Faili-Luren

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The Faili-Lurs , also called Faili-Kurds ( Kurdish فه یلی, Lurisch فَیلی, Arabic al-Faylia , Feyli for short ), are a Luric or Kurdish tribe who live in the Iraqi capital Baghdad , the neighboring Diyala province and above all the border area with Iran . Today, an estimated 1–2.5 million Faili Kurds live in Iraq and 2–3 million in neighboring Iran, but exact numbers cannot be recorded today due to deportations and persecution. The Faili Kurds speak Faili , a dialect of the South Kurdish language . In Iran there are some tribes among the Lurs , also called Feyli.

A Feili-Lurian dancer in costume

History and origin of the name

The historian about the Safavid era, Mirza Muhammad Husein Mostowfi (1749 AD) that Feyli addition to the Lak , the Bakhtiari and Mamasani as one of the four subgroups of Luren classified. Austen Henry Layard (1887) described Feyli as the largest and most powerful Lur tribes inhabiting the Zagros Mountains to the northern parts of Dezful . The origin of the name Faili is and remains one of the greatest mysteries of this people. Quite a few western and local researchers have tried to find the solution to this question. However, to this day it has not been possible to agree on the correct theory. Yaqut al-Hamawi ar-Rumi (13th century) combines the word Faili with the Arabic term “fil” (فيل), which means something like "elephant" and is intended to refer to the life of the people in the great mountains and the tenacity of the tribal members. The most widespread explanation of Mehrdad Izady today , who traces the term “Faili” back to the old Iranian Kingdom of Parthia (Arabic Pahla , pronounced Fahla ), in whose area the Failis still live then and now, has not been proven to one hundred percent.

Culture

Way of life

Since ancient times, the Failis have mainly lived in the border area between Iraq and Iran, which consists of the Zagros mountains and cliffs. They live on both sides of this mountain in Iran and Iraq, and they call it Kabir Kuh, "the great mountain". So your entire way of life is geared towards this place of life. The basic activities of the people are agriculture and sheep-raising . They plant cereals, barley, wheat and summer vegetables as well as fruits on the mountains or on the apartments, mainly for their own use, but sometimes also for trade. There are also some mineral resources in the area, such as oil and natural gas , whose extraction has also become a side income in recent decades.

The Alvand River plays an important role for the inhabitants of this area, as it serves both as a means of transport and as a source of irrigation for agriculture.

Regarding the weather, the summer is relatively dry, but the snow melts from the mountains and flows over the rivers and canals to the fields of the Failis. In summer they also move with their sheep to the top of the mountains, where there are wide pastures. When winter comes, they go back to their villages.

Some Kurds work in trade and trade and others have free jobs (urban professions). In the last decade, however, more and more tribal members have benefited from a good education and a university degree, which has drawn them away from the border areas and into the cities.

Tribes and clans

The Failis consist of many tribes , mostly called clans by them. These are usually named after the tribal founder or the tribal leader. However, most clans face each other peacefully and there is no strict hierarchy within the Faili people as to which clan is the leader.

threat

nationality

The first Iraqi citizenship law of 1924 divided the population into two categories, A and B, creating a "two-tier citizenship". Class A included all former members of the Ottoman Empire . According to this, only an "Ottoman" could become a "real" Iraqi citizen. Class B included all other citizens of Iraq. The Failis were particularly affected by this disadvantage, as many of them had Persian citizenship.

Even after the end of the monarchy in Iraq (1958), "two-class citizenship" continued. As a result, the Kurds and Shiites in particular were disadvantaged; the Failis were both Kurds and Shiites and were therefore hardest hit.

Political life

Since the establishment of the State of Iraq, the Failis have been active participants in the country's political life. In the political disputes, they took predominantly pro-Kurdish, left-wing and democratic positions. After 1968 the politically active Faili Kurds were in opposition to the Ba'th regime . In Baghdad they were the leaders of the Iraqi opposition to the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein .

Because of their political life, the Faili Kurds were repeatedly oppressed and also driven out:

  • In 1963 they offered fierce resistance against the coup Ba'th nationalists and after their victory were imprisoned, killed or they had to flee the country.
  • In 1975, thousands of Faili Kurds were imprisoned or deported to Iran using the Citizenship Law, which did not define Faili Kurds as Iraqis.
  • In 1979/80 Saddam Hussein issued several decrees. Among other things, "non-Iraqis" and Faili-Kurds who had no citizenship even though they had been living in Iraq for centuries were asked to apply for Iraqi citizenship within 6 months. Faili Kurds who did this were arrested, taken to the Iraqi-Iranian border and deported to Iran. Faili Kurds were considered Persians and were therefore affected by immediate deportation. In addition, the Iraqi Ministry of the Interior was allowed to expatriate any Iraqi and confiscate his property if he was "not loyal to the fatherland, the state and the highest Arab national goals and its revolution". This paragraph of the decree meant immediate deportation and confiscation of all of their property for tens of thousands of Faili Kurds.
  • In 1987/88 the Kurds were attacked throughout Iraq. Up to 300,000 Faili Kurds were deported, interned or "disappeared" to Iran.

Future prospects

With the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003, the Faili Kurds hoped for an improvement in their situation and full recognition of their civil rights. Although the country has a democratic constitution, approved by two-thirds of Iraqis, and legal legislative and executive powers, the Faili Kurds are still severely disadvantaged. This applies above all to those Faili Kurds who have returned from exile and for whom there is now no decent care. Most returnees have neither a secure income nor a permanent job and are therefore, like the majority of Iraqis, dependent on state food support. The reconstruction of the country, the state institutions and the economy is not progressing. The Autonomous Region of Kurdistan in the north of the country is an exception . There, too, the trend for returnees is unsatisfactory.

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Article Feyli , from Iranica
  2. ↑ They are, in any case, distinct from both the Bakhtiary (the Great Lur) and the Feyli Lurs (the Little Lur) of Khorramabad, who were also to play apart in the resurgence of the Zagros tribes. , John R. Perry, Karim Khan Zand , 2012, ISBN 1-78074-199-5 , [1]
  3. ^ Daniel T. Potts: Nomadism in Iran: From Antiquity to the Modern Era . Oxford University Press, 2014, ISBN 0-19-933079-4 , pp. 263 (English, limited preview in Google Book search).
  4. ^ William Kennett Loftus: Travels and Researches in Chaldaea and Susiana . Robert Carter & Brothers, 1857, p. 356 (English, limited preview in Google Book search).
  5. ↑ ۲۶ مارس ۲۰۱۶. In: دائرة المعارف بزرگ اسلامی . باجلان, accessed November 13, 2017 .
  6. ↑ a b c d e f Society for Threatened Peoples ( Memento from July 31, 2012 in the web archive archive.today ). Article of the Society for Threatened Peoples on Faili Kurds, section " General information on Feili Kurds ". Retrieved May 30, 2010.
  7. ↑ فرهنگ ایران زمین ، جلد 20 ، ص 406-409
  8. ^ Austen Henry Layard: Early Adventures in Persia, Susiana, and Babylonia: Including a Residence Among the Bakhtiyari and Other Wild Tribes Before the Discovery of Nineveh . 2nd Edition. Cambridge University Press, 2011, ISBN 978-1-108-04343-4 , pp. 307 ( limited preview in Google Book Search - first edition: 1887).
  9. ↑ MR Izady.The Kurds: A Concise Handbook. Taylor & Francis Publishing, 1992
  10. ↑ gfbv.de ( Memento from July 31, 2012 in the web archive archive.today ). Article of the Society for Threatened Peoples on Faili Kurds, section " The problem of citizenship ". Retrieved May 30, 2010.

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