The Fourth Column in Iraq: Assyrians

(Zinda) — In that day there will be a highway from Egypt to Assyria. The Assyrians will go to Egypt and the Egyptians to Assyria. The Egyptians and Assyrians will worship together. In that day Israel will be the third, along with Egypt and Assyria, a blessing on the earth. The LORD Almighty will bless them, saying, “Blessed be Egypt my people, Assyria my handiwork, and Israel my inheritance.” [Isaiah 19: 23-25]

The end of Iraq as a nation state will mark the end of a long 90-year struggle, divided into three 30-year phases, during which the astonishing turns of events are leading up to the restoration of the last of the three ancient nations of Egypt, Israel, and Assyria. The story of the formation of the last of the three blessed nations, or the Fourth Column in Iraq, is one of the most fascinating chapters of modern history.

The first phase of the restoration of Assyria began in the year 1918 with the end of the First World War. On this year the Ottoman Empire (modern Turkey) collapsed and the Turkish influence in Palestine and Mesopotamia ended. For the next thirty years the Balfour Declaration of 1917, mass immigration starting in 1920s, World War II and the Holocaust, and the international support for Jews seeking to settle in Palestine helped to restore a national home for the Jews in Palestine.

In the 19th century the Ottoman Turks had formed three provinces or Vilayats in Mesopotamia: Mosul or Ninewa ( Nineveh) Vilayat – the heartland of Assyria, the Baghdad Vilayat, and the Basra Vilayat.

In 1921, Iraq was carved out of the Ottoman Empire by combining all three provinces and handed over to a ruling Arab family– the same three provinces that today are being discussed as the Kurdish State in the north, the Sunni State in the center, and the Shi’ai State in the south. In effect, the history of the past 90 years in Iraq has been a history of the un-doing of what the French and the British did in 1918 to Mesopotamia under the Ottoman Turks. Interestingly, it was not until the third phase of the restoration of Assyria that the Mosul Vilayat is politically referred to as Kurdistan. When in 1926 the League of Nations settled the Iraqi-Turkish border dispute (Turks were claiming Mosul Vilayat or North Iraq as a part of greater Turkey) many Kurds began pouring into Iraq from Turkey. Until then the Christians in the Mosul Vilayat outnumbered both Kurds and Arabs.

The second phase of the Restoration Period begins exactly 30 years after the collapse of the Ottoman Empire when the independence of the modern State of Israel was achieved in 1948. A period of considerable instability follows in the Middle East as Arabs attempt to regain their hold on the lost Palestinian territories, now called the State of Israel. In Mesopotamia, the monarchy in Iraq was overthrown in 1958 and the Baath – an ideology formulated by a Syrian Christian, Michel Aflaq- comes to power in 1968.

Thirty years after the independence of Israel, in 1978 Egyptian President Anwar Sadat, makes a historic visit to the Jewish State, and officially recognizes the state of Israel. In essence, at the end of the second 30-year period, two of the three blessed nations in the prophecy of Isaiah form the highway of mutual political cooperation.

The start of the final phase or the last of the three 30-year periods also saw the overthrow of the Shah of Iran and the coming to power of Saddam. This was also the year the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan, leading to the rise of the Mujahedeens and the Talibans. All these events in 1978, directly and indirectly, result in the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq in 2001 and 2003, respectively.

In 1982 an essay appeared by Oded Yinon in the Journal for Judaism and Zionism’s February issue. It was titled “A Strategy for Israel in the 1980s”. Yinon explains that all Arab states should eventually be broken down into small units and points to the best case scenario in Iraq when it dissolves “into a Shi’ite state, a Sunni state and the separation of the Kurdish part”. He concludes: “In Iraq, a division into provinces along ethnic/religious lines as in Syria during Ottoman times is possible. So, three ( or more) states will exist around the three major cities: Basra, Baghdad and Mosul, and Shi’ite areas in the south will separate from the Sunni and Kurdish north.”

Twenty years after the publication of Yinon’s essay, in 2002 George W. Bush supported by his Neo-conservative strategists in Washington formulates the Plan of Attack on Mesopotamia and on the first day of the Assyrian new year 6753 invades Iraq — removing Saddam from power and putting into motion the strategy of the breakup of Iraq into the “three or more states”.

In 2005, the academy-award winning political thriller “Syriana” focused on the influence of oil money and its geo-political ramifications in the Middle East. The title “Syriana” was never explained in the film. Last year Zinda Magazine’s staff contacted several film studio and government officials and one anonymous source explained that the name “Syriana” referred to a State Department code name for a country that was to be artificially created by the western powers, namely the United States, to ensure continued access to oil in the Middle East. The source explained further that this country is to be created between the modern countries of Turkey, Iran and Syria — hence called “Syriana” — the name Greeks applied to “Assyria” or “Assyriana”, that which comes of Assyria.

The final 30-year phase is to end in 2008 with the creation of Syriana. Since the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 the State of Israel has invested hundreds of millions of dollars in helping transform northern Mesopotamia (Bet-Nahrain) or old the Ottoman Ninewa Vilayat into Kurdistan. It has helped create financial institutions, banks, financing redevelopment projects and even provide military and surveillance assistance.

