Iraqis

"The Iraqis" redirects here. For the Iraqi political party, see The Iraqis (party).

Iraqis
العراقيون
Map of the Iraqi diaspora in the world including descendants
Total population
48+- million worldwide
Regions with significant populations
 Iraq45,504,560[1]
 Iran500,000[2]
 Israel450,000 (Iraqi Jews)[3][4]
 Germany321,000[5]
 United Kingdom400,000–850,000[6]
 United States350,000 to 450,000[7][8]
 United Arab Emirates250,000[9]
 Sweden145,586[10]
 Jordan131,000[11]
 Turkey115,000[12]
 Australia80,000–130,000[13][14]
 Netherlands85,000
 Lebanon50,000[15]
 Canada49,680[16]
 Finland26,653[17]
 Austria13,000+[18]
 Greece8,000[19]
 More countries
Languages
Mesopotamian Arabic (Semitic): 100% (as the official formal language spoken by Iraqis) and native only language spoken to 65–70%;
Neo-Aramaic languages (Semitic): 10%;
Kurdish languages (Indo-Iranian): 20%;
Iraqi Turkmen Turkish (Turkic): 7–13%;[20]
Other indigenous Mesopotamian languages; 1% Including: Hebrew, Judeo-Iraqi Arabic, Mandaic, Armenian (diasporic), Shabaki, Domari and others
Religion
Predominantly
Islam (Shia and Sunni)
Smaller Minorities
Christianity (Church of the East, Oriental Orthodox, Eastern Orthodox, Eastern Catholic, Western Christianity), Irreligion, Judaism, Mandaeism, Yazidism, Yarsanism[21][22][23]
Related ethnic groups
Sumerians, Akkadians, Babylonians and other Arabs

Iraqis (Arabic: العراقيون) are people who originate from the country of Iraq.[24]

Iraqi Arabs are the largest ethnic group in Iraq,[25] followed by Iraqi Kurds, then Iraqi Turkmen as the third largest ethnic group.[26][27] Other ethnic groups include Yazidis, Assyrians, Mandaeans, Armenians, Ajamis and Marsh Arabs.[28][29][30]

Iraq consists largely of most of ancient Mesopotamia, the native land of the indigenous Sumerian, Akkadian, Assyrian, and Babylonian civilizations, which was subsequently conquered, invaded and ruled by foreigners for centuries after the fall of the indigenous Mesopotamian empires. As a direct consequence of this long history, the contemporary Iraqi population comprises a significant number of different ethnicities.[31] However, recent studies indicate that the different ethno-religious groups of Iraq (Mesopotamia) share significant similarities in genetics, likely due to centuries of assimilation between invading populations and the indigenous ethnic groups.[32]

The daily language of the majority of Iraqis is Mesopotamian Arabic, and has been ever since the Muslim conquest of Mesopotamia and the replacement of various Eastern Aramaic languages, most notably during the Abbasid Caliphate during which Baghdad became the capital of the caliphate and the center of Islamic Golden Age. However, Mesopotamian Arabic is considered to be the most Aramaic-influenced dialect of Arabic, due to Aramaic having originated in Mesopotamia, and spread throughout the Fertile Crescent during the Neo-Assyrian period, eventually becoming the lingua franca of the entire region prior to the Islamic invasions of Mesopotamia. [33][34][35][36] In addition, Kurdish, Turkish (Turkmen), Neo-Aramaic and Mandaic are other languages spoken by Iraqis and recognized by Iraq's constitution.[37]

