Category: Atrocity, from Wikidata’s class “massacre”
Simele massacre
Part of: persecution of Assyrians Wikidata
Wikidata classes on our event-class list: massacre (all its classes: Wikidata item)
The Simele massacre (Syriac: ܦܪܲܡܬܵܐ ܕܣܸܡܹܠܹܐ, romanized: Premta d'Simele, Arabic: مذبحة سميل, romanized: maḏbaḥat Simīl), also known as the Assyrian affair, was a massacre committed by the Kingdom of Iraq under the leadership of Kurdish army general Bakr Sidqi. The massacre was committed in August 1933 against the Assyrian population of Iraq in and around the village of Simele.
Although primarily known for the attacks in the village of Simele, 54 villages in total are said to have been targeted during the four day period of the massacre, primarily in the Zakho and Simele Districts (now in the modern Duhok Governorate).
The massacre is known partly for having imprinted the memory of persecution on the modern Assyrian identity, while also being regarded as the turning point for the Assyrian naming dispute. Raphael Lemkin's coining of the term genocide was influenced by the events of the massacre.
Text retrieved 2026-09-26 from Wikipedia.
Cite this
The link is the Wikipedia revision of August 31, 2026 (revision 1372452829), whose lead is exactly the text shown here.
APA 7
Simele massacre. (2026, August 31). In Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Simele_massacre&oldid=1372452829
MLA 9
“Simele massacre.” Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 31 Aug. 2026, en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Simele_massacre&oldid=1372452829.
Chicago (note)
Wikipedia, “Simele massacre,” last modified August 31, 2026, 20:29 (UTC), https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Simele_massacre&oldid=1372452829.
Chicago (shortened note)
Wikipedia, “Simele massacre.”
Chicago cites well-known reference works such as Wikipedia in notes only, not in the bibliography.
This event on Middle East, 1900–present: https://middleeast.events/event/simele-massacre
If you use the map’s borders: CShapes 2.0 - historical country borders. Schvitz, G., et al. (2022). CC BY-NC-SA 4.0. https://icr.ethz.ch/data/cshapes/ (modified by middleeast.events); West Bank Areas A/B/C: UN OCHA / HDX "Oslo Agreement" Areas A/B/C (West Bank). Distributed under the legacy HumanitarianResponse.info terms: non-commercial use with credit to UN OCHA. https://data.humdata.org/dataset/state-of-palestine-other-0-0-0-0-0; some corrected border points: GeoNames - CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). https://www.geonames.org/
Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0 by Wikipedia contributors, from the article Simele massacre. Classes are Wikidata’s labels (CC0). “Part of” is Wikidata’s statement, in its labels (CC0).