As this editorial is going to press, a few blocks away from Zinda office in Washington, James Baker III, the former U.S. Secretary of State during the collapse of Communism and the end of Cold War, is leading the Iraq Study Group, commissioned by the Congress to study the policy options regarding the future of Iraq and the implications of breaking up of the country into three or more States. The commission is expected to present its findings and reviews after the November mid-term elections in the United States.

Washington and the media may be talking about a political settlement or a power-sharing arrangement between the Arab Sunnis, Arab Shi’ai, and the Kurds; however, the language of the policy options include the phrase “three or more autonomous regional governments” sharing oil revenues in the north and south of Iraq.

The House of Iraq cannot be built on three columns; it will collapse under its weight of sectarian divisions between Moslems and non-Moslems, proponents of western-style democracy versus the Sharia rule. The Assyrian Column or the Fourth Column must be seriously taken into consideration, as the only region in Iraq open to both Moslem and non-Moslem minority groups who uphold the primacy of the rule of law and multiculturalism above all restrictive religious laws. At any point in the future, citizens of any one of the other three states or columns may fall prey to a pro-Islamic frenzy. Turkey is a great example of how a so-called nationalist and secular “Islamic” nation can move back and forth between a secular and an Islamic government. The Fall of the Shah in 1978-79 was another clear example. The rights of the Iraqi Christians, Yezidis, Shabaks, Jews, Mandeans, and all other non-Sunni or non-Shi’ai — both Arab or Kurd — can only be protected by the formation of the Fourth Column or the Restoration of Assyria.

In short, the Fourth Column is needed to stabilize the future of Iraq — a strategy currently pushed forward by Assyrians in Washington and in Iraq. It is about the formation of the State of Nineveh, an autonomous region encompassing the areas where the majority of the Assyrian people are concentrated in the governorates of Ninawa (Nineveh) and Dohuk.

There are many political reasons why the creation of the Fourth Column will be a stabilizing factor in the region — reasons that are currently discussed and studied in Washington. Here it is important to focus on a few other facts and matters of importance.

The Bush Administration is carefully studying the ramifications of breaking up Iraq into three or more states, initially under a federal structure and eventually as three or more separate nation-states. The Assyrian solution is being seriously studied at this time.
Several proposals for the creation of the Fourth Column have been put forth by two or more Assyrian political parties and lobbying groups. These proposals are different in their geographical scope as to how the borders of the State of Nineveh (the Fourth Column) should be drawn, yet they all focus on the relevance and timeliness of this plan to ensure a more stable Iraq.
The western media is now actively placing greater attention on the plight of the Christians in Iraq.
The Kurds show no interest in sharing their oil revenues with the Assyrians unless the Assyrians agree to a new arrangement in which they are provided a limited political autonomy in an area controlled by the Kurds. To expedite the implementation of this new arrangement, the government in Arbil is quickly manufacturing a “puppet leader ” out of a previously insignificant Assyrian individual, namely Sarkis Aghajan, and pressuring all three Assyrian Churches (Assyrian, Chaldean, and Syriac) to fully recognize the authority of this member of the Kurdistan Democratic Party. Fully complying with Masoud Barzani’s demands, the patriarchs of all three Churches have in the last few weeks decorated Aghajan with medals and honors. Last year, all Assyrian political parties except the Assyrian Democratic Movement, were consolidated in a single Kurdish-led election ticket under the leadership of Masoud Barzani, the head of the Kurdistan Democratic Party.
The Restoration of Assyria cannot materialize unless Assyrians work directly with their Kurdish, Arab, and Turkish neighbors and ask for political, economic, and military support as equal partners – and not subject to their rule. To accomplish this task, Assyrians must prove to their Moslem neighbors that the formation of the Fourth Column in Iraq will bring both economic and geo-political benefits to all concerned parties.
Assyrians and the Kurds have struggled, together since 1960’s, to reach this point in history; they ought to be able to share the Mosul Vilayat as two autonomous regions- first under a federalist arrangement and later as autonomous nation-states.

For the Assyrians of the world, the restoration of Assyria, a nation-state surrounded and outnumbered by non-Christian states is nothing short of a miracle. The realization of this dream in the next few months or years will require careful planning — an Assyrian National Strategy — to be worked out by various political, religious, and civic institutions. Not relying on a consensus building policy among themselves, the advocates of the Fourth Column Plan are working closely with Washington, Baghdad, and Ankara. Yet, there is much more to be done — an effort requiring massive human resources and capital investment.

The course is certain — to fulfill our ancient longing, the establishment of an Assyrian state in Mesopotamia; therefore, the going will be tougher than before. It has taken two enormous genocides of non-Moslem nations in 1915 and during the WWII, ninety years of upheaval, relentless wars and destruction, to bring us to this point in our history. It is now our duty to act selflessly and unified to bring about the greatest miracle of history — the Restoration of Assyria — the last of the three blessed nations in the Prophecy.