Assyrian Martyrs Day · Ruz-e Shahidan-e Ashuri

Culture of origin: Assyrian · Historical

Holiday sources: Assyrian · Iran

On 7 August Assyrians mark Martyrs Day, also called the National Day of Mourning. It recalls the Simele massacre of August 1933, the first of many massacres in the Iraqi government's targeting of the Assyrians of northern Iraq, which spread across 63 villages in the Dohuk and Nineveh districts and killed an estimated 3,000 people. The Assyrian Universal Alliance declared the day in 1970; in 2004 the Syrian government banned Assyrians there from commemorating it. The day also recalls the Sayfo of 1914–1918, which reached Iran: when Ottoman forces occupied Iranian Azerbaijan in 1915, the Ottoman army and Simko Shikak's Kurds killed 700 to 800 people at Haftevan near Salmas, among them all its Christian men, and dozens were executed at Urmia's Lazarist mission on 23 and 24 February 1915, among them Mar Dinkha, bishop of Tergawer. In July 1918, as Assyrians fled Urmia, Ottoman forces and Kurdish irregulars killed about 5,000 in one ambush near the Sahin Ghal'e pass, and an estimated 7,000 died in the poor conditions of the Baqubah refugee camp.