Event
How Do You Depict the Unimaginable? Genocide in Iraq Between History and Imagination
About
What to expect
Joost Hiltermann and Mariwan Kanie discuss the Anfal campaign and its historical meaning, with Esther Schoorel as moderator.
Hiltermann also discusses why he turned his research into the novel The Resurrected.
Mariwan Kanie teaches a University of Amsterdam master course that covers the Anfal campaign.
The conversation also looks at the people and communities behind the numbers.
- Anfal was a genocide campaign in Iraq
- Ba’ath regime under Saddam Hussein carried it out
- It targeted the Kurdish rural population
- Ran from 23 February 1988 to early September
- Iraqi forces and air force carried it out
- Included chemical weapons and heavy equipment
- Pattern: isolate, attack, depopulate, destroy
- Estimates: 50,000–100,000 killed
- About 2,000 Kurdish villages destroyed
- Hundreds of thousands deported or displaced
- Hiltermann interviewed survivors and witnesses
- Novel The Resurrected published by Afsana Press
- Kanie teaches UvA master course on Anfal
- Schoorel is a PhD candidate at ARTES
- Schoorel worked on Srebrenica genocide remembrance
- Studies online memory activism in Lebanon
- Schoorel taught at American University in the UAE
Questions
When does How Do You Depict the Unimaginable? Genocide in Iraq Between History and Imagination start and end?
How Do You Depict the Unimaginable? Genocide in Iraq Between History and Imagination runs Friday, 30 October 2026, 20:00.
Where is How Do You Depict the Unimaginable? Genocide in Iraq Between History and Imagination?
How Do You Depict the Unimaginable? Genocide in Iraq Between History and Imagination takes place at SPUI25, Spui 25-27, Amsterdam.
What was the Anfal campaign?
A large-scale military genocide campaign by Iraq’s Ba’ath regime under Saddam Hussein in 1988 against the Kurdish rural population.
It began on 23 February 1988 and lasted until early September.
Iraqi forces and the air force carried it out, with heavy equipment including chemical weapons.
The pattern was: isolate, attack, depopulate, destroy.
Estimates say 50,000–100,000 people were killed.
About 2,000 Kurdish villages were destroyed.
Hundreds of thousands were deported or forced to move.
What does Joost Hiltermann discuss?
His research on the Anfal campaign, including interviews with survivors and witnesses.
He published the novel The Resurrected with Afsana Press.
He discusses why he chose the novel form.
He asks how to depict a tragedy behind the facts and numbers.
What is Mariwan Kanie's background?
He is a writer and university lecturer at the University of Amsterdam.
He teaches a master course that covers the Anfal campaign.
He specializes in modern history, politics and culture of the Middle East.
His focus includes Kurdish nationalism, religion and secularization.
He received his PhD at the UvA in 2010 on martyrdom and Kurdish nationalism.
He publishes in Kurdish, Dutch and English.
His book Complexe Identiteit won a 2004 prize for best non-fiction from the Kurdish Ministry of Culture in Iraq.
How can I register?
Use the SPUI25 registration link:
Arabic and Moroccan events
Getting there
SPUI25, Spui 25-27, 1012 WX Amsterdam, Noord-Holland, NL
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