Sydney -- The French documentary Return to Babylon will be screened for Australian audiences at a cinema in Wetherill Park, Sydney, on Saturday evening, 23 August. Directed by French filmmaker Sébastien Daycard-Heid, the documentary explores Assyrian--Chaldean cultural heritage and the ties of the diaspora to their ancestral homeland.
Baghdad -- Joseph Sliwa, head of the Beth Nahrain Patriotic Union (Huyodo Bethnahrin Athroyo, HBA) and former member of the Iraqi Parliament, has spoken out after being barred from contesting the upcoming parliamentary elections as a representative of the Chaldean--Syriac--Assyrian community.
Nohadra, Iraq -- The Simele massacre remains an open wound in the collective memory of the Chaldean--Syriac--Assyrian people. Since 1933, the tragedy has lived on in the hearts of descendants who hold annual memorials in churches, local communities, and international forums across Beth Nahrin (Mesopotamia) and the diaspora, continuing to call for official recognition by the international community...
Bet Zalin, North and East Syria -- A century ago, a city was built in the far northeastern corner of Syria, at the junction of the borders with Turkey and Iraq. What began as a small settlement on the banks of the Al-Jaghjagh River soon grew into a vibrant town, carrying within it a unique blend of authenticity and openness, and preserving the stories of diverse communities that found in it both...
Abu Dhabi -- Archaeologists have unearthed a cross during excavations at a monastery complex on the United Arab Emirates' Sir Bani Yas Island, the National reports. The cross, molded on a plaque, measures 27 centimeters long, 17 centimeters wide, and 2 centimeters thick, and is believed to be around 1,400 years old.
Beirut -- Catholicos-Patriarch of Assyrian Church of the East Mar Awa III Royel arrived in Lebanon on 15 August 2025 with a busy schedule ahead of him. It shows the deep spiritual connection between the Assyrian Church of the East and Lebanon.
The monastery and tomb of the old saint had seen numerous desert raiders in the past 16 centuries. When Muslim conquerors first appeared in the seventh century, Mar Elian ("Mar" means saint in Syriac), near the Syrian desert town of al-Qaryatayn, was at least two centuries old.
A shrine to Mary, Mother of Persecuted Christians, will open in the Iraqi town of Qaraqosh, 11 years after the Christian population was temporarily driven out by ISIS. The shrine in Iraq's northern Nineveh Plains will be the seventh worldwide dedicated to Mary, Mother of Persecuted Christians, when it opens in the town's newly built St. Ephrem Church in October. Fr.
Baghdad -- In an unprecedented move, Iraq's Independent High Electoral Commission (IHEC) has excluded Chaldean-Syriac-Assyrian candidates from the parliamentary track, igniting widespread debate over disqualification criteria and its implications on minorities' representation.
Washington -- Amid growing discussions in diplomatic circles about the potential reduction or withdrawal of US military forces from North and East Syria, Bassam Ishak -- a member of the Syrian Democratic Council's (SDC) Representation Office in Washington, D.C.
In a sunlit room in Erbil, 72-year-old Marina Shamuel threads golden patterns into deep blue fabric, repeating stitches her mother and grandmother taught her decades ago. "Each dress tells a story," she says, her hands moving with the confidence of a lifetime.
On the 11th anniversary of the mass displacement of Christians from Mosul and the towns of Nineveh Plains in the wake of the invasion by the Islamic State (ISIS), Chaldean Patriarch Mar Louis Raphael Sako reflected on the 2014 tragedy, describing it as "a back-breaking event" for Iraq's Christian community.
(AINA) -- There were three Assyrian empires in BC times. The first was from 2000 BC to 1750 BC; the second was from 1365 BC to 1076 BC; the third and most famous and influential was called the Neo-Assyrian Empire, ruling from 911 BC to 609 BC. The following video from the History Time youtube channel presents the history of the neo-Assyrian empire. ...
(AINA) -- The following report by CBN addresses the issue of "protection" of Assyrians by the Kurdish regional government in north Iraq. ...
(AINA) -- The Assyrian Arts Institute (AAI) is an organization founded by Nora Betyousef Lacey in 2017 and claims to support Assyrian arts. AAI has sponsored a few events since its founding, including an Assyrian women's choir.
(AINA) -- On July 12 Iraqi president Abdul Latif Rashid repealed the decree recognizing the appointment of Cardinal Louis Raphael Sako as head of the Chaldean Catholic Church and which appointed him to the office of the waqf (وقف), the endowment which oversees all church property. The details of the events leading up to this action are exhaustively covered in this report by MEMRI.
(AINA) -- 'Syria is free'; thus screamed the Syrians as they celebrated the tumbling down of the criminal regime during a whole week. Thousands, even millions, of Syrians strolled the streets of the entire major cities of Syria. They were from all societal segments, strata, trends, genders, religious beliefs and non-religious ones, convictions, sects, confessions, parties, and orientations.
(AINA) -- The collapse of the Syrian regime has added yet another chapter to the cycle of deep crises that perpetually plague the Middle East. Yet, these devastations increasingly render ancient peoples, burdened by the weight of historical memory, invisible.
What if I told you that the core principles driving blockchain technology were actually explored over 5,000 years ago? Not in Silicon Valley boardrooms, but in the dusty archives of ancient Mesopotamia. Sounds unlikely, so let me explain how it worked.
Perceptions of ancient Mesopotamia -- the birthplace of the world's first civilisations, which emerged more than 4,000 years ago across what is now Iraq -- are dominated by stories of divine kings, their monumental stepped ziggurats, and vast libraries brimming with forgotten knowledge.