ICC Note: While Kurds and Iraq Security forces continue to battle ISIS for Mosul, another narrative is being left out. The Nineveh Protection Unit (NPU), am armed Christian militia, is being denied aid and provisions from Kurdish Peshmerga forces. The Kurds have a historical claim to the Nineveh Plains much as the Christians do. There is an unfortunate history of violence between the two groups despite their brotherhood in fighting ISIS. Questions remain as to whether these allies will last long after ISIS. We are already seeing defiance towards Christians in the blocking of food and supplies to the NPU.

02/06/2017 Iraq (Western Journalism): The Christian town of Qaraqosh, Iraq, located on the Nineveh Plain, is in ruins. It is far worse than its appearance, which is bad enough. Other than a handful of volunteers to clean up the streets, and the 300 or so members of the Nineveh Protection Unit, or NPU, the town is deserted.

The Christian town has enemies other than the ruthless Islamic State, or ISIS, which left it in ruins. Currently the Kurdish militia, the Peshmerga, is blocking aid to the NPU that guards the town, because the NPU is the Assyrian Christian militia. It is the only armed Christian group in Iraq.

The Kurds and some Shiite Muslims have territorial claims on the Nineveh Plain. While for appearance and funding from Washington, the Kurds support Christian interests for now, the historical relationship between the two groups includes participation in the slaughter of Christians by the tens of thousands. There is no room for a Christian enclave, particularly one that is armed, in the future of an independent state of Kurdistan, which the Kurds are foolish enough to believe Washington will support.

In December, I was personally escorting three trucks of supplies to the Nineveh Protection Unit, one 2-ton box truck with food and two pickups filled with bottled water, when the Kurdish military, the Peshmerga, stopped us at their main checkpoint between Erbil and Qaraqosh. I had authorized the aid, which amounted to a 20-day supply of food for the 300-man NPU garrison guarding Qaraqosh.

For more than two hours, solutions of varying kinds were explored. Taking certain measures that cannot be discussed here, we were finally able to deliver the aid to Qaraqosh. When we arrived at the NPU warehouse in Qaraqosh, the supplies for the day consisted of two bags of onions — that was all. There, we unloaded 2,200 pounds of rice and other supplies.

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