page_title: Cizre
section_title: Early 20th century
hierarchical_section_title: Cizre / History / Early 20th century
context_page_description: Cizre is a city and district in Şırnak Province in southeastern Turkey. It is located on the river Tigris, by the Syria–Turkey border, and in the historical region of Upper Mesopotamia.
  In Kurdish culture, Cizre is presented as the setting of the tale of Mem and Zin.
context_section_description: Mustafa Paşa feuded with agha Muhammad Aghayê Sor, and in 1900 the kaymakam of Jazirat Ibn ʿUmar intervened to aid the Tayan clan, Mustafa Paşa's allies, against Aghayê Sor. Several months later, Mustafa Paşa had twenty villages in the district loyal to his rival destroyed, and Aghayê Sor wrote to the Brigadier General Bahaeddin Paşa seeking protection. Bahaeddin Paşa travelled to Jazirat Ibn ʿUmar to conduct an inquiry, but was imprisoned there for five days by Mustafa Paşa, and the two rivals continued to attack each other's territories until Mustafa Paşa was assassinated on Aghayê Sor's orders in 1902. Within the kaza of Jazirat Ibn ʿUmar, in 1909, there were 1500 households, 1000 of which possessed over 50 dönüms. As late as 1910, the Miran clan annually migrated from their winter pastures in the plain of Mosul to Jazirat Ibn ʿUmar in the spring to trade and pay taxes, and then across the Tigris to summer grazing grounds at the source of the river Botan. The British scholar Gertrude Bell visited the city in May 1910.
  In 1915, amidst the ongoing genocide of Armenians and Assyrians perpetrated by the Ottoman government and local Kurds, Aziz Feyzi and Zülfü Bey carried out preparations to destroy the Christian population of Jazirat Ibn ʿUmar on orders from Mehmed Reshid, vali of Diyarbekir. From 29 April to 12 May, the officials toured the district and incited the Kurds against the Christians; Halil Sâmi, kaymakam of Jazirat Ibn ʿUmar since 31 March 1913, was replaced by Kemal Bey on 2 May 1915 due to his refusal to support the plans for genocide. At this time, two redif (reserve) battalions were stationed in the city. Julius Behnam, Syriac Orthodox Archbishop of Gazarta, fled to Azakh upon hearing of the commencement of massacres in the province in July. Christians in rural areas of the district were massacred over several days from 8 August onwards, and several Jacobite and 15 Chaldean Catholic villages were destroyed.
  On the night of 28 August, Flavianus Michael Malke, Syriac Catholic Bishop of Gazarta, and Philippe-Jacques Abraham, Chaldean Catholic Bishop of Gazarta, were killed. On 29 August, Aziz Feyzi, Ahmed Hilmi, Mufti of Jazirat Ibn ʿUmar, and Ömer, agha of the Reman clan, coordinated the arrest, torture, and execution of all Armenian men and a number of Assyrians in Jazirat Ibn ʿUmar. The men's bodies were dumped in the Tigris, and, two days later, the children were abducted into Muslim households, and most women were raped and killed, and their bodies were also thrown into the river. Walter Holstein, German vice-consul at Mosul, reported the massacre to the German embassy at Constantinople on 9 September, and the German ambassador Ernst II, Prince of Hohenlohe-Langenburg informed the German Foreign Office on 11 September that the massacre had resulted in the death of 4750 Armenians (2500 Gregorians, 1250 Catholics, and 1000 Protestants) and 350 Assyrians (250 Chaldeans and 100 Jacobites). After the massacre, eleven churches and three chapels were confiscated. 200 Armenians from Erzurum were exterminated near Jazirat Ibn ʿUmar by General Halil Kut on 22 September. Kemal Bey continued in the office of kaymakam until 3 November 1915.
  In the aftermath of Ottoman defeat in the First World War, Ali İhsan Sâbis, commander of the Ottoman Sixth Army, was reported to have recruited and armed Kurds at Jazirat Ibn ʿUmar in February 1919 in an effort to prevent British occupation. After the murder of Captain Alfred Christopher Pearson, assistant political officer at Zakho, by Kurds on 4 April 1919, the occupation of Jazirat Ibn ʿUmar was considered to ensure the security of British Iraq, but ultimately dismissed. Ahmed Hilmi, Mufti of Jazirat Ibn ʿUmar, was ordered to be arrested in May 1919 for his role in the massacre in 1915 as part of the Turkish courts-martial of 1919–1920, but he evaded arrest as he was under the protection of local Kurdish clans.
  Appeals from Kurds to the British government to create an independent Kurdish state spurred the appointment of Nihat Anılmış as commander at Cizre in June 1920 with inst
caption: The district of Djezireh (Cizre) in the province of Diyarbekir prior to the partition of the Ottoman Empire.
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