Jews of Kurdistan (,
Yehudei Kurdistan, lit. Jews of Kurdistan; , , lit. our people; ) are the ancient
Eastern Jewish communities, inhabiting the region known as Kurdistan in northern
Mesopotamia, roughly covering parts of northwestern
Iran, northern
Iraq, northeastern
Syria and southeastern
Turkey. Their clothing and culture is similar to neighbouring Kurdish Muslims and
Assyrians. Until their
immigration to
Israel in the 1940s and early 1950s, the Jews of
Kurdistan lived as closed ethnic communities. The Jews of Kurdistan largely spoke
Aramaic, as a
lingua franca, with some additionally speaking
Kurdish dialects, in particular the
Kurmanji dialect in Iraqi Kurdistan.