Tribute to Sargon Boulus

Stan Shabaz
Washington, DC

                                                     “He who migrated, never found the promised land.” [1]

Sargon Boulus (1944-2007)

It seems that lately the Mashriq has been losing some its greatest Arabic-language writers and intellectuals.  For example, just within the last few years we have witnessed the passing Nazik al-Mala'ika [2], Muhammad al-Maghut [3], Abdul Rahman Munif [4], Hisham Sharabi [5], Mai Ghoussoub [6], Ulfat Idlibi [7], Jan Dammou [8], Jalil al-Qaissi [9] and Edward Said [10], among others. And on October 22, we saw the passing of a name known to Assyrians the world over: Sargon Boulus. Sargon Boulus (Poulus) was a writer of great depth and talent. His name belongs in the above list, for he was very active and respected in the Arabic-language literary milieu. Not that he sought to distance himself from his Assyrian identity. On the contrary, Sargon was very proud of his Assyrian heritage and would often write about his fond memories of his childhood days in Habbaniya. He had a great respect for his ancient Assyrian ancestors and he always felt a close bond with his Assyrian family, colleagues and friends. Yet he also felt a profound attachment to the broader cultural, literary and artistic life of the entire Near East; an attachment to the whole Fertile Crescent region and the broader Arab World, in which he established a prominent and respected name for himself.

Sargon was born in al-Habbaniya in 1944. He had the following to say about his childhood days there:

Well, I was born in this small town of al-Habbaniya. It was all water – an artificial lake, built by the English I think – and I was born very close to the water. I think water is an important symbol to me even today and so I use it a lot. One of my first memories: I was sitting with my mother close to the water, where we had this kind of shack, small house, on the lake and we were just watching for hours and listening to the water and a sunset which still lingers in my mind, even the light, the shape of it, the form and the hues.

It is these small subtle details that can drive you along the path of your life, the rest of your life. Habbaniya was a small town and most of the Assyrians happened to live there because they were brought by the English. This is really important history for me because somehow I am involved with it, my bringing up and all that. In the twenties, I think, after the Assyrians were massacred in the north and the English took them over and put them under their protection, they moved from Henadi, which was a British air base, and brought to Habbaniya which became a military camp, a famous camp.

My father used to work for the English and one of my first and very cherished memories is when as a kid my father used to take me to the place of his work, which was a camp where only the English lived with the Iraqi workers (mostly Assyrian). We used to see these English ladies in summertime among their flowers and lawns, a totally different women from the women that I knew like my mother, my sisters and the other women in my family. Here was another type of image of humanity, let's say, and I was like sneaking a view through the trees, from far away into these gardens. For me, I think now, that's a vision of paradise, paradise meaning something very flowery, full of colour. I've even written about this somewhere, some lines in a poem. Of course I wasn’t aware at the time that they were occupying the country, I was too young. [11]

In 1956, his family moved to Kirkuk where he began his literary work as a poet and translator of English language literature. He describes his early years there as follows:

I started writing when I was 12: I published my first poem when I was 13 or 14 and since then I haven't stopped. It just grabbed me, this magic of words, of music. In the beginning I wrote so furiously […] So it was some kind of thing to do with destiny.
Yes, I believe in that--in a poet's case it is always true; that that magic, once it strikes you, you can never live without it. You always go back to that source to find out - how did this happen? Why did this thing happen to me? Why was I chosen, in fact, to see the world in this way, through words?

It’s like a magical drug of spirit and words. Arabic language really has that magic and once it reveals itself to you, you are trapped. That’s why in Arabic they say “Adracat’hu hirfatu al-adab”, meaning “the profession of words has struck, he’s cursed”. At the same time I consider it a blessing as well as a curse, because today, if you ask me, I would say I want to do exactly as I have done. I want it all over again. I think that in poetry I have found something besides just pain and just nibbling at the bones of history.

Arab history, Assyrian history, Armenian history, all the peoples, all their languages poured into the Arabic language. The Arabic language is probably 70 per cent Syriac, Aramaic, even Sanskrit, and other languages, so there is no pure language in this sense. [12]

He contributed his writings to the influential Shi’r [13] magazine of Adunis and Yusuf al-Khal. Sargon describes his early contact with al-Khal as follows:

When I was in Kirkuk in 1961, I sent poems to Yousef Al-Khal, 16 poems, which were published, opening the magazine, and I was hailed in Al Nahar newspaper as a new discovery, a young poet - which was true, I was very young. And so Yousef Al-Khal and me started a correspondence and that is the start of my relationship with the magazine. [14]

In 1967 he arrived in Beirut where he worked with al-Nahar newspaper and Shi’r magazine. During these years he worked closely with the literary giants of the city such as Adunis, Yusuf al-Khal and Ghada Samman to name just a few. In 1969 he left for the United States. Sargon explains how he was able to obtain entry into the United States in the following story:

Yousif Al-Khal helped me a lot. We went to the American Embassy and he told them about this young man who had translated two anthologies of American poetry in Shi’r magazine and introduced the beat generation of poets to Arab readers. He told the American Ambassador: “All you have to do is talk to this young man, just talk to him!”

So the Ambassador asked me about American literature. I started with Walt Whitman, and then came to the new names which the Ambassador had never heard of and probably will never hear of, and he said: “Enough! You got it.” So they gave me a paper, although I still had no passport.

That is how I got to New York. [15]

Once in America, he took Etel Adnan up on her invitation to visit her in San Rafael. Once there he fell in love with San Francisco. He described San Francisco as follows:

San Francisco is the centre of creativity in America, the centre of America. There is East Coast, New York, the publishing world, the business of literature and there is the West Coast, which is San Francisco and that is where all the new movements emerge from, always, even today, so there was the so-called San Francisco Renaissance, a tremendous movement with Kenneth Rexroth, whom I met, as master of ceremonies. Through him all the great poets of the beat generation came out, like Gary Snyder, and then Ginsberg, Kerouac, then Gregory Corso, Bob Kaufman, Lawrence Ferlinghetti. […]

So San Francisco is the place of awareness because writers there are the most open. They are not like the New Yorker writer and poet, the sophisticated Europeanised type, the New Yorker. No, they are cosmopolitan. San Francisco is the city that is actually made up of all the cities in the world: You have Paris, you have London, you have Rome, and you have Berlin, in this city you have China. It is international and culture is absolutely open. I think for an artist, especially a poet, that is the city. I mean, I spent a quarter of a century, more, in San Francisco, never getting bored one minute – the readings, the fantastic trips, especially in the seventies and the eighties. It was the time for me, that is the thing that I treasure, the adventures, the open spirit, and then Berkeley which in the late sixties was THE place for revolution, for stopping the war in Vietnam. The first night I arrived in Berkeley, I saw a procession of students with candles singing against the war, to stop the war in Vietnam and what they were reading but the poems of Ho Chi Min, which I had just translated into Arabic and published in Dar Al-Nahar in Beirut. Prison Diary (Youmiat fi Sijin), it was my first book. [16]

During this period Sargon was very active in his poetic writings. He also translated much English language literature into Arabic including the sonnets of Shakespeare as well as the works of Ezra Pound, Auden, Shelley, Sylvia Plath, Allen Ginsberg, Robert Duncan, Pablo Neruda and Rainer Maria Rilke.

