Al-Hasakah Governorate (, , , also known as ) is one of the fourteen governorates (provinces) of Syria. It is located in the far north-east corner of Syria and distinguished by its fertile lands, plentiful water, natural environment, and more than one hundred archaeological sites. It was formerly known as Al-Jazira Province. Prior to the Syrian Civil War nearly half of Syria's oil was extracted from the region. It is the lower part of Upper Mesopotamia. Most of the territory is controlled by the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (AANES), which as part of the ongoing Rojava conflict, on 21 January 2014 declared democratic autonomy on the area of Al-Hakasa Governorate as the Jazira Region, the largest of the three original regions of AANES. Geography During the Abbasid era, the area that makes this province used to be part of the Diyar Rabi'a administrative unit, corresponding to the southern part of Upper Mesopotamia. Kurdistan did not include the lands of Syrian Jazira. The Treaty of Sèvres' putative Kurdistan did not include any part of today's Syria. Political history The French, following the Ottoman policies which encouraged the nomadic tribes to become sedentary, established several villages and towns since the beginning of their rule. Hasakah was founded in 1922, Qamishli in 1926. In the late 1930s a small but vigorous separatist movement emerged in Qamishli. With some support from French Mandate authorities, the movement actively lobbied for autonomy directly under French rule and its separation from Syria on the ground that the majority of the inhabitants were not Arabs. Syrian nationalists saw the movement as a profound threat to their eventual rule. The Syrian nationalists allied with local Arab Shammar tribal leader and Kurdish tribes. They together attacked the Christian movement in many towns and villages. Local Kurdish tribes who were allies of Shammar tribe sacked and burned the Assyrian (Syriac) town of Amuda. In 1941, the Assyrian (Syriac) community of al-Malikiyah was subjected to a vicious assault. Even though the assault failed, Assyrians (Syriacs) felt threatened and left in large numbers, and the immigration of Kurds from Turkey to the area converted al-Malikiya, al-Darbasiyah and Amuda to Kurdish-majority cities. Between 1932 and 1939, a Kurdish-Assyrian autonomy movement emerged in Jazira. The demands of the movement were autonomous status similar to the Sanjak of Alexandretta, the protection of French troops, promotion of Kurdish language in schools and hiring of