Bar-hoppers on Monobaz Street and Israel Radio workers in the adjacent Heleni Hamalka Road near the Russian Compound in central Jerusalem might be surprised to learn that they are indirectly linked to the new American military campaign in Iraq. Heleni the Queen, as she is known in Hebrew, along with her husband Monobaz I and two sons, Izates and Monobaz II, ruled the ancient kingdom of Adiabene in Assyria and converted to Judaism in 30 AD: They financed parts of the Second Temple, built palaces in the City of David, helped fend off Roman onslaughts on Judea and are buried in the Kings Tombs near today’s American Colony Hotel.Without in any way discounting the difficulties of the current situation, I just don't get the analogy with Stalingrad. Erbil is in Kurdish territory and is defended by the Kurds, apparently now with the help of the Americans (and indirectly, the British), against an attack by ISIS. Stalingrad was on Soviet territory and was successfully defended by the Soviets, again (considerably more indirectly) with the help of the Americans and the British, against an attack by the Nazis. It was a major turning point in the failure of Hitler's Operation Barbarossa. I certainly hope Erbil does not deteriorate into a Stalingrad scenario, but it is ISIS, not America, who is playing the role of the Nazis in the analogy, and that isn't a particularly good omen for ISIS.
And their center of government was in Erbil, the capital of Iraqi Kurdistan, the city that is now under threat by Islamic State forces, which could emerge – in a wild exaggeration of course – as Barack Obama’s Stalingrad.
This was the upshot, at least, of the U.S. president’s Saturday morning address on the White House lawn, moments before he took off for his peculiarly-timed summer vacation. On Sinjar Mountain, Obama made clear that he is now committed to the much more complicated task of extricating them to safety as well. And only 24 hours after U.S. Navy F-18A Hornets dropped their first laser guided bombs on ISIS positions near Erbil “to protect Americans,” as the Pentagon said, Obama promised not to withdraw the American consulate from the city. By inference, and to all intents and purposes, Obama is pledging that Erbil, taken from Jewish Adiabene by the Roman Emperor Caracalla in 196 AD when its name was Arbella, won’t fall again.
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Be all that as it may (and I wish Erbil well whatever happens), the central interest for PaleoJudaica is in ancient Erbil (Adiabene). I have posted on Adiabene before, but only in association with Queen Helene of Adiabene and only with reference to architecture connected with her in Jerusalem. See here, here, here, here, here, and here. Note especially the last and most recent link, which discusses the somewhat complicated problem of her tomb in Jerusalem.