In 1981, Sargon, along with Kamal Boullata, edited “Fayrouz: Legend and Legacy”, a beautiful book of tribute in commemoration of Fayrouz’s North American concert tour. For the book Sargon wrote a moving essay, “Origins of a Legend” detailing the life of Fayrouz [17] and the beauty and uniqueness of her great talent. The tour was sponsored by the San Francisco based Forum for International Art and Culture, which was established in 1971 by Violette Yacoub. Sargon worked closely with this Forum in pursuit of its goal of fostering an appreciation and understanding of international culture. The Forum also sponsored the publication of “Tigris” magazine, of which Sargon was editor. It was an independent journal of literature and the graphic arts. The journal would include works by many of Sargon’s friends and colleagues including Mouayad al-Rawi, Yusuf al-Khal, Etel Adnan, Fouad Rifkah and many others.

Later Sargon became a consulting editor and frequent contributor to the influential magazine of modern Arabic literature, Banipal. [18] In a fascinating interview in the inaugural issue of Banipal he talked about his Assyrian heritage:

Is there any influence in my work from my Assyrian background? Well, as a child I was writing in Arabic, although I have written certain things in Assyrian. But I soon realized that Assyrian is a very limited language in the sense of an audience. First of all, throughout the whole Middle East where Assyrians exist their language is suppressed - they don't have schools, they don't have magazines, they don't have books, but almost secret societies. The first school I went to was in a church in Al-Habbaniya where the priest used to teach us and I read Assyrian. It's a beautiful language, it's a great language and sometimes I feel like writing a fantastic elegy for the Assyrian language, how it's dying and I'm seeing its death.

But then I realized, when I was struck by the Arabic language, when the gift came to me, that all languages are really one. I mean, Arabic is almost like Assyrian to me, that's strange, but it's really true. For me the sound of Arabic is like some kind of cover for what's beneath it - meaning all these ancient languages never really die. They are there. This might sound like an illusion but they are there, they are steamed up into Arabic and they are right there.

Of course, throughout the years I went and studied these things, I studied Turath, which is the classics of Arabic language. I found out that some of the greatest Arab poets were in fact Assyrians. They changed their names, they're all in history. Emr Al-Quais was Assyrian and Nabi Al Dhubiani, who was the poet of the kings, of the palace, was actually Assyrian. He was Monovesian, a kind of Christian at that time. Now who could be Christian in Iraq and not be Assyrian - either Assyrian, or Syriac or Chaldean, Assyrians considered all these people one. Then, Abu Tammam was Christian - he changed his name. Ibn Al-Abri, a great historian, is Ben Khafri in Assyrian, so he's Assyrian. I can tell you hundreds of names like that. Ibn Ar-Ruhmi, he was in fact Greek and Christian. These things are facts in Arabic literature. So, the way I see it is that there is no such thing as pure Arabic literature. It all is from here and there, especially from Iraq and Syria where the tremendous movements of classic poetry took place, the revolutions of Abu Tammam in Syria and Al Muttanebi in Iraq, these movements just dragged with them all the past of mixed origins, mixed languages, mixed knowledge, mixed terminology - and this past is all there in the poetry and the prose. [19]
 
A few years ago, the Assyrian writer Samuel Shimon dedicated these lines to his friend and colleague Sargon Boulus:

My native land?
The last book I’d think of reading [20]

What are these cryptic words meant to imply? I think they reveal a sense of alienation, frustration and loneliness felt by so many Near Eastern artists and intellectuals. It is why many of the great intellectuals mentioned at the start of this essay lived their lives in exile, so far away from their ancestral homeland and society. Yet their homeland, society and culture dominated their lives, their thoughts and their works. They carried their homeland with them in their very souls and it was central to everything they did.

Sargon Boulus is emblematic of this predicament: the artist in exile, an all too common phenomenon for us, unfortunately. But was it just a political exile? No upon further reflection, I think it was just as much a societal exile, if not more so. Sargon felt a frustration with society, which he described as follows:

It's long work, always thankless. After a while, after writing for 30 years, you feel a little bit of frustration because here is a whole world where idiots are taking over things and some rich sheikh or someone, with billions of dollars and oil can live such a fabulous life, and own all the papers and magazines and here is a poet sweating and laboring to advance the language. You know what that means, I think that is one of the most honorable missions in life, and they're totally neglected, so sometimes a poet, if he gives up, he is really justified. But then you try to fight against despair.

Sometimes I find oases like this sweet small German village or anywhere else in fact, just to pursue these fascinating, complex ideas of mine. [21]

I think he was frustrated by what he saw as an entrenched formulaic societal conservatism that tends to value conformity over originality. A type of fossilized traditionalism and social authoritarianism which discourages creativity, innovation, and independence of thought and action: a mentality that time and again values the “rich sheikh” over the “sweating poet”. 
                                                
Of course, given the precariousness, complexity and unpredictability of life in the region, this societal conservatism is somewhat understandable. Yet it should also be understood that there will always be creative people of talent, ambition and drive who refuse to be bound by the societal limitations and expectations imposed upon them; any more than they would accept to be bound by the political restrictions imposed on them from above. And while bucking political oppression is usually applauded, bucking societal expectations is much less appreciated. Yet the creative soul is always the strongest and will always find a way to express its uniqueness. Sargon Boulus was one of these unique creative souls; a free spirit that our nation has produced and whom we should take great pride in. We should all take a moment to remember him, reflect upon his great works, and honour his amazing life.

Barbaric Attacks on the Assyrian and Mesopotamian History

Fred Aprim
California

With the support of the United States, the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) was established in northern Iraq in 1992. Subsequently, efforts ensued to construct the foundation for what could become a new Kurdish nation state. There are those, however, who are convinced that the US at this time at least is unlikely to sponsor a Kurdish state within Iraq that could boost similar aspirations by Kurds in Turkey. Thus Kurds in Iraq could expect some degree of autonomy from the Iraqi Central Government sufficient enough to enable the US to maintain a strategic presence in northern Iraq, watch over Iran and keep Turkey happy at the same time.

At any rate, this new Kurdish nation-state envisioned by the Kurdish leaders in Iraq needed a foundation to be built upon and one pillar to support such foundation is history. The construction of this history was necessary since the Kurds have a relatively brief history in Iraq (Mesopotamia) compared to that of the Assyrians. With a healthy treasury and a strong continuous aid from the US and other European countries, the KRG has allocated millions of dollars on rewriting the Kurdish history. It has contacted and paid politicians and historians around the world for this purpose.  Luckily for the Kurds, the fabrication of their history began when there were no experts on Kurdish history, thus their claims set no boundaries.

