Anfal campaign

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Anfal campaign
Part of the Iran–Iraq War
Location	Kurdistan Region, Iraq
Date	February–September 1988
Target	Peshmerga Kurdish civilians Iranian Armed Forces
Attack type	Genocide ethnic cleansing mass murder deportation chemical warfare enforced disappearance counterinsurgency
Deaths	See Death toll: 50,000–100,000 (per HRW)[1] 182,000 (PUK claim)[2]
Perpetrator	Ba'athist Iraq Iraqi Armed Forces
Motive	Counterinsurgency, Anti-Kurdish sentiment, Arabization
Convicted	Saddam Hussein Ali Hassan al-Majid Hussein Rashid

This article is part of a series about Saddam Hussein
Personal Early life Saddamism Ba'athist Iraq Family Uday Qusay Raghad Rana Sajida Talfah Affiliations Arab Socialist Ba'ath Party Iraq-based Ba'ath Party Revolutionary Command Council Political offices President of Iraq (1979–2003) Prime Minister of Iraq (1979–1991, 1994–2003) Vice President of Iraq (1968–1979) Chairman of the Revolutionary Command Council (1979–2003) Regional Secretary of the Iraqi Ba'ath Party (1964–1966, 1979–2006) Secretary General of the Iraqi Ba'ath Party (1992–2006) Rise to power 1959 Mosul uprising Ramadan Revolution 17 July Revolution First Iraqi–Kurdish War Yom Kippur War Second Iraqi–Kurdish War 1974–75 Shatt al-Arab conflict 1975 Algiers Agreement 1979 Ba'ath Party Purge Presidency Iran–Iraq War Iraqi invasion of Iran Dujail massacre Anfal campaign Halabja massacre Iraqi invasion of Kuwait Gulf War missile attacks on Israel missile attacks on U.S. bases in Saudi Arabia 1991 Iraqi uprisings 1999 Shia uprising 2003 invasion of Iraq Battle of Baghdad Firdos Square statue destruction Human rights record Al-Qaeda link allegations Timeline Nuclear weapon program Operation Opera Desposition Capture Interrogation Trial Execution Reactions Elections and referendums 1995 Iraqi presidential referendum 2002 Iraqi presidential referendum Novels Blood Quran Zabibah and the King The Fortified Castle Men and the City Begone, Demons
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The Anfal campaign^[a] was a counterinsurgency operation which was carried out by Ba'athist Iraq from February to September 1988 during the Iraqi–Kurdish conflict at the end of the Iran–Iraq War. The campaign targeted rural Kurds^[3] because its purpose was to eliminate Kurdish rebel groups and Arabize strategic parts of the Kirkuk Governorate.^[4] The Ba’athist regime committed atrocities on the local Kurdish population, mostly civilians.^[5]

The Iraqi forces were led by Ali Hassan al-Majid, on the orders of President Saddam Hussein. The campaign's name was taken from the title of the eighth chapter of the Qur'an (al-ʾanfāl).

In 1993, Human Rights Watch released a report on the Anfal campaign based on documents captured by Kurdish rebels during the 1991 uprisings in Iraq; HRW described it as a genocide and estimated between 50,000 and 100,000 deaths. This characterization of the Anfal campaign was disputed by a 2007 Hague court ruling, which stated that the evidences from the documents were not sufficient to establish the charge of genocide.^[b] Although many^[specify] Iraqi Arabs reject that there were any mass killings of Kurdish civilians during Anfal,^[6] the event is an important element constituting Kurdish national identity.

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