With the sudden overthrow of Assad’s regime in Syria, the Kurds of Syria specifically in the north of the country have been frequently mentioned in the news lately. This is good, because we need to know about this people group and the area of Rojava, along with the spiritual war raging over Syria in order to pray effectively.
THE KURDISH PEOPLE AND THE MEDES
The Kurdish enclave of Rojava (also known as the Autonomous Administration of North East Syria, AANES) in the northeast of Syria, borders Turkey and Iraq. It has been a haven of democracy where minorities are protected and even Muslim background believers can worship freely, and the Kurds of Rojava allied with the west in the fight against ISIS. Today AANES is under threat, both from the rebel forces that overthrew the Assad regime and also from Turkey, so it’s extremely important to pray for their protection at this time.
Picture 1: Military situation after the fall of the Assad regime in December 2024. Territories held by the Syrian Democratic Forces – the Kurds (yellow), IS (grey), the Syrian uncertain/mixed (red/light grey), the SNA and Turkey (light green), SOR (pink), Tahrir al-Sham (white), the SFA and the United States (teal).
The Kurdish people are located in an area that spans four different countries in the Middle East: in addition to Rojava in Northeast Syria, Kurds can be found in Northern Iraq, Northwest Iran and the largest majority in Turkey. They trace their lineage back to the ancient Medes, mentioned in the Bible. It is believed that their priests were the Magi of ancient times, searching the heavens for significant movements that might indicate the beginning of the Messiah’s era. Most likely this is what led the Magi (of Matthew Chapter 2) to the newborn King of Kings in Judea, 2000 years ago.
While this is debated in academic circles, the Kurds themselves are quite sure that that’s their heritage, and certainly linguistic, geographic, ethnographic and cultural and spiritual practices are closely connected to that of the ancient faith of the Medes and Persians, Zoroastrianism. In Turkey believers produced a booklet about our faith called, “The search of the Magi”. The booklet was extremely well received, primarily because it gave the Kurds back their identity which had been lost with the creation of the Turkish republic in 1923.
Even though the Kurds are Muslims today, Kurdish cultural and religious practices have distinct signs of Zoroastrianism, again linking them to the ancient Medes. Much of the Kurdish media outlets use the name of the Medes, and it’s common to see “Mede TV” channels wherever you go in Kurdish areas.
THE MEDES IN THE BIBLE
Ender Peker is the pastor of the Mardin Protestant Church in Turkey, which meets in one of the oldest Protestant Church buildings in the Middle East. He has written a book called “Medes in the Bible”. Peker explains that the Medes have a very deep-rooted past which can be found in the Bible, as recorded by the prophets with God’s revelation. According to Peker, unlike most nations, the Medes did not keep much in the way of historical records about their own story, and so he turns to the Bible to enlighten us about the Medes today:
“Since the Holy Bible is God’s book, it conveys the history of the Medes to us with impartiality… The Torah and the Bible will be useful for the Medes to regain their awareness of their historical roots, and to look at their history through God’s eyes.“
Interestingly, there is not one judgement in the Bible against the Medes in the prophetic books, and almost everything that’s said is positive, the Medes even often being used as God’s rod to execute judgement (Jeremiah 51:27-29). From the time of the Medo-Persian takeover of the Babylonian empire in Daniel’s lifetime, Jewish people lived in exile under the Medes. The relationship with Israel goes back to the Medo-Persian kings Cyrus and Darius. This cultural link can even be seen influencing second temple Judaism, with Zoroastrian ideas of angels, demons and principalities and powers appearing in Jewish thought (and subsequently the New Testament) at that time. Zoroastrianism is a monotheistic religion that dates back to the seventh century BC, worshipping a single deity named Ahura Mazdā (the Creator), with a Messiah figure, Saoshyant, that would redeem the world to turn back the curse of sin. The Zoroastrian religion puts a lot of emphasis on “good thoughts, good words, and good deeds”. The idea of restoring the world has always been very much part of their faith, as is the idea of an ongoing conflict in the spiritual world over good and evil. It’s interesting that in the book of Daniel, during the Medo-Persian empire, the narrative records a war between angelic powers in the heavenlies for God’s purposes for the nations and also regarding the revelation of the appearance of the Messiah. Now it’s time for us to join the battle in the heavenlies.
OUR PARTNERSHIP WITH KURDISH BELIEVERS IN THE MIDDLE EAST
Kurdish culture was all but erased by Turkey in the last century, so when the Kurdish separatist movement arose in the 1980-90’s for their independence and separate identity, they made themselves enemies of the Turkish government. Today President Erdogan, after unsuccessfully trying to bring about a negotiated peace, has made the Kurdish separatists public enemy number one. He has been relentless in his determination to attack the Kurds—not only in Turkey, but also in Syria. He has been behind much of the movings and shakings in Syria, and the Kurds are now under substantial threat not only from the jihadist groups led by al-Jolani, but also Erdogan.