The KRG did not only rely on the paid Kurdish and non-Kurdish writers, it went further by learning from Saddam Hussein's policies. KRG officials are never shy from making unfounded and outrageous historic claims as they see them fit and then allow those paid writers to justify such claims. If we look at Saddam Hussein's claims, we would see that he first claimed that he was a descendent of Mohammad.  Then he turned around and claimed that King Nabuchednassar of Babylon was his ancestor. Kurdish officials have learned from such chauvinistic and brutal dictatorship as they too with insolence and sauciness claim that they are the descendents of the Medes, Hittites and other Indo-European races and then turn around and claim that the Sumerian, Akkadian and Assyrian kings were Kurdistanis as well. One does not understand, are the Kurds Indo-Europeans or Semites, because one could not be both. I guess some Kurdish writers and politicians think that the Kurds are unique like no other people on earth as one half of the Kurdish body is Indo-European, while the other half is Semitic.

The rewriting of the Kurdish history requires much manipulation, appropriation, imagination and great disguise. The examples of the barbaric attack on the history of Assyria and Mesopotamia by certain paid Kurdish writers and officials are plentiful. The Kurdish assault on Mesopotamian history is turning to become a major offensive as more and more appalling claims by those arrogant Kurdish writers and politicians turn on various sites or media outlets.

Allow me to list the following examples: 

Dr. Farsat Mur'ai

Dr. Farsat Mur'ai, a Kurd, is the Head of the Kurdish Central Studies in the University of Dohuk, northern Iraq. The corruption of history by Dr. Farsat would make world's theologians and historians scratch their heads.  Let me just point to one of the most outrageous claims made recently by this so-called history teacher. Dr. Farsat claims that the early fathers of Syriac literature and theology Mar Aprim the great, Mar Narsai and Bardisan were Kurdish Christians. There is not much that a person can say about such an outlandish claim.

On May 18, 2006, the al-Jazeera.net published an article by Dr. Farsat Mur'ai titled "The Historic Role of Kurds."

In his article, Dr. Farsat speaks about the role of the Kurds in world's history and claims that the Kurds had a rather important role, because the world's first civilizations appeared on Kurdish lands. He adds that the ancient people of Iraq, including the Sumerians, Akkadians, and Assyrians were considered to be the second wave of mankind that spread after the resting of Utnapishtim's (Noah) Ark on one of the Kurdish mountains. He claims that this is recorded in the Akkadian and Assyrian ancient texts. Dr. Farsat continues later to claim that the third millennia B.C. historic records have saved the names of many gods that were worshipped by the people of northern Mesopotamia, the ancient people of Kurdistan, in addition to few myths or epics that had great influence on the development of civic awareness and mental structure for those nations and the surrounding nations as they began to have common feelings that framed civic, economic and political relationships. Dr. Farsat continues on and claims that other gods made the doctrine of the people of northern and eastern Mesopotamia or Subartu. These gods that originated from the Hindu-Aryan mythology, he claims, left their homes of southern Russia in the beginning of the second millennia B.C. and headed towards India, Iran, Anatolia and Subartu (Kurdistan).

I just wonder, where did Dr. Farsat see those claimed Assyrian and Akkadian ancient texts that refer to that certain Kurdish mountain? Did he see those texts in his dreams? The rest of the gibberish that he claims is nothing but a figment of his imagination and he is brilliant at mixing up Mesopotamia, Subartu and the illusive Kurdistan to confuse the simple readers.

Fadhil Mirani

During the early 1990s, Fadhil Mirani, Political Bureau Secretary of the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) of Massoud Barazani, head of the Kurdish front in Dohuk at the time, repeatedly used racist methods to divide the Assyrians with methods similar to those of Saddam's Ba'ath regime. Foremost among their tactics were financing divisionists in northern Iraq to undermine the Assyrian history and making the Assyrians known as a group of separate religious denominations rather than a distinct ethnic group, thus questioning the historic rights of Assyrians in northern Iraq and rejecting the Assyrian rooted history in the region.

Mulla Bakhtiyar

On October 22, 2007, al-Malaf Press posted an interview with Mulla Bakhtiyar, In Charge of Foreign Relations Bureau in the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) party under Jalal Talabani.

Mr. Bakhtiyar stated that there were investigations and international historic studies during the previous League of Nations regarding Kirkuk, Sulaimaniya, Dohuk, Arbil and Mosul that prove that those regions are Kurdistani regions and that those regions were/are inhabited by the indigenous Kurdish people. Mr. Bakhtiyar answered a question regarding the rights of the Turkoman for example to establish a region for themselves in northern Iraq and he stated: "…It is known that nations (peoples) have the legal right to establish their own states or regions if they had historic and geographical lands; however, the Turkomen and ChaldoAshur [referring to Assyrians] are residing in Kurdistan and they have full citizenship rights in it, but they, i.e., Turkomen and Assyrians, do not own/have any Turkomeni or ChaldoAshuri [Assyrian] lands in Kurdistan and/or in Iraq."

This writer published a detailed article about Mr. Bakhtiyar's statement as a guest editorial for AINA.
Mr. Bakhtiyar must be blind since he fails to recognize all the Assyrian archaeological findings in northern Iraq and in world's museums, when we know for a fact that there is not a single ancient Kurdish monument, stele, artifact, tablet, etc., about people known as Kurds in northern Iraq.

Mahrdad Izady

The writings of Kurdish writer Mehrdad R. Izady regarding the claimed Kurdish essence of northern Iraq have influenced many, including David Axe and Dr. Victor Sharpe M.D., who repeat the history fabrications of Izady. For example, on July 30, 2007, Victor Sharpe, a medical doctor, posted an article on the web site of Israel Hasbara Committee where he copied the claims of Izady that the royal house of Adiabene was Kurdish.

This writer published a detailed response to Dr. Sharpe's statement as a guest editorial for AINA. Did Dr. Sharpe M.D. study reliable history accounts, including those of 1st Century renowned Jewish historian Flavius Josephus who asserts that Adiabene (Arbella or Arbil) was Assyrian and the Adiabeni people were Assyrians? (See Whinston, William. Translator. The Works of Josephus. Massachusetts: Hendrickson Publishers Inc. 1999.) I will leave this to the Jewish scholars to figure out. Because, if we assume that the accounts of the 1st Century father of Jewish history Josephus are false and those of Izady and Dr. Sharpe M.D. are correct, then the Jewish scholars have a lot of explaining to do and they have much to lose on an academic level. This would put a big question mark on other accounts by the famous 1st Century Jewish historian Josephus, if one assumes that he was wrong about Adiabene and Izady and Dr. Sharpe M.D. are correct.

Changing Educational Material

The KRG intimidates Assyrian individuals or groups that do not agree with its policies in northern Iraq. The Assyrians must accept any preconditions set by the KRG if any benefits are to be granted. For example, the Sixth Grade Geography Curriculum book taught in Syriac Schools in northern Iraq forces the Assyrians to print that Simko the warlord who murdered the Assyrian Patriarch Mar Benyamin Shimun in 1918 was a national hero. As we know, Simko invited the Assyrian patriarch to his home to negotiate peace terms. However, after the negotiations were completed and Simko accompanied the patriarch outside and as the patriarch was attempting to ride his carriage, Simko went inside immediately and his men began to open fire and shot the patriarch in the back. Is that the act of a national hero or a coward? If the Assyrians refuse to print this in the book, the Kurdish authorities would not approve the curriculum and perhaps close the schools. The policy of the KRG is no different than that of Saddam Hussein, who was involved in the policy of forced Arabization and indoctrination of the non-Arab people in Iraq. Today, the KRG is involved in the policy of forced Kurdification and indoctrination of the non-Kurdish people in northern Iraq.

