The Barzani Christians who stuck by their tribe – and paid the ultimate price
The 82-year-old, a Christian from the village of Bedyal, is a survivor of the Barzan Anfal.
The term Anfal is most widely recognised as relating to Saddam Hussein's campaign of genocide against the Kurds, officially recognised as having taken place from 1986-1988. However, Kurds often use the term Anfal to refer to decades of forced displacement and persecution under the Baath regime.
Like many Barzan area villagers, residents of Bedyal were forcibly displaced to Diyana, Soran province as part of the Anfal campaign in 1978. Bedyal was once home to 50 families. It now hosts only eight.
Two Bedyal villagers were killed in Diyana in 1983 for wearing the distinctive red turban scarf worn by the Barzanis. One was Georges' brother, and the other was his cousin.
"They told my brother that if he were to wear a blue turban and throw away the red one, he wouldn't be arrested," Georges said. "He refused, and said 'How can I throw it away? It is my identity. We are Barzanis.' I wish I could be with them, because they are immortal and judged as innocents. They took him away like a partridge in a cage and never brought him back.
Joliyan Khoshaba, son of Khoshaba Yohenna, was only 10 when his father was killed. Both his mother and sister died of a heart attack after his father was killed, so he is the only surviving member of his family. He remembers how his father was taken away.
"I remember one night, the Baath regime surrounded the Diyana compound. In the morning, they arrested anyone who would wear the red turban scarf. I remember when they told my father, 'you’re an Assyrian Christian - throw away your turban and we'll do nothing to you.' But my father refused to do so," Joliyan said.
During the Anfal campaign as many as 2,225 Barzani families were transported to concentration camps including in the Baharka, Qushtapa and Diyana areas of the Kurdistan Region. Some were held in the camps for years before being rounded up, killed and buried in mass graves in Iraq's southern deserts. Of the 8,000 Barzani men and boys killed in the campaign, the bodies of only 596 have been returned home for burial.
Rudaw
