al-Malikiya

Al-Malikiyah is a small Syrian city and the center of an administrative district belonging to Al-Hasakah Governorate. The district constitutes the northeastern corner of the country. The town is about 20km west of the Tigris river which defines the triple border between Syria, Turkey and Iraq. According to the Syria Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS), Al-Malikiyah had a population of 26,311 in the 2004 census. It is the administrative center of a nahiyah ("subdistrict") consisting of 108 localities with a combined population of 112,000 in 2004. The population enjoys demographic and ethnic diversity that is characteristic of most of Al-Hasakah Governorate. The town is inhabited by Kurds, Assyrians, Arabs and Armenians.EtymologyThe name of the town, "Al-Malikiyah", is named after a Syrian army officer Adnan al-Malki. The original native name is a matter of controversy. The Kurdish name Dêrika stands for tumbleweed, which is ubiquitous in the region. The alternative name, "Dayrik", is presented as a Kurdish deformation of the Syriac-Aramaic word for monastery, "Dayr".HistoryThe town's indigenous people are Assyrians who trace their ancestry to many Turkish villages in (Tur Abdin) whose inhabitants fled to Syria and established the city after the Assyrian Genocide. Assyrians began to emigrate from the area after the Amuda massacre of August 9, 1937. In 1941, the Assyrians of Malikiya were subjected to a vicious assault. Even though it failed, fear, anxiety and the immigration of Kurds from Turkey led to Malikiya, Darbasiya and Amuda becoming predominately Kurdish.