Iraqi President, Jalal Talabani

Jalal Talabani, the Head of the PUK and the current Iraqi president, had declared earlier that he is not aware of the presence of Assyrians in Iraq. In the hallways and corridors of the Iraqi cabinet, Kurdish officials in the Iraqi Central government continue to spread the poison that Assyrians have no lands in Iraq, thus the Iraqi Assyrian Christians are simply outsiders residing in the country.

I am bringing up these examples for two main purposes: First, it is to refute certain claims (including those of certain Assyrian groups or individuals working for the KRG currently) that claim that the undermining of Assyrian history and rewriting that of the region are not a collective policy of the KRG and Kurdish leadership. These few claim that such actions are of individual nature, but as we see from the above few examples that that is not the case and that politicians and officials of the KRG are in the center of this campaign. The second purpose is to bring attention to what is going on in northern Iraq as Kurdish politicians, officials, and writers construct their new history. They do this via a meticulous campaign that includes indoctrination, deceit, falsification and corruption of history to achieve two main goals: The first is to make everyone digest the myth of the rooted Kurdishness of northern Iraq. The second is to make everyone accept that they are Kurdistanis living on the supposedly historic Kurdish lands.

Most of the articles on Kurdish history written by Kurdish writers are in essence a collection of historical events, but those events are restructured and represented in a way that suit the Kurdish agenda in rewriting the history of northern Iraq (Assyria). Kurdish writers and officials conveniently insert the name Kurds and Kurdistan wherever and whenever necessary and with that they create a new version of Mesopotamian history, Kurdish style. One could recommend these claims to be read as a comic tale, but it is not funny either. The KRG might pay certain media groups to promote this corrupted version of history, but the KRG and those paid writers would never be able to ignore the thousands of steles, monuments, artifacts, tablets, ancient cuneiform and old Syriac texts and a wealth of history documents that prove the Assyrian essence of northern Iraq. They could not ignore tons of archaeological evidence that fill the world's museums or those pieces of history that continue to be excavated in northern Iraq, that prove beyond any reasonable doubt the strictly Assyrian origin of the region.  

Let me be clear that the Kurdish people deserve attention and have the right for self-determination, but this attention and/or special treatment that they are receiving must not be granted at the expense of the demise of the indigenous ethnic people of the region, namely the Assyrians, or other ancient religious minorities such as the Yezidis. 

It is unfortunate that certain non-Kurdish writers and self-proclaimed historians blindly copycat corrupted versions of history of Mesopotamia and Assyria written by certain Kurdish writers and nationalists. They do this without serious efforts to investigate such claims made by Kurdish nationalists and writers that are constructing a new history for northern Iraq (Assyria), Assyrians and for the Kurdish people. We must encourage genuine Kurdish scholars to step up to the plate and challenge these revisionists. We encourage them to write the history of Kurds in Iraq, a genuine history narrative that is, which would be respected by academia and not allow politicians and blind nationalists to write a history that is the laughing stock of the world historic and archaeological societies.

Unfortunately, the methodical campaign of denying, corrupting and usurping the history of northern Iraq and Assyrians goes on today in the supposedly new, free and democratic Iraq. What is most unfortunate is that certain Kurdish officials and writers continue to do this while many Assyrians are busy with controversies and internal conflicts created by their churches. These churches are vulnerable and their leaders have been and continue to be influenced by certain governments in the Middle East and most recently by the empowered KRG.

Mosul Dam at Risk of Collapse

Courtesy of BBC
31 October 2007

(ZNDA: Mosul)  United States is warning the Iraqi authorities that the largest dam in Iraq is at risk of an imminent collapse that could unleash a 20 meter or 65 feet wave of water on Mosul, a city of 1.7 million people.  The flooding will also completely cover the ancient ruins of Nineveh, capital of Assyria, and much of the Nineveh Plain, where the large majority of Assyrian population in Iraq lives.

In May, the US told Iraqi authorities to make Mosul Dam a national priority, as a catastrophic failure would result in a "significant loss of life".

However, a $27 million US-funded reconstruction project to help shore up the dam has made little or no progress.

Iraq says it is reducing the risk and insists there is no cause for alarm.

However, a US watchdog said reconstruction of the dam had been plagued by mismanagement and potential fraud.

In a report published on 30 October the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction (SIGIR) said US-funded "short-term solutions" had yet to significantly solve the dam's problems.

SIGIR found multiple failures in several of the 21 contracts awarded to repair the dam.

Among the faults were faulty construction and delivery of improper parts, as well as projects which were not completed despite full payments having been made.

'Fundamentally flawed'

Mosul Dam is Middle East's fourth largest dam in reservoir capacity and Iraq's largest Key component in Iraq's national power grid, with four 200 megawatt (MW) turbines generating 320 MW of electricity a day Built on water-soluble gypsum, which causes seepage. Subsequent erosion creates cavities beneath dam that must be plugged or "grouted" on a regular basis or dam will fail, say experts Array of piezometers have been deployed to measure water pressure and leakage Seismic equipment provides information to monitor dam's stability US-funded reconstruction project - costing $27m (£13m) - to help shore up the dam has made "little or no progress" since 2005 to significantly improve basic grouting capability of the Iraqi Ministry of Water and Resources at the dam, according to the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction (SIGIR)

The dam has been a problem for Iraqi engineers since it was constructed in 1983.

It was built on water-soluble gypsum, which caused seepage within months of its completion and led investigators to describe the site as "fundamentally flawed".

In September 2006, the US Army Corps of Engineers determined that the dam, 45 miles upstream of Mosul on the River Tigris, presented an unacceptable risk.

"In terms of internal erosion potential of the foundation, Mosul Dam is the most dangerous dam in the world," the corps warned, according to the SIGIR report. "If a small problem [at] Mosul Dam occurs, failure is likely."

The corps later told US commanders to move their equipment away from the Tigris flood plain near Mosul because of the dam's instability.

The top US military commander in Iraq, Gen David Petraeus, and US ambassador Ryan Crocker then wrote to Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki urging him to make fixing the dam a "national priority".

"A catastrophic failure of the Mosul Dam would result in flooding along the Tigris River all the way to Baghdad" the letter on 3 May warned.

"Assuming a worst-case scenario, an instantaneous failure of Mosul Dam filled to its maximum operating level could result in a flood wave 20 meter deep at the city of Mosul, which would result in a significant loss of life and property."

If that were to happen some have predicted that as many as 500,000 people could be killed.

Alarm bells

Iraqi authorities, however, say they are taking steps to reduce the risk and they do not believe there is cause for alarm.

The Iraqi Minister for Water Resources, Latif Rashid, says that a number of steps were being taken to tackle the problem, including a reduction in water levels in the reservoir and a round-the-clock operation to pump grouting into the dam's foundations.

Work would also begin next year on a longer-term plan to make the foundations safe by encasing them in a concrete curtain, he added.

