During the February-September 1988 Operation al-Anfal– a reference to a Koranic chapter that speaks of plundering the possessions of infidels defeated in battle – the regime systematically killed tens of thousands of Kurdish villagers.

The countries of Iran and Iraq paid a high price for the eight-year war. According to conservative estimates, 105,000 died on the Iraqi side and approximately twice that number on the Iranian side; the number of wounded was two or three times greater. Tens of thousands of civilians were forced to flee the hostilities.

In 1979, after the fall of the Shah and the formation of the Islamic Republic in Iran, a chance appeared to present itself for strengthening the position of Iraq in the region.

On 22 September 1980, Iraqi fighter-bombers took to the skies in an operation to take out the Iranian Air Force – a surprise attack. Iraqi mechanized columns breached the border to the east of Baghdad and, especially, in the south, where they set their sights on the cities and oil fields of Khuzestan, commonly called Arabistan in the Arab world.