Charmaine Hedding who founded the Shai Fund, an organization that supports those affected by war, conflict, disaster, persecution, and exploitation, has been partnering with local communities in Syria over the last 20 years to provide urgent aid, practical support, and humanitarian assistance. Shai means “gift” in Biblical Hebrew, and refers to the greatest gift of all: Yeshua-Jesus. Charmaine and the Shai Fund have been partnering with us at Derech Avraham, organizing practical support for Kurds, Christians and other minorities such as the Yazidis and Druze. She explains the importance of supporting Rojava:
“The one part of Syria that is democratic and has values like we have: freedom of religion and belief, inclusion for women, participation of all religious minorities according to their 2012 social contract is North East Syria. It’s from there that the US bases have been able to form the coalition forces. They joined up with North Eastern Syria to fight ISIS. These are the people we should be actively supporting, not these Jihadist groups.“
Talking to ALL ISRAEL NEWS, Charmaine emphasized, “This is the best governance and the people who practice it in the region it’s a model of inclusiveness, participative governance and religious freedom.” She added, “That’s where there are many evangelical churches that Andrew Brunson and others supported. They have freedom of religion and Muslim converts are able to openly worship Christ there.”
Several churches that are part of the Derech Avraham alliance of ministries are among those mentioned by Charmaine, including Mardin Protestant Church led by Ender Peker. They have been very involved in relief work during the time of ISIS, taking large quantities of aid from Turkey into Rojava to support people there. The border had broken down completely at that time, so it was easy to look after refugees coming across. Similarly we here in Israel have supported “Operation Good Neighbor”, a joint initiative of believers based in Israel, International Christians, and the IDF to help Syrians in need of medical assistance during the eight year long civil war.
We need to pray for divine protection over the traditional Christian communities, Kurdish Muslim background believers, a growing number of Druze background new believers and also for Muslim background believers in the north of Syria, for clarity and truth, and for God’s purposes to succeed.
PRAYER POINTS
The fall of the Assad regime is positive for the Syrian people and the region, but we should monitor:
▫️Spillover of violence to Jordan
▫️Turkish invasion into Syria, especially NE Syria through SNA rebels
▫️Attempt to attack the Israeli Golan
There is the potential for revenge to motivate the new Syrian regime in power. Pray that revenge and blood feuds do not drive their actions. Hebrews 12:24 says, “to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel.”
Let’s pray that international Christian organizations and churches would continue to send laborers into the region at this time even though it could be potentially dangerous. It is specifically at times like these that people are losing faith and are desperate for the good news of the Kingdom of God. While going to the Middle East might include a significant risk at the moment, it’s not without eternal rewards, so let’s pray that laborers would be released into the harvest field of Syria at this time. (Matthew 9.35-38)
Finally let us pray that God would bring forth an alliance of nations (similar to that of the Abrahamic Accords) that would work with the new government in Syria to allow the gospel to be freely preached.
Picture 1 – Map by RowanJ LP – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0
Military situation after the fall of the Assad regime in December 2024. Territories held by the SDF (yellow), IS (grey), the Syrian uncertain/mixed (red/light grey), the SNA and Turkey (light green), SOR (pink), Tahrir al-Sham (white), the SFA and the United States (teal).
Picture 2 – below: Military situation before the opposition offensives in late 2024. Territories held by the SDF (yellow), IS (grey), the Syrian Army (red), the SNA and Turkey (light green), Tahrir al-Sham (white), the SFA and the United States (teal).
Derived from the map produced by The Institute for the Study of War and AEI’s Critical Threats Project Team: George Barros, Tom Thacker, Noel Mikkelsen, Mitchell Belcher, Daniel Mealie, Harrison Hurwitz, Derik Durbin, Johanna Moore, Brian Carter, Andie Parry, Kelly Campa, Annika Ganzeveld, Kitaneh Fitzpatrick, Alexandra Braverman, Katherine Wells, Siddhant Kishore, Carolyn Moorman, Ria Reddy, and Ben Rezaei.This is a retouched picture, which means that it has been digitally altered from its original version. Modifications: Marks for the cities and towns as well as colour on the ground were added to show the situation in the Syrian Civil War.. The original can be viewed here: Syria location map3.svg: . Modifications made by Ermanarich.En:Module:Syrian_Civil_War, CC BY 4.0