The debate over the dam has gone on largely behind the scenes so as not to cause public panic or attract the interest of insurgents.

Assyrian Students & Youth Hold Sixth Conference in Dohuk

Courtesy of the Khoyada
18 October 2007

(ZNDA: Dohuk)  The Sixth Conference of the ChaldoAssyrian Youth and Student Union was held at the Assyrian Cultural Center in Dohuk, Iraq between October 14 and 15. 

198 delegates attended this conference from several branches of the Union.   Reports of each delegation was read and accepted into the minutes of the meeting.

The first day of the conference was primarily allocated to the discussion of the hardships faced by the students and the youth in completing their education and university studies amid the deteriorating conditions prevailing in Iraq.  Assassinations of the university professors, attacks on Christian students, and inability to find work after completion of a university degree were among such issues discussed.  

198 delegates attended the 6th Conference of the Chaldo-Assyrian Student Union in Dohuk, Iraq between Oct 14 and 15.

"The brain drain", exacerbated by the exodus of the Assyrian students from Iraq, is a serious social issue in that country, particularly in cities and towns dominated by Assyrians.  One possible solution elaborated by the participants was the establishment of colleges, universities, and institutions for research and higher learning in the Nineveh Plain.

The participants agreed that their efforts to obtain higher education should continue and asserted their commitment to overcome all obstacles and develop mechanisms to strengthen the educational experiences of the students and the youth, with an emphasis on the study of the Syriac language at all educational levels.

The Conference discussed the use of the name "Chaldo-Assyrian" and after extensive discussions voted to keep this name as a unifying tool and a commitment to the decision reached at the October 2003 conference in Baghdad.

The Conference adopted new procedural rules and elected a new Secretary of the Union and an Executive Committee.  The following is the list of the new officers:

The new Executive Committee of the Chaldo-Assyrian Students Union in Iraq.

Maliki Pledges to Protect Christian Minority from Violence

Courtesy of the Canadian Press
27 October 2007

(ZNDA: Baghdad)  Iraq's prime minister pledged on 27 October to protect and support the Christian minority that has been fleeing the chaos and sectarian violence in the country.

In receiving the Chaldean patriarch of Baghdad, Mar Emmanuel III Delly, the head of the Chaldean Church in Iraq and the world, Nouri al-Maliki affirmed his government's readiness and determination to defend the small community and to stop the outflow of Iraqi Christians, according to a statement by al-Maliki's office.

Mar Delly has been outspoken about the need to protect minority Christians from Iraq's spiraling violence.

Pope Benedict XVI named Mar Delly as one of 23 new cardinals as a prince of the Roman Catholic Church on 17 October.

Since the 2003 war, Iraqi Christians, mostly Chaldeans, were the targeted by Islamic extremists who labeled them "Crusaders" loyal to the U.S. troops they are fighting.

The Christian community, about three per cent of the country's 26 million people, is particularly vulnerable. It has little political or military clout to defend itself.

Churches, priests and businesses owned by Christians have been attacked by Islamic militants.

Seeking a better and safer life, about 50 per cent of Iraq's Christians may already have left the country, according to a report issued by the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom.

Chaldean Patriarch on Iraqi Refugees in Lebanon

Courtesy of the Catholic Online
23 October 2007

(ZNDA: Beirut)  Patriarch of the Chaldean Catholic Church and the Cardinal-designate Emmanuel-Karim Delly of Baghdad thanked the people of Lebanon for their hospitality and called for more help for Iraqi refugees there.

Millions of Iraqis have fled their homeland to escape violence, terrorism, extortion and death, said the patriarch of the Chaldean Catholic Church at a Mass in St. Raphael Chaldean Cathedral in Beirut Oct. 21.

He appealed to Lebanese authorities to ease the burden weighing on the lives of the tens of thousands of Iraqi refugees in Lebanon, many of whom are Christian.

He expressed gratitude toward the Lebanese who have welcomed Iraqis seeking refuge "while they wait for the storm to pass" in their homeland.

Cardinal-designate Delly noted that Iraqi refugees face numerous difficulties, particularly regarding their employment, legal status and ability to obtain work permits.

Although they receive emergency aid, notably from Caritas Lebanon and the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, they need more help for medical treatment and education for their children, he said. Caritas Lebanon is the local agency of the Caritas Internationalist confederation of Catholic relief, development and social services organizations.

He said the refugees live in "extremely poor conditions."

"They are packed in small spaces for which they pay high rents even though their refugee status qualifies them for better treatment, especially from the police," Cardinal-designate Delly said.

Cardinal-designate Delly has stood out as the voice of the suffering of all Iraqis during the ongoing war in his country. He had retired as an auxiliary bishop of Baghdad when he was elected patriarch in 2003, just months after the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.

Meanwhile, at the Mass Chaldean Bishop Michel Kassarji of Beirut called attention to the "intolerable treatment of Chaldean Christians by extremist groups in Iraq, forcing the Christians to convert, or kidnapping them or killing them, not to mention violence against women, the elderly and children, the killing of priests and destruction of churches."

"Is this the Iraq that we know?" Bishop Kassarji asked.

"Surely, what is happening in Iraq today is inhumane and contrary to all religious beliefs and traditions," he said.

The bishop noted that "there are people in Iraq that want to stay in their homeland, who refuse that their lives be at the mercy of others ... who plead for the Iraqis to come back to their senses."

Assyrian-Iraqi Poet, Sargon Boulus, Dies in Berlin

Courtesy of the Daily Star (Lebanon)
23 October 2007

(ZNDA: Beirut)  He walked across the desert from Baghdad to Beirut without a passport in his hand or a single dinar in his pocket. He joined up with Yusuf al-Khal and Adonis and helped revolutionize Arabic poetry from the tabletops of the Horseshoe cafe in Hamra. When he was jailed for entering Lebanon without proper papers, the novelist Ghada Samman used her connections and sprung him loose - but only on the condition that he leave the country.

When he made his way to the United States, the artist and writer Etel Adnan helped him travel from New York to San Francisco, where he fell in with the Beat generation. In his own words he wrote furiously from the time he was 12 until his death, on Monday morning, in a hospital in Berlin.

The poet Sargon Boulus, who championed free verse, honored the depth and breadth of the Arabic language and translated the likes of Ezra Pound, William Carlos Williams, Allen Ginsberg, John Ashbery, Sylvia Plath, Anne Sexton and Ho Chin Minh, was just 63 years old.

Boulus was born into an Assyrian family in the village of Habbaniya in western Iraq. He moved to Kirkuk just as he hit his teenage years and began writing poems alone in his bedroom. "It just grabbed me," he told Margaret Obank of the literary journal Banipal, "this magic of words, of music. In the beginning, I wrote so furiously ... In was some kind of thing to do with destiny. Yes, I believe in that - in a poet's case it is always true; that that magic, once it strikes you, you can never live without it."

In 1961, Boulus sent a suite of 16 poems to Yusuf al-Khal in Beirut, who published them in the influential journal Shir. Later on, Khal traveled to Baghdad, met with Boulus, and told him: "Your place is in Beirut. Come to Beirut. You are one of us."

