Farhud

The Farhud (Arabic: الفرهود, romanized: al-Farhūd) was a pogrom carried out against the Jewish population of Baghdad, Iraq, on 1–2 June 1941 (coinciding with the Jewish holiday of Shavuot), immediately following the British victory in the Anglo-Iraqi War. The riots occurred in a power vacuum that followed the collapse of the pro-Fascist and pro-Nazi government of Rashid Ali al-Gaylani while the city was in a state of instability. The violence came immediately after the rapid defeat of Rashid Ali by British forces, whose earlier coup had generated a short period of national euphoria, and was fueled by allegations that Iraqi Jews had aided the British. More than 180 Jews were killed, with some reports that as many as 600 Jewish victims were buried in a mass grave. A thousand Jews were injured, Jewish property was looted and 900 Jewish homes were destroyed. Some non-Jewish rioters were killed in the attempt to quell the violence.

On account of the role of Axis and pro-Axis elements in inciting and eventually carrying out the pogrom, it is often argued to have constituted the extension of the Shoah in Iraq, though this classification, and even its inclusion as part of the wider Holocaust, have been disputed. In any case, as with other persecutions of Jews outside of Europe, it is often overlooked when compared to the Holocaust in Europe, especially outside of Israel (where the vast majority of Iraqi Jews, as well as their descendants, currently live).

The event spurred a migration of Iraqi Jews out of the country, although a direct connection to the 1951–1952 Jewish exodus from Iraq is also disputed, as many Jews who left Iraq immediately following the Farhud later returned to the country, and permanent Jewish emigration out of Iraq did not accelerate significantly until 1950–1951.