Aram-Nahrin sends a letter to President George Bush, President Nicolas Sarkozy and Prime Minister Gordon Brown

Ishak Bar Armalto

Aramean people: Aramean people (not to be confused with ‘Armenians’) speak Aramaic, the language spoken by Abraham, Moses and Jesus. They are the indigenous people of what was called in ancient times Aram- Nahrin, in our days it is called ‘Mesopotamia’.

Some Arameans today identify themselves with “Assyrians”, because of the spiritual colonial hate generating activities of the Western missionaries and diplomats in the Middle-East in 16th and 19th centuries. Other Arameans became known as “Chaldeans”. However all of them are Arameans.In Turkey, the Arameans are called: Süryani. In Arabic they are called Al- Suryan.

Aram-Nahrin sends a letter to President George Bush, President Nicolas Sarkozy and Prime Minister Gordon Brown

Dutch Version

Below you will find a letter sent by the Arameans of Aram-Naharaim Organisation, on 22 august 2007, to President Geoge Bush, President Nicolas Sarkozy and Prime Minister Gordon Brown. In the letter Aram-Nahrin makes an appeal to the moral obligation of the West in helping unifying the divided Aramean nation.

Nr.: 2007-08-22/16

Netherlands, 22^nd of August 2007

Subject: The moral obligation of the West: Unifying the Aramean nation, repairing and healing of the wounds caused by the West

To the Most Honorable:

President George Bush, United States of America

President Nicolas Sarkozy, Republic of France

Prime Minister Gordon Brown, United Kingdom

Your Excellencies,

The Arameans of Aram-Naharaim Organisation is an international cultural and human rights organization to defend worldwide interests of the indigenous Christian Aramean (not to be confused with Armenians) people of Mesopotamia who have been present in the Cradle of Civilization for thousands of years. They have made a great contribution to world civilizations, in particular through their Aramaic language, spoken by Abraham, Moses and Jesus Christ. This ancient Semitic people, now divided into several denominations and spread throughout the Middle East, amount to approximately 8 million people worldwide.

We are writing you to ask for your help in unifying the spiritually as well as politically multi-divided Aramean indigenous nation of Mesopotamia, in the ancient times called Aram-Nahrin in Aramaic and Aram-Naharaim in Hebrew.

Both the political and the spiritual division were created through the intervention of the colonial practices of the Western spiritual and political powers. This intervention, carried out by inciting son against father, daughter against mother, family against family, village against village, has caused unprecedented hatred and sorrow within our nation resulting in their decline in the Middle-East. Furthermore, through this division they have been made vulnerable to the hostile environment of the Middle-East where they are threatened with extinction and ethnic cleansing.

A divided nation is obviously a weak nation. And this division prevents not only attaining of their minimal fundamental human rights, but also gaining their social, cultural and political development and rights in both the Middle-East and the rest of the world.

There are, for example, around 600.000 Arameans of different denominations in Iraq. The Western intervention in the 16^th and 19^th centuries, which brought fanaticism and nationalism to the Middle-East, unfortunately resulted in a part of our nation identifying itself as “Chaldeans” (since the 16^th century) and another part as “Assyrians” (since the 19^th century). Roughly speaking, this division was due to the spiritual war between the Western Catholics and Protestants, which was battled out at the cost of the Aramen nation, thereby planting doubts regarding their ethnic origin.

As it is known to you, the Iraqi people are suffering terribly under the daily insurgence, which creates many innocent victims and causes heartrending tears and unprecedented sorrow. The situation for the Arameans is even worse, for they have no means to defend themselves and are at the mercy of those whose dictionary lacks words like “peace” and “brotherhood”. However if the Arameans were not divided and were not stuck to the unprecedented hatred implemented by the West, their chances to survive in Iraq would be much greater.

Thus: Not only the fanatics of the Middle-East are to be blamed for the decline of the Aramean Christian Indigenous Nation, but also those who came from outside and presented themselves as the children of “light”, “peace” and “brotherhood”- acting in the name of the powerful Jesus of the West, who is of course different than Jesus Christ of the Bible- have damaged our nation severely.

Your Excellencies;

The West wishes to present itself as a civilized and shinning example to other nations and as a beacon of democracy, Human Rights standards and values, mutual respect and dignity. We believe that first and foremost, the West itself should implement and apply the standards and values, which it claims to stand for, before asking other nations to share and implement these very values. What do we want to say by this?

Since the unprecedented hatred, division and identity distortion (a form of genocide) within our nation was promoted, implemented and diffused on an academic, cultural and social level by the West, we believe that it is the moral obligation of the same West to start with the healing, repairing and unifying of the fragmented Aramean nation; at least if the West takes its own standards and values seriously.

We believe that you have the power, the ability and are in the position to make a start with the unification of the Aramean Indigenous Nation- which has given so much to mankind throughout history- on the political level. The same efforts that have been exhausted in the 16^th and 19^th centuries to cause division and hatred within our nation in the past, should be exerted in our times to unify, heal and repair the deep wounds of the past. After a time of separation, fragmentation and mutual hatred, we believe now it is time for amelioration, restoration and rehabilitation. And your involvement in this unification process is of utmost importance!

Regarding the contribution of the Aramean Nation to world-civilizations, an eminent scholar of Oxford University, Sebastian Brock says, “…it is undeniable that the simple Aramaic alphabet of 22 letters has had the most extraordinary impact on the development of alphabetic writing systems throughout the world. Indeed, it is very hard to imagine how human culture and scientific learning could have progressed without it…...“It is thus without doubt one of the greatest gifts of the Aramaean peoples to world culture”

Unification of the Aramean Nation should not be restricted to the various Aramean Christian denominations, but should also include the non-Christian Arameans who currently identify themselves with strange names. When the Christian Arameans and non-Christian Arameans would become aware of their glorious Aramean identity, this would cause a dramatic change in the mentality of millions of people in the Middle-East and elsewhere who blindly and fanatically follow and glorify identities which are not theirs. This change in mentality would not only help outmaneuver fanaticism and terrorism, but would also make the door open for peace and prosperity in the entire region of the Middle-East. And we believe the key to make this door open is in your hands!

Respectfully yours,

Gabriel Sengo

(President)

Arameans of Aram-Naharaim Organization

P.O. Box 178

7550 AD

Hengelo (Ov.)

Netherlands

Enclosed: Detailed information about Christian and non-Christian Arameans.

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