Long before the Ottoman Empire, Kurdistan existed. Tucked among the Zagros and Taurus mountains and beyond, the people of Kurdistan lived as their ancestors had until the splintering of their lands following World War I.

Hazim Beg Shemdin Agha foresaw the changes that would come during his lifetime, and after.

Born in 1901 to a distinguished Kurdish family in Zakho, Iraq, he passionately believed in education as the foundation of liberty and social justice. As the leader of his tribe and a senator in the Iraqi parliament during the tumultuous first half of the 20th century, he used...