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Portal:Iraq

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The Iraq Portal

A view of Baghdad, Iraq
A view of Baghdad, Iraq

Flag of Iraq
Flag of Iraq
Coat of Arms of Iraq
Coat of Arms of Iraq
Iraq's location on a map of the Middle East and the world.

Iraq, officially the Republic of Iraq, is a country in West Asia and in the geopolitical region known as the Middle East. With a population of over 46 million, it is the 30st-most populous country. It is a federal parliamentary republic that consists of 18 governorates. Iraq is bordered by Turkey to the north, Iran to the east, the Persian Gulf and Kuwait to the southeast, Saudi Arabia to the south, Jordan to the southwest, and Syria to the west. The capital and largest city is Baghdad. Iraqi people are diverse; mostly Arabs, as well as Kurds, Turkmen, Assyrians, Armenians, Yazidis, Mandaeans, Persians and Shabakis with similarly diverse geography and wildlife. Most Iraqis are Muslims – minority faiths include Christianity, Yazidism, Mandaeism, Yarsanism and Zoroastrianism. The official languages of Iraq are Arabic and Kurdish; others also recognized in specific regions are Turkish, Suret, and Armenian.

Modern Iraq dates to 1920, when a Mandate was created by League of Nations. A British-backed monarchy was founded in 1921 under Faisal. The Hashemite kingdom got independence from the UK in 1932. In 1958, the kingdom was overthrown and a republic was established. Iraq was ruled by the Ba'ath Party from 1968 to 2003, led by Al-Bakr and then by Saddam Hussein, as a one-party state. Iraq engaged in war with Iran from 1980 to 1988 and another war from 1990 to 1991, resulting from the invasion of Kuwait. An invasion launched by a US-led coalition as part of its "War on Terror" in 2003, sparking a war, resulted in the defeat of Ba'athists and Saddam's execution and continued with an insurgency and sectarian civil war. U.S. troops began withdrawing in 2008 and war officially ended in 2011. The subsequent continuing repression and sectarian policies of Nouri al-Maliki's government caused protests, after which a coalition of Ba'athist and Sunni militias took up arms during a campaign. The climax of the campaign was the offensive by the ISID that marked its rapid territorial expansion, prompting the return of American troops to fight the war, which lasted until 2017. Iran has also intervened since 2014, expanding its influence through sectarian parties and Khomeinist militia groups, triggering widespread protests. (Full article...)

Seated in the centre: Sir Sassoon Eskell, first Minister of Finance of the Kingdom with King Faisal I immediately to his left. The tycoon, Senator Menahem Saleh Daniel is seated on the far right of this shot.
The history of the Jews in Iraq (Hebrew: יְהוּדִים בָּבְלִים, Yehudim Bavlim, lit.'Babylonian Jews'; Arabic: اليهود العراقيون, al-Yahūd al-ʿIrāqiyyūn) is documented from the time of the Babylonian captivity c. 586 BCE. Iraqi Jews constitute one of the world's oldest and most historically significant Jewish communities. The Jewish community in Mesopotamia, known in Jewish sources as "Babylonia", traces its origins to the early sixth century BCE, when a large number of Judeans from the defeated Kingdom of Judah were exiled to Babylon in several waves by the Neo-Babylonian Empire. A few decades later, some had returned to Judah, following the edict of Cyrus. During this time, the Temple in Jerusalem was rebuilt, significant changes in Jewish religious tradition were made, and the Judeans were led by individuals who made Aliyah from Babylonia, such as Zerubbabel, Ezra and Nehemiah. (Full article...)

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Did you know...

  • ...that the oldest known writing system, known as cuneiform, was developed in southern Iraq during the Sumerian civilization.
  • ...that the oldest laws were written in Iraq by the Sumerian King Ur-Nammu.
  • ...that Iraq is second only to Saudi Arabia in oil reserves.
  • ...that the national soccer team of Iraq won the AFC Asian Cup in 2007.
  • ...the wheel was invented in the southern Iraqi city of Ur.
  • ...that Iraq is the largest producer of dates with more than 400 types and more than 22 million date palms.
  • ...that Iraq’s national dish is Masgouf (impaled fish) and its national cookie is Kleicha (meaning circle or wheel), both of which can be traced back to antiquity.
  • ...in the 1940s and 1950s, Iraq had 4/5 of the world's Arecaceae population, these numbers have drastically decreased in the last few decades.

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Possible representation of Gilgamesh as Master of Animals, grasping a lion in his left arm and snake in his right hand, in an Assyrian palace relief (713–706 BC), from Dur-Sharrukin, now held in the Louvre

Gilgamesh (/ˈɡɪlɡəmɛʃ/, /ɡɪlˈɡɑːmɛʃ/; Akkadian: 𒀭𒄑𒂆𒈦, romanized: Gilgameš; originally Sumerian: 𒀭𒄑𒉋𒂵𒎌, romanized: Bilgames) was a hero in ancient Mesopotamian mythology and the protagonist of the Epic of Gilgamesh, an epic poem written in Akkadian during the late 2nd millennium BC. He was possibly a historical king of the Sumerian city-state of Uruk, who was posthumously deified. His rule probably would have taken place sometime in the beginning of the Early Dynastic Period, c. 2900 – 2350 BC, though he became a major figure in Sumerian legend during the Third Dynasty of Ur (c. 2112 – c. 2004 BC).

Tales of Gilgamesh's legendary exploits are narrated in five surviving Sumerian poems. The earliest of these is likely "Gilgamesh, Enkidu, and the Netherworld", in which Gilgamesh comes to the aid of the goddess Inanna and drives away the creatures infesting her huluppu tree. She gives him two unknown objects, a mikku and a pikku, which he loses. After Enkidu's death, his shade tells Gilgamesh about the bleak conditions in the Underworld. The poem Gilgamesh and Aga describes Gilgamesh's revolt against his overlord Aga of Kish. Other Sumerian poems relate Gilgamesh's defeat of the giant Huwawa and the Bull of Heaven, while a fifth, poorly preserved poem relates the account of his death and funeral. (Full article...)

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