In the summer of 1963, the Iraqi government led by Abdul Salam Arif launched a wide-scale attack on Kurdistan. From Baghdad station, he issued a statement rejecting talks with the leaders of the Kurdish revolution and decided to resume a bloody war against the Kurds. Then they began attacking cities, towns, and villages, and arresting, chasing, and suppressing people in all areas that were subjected to military attacks. The Ba'athists believed that the Abdul Karim Qasim regime had not fought the war against the Kurds seriously before them, and that they could overturn the Kurdish revolution in a short time. This indicates that Abdul Salam Arif never believed in the Kurdish cause in Iraq, and this was reflected in his speeches as he did not recognize the Kurds and did not use the word Kurdistan.

Before the outbreak of the war in 20 May 1963, the general military order was issued to impose an economic blockade on Kurdistan. With the resumption of the war in 10 June, serious crimes far from moral and human values were committed in many places. It is clear that during this period, the city of Sulaymaniyah fell under the oppression and injustice of the Iraqi Army more than other Kurdish cities. Whenever the Peshmerga Forces attacked army convoys, the army would come and pour its anger on the residents of Sulaymaniyah. Among the acts of violence and brutality was the Sulaymaniyah incident ordered by the leader Sadiq Mustafa, commander of the Twentieth Brigade, who was known as the most brutal brigade in the history of Iraq and was involved in the blood of thousands of young people. The city of Sulaymaniyah became a burning arena in the heart of the enemies. They arrested 5000 civilians in the city and chose (86) of them and buried them alive. Their only crime was that the Ba'athists brought a picture of the Kurdish revolutionary leader Mustafa Barzani to the crowd and ordered them to insult him. But they refused to accept that, and one of the detainees replied: If you are willing to insult your president, then we will obey you. Therefore, the Ba'athists exterminated them all.

The Iraqi Army did not stop there; in the autumn of 1963, it launched a military campaign on the Azmar mountain range located five kilometers from Sulaymaniyah. Supported by tanks, aircraft, and machine guns, they attacked the Peshmerga positions. The Peshmerga Forces confronted them on the defensive front. They had weapons (Brno, the eleven-round rifle, and the Bren machine gun). In the morning, government forces attacked the Peshmerga positions three times, but the resistance of the Peshmerga was such that they were able to defeat the three attacks and forced them to retreat to the foot of the mountain, leaving several corpses on the battlefield.

 

Although the defeat of the army brought calm to the area for a while, the army was preparing for a larger attack with a stronger plan. On the other side, the Peshmerga Forces organized their positions very well and confronted them severely and defeated their plan, and their attack was thwarted and they suffered heavy losses. In return, the Iraqi Army took revenge on the shepherds, caravans, and merchants in the suburbs of Sulaymaniyah, capturing and martyring them all.

In the Battle of Mount Azmar, which is an example of a series of battles to defend the homeland, the attacks of the Ba'ath army were defeated several times and suffered heavy losses. Only one Martyr was recorded in the ranks of the Peshmerga.

Sources:

1- Shawkat Mela Ismail Hassan, Days in the History of the Aylul Revolution, Ministry of Education Press, Erbil, 2007.

2- Masoud Barzani, Barzani and the Kurdish Liberation Movement, Volume Three, Part One, Aylul Revolution 1961-1975, 1st ed. 2004.

3- Hawkar Karim Hama Sharif, Aylul Revolution, Salahaddin University Press, Erbil, 2012.

4- Ibrahim Jalal, Southern Kurdistan and the Aylul Revolution: Building and Destruction 1961- 1975, Fourth Edition, 2021.

5- Ari Karim, Several Living Pages from the Aylul Revolution, Khabat Press, Duhok 1999.

6- Khoshawi Ali Kanyelanj, Memoirs of Aziz Qazi Hamad Surchi, Daneshfar Press, Erbil, 2023