Jash ( Kurdish: جاش, Caş; from جەحش, Cehş; meaning '

donkey The donkey or ass is a domesticated equine. It derives from the African wild ass, ''Equus africanus'', and may be classified either as a subspecies thereof, ''Equus africanus asinus'', or as a separate species, ''Equus asinus''. It was domes ...

foal A foal is an equine up to one year old; this term is used mainly for horses, but can be used for donkeys. More specific terms are colt (horse), colt for a male foal and filly for a female foal, and are used until the horse is three or four. Whe ...

') is a Kurdish term for a

traitor Treason is the crime of attacking a state (polity), state authority to which one owes allegiance. This typically includes acts such as participating in a war against one's native country, attempting to Coup d'état, overthrow its government, spy ...

, or a collaborator. It refers to

Kurds Kurds (), or the Kurdish people, are an Iranian peoples, Iranic ethnic group from West Asia. They are indigenous to Kurdistan, which is a geographic region spanning southeastern Turkey, northwestern Iran, northern Iraq, and northeastern Syri ...

who are either fully loyal to the enemy, or cooperate with the enemy against the Kurdish nation, Kurdish militant groups, or Kurdish political interests. The term is considered derogatory in a cultural sense, in much the same way as the use of the term '' quisling'' in the

Western world The Western world, also known as the West, primarily refers to various nations and state (polity), states in Western Europe, Northern America, and Australasia; with some debate as to whether those in Eastern Europe and Latin America also const ...

. The National Defense Battalions, the Village Guards, and the Muslim Peshmerga are considered "jash" by some Kurds.

History

The Light regiments were first established in the 1940s, during the

1943 Barzani revolt The 1943–1945 Barzani revolt was a Kurdish insurrection in the Kingdom of Iraq, during World War II. The revolt was led by Mustafa Barzani and was later joined by his older brother Ahmed Barzani, the leader of the previous Kurdish revolt ...

in northern Iraq, then it flourished and start to take an important role in the 1960s during the First Iraqi–Kurdish War, when General Khaleel Jassim was in the command of these regiments and associated them with many

Iraqi Army The Iraqi Ground Forces (Arabic: القوات البرية العراقية), also referred to as the Iraqi Army (Arabic: الجيش العراقي), is the ground force component of the Iraqi Armed Forces. It was formerly known as the Royal Iraq ...

operations against the Kurd rebels, specially in Amadiya in 1965 and

Rawandiz Rawandiz () is a city in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, located in the Erbil Governorate in Soran, Iraq, Soran district, close to the Iran–Iraq border, borders with Iran and Iraq–Turkey border, Turkey. It is only 7 km from the city center ...

1966. During the

al-Anfal campaign The Anfal campaign was a counterinsurgency operation which was carried out by Ba'athist Iraq from February to September 1988 during the Iraqi–Kurdish conflict at the end of the Iran–Iraq War. The campaign targeted rural Kurds because its pu ...

, the military campaign of genocide and looting commanded by

Ali Hassan al-Majid Colonel General Ali Hassan al-Majid al-Tikriti (; – 25 January 2010), was an Iraqi military officer and politician under Saddam Hussein who served as Defense minister, Interior minister, and chief of the General Security. He was also the ...

, al-Majid's orders informed ''jash'' units that taking cattle, sheep, goats, money, weapons and even Kurdish women was legal.Jonathan C. Randal, ''After Such Knowledge, What Forgiveness?: My Encounters with Kurdistan'', 356 pp., Westview Press, 1998, , p.231 The term "Jash Police" was used by the Kurds towards Iraq's local Kurdish police militias in 1944. In the latter half of the 20th century, Kurds who became collaborators with the Iraqi government were referred to as ''jash''. The number of jash increased to "as many as 150,000 by 1986" as a method of avoiding military participation in the

Iran–Iraq War The Iran–Iraq War, also known as the First Gulf War, was an armed conflict between Iran and Iraq that lasted from September 1980 to August 1988. Active hostilities began with the Iraqi invasion of Iran and lasted for nearly eight years, unti ...

. The jash then realigned with the rest of the Kurdish people during the 1991 Kurdish uprising. It has been stated by a number of Kurds that "the jash had been completely forgiven".

References

{{Reflist Ethnic and religious slurs Kurdish culture Treason Wartime collaboration

History

See also

References