So many Assyrians in Slemani fought alongside the Peshmerga against ba’athism only to be told they enable Baathism on twitter

Yes I am aware that some Assyrians benefitted from Baathist governmental positions (as if there weren’t Kurds who did the same jashyati)

My mom was telling me about her childhood street to which everyone would gather at “Bahra’s house” for the “jezhni helka” to which many sunni

Kurds would gather at the Assyrian neighbors house for Easter and help celebrate the “holiday of the eggs.”

My mother couldn’t tell you about Assyrian oppression because her experience was “always seeing them like one of her own” and when I told her about the experiences of what

Many face today her response was “we were all running from Saddam” and I get that. And it’s hard to recognize the oppression your own ethnic group contributed to when you were merely worried about eating and not waking up to ba’athist tearing your doors down to take your brothers

But we had a nice conversation because it was then revealed that “yes- indeed. It’s hard to learn the history when you yourself were someone trying to survive it” but my mom is in the US now. She has the ability to look back and see that perhaps not all Assyrians shared the warm

Memories that she recalls. It was hard having the discussion because a lot of her pushback was “narin that’s nonesense, your uncles best friend was Assyrian” “my roommates in college were Assyrian” and she also always talks about the time when her and her Assyrian classmate

Were the only ones rejected from college because they refused to sign an oath to Saddam. So if this strong solidarity existed, it would be reasonable then, to hear out the community you’ve always been so close with. We talked about many of the massacres and a couple of other

Stories I learned from Assyrians near Faysh Xapour. To which her responses then became “yes that’s right I can recall friends who would say derogatory things about them”

The point of this thread is to say that it would be unfair to claim that Assyrians enable Baathism/Turkish nationalism while hating Kurds. Conversations with family/friends in real life are so much more constructive than arguing with unreasonable accounts on this app.

Of course there are literal psychopaths I’ve encountered and I’m not telling anyone to reason with trolls on this app. I’m asking that perhaps conversations with your close members who have experienced life under ba’athism could reveal a lot more than some of the discourse

I’ve seen.

Anyway, it's annoying to be immersed in inflammatory twitter discourse that suggests that Assyrians never fought alongside Kurds against baathism, ISIS, and so forth. When...history suggest otherwise. And diaspora now feel comfortable in exchanging in dialogue that vocalizes

partly some of their own frustrations along with what their parents have shared.

It's been helpful hearing these exchanges and speaking to family members about it. My own family members have taught me a lot. My dad introduced me to his Assyrian friend in Ankawa after a lot of these conversations. His name was Andy, and we went around the shops together I was

able to meet with more of his friends. I know this sounds like reconciliation porn and it's not my intention. I am also cognizant of the labor/time Andy took out of his day to help answer questions. But I am thankful for bringing the exchanges I saw online to my own parents

who were kind enough to introduce me to their friends who helped foster an environment that allowed me to better understand. Which is why I take these conversations so personally. No amount of time in academia or online discussions are as constructive as hearing your own Kurdish

parents tell their stories next to their Assyrian friend's experiences that they grew up with. It fills in so many gaps.