timeline is correct : i know surayt is a dialect that exists, but i have no idea if it was spoken at the time.

Furthermore, is surayt a subdivision of the Assyrian language? If yes, then what is syriac?? Also, what exactly IS the Assyrian language? A dialect of aramaic or akkadian? A separate third entity? (i am losing my mind)

Another thing i'm struggling with is understanding how arabic came to be spoken : was it an evolution of aramaic? Of assyrian? of something else? 🙀

tldr : From what i could gather, my understanding is as follows : Akkadian and Aramaic were spoken at the same time, then they both came together to form what we call the Assyrian language, which is itself divided between surayt and syriac which BOTH evolved into/were replaced (?) by arabic (somehow).

Is any of this correct? I'm sorry if this doesn't make much sense : english is my second language and it's hard to even articulate what my problem exactly is. I don't even know if this is the correct subreddit to ask :((

Thank you so much to anyone who might answer ! Please consider helping my confused self 💔

This was originally posted in AskHistorians, but i figure this subreddit could also help! 🫶

This will be a big night for us - would love to see you all there if you are in the LA area.

Is there anybody that has a YT link to this beautiful Assyrian song? Bassima raba!

This is interesting, as it directly correlates to the ancient empires in antiquity.

ܫܠܵܡܵܐ ܐܲܚܲܝ ܘܚܲܒܝܒܲܝ!
I’m Syriac Orthodox from Brazil, and i would like to learn more on the discussion between aramean and Assyrian ethnicity.

Here in Brazil the Conservatives Syriac orthodox are more aligned towards Syriac orthodox, ACOE and Chaldeans all sharing the same ethnicity as Assyrians.

However recently an European came to me saying that it is actually wrong and the are only arameans and Chaldeans in history and that Assyrian name was created earlier this century by British or something like that

He also mentioned that Mor Afrem used the Syriac term for Assyrian as an curse and that Assyrians have only ever been used for curses through history

So I’d like to understand more on it
I’m primarily aligned towards a common ethnicity between ours people. But I also need to learn arguments on it

So that’s why I ask your help!! 😁
ܬܘܕܝ

Hi all,

I have a theological question. I am in the ACOE and when I go to Church that isn't ACOE, i.e., Roman Catholic, I receive Holy Communion. I have always done this because of my understanding of the Common Christological Declaration Between the Catholic Church and the Assyrian Church of the East and the findings of the Joint Committee for Theological Dialogue between the Catholic Church and the Assyrian Church of the East.

However I just realized I may have misread the guidelines 🙃. I thought because of the resolution reached by this committee, I was able to get communion at any Catholic Church. However, upon further reading, I realized it specifically says at a Chaldean Catholic Church:

1. When necessity requires, Assyrian faithful are permitted to participate and to receive Holy Communion in a Chaldean celebration of the Holy Eucharist; in the same way, Chaldean faithful for whom it is physically or morally impossible to approach a Catholic minister, are permitted to participate and to receive Holy Communion in an Assyrian celebration of the Holy Eucharist.
[...]
4. The above considerations on the use of the Anaphora of Addai and Mari and the present guidelines for admission to the Eucharist, are intended exclusively in relation to the Eucharistic celebration and admission to the Eucharist of the faithful from the Chaldean Church and the Assyrian Church of the East, in view of the pastoral necessity and ecumenical context mentioned above.

Would the fact that the Chaldean Church being a sui iuris church in communion with the worldwide Catholic Church mean that my permission is extended to the latter ? I am sensing no, and I guess from now on I will only cross my arms for a blessing lol