Alqosh


Alqosh is an ethnic Assyrian village in the Nineveh plains of northern Iraq. It is a sub-district of the Tel Kaif District and is 45 km north of the city of Mosul. It is the site of a military base of the Nineveh Plain Protection Units. Colonel R. S. Stafford, who was the British Administrative Inspector for Mosul, referred to Alqosh as an "Assyrian center" where another massacre was planned.

Christianity

The importance of Alqosh for the Church of the East arose from its proximity to the Rabban Hormizd Monastery, named after its seventh-century founder Rabban Hormizd, who is venerated as a saint in the churches descended from the Church of the East, erroneously called the Nestorian.
The monastery, built on the mountain slope, was for the East Syrian Church of the East a centre of learning that stood against the neighbouring West Syrian communities and monasteries. It was the burial place of the patriarchs of the Church of the East from the late fifteenth century and was their seat from the time of Shimun VI until the end of the series of patriarchs known as the Eliya line. Isolated and cut off by snow from Alqosh in winter, it never became their permanent residence, and its line of patriarchs is commonly described as the Mosul line or as resident in Alqosh.
In the schism of 1552, the abbot of the monastery, Yohannan Sulaqa, was elected irregularly to the post of patriarch by several bishops who were dissatisfied with the restriction of patriarchal succession to members of a single family. By tradition, a patriarch could be ordained only by someone of archiepiscopal rank, a rank to which only members of that one family were promoted. For that reason, Sulaqa travelled to Rome, where, presented as the new patriarch elect, he entered communion with the Catholic Church and was ordained by the Pope and recognized as patriarch. He and his successors took up residence further east. This schism gave rise to the Chaldean Catholic Church, in opposition to what historians call the traditionalist wing of the Church of the East, that which in 1976 officially adopted the name "Assyrian Church of the East".
In the 17th and 18th centuries, the "legitimist" Alqosh patriarchal line from which Sulaqa broke away in 1552, drew closer to Rome, especially during the 58-year reign of Eliya XI/XII Denkha, who sent several letters to Rome, some with professions of faith in line with Catholic teaching, but no formal papal recognition followed. However, it was a member of the family from whom the "legitimate" traditionalist patriarchs were chosen, Yohannan Hormizd who, having considered himself a Catholic since 1778, was chosen as patriarch of the Chaldean Catholic Church in 1830.

Association with the Prophet Nahum

, who visited the area in 1847, reported that by "a very ancient tradition" the village contains the tomb of the prophet Nahum, whose Old Testament book begins with: "An oracle concerning Nineveh. The book of the vision of Nahum of Elkosh." While Jerome located in Galilee the birthplace of Nahum, Layard considered not without weight the Alqosh tradition in spite of the lack of inscriptions or ancient remains. Iraqi Jews made pilgrimage to the site during Shavuot, and "He who has not made the pilgrimage to Nahum's tomb has not yet known real pleasure" was a common saying. When Jews were expelled from Iraq or voluntarily emigrated to Israel in 1948, the Jewish custodian entrusted the care of the building to a local Chaldean Catholic. A survey conducted in 2017 determined that the structure was in danger of collapse, and in the following year work began on stabilizing it.

Destruction

Other attacks

Demographics

The town of Alqosh is primarily home to members of the Chaldean Catholic Church but has a smaller number of Yazidi inhabitants. In 1913, the town of Alqosh, was according to Joseph Tfinkdji inhabited by 7,000 Chaldean Catholics. Many have emigrated since the 1970s. It is estimated that at least 40,000 "Alqushnaye" immigrants and their 2nd and 3rd generation descendants now live in the cities of Detroit, Michigan, the western suburb of Fairfield in Sydney, Australia and San Diego, California.
In February 2010, the attacks against Assyrians in Mosul forced 4,300 Assyrians to flee from Mosul to the Nineveh plains where there is an Assyrian majority population. A report by the United Nations stated that 504 Assyrians at once migrated to Alqosh. Many Assyrians from Mosul and Baghdad since the post-2003 Iraq war have fled to Alqosh for safety. The town's population in 2020 is estimated to be roughly 4,600.
In 2014 the mayor of Aqlosh, Faiz Jahwareh, was illegally detained and replaced by KDP member Lara Zara, only to be reinstated after protests by Alqosh residents. Jahwareh was again detained and replaced by the KRG in July 2017 on the basis of false corruption charges that were dismissed by the Iraqi Federal Court. Basim Bello, mayor of nearby Tel Keppe, was also unlawfully removed by the same parties in August 2017, and reinstated by order of the Governor of Nineveh in August 2018.

Climate

Alqosh has a semi-arid climate with extremely hot and dry summers, and cool wet winters.

Natives of Alqosh