Tel Keppe

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Tel Keppe
location
Tel Keppe (Iraq)
Tel Keppe
Tel Keppe
Coordinates 36 ° 29 ′  N , 43 ° 7 ′  E Coordinates: 36 ° 29 ′  N , 43 ° 7 ′  E
Country IraqIraq Iraq
Governorate Ninawa
Basic data
Residents 40,000 (2010)
mayor Basim Bello

Tel Keppe ( Arabic تل كيف Tel Kaif ; Aramaic ܬܠ ܟܐܦܐ, classic Syriac ܬܸܠ ܟܹܐܦܹܐ Tel Kepe ) is a traditional Assyrian ( Aramaic / Chaldean ) city in Iraq . The city is located on the Nineveh Plain and belongs to the Ninawa Governorate . Tel Keppe is less than 20 km northeast of the provincial capital Mosul and is now a suburb of the same. At times Tel Keppe was the largest city ​​in Iraq with Chaldean Christians, but only a few Chaldean refugees returned after the Daesh (IS) reign of terror from 2014 to 2016.

population

Almost 30,000 people lived in the city in 2000 - in the historic city center almost exclusively Christians of the Chaldean Catholic Church , while in the outer districts, since the end of the 20th century, predominantly Arab Sunnis . According to the Church in Need , the majority of Chaldean Christians have left the country for overseas, and of around 4,000 before the Daesh occupation in 2014, only around 130 lived in Tel Keppe in October 2019, while others were still living as internally displaced persons in Alqosch or Tesqopa . According to a study published in 2020, almost 80% of the Christians surveyed in Tel Keppe identify themselves as "Chaldeans" and a good 20% as "Assyrians", and all of the Christians surveyed in the city gave Surith (" Syriac ", Eastern Aramaic ) as their first language on. At times Tel Keppe was considered the largest Chaldean city in Iraq, but around the year 2000 - after heavy emigration to Baghdad and the USA - only around 5000 Chaldeans lived in the city. Nevertheless, until the houses and churches were destroyed by the Islamist terrorist organization Daesch (IS) from 2014 to 2016, Tel Keppe - alongside Alqosch and Tesqopa - was still one of the centers of the Chaldean Christians in Iraq.

history

Tel Keppe was first mentioned in 1403. In 1508 Tel was sacked by the Mongols. In 1743 troops of the Nader Shah plundered and burned the city on his march to Mosul . In 1833 Tel Keppe and Alqosch were sacked by the Kurdish governor of Rawandiz .

In 1768 Tel Keppe still had 2500 inhabitants, but wars, diseases and other catastrophes caused the population to drop to 1500 in 1882, and then to rise again to 2500 by 1891. In 1923 Tel Keppe had 14,000 inhabitants and in 1933 only 10,000. This number fell further to 7,108 in 1968 due to internal migration to Baghdad and emigration to the USA - especially to Detroit and San Diego . Today's Tel Keppe district was about 50% inhabited in the mid-20th century, but they were 6600 inhabitants of the actual city Tel Keppe almost exclusively Chaldean Christians.

At the end of the 20th century, as a result of the Arabization policy of President Saddam Hussein, an increasing number of Arab Sunnis settled in the city, creating new residential areas outside the city center. Around the year 2000, for example, almost 30,000 people were living in Tel Keppe, the majority of whom were Muslim Arabs .

In August 2014 the place was captured by the terrorist organization Islamic State (Daesch) . All the Chaldeans fled, many of them to Alqosh , which did not fall into the hands of Daesh. Others came to the predominantly Christian city of Ankawa in the north of the Kurdish metropolis of Erbil , where many found accommodation in the Chaldean Cathedral of St. Joseph . In October 2016, the Iraqi armed forces retook Tel Keppe in the course of the Battle of Mosul . After the Islamists were driven out, Tel Keppe was occupied by the Babylon Brigade , organized within the al-Hashd al-Sha'bī , under the command of Ryan al-Kaldani . Ryan al-Kaldani claims to be a Chaldean Christian, but his mostly Shiite brigade has been blamed for harassment of the Christian population of Tel Keppe. According to the Church in Need , of the 4000 Chaldean inhabitants in 2014, only around 130 had returned to Tel Keppe by October 2019, which - apart from Mosul itself - is the lowest return rate in the Christian towns of the Nineveh Plain.

The long-time Assyrian mayor of Tel Keppe, Basim Bello , a former member of the Assyrian Democratic Movement , was removed from office on August 3, 2017 at the request of the Kurdish chairman of the Provincial Council of Ninawa , Bashar al-Kiki , and Adel Marogy Jajo as director of his Place used. Shortly before, something similar had happened to the mayor of Alqosch , Fayez Abed Jawahreh , when Lara Yussif Zara was elected as his successor . A year later, on August 8, 2018, the relevant Iraqi administrative court annulled the decision made regarding Tel Keppe and reinstated Basim Bello.

Sons and daughters

  • Georges Garmou (born December 8, 1921 in Tel Keppe near Mosul Iraq; † September 9, 1999), Archbishop of the Chaldean Catholic Archeparchy Mosul.
  • Joseph II (Chaldean Catholic Patriarch) , Mar Joseph II (* 1667 in Tel Keppe, † June 2, 1712 in Diyarbakir), Patriarch of the Chaldean Catholic Church
  • Tariq Aziz (1936–2015), Foreign Minister of Iraq under Saddam Husain

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Natalie Jill Smith: Ethnicity, Reciprocity, Reputation and Punishment: An Ethnoexperimental Study of Cooperation among the Chaldeans and Hmong of Detroit (Michigan) (PhD dissertation). University of California , Los Angeles 2001. p. 61. UMI Number: 3024065.
  2. ^ A b Andrzej Halemba , Xavier Bisits: Life after ISIS: New challenges to Christianity in Iraq. Results from ACN's survey of Christians in the liberated Nineveh Plains. . Aid to the Church in Need , June 2020. pp. 11f., 36, 39, 42, 44, 68.
  3. ↑ a b Welcome To Tel Keppe ( Memento from July 19, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Chaldeans On Line.
  4. ^ David Wilmshurst: The ecclesiastical organization of the Church of the East, 1318-1913 . Corpus Scriptorum Christianorum Orientalium, Volume 582, Subsidia 104. Peeters, Leuven 2000. p. 205.
  5. ↑ Majid Khadduri: Area Handbook on Iraq. Human Relations Area Files, Volume 58. Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore (Maryland) 1956, p. 76 (on Google Books ).
  6. ↑ Press Release: Iraq - Additional Emergency Help of $ 146,000 Granted by Aid to the Church in Need. Aid to the Church in Need Canada, August 8, 2014.
  7. ↑ Zara Sarvarian: Iraq's Assyrian Christians: resurgence persecution and. World Watch Monitor, April 4, 2018.
  8. ^ Mosul offensive: ISIS kills hundreds of men and boys, Iraqi source says. CNN , October 23, 2016
  9. ↑ Kurdish leader Barzani promises the Christians security. Catholic Media Center, August 8, 2017.
  10. ↑ Mayor of Tel Keppe Reinstated After Unlawful Dismissal by KDP. Assyrian Policy Institute, August 9, 2018.