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Are Kurds a pariah minority?
Social Research, Spring, 2003 by Michael Rubin
Do the Kurds Have a Common History?
Although nationalism is very much a nineteenth-century phenomenon, newly independent countries and peoples aspiring to nationhood often seek retroactively to extend their historical narrative. For example, after Uzbekistan's independence in 1991, authorities in Tashkent actively promoted the thirteenth-century conqueror Amir Timur (Tamerlane) as the father of their country. (6) Likewise, successive Iraqi governments used archaeology to root Iraq's legitimacy in Babylon past, even though Iraq only emerged as a state in the aftermath of World War I (Bernhardsson, 2003). The Kurds are no different. Historian David McDowall notes that "[i]t is extremely doubtful that the Kurds form an ethnically coherent whole in the sense that they have a common ancestry" (McDowall, 2000: 8); yet Kurdish teachers and professors in Iraq today base their claims to nationhood on alleged common descent from the Medeans, a nomadic people who established an empire in Iran in the eighth century B.C.
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Kurds across national boundaries also promote Salah al-Din al-Ayyubi (commonly known as Saladin in the West) as part of the Kurdish historical legacy. In the twelfth century, Salah al-Din defeated the Crusaders, reestablishing Muslim rule over Palestine and Syria. Salah al-Din may be history's most famous Kurd, but including him in a nationalist historical narrative is artificial, since Salah al-Din fought in the name of religion, not ethnicity (Spuler, 1960: 93). Recognizing this, some nationalistic Iraqi Kurds interviewed have bragged about urinating upon the tomb of Salah al-Din in Damascus because "he betrayed his nation for the sake of Islam" (interview in Halabja, October 14, 2001).
Kurdish nationalists complain that the Great Powers undercut Kurdish unity by dividing Kurdistan. Had it not been for the Sykes-Picot Agreement, and the treaties of Sevres and Lausanne, the argument goes, then the Kurds might have realized their dream for a united and independent homeland (Kendal, 1993: 33-35). While such sentiments are appealing, Kurdish divisions predate the twentieth century. The border between Iran and Iraq, despite minor fluctuation, has remained remarkably consistent, and even corresponds approximately to the frontiers of the great Byzantine and Persian Empires. In recent centuries, Kurds straddled the frontier between the Ottoman and Safavid Empires, often fighting against fellow Kurds on behalf of their respective suzerains.
Although Kurds in various areas of Kurdistan historically do have local histories of autonomy, most Kurdish entities were fleeting and geographically limited. For example, in 1880 Shaykh 'Ubaydullah crossed from the Ottoman Empire and seized Iranian territory centered on Mahabad and Lake Urumiya. However, he underestimated the shah's power, and within two years the rebellion was over. The Mahabad Republic, established in the aftermath of World War II, did not survive one year. On the downfall of the shah in 1979, the Kurds again established fleeting autonomy in Iran, but were not able to sustain their resistance against the Islamic Republic (Abrahamian, 1982: 527). In Iraq in 1923, Shaykh Mahmud Barzinji presided over an autonomous Kurdish entity centered in Sulaymaniyah. Celebrated today as a hero on murals in Sulaymaniyah's central square, his autonomous region lasted only two months.
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