Assyrian nationalism

[5] The ideology of Assyrian nationalism is based on the political and national unification of ethnic Assyrian followers of a number of Syriac Christian churches (mainly those originating in, or based in and around Upper Mesopotamia) with classical, Akkadian influenced Syriac as its cultural language and Eastern Aramaic dialects as spoken tongues.

Eastern Aramaic-speaking populations who follow the Syriac Orthodox Church and Syriac Catholic Church who live or descend from those who lived in northern Iraq, northeastern Syria, southeastern Turkey, northwestern Iran and the southern Caucasus tend to regard themselves as Assyrian, whereas formerly Western Aramaic-speaking and now almost exclusively Arabic-speaking Levantine members of these churches from the rest of Syria, Lebanon and south-central Turkey often espouse an Aramean, Phoenician (more common among Maronite Christians) or even Greek heritage (see Arameanism and Phoenicianism).

According to Raif Toma, Assyrianism goes beyond mere Syriac patriotism, and ultimately aims at the unification of all "Mesopotamians", properly qualifying as "Pan-Mesopotamianism".

This is expressed for example in the Assyrian calendar introduced in the 1950s, which has as its era 4750 BC; then thought to be the approximate date of construction of the first (pre-historical, pre-Semitic) temple to Ashur.

Other communities exist over the borders in southeastern Turkey (Mardin, Diyarbakır, Harran, Bohtan, Kültepe, Hakkari), northeastern Syria (Al-Hasakah, Qamlishi Khabur delta) region and northwestern Iran (Urmia).

In post-Ba'thist Iraq, the Assyrian Democratic Movement (or ADM) was one of the smaller political parties that emerged in the social chaos of the occupation.

H. W. F. Saggs in his The Might That Was Assyria clearly supports cultural and historical continuity,[17] as do Richard Nelson Frye, Simo Parpola, Robert D. Biggs and Patricia Crone among others.