In 1967, Boulus set off for Beirut on foot, cutting through northern Iraq and central Syria before crossing the border to Lebanon with nothing in hand but a manuscript of Jabra Ibrahim Jabra's Arabic-language translation of Shakespeare's "King Lear."

He spent a precious few years in Beirut and then, after that brief stint in prison, he left for America.
In San Francisco he met the Beats he had been writing about for Shir in Beirut, including Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac and Lawrence Ferlinghetti.

Boulus published six collections on poetry, including "Arrival in When City," "When You Were Sleeping in Noah's Ark" and "Live Next to the Acropolis." He also published an autobiography entitled "Witnesses on the Shore" and a short-story collection.

A funeral for Mr. Sargon Boulus was held in the city of Turlock, California on 31 October, where he was also buried.

Assyrian & Kurdish Residents of Malkieh Reconcile over Death of Kurdish Youth

On 2 November, a large gathering in the town of Malkieh, Syria took place where a huge crowd of Assyrian and Kurdish residents met to begin the reconciliation process over the killing of a young Kurdish man in April 2007.

Several thousand people met near the house of the victim, Jawan Ahmad Ali.

Metropolitan Eustathius Matta Roham of the Syriac Orthodox Church, Grand Sheik Mohammad Maasoum, Mr. Hamid Darwish, General Secretary of the Kurdish Democratic Progressive Party in Syria; Mr. Mohammad Ali, victim's brother; Mr. Bashir Ishaq Saadi, Secretary General of the Assyrian Democratic Organization in Syria and many other dignitaries spoke to the public about the importance of maintaining peace through forgiveness and reconciliation.

The town of Malkieh has about 30,000 inhabitants, eighty percent of whom are Kurdish and the rest Christian.

To view more photos from this event click on the links below:

1. Mr. Bachir Saadi, Secretary General of the Assyrian Democratic Organization
2. Mr. Hamid Darwish, Secretary General of the Kurdish Democratic Progressive Party
3. High dignitaries walking in the streets to Jawan's family house
4. Thousands walking from Jawan's family house to the church hall to "eat a common meal"
5. Sharing the "Common Meal" at the Hall of the Syrian Orthodox Church
6. Grand Sheik Mohammad Maasoum
7. Metropolitan Matta Roham speaking; next to His Grace is Jawan's father
8. Jawan's brother, Mohammad Ali

Zinda Magazine thanks the offices of the Assyrian Democratic Organization in Syria and His Grace Eustathius Matta Roham, Metropolitan of Jazirah & Euphrates, the Archdiocese of the Syrian Orthodox Church of Antioch for the information and photos presented in this report.  Metropolitan Roham is also a member of the Central Committee of the World Council of Churches.

Assyrian Church Wins Two-Year Court Battle

Courtesy of the Modesto Bee
10 November 2007

(ZNDA: Modesto)  Members of St. George Assyrian Church of the East in Ceres, California were dancing and celebrating last week because a superior court judge in Santa Clara ruled that a former bishop had to hand back church property he had claimed as his own.

In a summary judgment on 25 October (click here), the judge ordered that Bishop Mar Bawai Soro must turn over the St. George church property and a plot owned by the church in Empire, California.  He had to do the same for two other Assyrian churches in San Jose and San Francisco.

According to Sargon Dadesho, a member of the Ceres church, Bishop Soro was suspended in November of 2005 for alleged "rebellion of dogma" of the Assyrian Church of the East by its ruling body, or synod.

But Bishop Soro filed incorporation documents with the secretary of state and put the three churches in the Western California Diocese under his name, thus forcing a lawsuit to regain control of the properties.

A small minority of people, "no more than 50 to 60 people" out of 300 to 400 in the Ceres congregation, followed Bishop Soro, causing a minor church split as well, Dadesho and other church members said.

It was a costly two years.

"It cost us more than $800,000 for court costs. He told his supporters the other day that it cost him more than a million dollars. We have a court date on 10 December to talk about attorney fees and punitive damages," Dadesho said.

As news of the court ruling spread, a two-day celebration broke out at the Bet Nahrain Cultural Center in Ceres.

"We are very happy. More than 1,000 people were there, the whole Assyrian community and others who are not Assyrian who joined us," Dadesho said.

What this means, besides the ownership issue, Dadesho said, is that "for the first time, we'll hold our Mass at the regular time, 10 a.m. Sunday. We're hoping that by next year, a new bishop will be consecrated."

Full Text of the Statement Issued by Bishop Mar Bawai Soro

For Immediate Release                                                                                                                                                                 3 November 2007

His Grace Mar Bawai Soro
Church of the East
San Jose, California                                                                                                                                                                                

1.  After offering gratitude to Almighty God for His mercy and blessings in our lives, I wish to thank all our brothers and sisters in Christ who prayed for peace, called to express their love and continue their support.

2.  Concerning the civil aspect of our case, on October 25, 2007, the Superior Court of California (County of Santa Clara) reached its decision concerning the issue of the property dispute with the Assyrian Church of the East.  As law-abiding citizens of America, I have, along with our clergy and faithful, accepted the Court’s decision and agreed to transfer all such properties, financial and administration records to the other side. Just as always, all properties of the Diocese were registered under the name of both corporations.  Our side has no intention of appealing this court’s decision in order to shorten the period of pain for our people and to lessen the financial burden on them.

3.  In regard to the religious aspect, we feel more than ever motivated to pursue the much needed principles of our movement: accountability, reform and unity.  For us, victory was never about buildings & land parcels.  It has always been about offering Christian salvation and spiritual upbuilding to our faithful, restoring unity among all branches of the Church of the East, bridging the theological gap with the Protestants, re-establishing communion with other Christians, financially helping our needy people in the Middle East, and bringing unity to the Chaldo-Assyrian communities of Iraq so that our people’s rights are protected and their future is secured in our homeland. Our movement therefore by God’s grace shall continue and must further grow.

4.  In the past two years, I have stated several times that our side would not establish a new independent branch of the Church of the East, nor would it abandon or replace Church of the East tradition with another one.  We are and shall always remain faithful to the Lord, worshipping Him within the Church of the East patrimony.  Practically speaking, this means that we as a Diocese (i.e., a bishop, priests, deacons & faithful) shall unite with one of the two remaining branches of the Church of the East Tradition: either the Ancient Church of the East or the Chaldean Catholic Church.

5.  To reach such an objective, our diocesan priestly council (bishop and six priests) intends to pursue official talks with both branches of the Church of the East in order to discern the more suitable and final path that leads towards the perfection of love, which is unity.  This dialogue shall be based on, and determined by, the following principles:

   A.   The Will of the Lord Jesus Christ for His Church as expressed in the Sacred Scriptures.
  B.  The Church of the East’s comprehensive patrimony (liturgy, canons & Church Fathers) concerning the meaning and the nature of the particular and universal Church, and in regard to the historical experience of our forefathers.
   C.   The contemporary circumstances and the needs of our people in the present time.

6.      In conclusion, I pray that you and your loved ones are always protected.  May the Lord show you His love and guide you with His wisdom. May God grant our people and churches peace and unity and a renewed confidence and faith. Amen.

