Zakho is a city located in the Dohuk Governorate in southern Kurdistan near the northern border with Northern Kurdistan . The Khabur River that comes from Turkey passes through the city of Zakho. A mixture of Muslim Kurds live in the city of Zakho today, and they constitute the majority of the population of the city of Zakho and some of the Christians who are divided into Chaldean Catholics, Syriac Orthodox, and Armenians. It was built after the Islamic conquest of Iraq in the year 20 AH / 641 AD, and it contains many archaeological monuments. The Dalal (Abbasi) Bridge is one of the most prominent historical landmarks of the city. There is also a statue of the Kurdish fighter Saleh al-Yousifi in the city. The city of ZakhoZakho is overlooked by Jabal Bekhir, around which there are many stories about the flood of the Prophet Noah, and from the districts of Zakho district, the district of Hizawa, Darkar and Batifa.
Historians differed in determining a specific date for the city or knowing the true meaning of its name. Jamal Baban, when mentioning Mount Zakho Tag, mentions that it is attributed to the city of Zakho, which was written in the past under the name of the ancient Azochis, and it is inferred from this that the city existed with evidence of how the name of a city is given to a mountain, and he goes on to say that The word Zakho means strength and determination in the Kurdish language, and he adds that there is an opinion according to which Zakharios, one of the leaders of Xenophon, landed the trekking stick during the retreat in the location of the town of Zakho, and the city was named after him, then it developed over time into the name of Zakho that is currently used. As for the explorer Konrad Preuser, and while he was coming to Zakho, he said: We found ourselves in front of the island of Zakho, which is located on a rocky land similar to what we saw in the plain, which is the ancient Azukhis. In fact, the word Azukhiz may have been originally purely Kurdish, meaning (Aaf and Khiz), which consists of two syllables (Aaf) and means ( Water) and (Khiz), which means (sand) on the beaches, and the same term is still used by the people, and the name Khizi Duafi is still applied to one of the northern regions of the central island, so the possibility that Azokhiz is approximated from Avo-Khiz is very likely, and it is the name that is proven in European literature. The most convincing local name is the presence of an area in the south of the city called by several names, including Khok. A creek flows through it from the valley called Ziyi, and it was an important area in terms of the passage of the old trade route east of the Tigris from it. It was taken from the convoys passing through there, called Khok or Khaik. Perhaps the name Zakho means (Zay Khoen), meaning the river of blood, in relation to a bloody accident that took place in this place and blood was spilled there. The origin of the name is attributed to the Syriac Aramaic word Zakhotha, which means “victory.” This designation is traditionally attributed to the victory of Alexander the Great over the Parthians in an incident near Zakho.[1]