The Cultural War against the Kurdish Nation

Scherco R. Baban | Exclusive to iKurd.net

Cultural War

On May 11 [2014], The Iranian Consulate in Silêmanî, South [Iraqi] Kurdistan released a statement about Iran’s perspective regarding its relationship with the Kurdistan Region of Iraq. This statement about The Kurds was full of misrecognition, distortion and disrespect.

The statement started with demonizing The Kurdish Republic of 1946 in Mehabad that lasted for a year and labeled it as “the few day lasting communist state of Mahabad” which had pushed some Kurdish political parties to be involved in “construction of nation, culture, language and history”.

It went on describing “Kurdish dialect is not an autonomous language but belongs to the Iranian languages and is a mixture of Arabic, Turkish and Persian languages”. It is not clear which Iranian languages the Consulate intended but Persian is the normative point of comparison.

Persian and Kurdish language 2022 Scherco Baban ikurd.net — Photo: Provided by Scherco R. Baban. Click to enlarge.

Furthermore, the statement reiterated the classical mantra of the Regime of Tehran accusing The West of being the major source of division in the Islamic and Middle Eastern countries in search of natural resources.

It also underlined that there are no divisions among the people of the region since they have been living together in harmony for thousands of years.

The Kurdish Nation in this statement was reduced to a “minority” living in Iraq, Syria and Turkey and their so-called great homeland, Iran. The statement also warned the Kurdistan Region to preserve the territorial unity of Iraq otherwise it would be facing hardships.

This recent event is just one of many that occurred in recent months that shows Iran’s nervosity of the emergence of an independent, but also secular and democratic South Kurdistan, The ascendance of the Kurdish liberation movement in both Turkey and the moribund states of Iraq and Syria didn´t go unnoticed by the Iranians both in exile and the Regime.

Even in Stockholm and about the same period (June 2014) there were a petite demonstration among exile Iranians calling for the unity of Iran against the “The Separatists” There were few persons with ill fitted “Kurdish clothes” trying to dance a Kurdish dance while waving the old flag of the Shah.

The whole scene was a total comedy. Of course there was a counter demonstration by real Kurds denouncing the fake ones who were protected by The Swedish police. The scene ended in turmoil and the fake “Kurds’ ‘ took off the “Kurdish” clothes that they wore over the normal ones and disappeared.

The former mentioned statement of the Iranian consulate about Kurds and the Kurdish language, stird hard reactions among The Kurdish diaspora but The response from the Kurdistan Regional Government and because of internal weakness and geopolitical reason was far from our aspirations. This disrespectful statement ignored intentionally all scientific and historical evidence of the notion and existence of Kurds as ancient people prior to the notion of any existence of Persians or Pars.

It’s not a secret that Kurdish is a more homogeneous language than Farsi even according to many Iranian linguists. Just show a Farsi newspaper to any Arabic speaker and he or she will tell that this language is composed of a huge amount of Arabic loanwords, beside the loanwords of other languages. This is not the case of Kurdish. Everyone knows that!

The Cultural War, Newroz, Saladin, Kawa The Smith and The Babans

So what is happening? There is a planned Cultural War against the Kurdish Nation on behalf of the occupying forces of Kurdistan. It is not just the Kurdish language, the very spirit of the Kurdish Nation. They are attacking everything. They are attacking Newroz appropriating the very Kurdish way of Congrating during the festivity in its language. They used to say “Norooz Moobarek” and now they are using The Kurdish Newroz Piroz.

Blaming Saladin for atrocities as if it was required from The Kurdish Sultan to be a modern day pacifist. Before that they tried to dekurdify him and claim another origin. Then some come blaming him for not building a nation state in an age where there was no existence of a nation state in any part of the world except in some cases. but there was not one in a modern meaning.

Yazidis usher in New Year at Lalish with candles, gather at their holy Temple of Lalish in Duhok, Iraqi Kurdistan, April 16, 2019. Photo: AFP

Then came the turn to Kawa The Blacksmith, claiming he was a traitor. There is no historical evidence of this man’s existence as a historical person. and the turn would come to the Baban´s for sure for one or another reason.

Then there is the effort to separate the Feyli [Feyli] Kurds, the Zazas and the followers of the Yarsanin and Ezidi [Yazidi] faiths from the Kurdish Nation. Last time I heard about the Hawramis.

The list goes on and on and it will be not strange that same day they would attack some typical Kurdish food such as the famous Kurdish Dolma. It begins typically by a social media page that says that then there would be discussion about it and it explodes.

This is definitely a Cultural war against everything Kurdish. Everything! From our Language to our dresses to our music. From our mythical persons to our historical onse. From our heros to our traitors. From our poets to our beggars. It is a Cultural War! In the face of this Cultural War we can’t wage a real war against it, nor we have the capacity. What shall we do? What did they do in India? or another part of the world? Did they sing the Peaceful coexistence or the brotherhood of the nations? No we cant wage peace against your rapist!

Cultural Boycott

You can’t love your enemy! Leave that to Jesus. Jesus tried to save the souls of his people not saving them from an eminant Cultural Genocide

In Psychology there is a term called “breaking rapport” which means that two person are on emotional crossroads and that’s why they would collid for the simplest reason. It’s not a secret that South Kurdistan has great influence from neighboring countries unfortunately. Start with a cultural boycott.

A Kurdish soldier who consumes the enemy´s music, movies and culture will definitely feel more affection towards his oppressor. Its easier to create traitors! Then what to do? Well start with culture! Kurdistan has a huge hunger for culture.

Don’t let The neighbours fill this need. Promote and the establishment of Western and Asian culture institutes in the city. This by far is much more beneficial for Kurdistan than our neighbour´s Cultural Trash there which after all are just tools for their irredentist nationalism. Nations who were colonized by advanced nations, they became advanced too. Just check the case of UK-India or UK-USA.

Cultural Resistance

The establishment of the American Universities was a step in the right direction. Let’s promote Spanish Instituto de Cervantes, German Schools, Name new streets if not after Kurdish heroes and poets after known western scientists like Einstein or Edisson.

These Languages by learning them and understanding their cultures of origin are by far much more beneficial for our society than the backward and chauvinist ones.

But more important is Kurdish Unity and strengthening the cultural characteristics of our nation. In my article about The introduction of Standard Kurdish. Strengthen the Kurdish culture, impose the language in all aspects of life. Movies, series products, everything!

Unify our script and harmonize our dialects! Establishing a High Academy Of Kurdish Language, Unify terminology and the Foreign words that came to Kurdish via neighbouring countries should also vanish and should be taken from the origin or other language that is more proper to our language! Translations of all litterature should only be from the original languages and by an official institution, not like today, from our neighbours languages. This praxis should have vanished by now!

Countries on the shores of The Persian Gulf have been anxious of the Persian dominance in the region. A stronger Kurdistan is in the benefit of the Arab region. A dialogue with Arab Nations is possible by trading independence for Water. All the water that comes to Iraq and Syria comes from the occupied Kurdistan! Why should we call the Gulf, Persian and not Arabic or something else if they call our Old Kurdish Language a dialect of Farsi?

Scherco R. Baban, an independent researcher and analyst specializing in Kurdish Question and The Middle Eastern security, economical and cultural dynamics.

The opinions are those of the writer and do not necessarily represent the views of iKurd.net or its editors.