  1. ^ "Iraq Population". worldpopulationreview.com. World Bank. Retrieved 27 January 2024.
  2. ^ "500,000 Iraqis in Iran". Archived from the original on 10 June 2019. Retrieved 10 December 2010.
  3. ^ HighBeam
  4. ^ Collie, Tim (2 March 2003). "JEWISH & IRAQI". Sun-Sentinel. Archived from the original on 4 April 2022. Retrieved 4 April 2022.
  5. ^ "Ausländische Bevölkerung in den Jahren 2011 bis 2018" (PDF). statista (in German). Archived (PDF) from the original on 20 January 2022. Retrieved 4 April 2022.
  6. ^ Kadhum, Oula (26 July 2021). "The UK Iraqi Diaspora and their Mobilization towards Iraq". Arab Reform Initiative. Archived from the original on 18 January 2022. Retrieved 4 April 2022.
  7. ^ "PLACE OF BIRTH FOR THE FOREIGN-BORN POPULATION IN THE UNITED STATES Universe: Foreign-born population excluding population born at sea more information 2015 American Community Survey 1-Year Estimates". United States Census Bureau. Archived from the original on 18 September 2016. Retrieved 13 October 2016.
  8. ^ "PEOPLE REPORTING ANCESTRY". United States Census Bureau. Archived from the original on 13 February 2020. Retrieved 4 October 2016.
  9. ^ "UAE Iraqis restricted by passport delays". 28 August 2008. Archived from the original on 9 March 2016. Retrieved 26 October 2021.
  10. ^ "Population by country of birth, age and sex. Year 2000 - 2020". Archived from the original on 23 November 2020. Retrieved 26 October 2021.
  11. ^ "الأردن يستضيف 3 ملايين شخص من 57 جنسية". قناة المملكة (in Arabic). 18 December 2019. Archived from the original on 21 November 2021. Retrieved 21 February 2022.
  12. ^ "Ethnic groups of Turkey". Joshua Project. Archived from the original on 19 July 2019. Retrieved 10 December 2010.
  13. ^ "Australian Iraqi population estimated to be as high as 80,000". The Sydney Morning Herald. 22 January 2005. Archived from the original on 17 August 2016. Retrieved 10 December 2010.
  14. ^ "Iraqis in Lebanon". aina.org. Archived from the original on 29 September 2007. Retrieved 15 August 2007.
  15. ^ "العراقيون في لبنان.. لاجئون منسيون بانتظار "إعادة التوطين"". 6 January 2021. Archived from the original on 27 October 2021. Retrieved 26 October 2021.
  16. ^ Statistics Canada (8 May 2013). "2011 National Household Survey: Data tables". Archived from the original on 24 December 2018. Retrieved 11 February 2014.
  17. ^ "Persons with foreign background". stat.fi. Archived from the original on 5 January 2021. Retrieved 13 December 2020.
  18. ^ "Bevölkerung zu Jahresbeginn seit 2002 nach detaillierter Staatsangehörigkeit" [Population at the beginning of the year since 2002 by detailed nationality] (PDF). Statistics Austria (in German). 14 June 2016. Archived from the original on 14 November 2016. Retrieved 1 August 2016.
  19. ^ "Iraqi community in Greece" (PDF). UNHCR. Archived (PDF) from the original on 18 October 2017. Retrieved 14 August 2007.
  20. ^ Barker, Geoff (2012), Iraq, Britannica, p. 23, ISBN 1-61535-637-1
  21. ^ "Minorities in Iraq: Pushed to the brink of existence" (PDF). European Parliament. February 2015. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2 July 2022. Retrieved 2 July 2022.
  22. ^ "Middle East :: Iraq — The World Factbook - Central Intelligence Agency". cia.gov. 2 November 2021. Archived from the original on 10 November 2022. Retrieved 24 January 2021.
  23. ^ "Iraq - Arabs". Encyclopedia Britannica. Archived from the original on 26 May 2015. Retrieved 1 September 2018.
  24. ^ "Iraqi – a native or inhabitant of Iraq". Reference.com. Archived from the original on 29 December 2015. Retrieved 10 December 2010.
  25. ^ Office, Great Britain Foreign (1958). Documents on British Foreign Policy, 1919-1939. H.M. Stationery Office. Archived from the original on 16 January 2023. Retrieved 17 March 2022.
  26. ^ "Minorities in Iraq: EU Research Service" (PDF). Archived (PDF) from the original on 26 May 2019. Retrieved 2 May 2019.
  27. ^ Mitchell, T. F. (1990–1993). Pronouncing Arabic. Oxford [England]: Clarendon Press. p. 37. ISBN 0198151519. OCLC 18020063.
  28. ^ Office, Great Britain Foreign (1958). Documents on British Foreign Policy, 1919-1939. H.M. Stationery Office. p. 719. Archived from the original on 16 January 2023. Retrieved 17 March 2022.
  29. ^ "Minorities in Iraq: EU Research Service" (PDF). Archived (PDF) from the original on 26 May 2019. Retrieved 2 May 2019.
  30. ^ Mitchell, T. F. (1990–1993). Pronouncing Arabic. Oxford [England]: Clarendon Press. p. 37. ISBN 0198151519. OCLC 18020063.
  31. ^ Dogan, Serkan; Gurkan, Cemal; Dogan, Mustafa; Balkaya, Hasan Emin; Tunc, Ramazan; Demirdov, Damla Kanliada; Ameen, Nihad Ahmed; Marjanovic, Damir (3 November 2017). "A glimpse at the intricate mosaic of ethnicities from Mesopotamia: Paternal lineages of the Northern Iraqi Arabs, Kurds, Syriacs, Turkmens and Yazidis". PLOS ONE. 12 (11): e0187408. Bibcode:2017PLoSO..1287408D. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0187408. ISSN 1932-6203. PMC 5669434. PMID 29099847. Text was copied from this source, which is available under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License Archived 2017-10-16 at the Wayback Machine.
  32. ^ Lazim, Hayder; Almohammed, Eida Khalaf; Hadi, Sibte; Smith, Judith (17 September 2020). "Population genetic diversity in an Iraqi population and gene flow across the Arabian Peninsula". Scientific Reports. 10 (1): 15289. Bibcode:2020NatSR..1015289L. doi:10.1038/s41598-020-72283-1. ISSN 2045-2322. PMC 7499422. PMID 32943725.
  33. ^ Cite error: The named reference CMK was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  34. ^ Aramaic was the medium of everyday writing, and it provided scripts for writing. (1997). Humanism, Culture, and Language in the Near East : Studies in Honor of Georg Krotkoff. Krotkoff, Georg., Afsaruddin, Asma, 1958-, Zahniser, A. H. Mathias, 1938-. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns. ISBN 9781575065083. OCLC 747412055. [verification needed]
  35. ^ Tradition and modernity in Arabic language and literature. Smart, J. R., Shaban Memorial Conference (2nd : 1994 : University of Exeter). Richmond, Surrey, U.K. 16 December 2013. p. 253. ISBN 9781136788123. OCLC 865579151.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) CS1 maint: others (link) [verification needed]
  36. ^ Sanchez, Francisco del Rio. ""Influences of Aramaic on dialectal Arabic", in: Archaism and Innovation in the Semitic Languages. Selected papers". Archived from the original on 11 September 2021. Retrieved 4 April 2022. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) [verification needed]
  37. ^ "Iraq's Constitution" (PDF). Archived (PDF) from the original on 15 May 2019. Retrieved 4 April 2022.