Muslim Peshmerga

The Muslim Peshmerga, officially the Organization of Kurdish Muslim Peshmergas (Persian: سازمان پیشمرگان کرد مسلمان; Sâzmân-e Pešmargân-e Kord-e Musalmân; Kurdish: ڕێکخراوی پێشمەرگەکانی کوردە موسڵمان) was a militia group formed by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps after the 1979 Kurdish revolts.^[1]

Organization of Kurdish Muslim Peshmergas
سازمان پیشمرگان کرد مسلمان ڕێکخراوی پێشمەرگەکانی کوردە موسڵمان
Ali Khamenei with the Muslim Peshmerga in 1980
Founding leader	Mohammad Boroujerdi
Foundation	1980
Dissolved	1985
Country	Iran
Active regions	Iranian Kurdistan
Opponents	Ba'athist Iraq Salvation Force Komala KDPI Khabat
Battles and wars	1979 Kurdish rebellion in Iran Iran-Iraq war

History

The group was established in February 1980 during the Iran–Iraq War, and was led by Mohammad Boroujerdi. The term "Peshmerga" meant "to face death" in Kurdish, and had no correlation to the more commonly known Peshmerga, the armed forces of the Kurdistan Region, aside from the fact that Iran had supported the Peshmerga against Saddam Hussein. The purpose of the group was to recruit natives of Iranian Kurdistan as a way to guide the military forces against the separatists.^[2][3] During the Iran-Iraq war, after Kurdish separatists captured parts of Iranian Kurdistan, many locals joined the Muslim Peshmerga after seeing the chaos brought to their communities under separatist rule, while others were from poor communities and joined for income.^[4] The organisation was active until 1985, when its members were gradually incorporated into Basij.^[5][6] In February 2024, the head of the Kurdistan Beit-ol-Moqaddas Corps committee announced that its goal was to reward 4,600 Muslim Peshmerga veterans, and that it had so far given loans of 15 billion Iranian Rials ($265,000) in total.^[7]