[4] During the First World War, with the outbreak of the Arab Revolt, Sidqi joined Faisal's army in Syria and served in Aleppo with a number of other Sharifian officers.

[6] Bakr Sidqi was "accused of having tried to set up a Kurdish state in the north of Iraq, which would include the Kurds of Iran and Turkey".

His followers established plans to resign from the Iraq Levies and to regroup as a militia and concentrate in the north, creating a de facto Assyrian enclave.

[9] In June 1933, the young Patriarch was invited to Baghdad for negotiations with Hikmat Sulayman's government[clarification needed] and was detained there after refusing to relinquish temporal authority.

Mar Shimun and his family would eventually be exiled to Cyprus, forcing the head of the Assyrian Church of the East to be located in Chicago, where it remained until 2015 when it was brought back to Erbil.

[10] In early August 1933, more than 1,000 unarmed Assyrians who had been refused asylum in Syria crossed the border to return to their villages in Northern Iraq.

[18][19] Eleven Iraqi military planes dropped leaflets over Baghdad on 29 October 1936, requesting the King to take action and dismiss Yasin al-Hashimi's administration and for the installment of the ousted anti-reform Prime Minister, Hikmat Sulayman.

As the acting Chief of Staff, Sidqi ordered those in the army and in the air force who shared his beliefs of a military coup to adhere to his directions.

In an interview conducted by Majid Khadduri, he claims that Sidqi had disclosed to Khodduri that the King had called the British Ambassador, Sir Archibald Clark Kerr, over to the Zahur Palace for advice.

With the exception of Nuri al-Said, all those present in the palace agreed to comply with the demands of General Bakr Sidqi and allow Hikmat Sulayman to step into power.

Coincidentally, Sulayman arrived at the palace to deliver the letter, written by Sidqi and Latif Nuri, to the King explaining the implications of the coup.

Concerned at the potetion for any dissension arising from al-Askari's actions, Sidqi sent two of his men, Akram Mustapha, member of the air force, and Ismail Tohalla, who had participated in the Simele massacre, to assassinate him.

The death of al-Askari was widely viewed as challenge to the old government and highlighted Sidqi's quest in ultimately gaining control of the country by first taking over the army.

However, the murder of al-Askari created resentment, especially among Iraqi forces, of the new government, and Sulayman's cabinet lasted only ten months until Sidqi was assassinated.