Arameans

The ancient Arameans, or Aramaeans, (Aramaic: ܐܪ̈ܡܝܐ‎, ʼaramáyé) were a Northwest Semitic people who originated in what is now present-day western, southern and central Syria (Biblical Aram) during the Late Bronze Age and the Iron Age. Large groups migrated to Babylonia in southern Mesopotamia during the 11th and 10th centuries BC, where they established small semi-independent Aramaic kingdoms, in the Levant and in Mesopotamia conquered Aramean populations were forcibly deported throughout the Assyrian Empire, e.g. under the rule of king Tiglath-Pileser III.

In northeast Syria, northern Iraq, northwest Iran and southeastern Turkey, Akkadian influenced Eastern Aramaic-Northeastern Neo-Aramaic dialects are still spoken fluently by between 575,000 and 1,000,000 people, but most of the speakers of these dialects are ethnic Mesopotamian Assyrians, the indigenous people of Upper Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq), rather than Levantine Arameans (present-day Syria and Israel). The Western Aramaic language of the Arameans in Maalula is in danger of extinction, although Aramean personal and family names are still found among the Syriac Christians throughout the Middle East.

Assyrian people

Assyrian people (Syriac: ܐܫܘܪܝܐ‎), also known as Chaldeans,Syriacs, and Arameans, (see names of Syriac Christians) are an ethnic group indigenous to the Middle East. Most Assyrians speak a Semitic Neo-Aramaic language, whose subdivisions include Northeastern, Central, and Western Neo-Aramaic, as well as another language, dependent on the country of residence.

The Assyrians are a Christian people who follow various Eastern Churches that use East Syrian and West Syrian liturgical rites. Churches that use the East Syrian rite include the Assyrian Church of the East, Ancient Church of the East, Assyrian Evangelical Church, Assyrian Pentecostal Church, and Chaldean Catholic Church, whose followers commonly speak Northeastern Neo-Aramaic whereas Churches that use the West Syrian rite include the Syriac Orthodox Church and Syriac Catholic Church and followers speak Central Neo-Aramaic.

The Assyrians are descended from one of the oldest civilizations in the world, dating at 2500 BC, in ancient Mesopotamia, making them one of the oldest and longest surviving ethnic and cultural groups in Asia. Today, the indigenous Assyrian homeland areas are "part of today's northern Iraq, southeastern Turkey, northwestern Iran and northeastern Syria". Many have migrated outside of the indigenous Assyrian homeland areas to other regions in the Caucasus, Levant, United States, Canada, Australia and Europe during the past century or so.Emigration was triggered by such events as the Assyrian Genocide by the Ottoman Empire during World War I, the Simele massacre in Iraq (1933), the Islamic revolution in Iran (1979), Arab Nationalist Baathist policies in Iraq and Syria, the Al-Anfal Campaign of Saddam Hussein