MESOPOTAMIA
(Gr.: “country between rivers”). Term used in the LXX. In Hebrew: “AramNaharaïm.” The name gr. It is after Alexander the Great.
The Greek and Roman geographers used it to designate the entire country located between the Tigris and the Euphrates, except the mountainous regions where the sources of both rivers are located and also excepting, at the other end, the end of the Babylonian plain.
Within these limits we can distinguish upper Mesopotamia, rugged, fertile, and lower Mesopotamia, which is a desert, especially in the vicinity of the Tigris. The current name given to Mesopotamia by the Arabs is “Jerizeh” (the island).
There were some Mesopotamian Jews in Jerusalem on the day of Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit descended (Acts 2:9). Stephen places Ur of the Chaldeans in Mesopotamia (Acts 7:2).
Modern commentaries also give this intense meaning to the term Mesopotamia. This region is of great fertility, and produces, if irrigated, wheat, barley, corn, figs, dates, pomegranates, etc.
In ancient times there was an entire system of irrigation canals that supported the sustenance of a dense population with a high degree of civilization.
Great kings such as Rim-Sin of Larsa and Hammurabi of Babylon were glorified for their great works in this regard. When the conquest of this country by the Muslims in the 13th century AD. and by the Mongols in that same century, the entire vast canal system disappeared.
The region was burned and left uninhabitable due to the torrid heat and sand storms. The Turks took over this region until the taking of Baghdad by the English in 1917.
Today, this country is called Iraq, and great efforts have been made to restore the ancient irrigation system.
With this, Iraq had achieved great material prosperity due to its oil revenues, especially since the 1973 crisis, which invested in a modern industrial-military structure.
This prosperity, however, faded, and this nation is currently economically, socially and militarily prostrate. The causes must
found in the following. Between 1980 and 1988, Iraq was at war with Iran, which degenerated into a war of attrition.
Once the ceasefire was agreed in 1988, Iraq was established as a great military power. Its attempt in 1990 to annex Kuwait, a vital oil production area, led to an intervention by UN forces (centered around the leadership of the US, which, along with other Western powers, felt its rights threatened). economic and strategic interests in the area).
The subsequent sanctions imposed by the United Nations on this country, in an attempt by the United States to destabilize its political regime, have led to serious economic difficulties and hardships of all kinds among the population.
However, the latent reserves of this nation remain considerable, and it is called to play an important role in the prophetic future. From Mesopotamia to Egypt, passing through the green valleys of Syria and the coastal plain of Palestine, stretches what is called the Fertile Crescent.
To the south and southwest of these lands, cradle of the great empires of antiquity, is the Syrian desert, one of the driest in the world. When the kings of Mesopotamia and Egypt became powerful, they extended towards each other, both in times of peace and in times of war.
The obligatory route was through Palestine, which became the bridge between Mesopotamia and Egypt, and a crossroads of immense strategic importance.