At press time Zinda Magazine has received only an Assyrian copy of Mar Dinkha IV's statement released on 31 October.   To read this official statement in Assyrian click here.

Barnabas Fund Launches Campaign for Iraq's Christians

Courtesy of the CNS News
1 November 2007
By Patrick Goodenough

(ZNDA: London)  The U.K.-based Barnabas Fund, an international charitable and advocacy group supporting Christian minorities in Islamic societies, has launched a new campaign to draw attention to the plight of Iraq's Christians, a community which it says "faces extinction."

The U.K.-based Barnabas Fund says that Islamic extremists in Iraq are telling Christians to convert, leave or face death.

"The militants are well on the way to succeeding in their aim, at least in the south and central areas, as Christians flee the restrictions, threats and violence imposed on them."

Iraq's Christians -- who include Chaldean Catholics, Assyrians, Orthodox Syriacs, Catholic and Orthodox Armenians, and Protestants -- are mostly non-Arabs who trace their origins to the ancient Assyrian empire.

Members of one of the world's oldest Christian communities, they have over the centuries survived persecution and ill-treatment at the hands of Muslim Arabs, Kurds, Turks and Mongols, the Barnabas Fund said.

During World War I, some 750,000 Assyrians were killed by Ottoman Turks and Kurds, an atrocity far less frequently discussed than the atrocities committed against the Armenians over the same period.

The Minority Rights Group International this year named Iraq the second-most dangerous country in the world for minorities, after Somalia. Apart from Christians, Iraq also has very small minorities of Yezidis, adherents of a religion that predates Islam and Christianity; and Mandaeans, a sect that reveres John the Baptist.

A 1987 census recorded 1.4 million Christians in Iraq, according to a State Department report in September. Researchers say the numbers began to drop steadily after the 1990 Gulf War, with some attributing this to a rise in anti-Christian sentiment as a result of the war and international sanctions campaign.

The exodus sped up following the 2003 U.S.-led war to topple Saddam Hussein, and today, estimates of the community's size range from 300,000 to 800,000, with a Chaldean bishop in Baghdad in mid-2006 putting the figure at 600,000.

Religious freedom researchers say Sunni, Shi'a and Kurdish elements have been implicated in the maltreatment of Christians.

The Barnabas Fund published translations of letters sent by Shi'a organizations to Christians in Baghdad ordering women to wear the Islamic veil or face the consequences.

A letter sent to one Christian family threatened death, kidnapping and bombing or the burning down of its house if the family did not comply with wearing the veil and following Islamic principles.

It reported cases of Christian women threatened, kidnapped, assaulted and killed.

The Barnabas Fund said many Christians who have left Iraq are struggling with basic needs in neighboring Syria and Jordan. Of those who remain in the country, many have moved to the autonomous Kurdish area in the north.

The organization, which has been helping the community inside Iraq since 1999, urged Christians to lobby their elected representatives about offering Iraqi Christians at risk asylum in their countries.

'Violence, discrimination, marginalization'

A fortnight ago, in what was seen as a reflection of the Vatican's concern about indigenous Christian minorities in the Middle East, Pope Benedict named a Chaldean church leader, Emmanuel III Delly, as one of 23 new Roman Catholic cardinals.

Delly, who warned in a statement last May that Iraqi Christians were facing "blackmail, kidnapping and displacement" at the hands of Sunni insurgents and said the government was not acting to protect the community, met last Saturday with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

The prime minister said in a statement afterwards that his government was committed to defending Christians and preventing the further exodus from Iraq.

Iraq's post-Saddam constitution guarantees freedom of thought, conscience and religious belief and practice, but it also declares Islam to be the official religion and states that no law may be enacted that contradicts the established provisions of Islam.

The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, an independent body advising the White House and Congress on religious persecution issues, reported in its 2007 annual report that Iraq's non-Muslim minorities "face widespread violence from Sunni insurgents and foreign jihadis."

"They also suffer pervasive discrimination and marginalization at the hands of the national government, regional governments and para-state militias, including those in Kurdish areas," it said.

The commission consequently placed Iraq on a "watch list" and said if the situation doesn't improve, it will recommend that it be listed as a "country of particular concern" (CPC) under the 1998 International Religious Freedom Act.

Iraq was put onto the CPC list in 1992, but the administration removed it in 2003 after toppling the Saddam regime. Designation provides for a range of actions against governments that engage or tolerate egregious religious freedom violations, including sanctions.

Countries currently on the CPC list are Burma, China, Iran, North Korea, Sudan, Saudi Arabia, Uzbekistan and Eritrea.

1915 Genocide Monument Erected in Wales

(ZNDA: London)  On 3 November a monument to commemorate the Assyrian-Armenian-Greek Genocide of 1915 was unveiled in Cardiff, England.

Many screaming Turkish protestors were present to disrupt the event and the Requiem led by Bishop Nathan Hovhannissian and the St Sarkis Church Choir from London.

The Assyrian Bishop, Khoshaba Guorges from the Ancient Churches of the East, also prayed and addressed the meeting.

The monument was unveiled by Lord Dafydd Elis-Thomas, Presiding Officer of the National Assembly of Wales and His Excellency Dr Vahe Gabrielyan, Ambassador of the Republic of Armenia to the United Kingdom.

Wreaths were laid in memory of the Armenian and Assyrian victims of the 1915 Genocide.

The event was followed by an afternoon of speeches and Welsh and Armenian music, poetry and dancing. Permission to erect the beautiful Stone Cross monument, a veritable Armenian Khatchkar, was granted by the United Nations Association Wales on land owned by the National Assembly of Wales.

Kayseri Constructs World’s Largest Cuneiform Monument

Courtesy of Today's Zaman
3 November 2007

(ZNDA: Diyarbekir)  The Kayseri Metropolitan Municipality in central Turkey has erected the world’s largest clay cuneiform monument at Kiçikapı Square in Kayseri on Thursday.

The monument is a large copy of the clay tablets used by Assyrian traders 4,000 years ago.

Professor Fikri Kulakoğlu, who is in charge of excavations at Kültepe, expressed his gratitude over Kayseri Mayor Mehmet Özhaseki’s efforts to preserve the historical heritage of Kayseri.

Kulakoğlu said the excavations at Kültepe, located 10 kilometers from the Kayseri-Sivas highway, have been under way since 1948. He noted that they have discovered over 20,000 cuneiform tablets so far. “Kültepe’s significance stems from it being the first place where Anatolia encountered writing. Kayseri recently began realizing its value, and I appreciate Mayor Özhaseki for supporting the excavations and erecting a monument with a replica of the clay tablets we discovered.”

Emphasizing the importance attributed to Kültepe, Özhaseki stated that they have initiated several projects to make the excavation site easier to visit and to be able to introduce it to the world.

Özhaseki said they have completed the construction of paths linking to the site from seven different locations in the city and placed four different figures, which represent Kayseri, along some of these pathways. “One of these figures is the monument of the cuneiform tablet, dating back to the Assyrians. The specialists translated it so as to create a replica of it. The replica is 3.30 by 2.20 meters and includes a Turkish translation on its lower section. The world is closely watching the historical monuments that have been dug up in Kültepe, but unfortunately we don’t appreciate its value much. We are trying to do our own bit to make up for this shortcoming,” he said.

