december 25, 2023
Celebrating Christmas as Part of Conflict Resolution in the Middle East
A few days after Christmas, our world will enter a new millennial year. On this occasion, we wish a happy new year to all humanity, especially the people of Kurdistan, and we want to express our hope that the year 2024 will be a year in which basic human problems are solved, the wars and conflicts in the Middle East and all over the world come to an end, and humanity attains a democratic and free life in peace, tranquility and health.
The Middle East, where Christianity was born and spread to humanity, is entering the year 2024 with intense war, isolation, torture and attacks that have reached the level of genocide. It is a reality that the societies of the Middle Eastern, especially the Kurdish and Arab societies, have suffered great damage as a result of these attacks, and that the unity and solidarity, trust, respect, love and brotherhood of the peoples have been damaged and hit. In such an environment, we believe that we can make it meaningful to celebrate Eid and to remember social sacredness by using it for solving the problems faced by humanity. Our hope is that this year’s Christmas holiday marks the end of all these wars, the lifting of isolation, peace and brotherhood among peoples, and the attainment of health, peace, prosperity and abundance.
As the Kurdish Freedom Movement, we believe that the problems, crisis and chaos experienced by the Middle Eastern societies and the humanity of the world can be overcome through a struggle based on moral and political consciousness and through social organization. We know that the struggle for democracy and freedom to be waged by peoples, faith communities, women and youth is the only way out of the crisis and chaos in the Middle East and the world. Having this in mind, we call on all democratic forces and everybody in favor of human values to fight for this year’s Christmas and the new Gregorian year to be a year in which the struggle to achieve the values of freedom and democracy for the coming years of humanity will grow.
We remind that religious holidays are a call to human and social values such as love, respect, peace and brotherhood, which are the common emphasis of all religions, and we would like to emphasize that these social and human values are needed more than ever in the period we are going through. In this sense, we call on humanity to participate more strongly in the organized struggle against colonialist, genocidal, fascist mentality states and governments in Kurdistan, the Middle East and all over the world in 2024. We would like to remind that in the New Year, as peoples of the Middle East and the world, we need to be in support and solidarity with each other more than ever. We hope that this year’s Christmas will be a year in which the peoples of the Middle East and the people of Kurdistan will further increase their struggle for a democratic nation and strengthen their feelings of unity, solidarity and brotherhood.
With these feelings and thoughts, we once again celebrate the Christmas feast of the entire Christian world, especially our Armenian, Assyrian, Assyrian, Syriac Chaldean peoples of Kurdistan, and wish everyone a year of love, peace and brotherhood.
KCK Peoples and Beliefs Committee