Human rights in pre-Saddam Iraq were often lacking to various degrees among the various regimes that ruled the country. Human rights abuses in the country predated the rule of Saddam Hussein.
1850 to 1920 Assyrian historian Eden Naby writes that the relations between Assyrians and Kurds have been marked by a "bitter history", since Kurdish tribal chiefs in Iraq, southeastern Turkey, northeastern Syria, and northwest Iran regularly attacked and plundered Christian tribes, and during World War I Kurds were "responsible for most of the atrocities committed against the Assyrians in particular, due to proximity and a long tradition of perceived Kurdish rights to pillage Assyrian Christians and carry away women and goods", and that "Kurdish expansion happened at the expense of Assyrians". In 1918, a Kurdish chieftain and his tribe assassinated the Patriarch of the Church of the East at the negotiation dinner."From Lingua Franca to Endangered Language The Legal Aspects of the Preservation of Aramaic in Iraq" by Eden Naby, In: On the Margins of Nations: Endangered Languages and Linguistic Rights, Foundation for Endangered Languages. Eds:Joan A. Argenter, R. McKenna Brown PDFSchanzer, Jonathan. (2004) Ansar al-Islam: Back in Iraq Middle East Quarterly It is known that the Iraqi Kurdistan have accepted more than 200,000 Christians refugees and IDPs who had fled from Arab areas between 2012 and 2016. It is also known that security officers and authorities who work for Barzani tribe and his political party, the KDP, have frequently abused some local Christians and IDPs for not being "enough" loyal to them.
From the mid 19th century, "the Kurds carried out numerous massacres of Nestorians, culminating in 1915-1918 with the murder of about half of all the Nestorians and their patriarch Mar Shimun XIX - a genocide proportionally similar to the massacre of the Armenians."The Church of the East: An Illustrated History of Assyrian Christianity, Christoph Baumer, I.B. Tauris, 2006., p7 The important Rabban Hormizd Monastery and the Mar Mattai monastery in Iraq was plundered countless times by the Kurds.The Church of the East: An Illustrated History of Assyrian Christianity, Christoph Baumer, I.B. Tauris, 2006., p95-99 Nestorian libraries were destroyed by Turks and Kurds over the course of centuries.The Church of the East: An Illustrated History of Assyrian Christianity, Christoph Baumer, I.B. Tauris, 2006. The Kurds murdered thousands of women and men, slicing off the ears of the dead and sending them to Badr Khan, and young women were sold as slaves.The Church of the East: An Illustrated History of Assyrian Christianity, Christoph Baumer, I.B. Tauris, 2006., p.244 The Kurds also forcibly took possession of churches and convents, and they constantly abducted virgins, brides and women, forcing them to turn Muslim.The Church of the East: An Illustrated History of Assyrian Christianity, Christoph Baumer, I.B. Tauris, 2006., p.246 Most notable are the first genocide carried out by Turks and Kurds in the period 1894 1896,The Church of the East: An Illustrated History of Assyrian Christianity, Christoph Baumer, I.B. Tauris, 2006., p.247 and in 1915–1918.The Church of the East: An Illustrated History of Assyrian Christianity, Christoph Baumer, I.B. Tauris, 2006., p.255 The Kurd Agha Simko assassinated the patriarch Mar Shimun XXI Benyamin.The Church of the East: An Illustrated History of Assyrian Christianity, Christoph Baumer, I.B. Tauris, 2006., p.251
The British occupation of Iraq (1920–1932) In the 1920s, when Britain held a mandate from the League of Nations (predecessor of the United Nations), British occupational forces, under the command of Arthur Harris, used mustard gas and delayed action bombing to suppress Iraqi resistance to British rule, leading to numerous civilian casualties.Our last occupation | Guardian daily comment | Guardian Unlimited
The Hashemite monarchy (1932–1958) The Hashemite monarchy that took over Iraq from the British has been described as imperfect in terms of human rights, but in many ways better than the regimes that followed: "After the creation of Iraq as an independent kingdom in 1932, the monarchy [...] sought to maintain the status quo of Sunni dominance, prompting conflict between the Arab Sunni establishment and several minorities (such as the Assyrians and the Kurds). But the monarchy also sought solutions, compromises, and certain forms of elections and democratic expression." Because the regime's legitimacy derived from its history in Arabia and its long experience in administration and ability to work with the British, it was able "to lead with less repression and coercion." Ghabra, Shafeeq N., "Iraq's Culture of Violence", article in Middle East Quarterly, Summer 2001, accessed March 21, 2007
Prime ministers, and at one point the leaders of a military coup, had enormous influence during the era of the monarchy, and civil rights varied at different points. According to a United States Library of Congress history of Iraq: Library of Congress Country Profiles: Iraq: Iraq as an Independent Monarchy", accessed March 21, 2007, linked to: "Country Study: Iraq Library of Congress Call Number DS70.6 .I734 1990"
In 1952 the depressed economic situation, which had been exacerbated by a bad harvest and by the government's refusal to hold direct elections, triggered large-scale antiregime protests; the protests turned especially violent in Baghdad. In response, the government declared martial law, banned all political parties, suspended a number of newspapers, and imposed a curfew. The immense size of the protests showed how widespread dissatisfaction with the regime had become. The middle class, which had grown considerably as a result of the monarchy's expanded education system, had become increasingly alienated from the regime, in large part because they were unable to earn an income commensurate with their status. Nuri as Said's autocratic manner, his intolerance of dissent, and his heavy-handed treatment of the political opposition had further alienated the middle class, especially the army. Forced underground, the opposition had become more revolutionary.