The other structures erected on the remaining pathways include a fountain as well as the symbols of a mountain climber and parachutist.

Chaldean Store Owners Boycott Miller Brewing Company

Courtesy of the Catholic News Service
3 November 2007
By Robert Delaney

(ZNDA: Detroit) Chaldean Catholic Bishop Ibrahim N. Ibrahim credited the support of Chaldean Catholics in metro Detroit for the success of a boycott of Miller Brewing Co. products that he said resulted in the company pledging to never again support events that insult and offend religious sensibilities.

"We were a big factor in that," said Bishop Ibrahim, who heads the Southfield, Mich.-based Eparchy of St. Thomas the Apostle, the Chaldean Catholic diocese for the eastern half of the United States.

In metropolitan Detroit, Chaldean Catholics own about 2,000 party stores -- about 90 percent of the total of the area's independent neighborhood convenience stores that sell food and other items, including alcoholic beverages.

Bishop Ibrahim worked with Chaldean ethnic and business groups to boycott Miller products after the company's logo appeared on a poster for a Sept. 30 San Francisco street fair that mocked Leonardo da Vinci's painting of "The Last Supper" and had what critics described as a sadomasochistic theme.

The New York-based Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights and other Christian groups expressed outrage, and the league immediately called for a boycott of Miller until the company apologized for its association with the poster and the fair.

On Oct. 31 the Catholic League said it was dropping the boycott and its anti-Miller public relations campaign because the company had extended its Oct. 26 apology over the use of its logo to an acknowledgment of "disrespectful activities" at the fair.

The poster featured men clad in the leather outfits common to the sadomasochistic homosexual subculture. Various sex toys were on the table in front of them. The fair itself featured a man dressed as Christ and a stripper who were lifted up over a Catholic church by a piece of construction machinery men dressed in mock nun garb.

Bishop Ibrahim announced the boycott Oct. 14 at Mother of God Chaldean Cathedral in Southfield. "I told our people, if they are really believers in Jesus Christ, to boycott Miller products," the bishop said.

"Our religion is important for us. I told our people Sunday (Oct. 28), 'Look how it is in Iraq, with all the pressure on them, not one (Chaldean) family has changed their religion. And here we are in the United States, and someone is mocking our religion, and we are going to do nothing?'" Bishop Ibrahim told The Michigan Catholic, newspaper of the Latin-rite Detroit Archdiocese.

"I told them that if they support someone who is supporting such activities, it is just as if they were doing those activities too," he said.

The bishop and leaders of Chaldean ethnic and business groups were meeting the afternoon of Oct. 29 at the Chaldean diocesan center in Southfield, a Detroit suburb, when they received word from Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan of Milwaukee, where Miller is based, that he had just received a new letter from Miller that seemed to agree with the terms.

Two days later the league announced it was ending the boycott.

Bishop Ibrahim said he is very pleased with the near total participation of Chaldean business owners with the boycott. "I'm happy we defended our faith and our values," the bishop said.

On Oct. 29, Saad Kassab, proprietor of the King of Woodward party store in Highland Park, about a half-mile north of Detroit's Cathedral of the Most Blessed Sacrament, told The Michigan Catholic he had ordered no Miller products for the store for three weeks.

"They disrespected my religion. It's not right; it wouldn't be right to do it with any religion," said Kassab, a member of St. Thomas Chaldean Parish in West Bloomfield Township.

His wife, Ahlam Kassab, said that when they explain the reasons behind the boycott to customers, "99 percent of our customers are agreeing with it."

Chaldean Store Owners Arrested in Pop Can Smuggling Ring

(ZNDA: Detroit)  Michigan authorities said that in the last 2 months they have arrested and named 15 people and seized more than $500,000 in cash after breaking up a smuggling ring that collected millions of beverage containers in other states and cashed them in for 10 cents apiece in Michigan.

The 10 people were arraigned on charges ranging from false pretense, a possible 5-year felony to running a criminal enterprise, a possible 20-year sentence.

A 67-count warrant was issued as part of Operation Can Scam, according to Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox. Some suspects are Chaldean-Assyrians who own liquor and convenient stores in Michigan.

The Chaldean-Assyrian suspects are Waleed Kada, 23; Eddie Barash, 56; Aziz Miha Aboona, 48; Saad Choulagh, 37; Essam Sattam, 47; Adnan Elias Kada, 46; Romel Kejbou, 52; Michael Friedrick Krauthofer, 37; and Eddi Aboona.

These suspects ran grocery stores such as Save Plus Superstore in Pontiac, The Larosa Market in Sylvan Lake, Value Foods in Ypsilanti, The Farmer John, Savemart Food Center and the Americana Foods in Detroit.

Investigators allege that millions of non-redeemable out-of-state cans were collected, crushed, packaged in plastic bags and sold at a discount to merchants who then redeemed them.

Bulk redemption payments from the state are based on weight.

The scheme defrauds Michigan and many other states that allow such a deposit on aluminum cans and glass bottles.  In many U.S. states the proceeds are used to pay for environmental cleanup efforts.

In Michigan this type of activity defrauds the state approximately $13 million," according to Col. Peter Munoz, Michigan State Police director.

The probe recalled a 1996 episode of "Seinfeld" in which two characters learn about Michigan's 10-cent deposit law and head there with a truckload of 5-cent New York cans, hoping to cash in on the difference, before getting sidetracked.

Mary Pera Eshoo (1916-2007)

Mariam Eshoo

Miriam Mary (Pera) Eshoo, 91, of New Britain, Connecticut, widow of Nicholas E. Eshoo, died Monday (November 5, 2007) at Hartford Hospital.

Born in the Urmian village of Taka Ardishy in northwest Iran, she lived in New Britain most of her life. Mary was employed at Peter Paul Electronics in New Britain for 33 years, retiring in 1991. She was a member of St. Thomas Assyrian Church of the East in New Britain; the church sewing club; and the Taka Ardishy Society.

Surviving is a son, Paul Eshoo and his wife Patricia of Kensington; two daughters, Margaret Aziz and her husband Joseph of Kensington and Hilda Roden and her husband Martin of New Britain; a brother, Joseph Pera and his wife Esther in Syria; a sister, Mary Kakos in West Hills, CA; nine grandchildren, Diana Veneri and her husband David of Prospect; Elizabeth Mongillo and her husband Paul of Berlin; Jason Aziz of Kensington; Paula Eshoo of New Britain; Marlene Eshoo of Bristol; Melissa Simard and her husband David of Kensington; Stephen Roden and his wife Ann Marie of Plainville; Mark Roden of Plainville and David Roden of New Britain; six great grandchildren, Nicholas and Natalie Veneri, Jacob and Zachary Mongillo, and Toby and Noah Simard; several nieces and nephews.

Funeral services were held last Thursday at 11 AM at St. Thomas Assyrian Church of the East, 120 Cabot Street, New Britain, CT 06051. Burial was in the church cemetery.   In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to St. Thomas Assyrian Church.