Shabaks

Shabaks (Arabic: الشبك; Kurdish: شەبەک, romanized: Şebek) are a group with a disputed ethnic origin. Some Shabaks identify themselves as a distinct ethnic group and others as ethnic Kurds.^[6][7][8] They live east of Mosul in Iraq. However their cultural traditions are different from Kurds and Arabs.^[9] Historically the Shabak can be identified as an ethnoreligious group.^[10] According to Shabak representatives,^[who?] the Kurdish authorities intend to eliminate their culture and language, with concerns expressed over any new Kurdish language schools within Shabak villages.^[11] Their origin is disputed, and they are considered Kurds by some scholars.^[12] They speak Shabaki and live in a religious community (ta'ifa) in the Nineveh Plains. The ancestors of Shabaks were followers of the Safaviyya order, which was founded by the Kurdish mystic Safi-ad-din Ardabili in the early 14th century.^[13] The primary Shabak religious text is called the Buyruk or Kitab al-Manaqib (Book of Exemplary Acts), which is written in Turkmen.^[14]

Members of the three Kurdish tribes of Bajalan (or Bajarwans), Zangana and Dawoody live in the same villages as the Shabaks and are commonly mistaken for being Shabak.^[5]