Repression of Assyrians In 1915, facing massacres that led to the deaths of up to two-thirds of the Assyrians in southeastern Turkey and northern Iran, about 50,000 survivors streamed over the border into northern Iraq, which was largely populated by Kurds and Turkomen. The refugees were housed in British-run refugee camps. Similar upheavals in 1918 in Iran led to more flows of refugees into Iraq, where Assyrian communities already had existed for centuries. These influxes led to decades of ethnic conflict. Lewis, Jonathan Eric, "Iraqi Assyrians: Barometer of Pluralism", article in Middle East Quarterly, Summer 2003, accessed March 21, 2007
Under the British mandate, Assyrians were organized into militia groups called "the Assyrian Levies" and were used to put down revolts and support the British military presence in Iraq. The Assyrians were abandoned by the British once Iraq achieved independence in 1933. In the summer of that year an armed group of 800 Assyrians crossed from Iraq into Syria, where there were many other Assyrians, to "assert what they perceived as their legitimate national rights", according to Jonathan Eric Lewis, a political analyst. French colonial authorities in Syria forced them back into Iraq where the Iraqi military attacked them. On August 7, "the Iraqi army and Kurdish irregulars, with genuine popular support, committed a massacre at Simele." According to Assyrian sources, the dead numbered 3,000 (other estimates put the number in the "hundreds".Khashan, Hilal, "Arab Christians as Symbol: Disappearing Christians of the Middle East", Middle East Quarterly, Winter 2001, accessed March 21, 2007 "No event has shaped Iraqi Assyrian collective identity more", Lewis wrote.
Assyrians have suffered persecution during the early 20th century, mainly at the hands of Kurdish tribes who persecuted them as individual tribes (Shakkak), and as Muslim allies of the Committee on Union and Progress working through the Ottoman armies during World War I, and later as Kurds who took part in the 1933 Simele massacre of Assyrians. In the early 1930s, the Iraqi ministries disseminated leaflets among the Kurds calling them to massacre Assyrians. This call appealed to Islamic convictions and united Arabs and Kurds against the infidel Christians. Shortly before the August 11 Simmele massacre in 1933, Kurds began a campaign of looting against Assyrian settlements. The Assyrians fled to Simele, where they were also persecuted. There were many accounts by witnesses of numerous atrocities perpetrated by Arabs and Kurds on Assyrian women. Under the command of Kurdish chieftain Bakr Sidqi on August 11 the perpetrators committed the Simele massacre which targeted men almost exclusively. Under the leadership of the Kurdish General Bakr Sidqi Kurds, Arabs and others united and committed the Simele massacre against Christian Assyrians and plundered their towns, and raped and murdered women and children. Since the 16th century after Sultan Selim I brought the Kurds and settled them in Assyrian lands, the Ottoman Empire began using Kurdish tribes to kill Christian Assyrians and Armenians systematically. In the beginning of World War I the Kurdish tribes, and which formed a Kurdish cavalry force in the Ottoman army known as the ""Hamidian Cavalry"" headed to the Assyrian plain villages in the east of what is today known as Turkey as well as the Assyrian villages in Tur Abdin and Hakkari and killed thousands of Assyrians. The Assyrian Patriarch Mar Binyamin Shimon (who was later assassinated by a Kurd) declared that the Assyrians joined the war on Russia's side in self-defence and for liberation.
Between the monarchy and Saddam Hussein (1958–1969) In the decade following the overthrow of the Iraqi monarchy in 1958, various regimes ruled the country, each responsible for the government's treatment of its citizens and for protecting citizens, until the 1968 coup that brought the Ba'ath Party to power with Saddam Hussein as one of the coup leaders:"GENOCIDE IN IRAQ / The Anfal Campaign Against the Kurds / A Middle East Watch Report / Human Rights Watch" dated 1993, Chapter 1 "Ba'athis and Kurds", Footnote 6 report at Human Rights Watch Web site, accessed March 21, 2007
Military government of Abd al-Karim Qasem and the "Free Officers" (1958–1963); First regime of the Ba'ath Arab Socialist Party (February–November 1963); Governments of the Arif brothers and Abd al-Rahman al-Bazzaz (1963–1968).
The second regime of the Ba'ath Arab Socialist Party began with a coup in July 1968, with Saddam Hussein, one of the leaders of the coup, growing in power and eventually assuming the presidency of the country in 1979. He was overthrown in the United States-led invasion of 2003.
In the 1950s and 1960s, Iraqis and many other Arabs often supported the idea of a strong leader "along the lines of Stalin or Mao, Ho Chi Minh or Castro" who would act as "a political savior", acting with great power, a sense of mission and ruling with justice. Saladin, the eleventh-century Islamic hero who defeated the Crusaders, was looked on as a model and even Atatürk, the founder of modern Turkey, was viewed as a leader from whom an example could be drawn. In Iraq, many felt a strong leader was needed to hold the country together despite its ethnic divisions and other problems.
Abd al-Karim Qasem and the "Free Officers" Regime (1958–1963) The 1958 military coup that overthrew the Hashemite monarchy brought to power members of "rural groups that lacked the cosmopolitan thinking found among Iraqi elites". Iraq's new leaders had an "exclusivist mentality [that] produced tribal conflict and rivalry, which in turn called forth internal oppression [...]"