Assyrian people living in Til Temir said Turkey had allowed the level of the Khabour River to rise for the first time 15 years after it had been cut off, adding that this could not be random.

Some local Assyrians told ANF that the attacks and the rise of the water level happened at the same time, demonstrating that Turkey was also involved in the attack.

Yunadan Nuviya Werdem (65), an Assyrian living in Til Temir, said the rise of the water in the Khabour River was not coincidental and due to rain or snow as it happened at the start of the attacks by ISIS, adding that it demonstrated the support of Turkey for ISIS in its attacks on Assyrians.  Werdem also said the Zirgan river, which originates in Turkey and is a tributary of the Khabour, was also allowed to flow during the attacks, adding that they believe that Turkey allowed the water to flow three days ago in order to assist the gangs.

Werdem said Assyrians are the oldest community of the region and had sold land even to Kurds and Arabs and have always lived together in peace with the other communities in the region, adding that the gangs tried to trigger conflicts among the communities through Salafi ideology and targeted the values of the people. He said Assyrians want to live in their own lands and will never leave and defend them whatever the cost.

Besem Verdê, a member of the Khabour asayish (security force), said ISIS targeted the Assyrians because of their collaboration with the Kurds, adding that Assyrians want to live in peace with the other communities without leaving their own lands. He told how ISIS brutally  attacked the Assyrian villages and abducted hundreds of women, children and the lderly and added that the Assyrians will do anything to live in dignity. He stressed that the defeats ISIS suffered in Kobane as well as Til Hemis and Til Brak recently led ISIS to take revenge for these defeats on the Assyrian people who are more defenceless in the region.

Verdê further said that the Khabour Defence Forces and Assyrian People’s Assembly and the Asayish forces are working together to struggle against the gangs and called on the international community to be more aware of the threat of massacre against the Assyrian community. He added that they believe that they will defeat the gangs in Til Hemir soon.

The ISIS gangs attacked Assyrian villages and the villages of Til Hemir on the northern side of the Khabour River and massacred dozens of Assyrians and Kurdish people as well as abducting hundreds of Assyrian women, children and elderly people.