Hit, Iraq in the context of "Upper Mesopotamia"

Upper Mesopotamia constitutes the uplands and great outwash plain of northwestern Iraq, northeastern Syria and southeastern Turkey, in the northern Middle East. Since the early Muslim conquests of the mid-7th century, the region has been known by the traditional Arabic name of al-Jazira (Arabic: الجزيرة, lit. 'the island', also transliterated Djazirah, Djezirah, Jazirah) and the Syriac variant Gāzartā or Gozarto (ܓܙܪܬܐ). The Euphrates and Tigris rivers transform Mesopotamia into almost an island, as they are joined together at the Shatt al-Arab in the Basra Governorate of Iraq, and their sources in eastern Turkey are in close proximity.

The region extends south from the mountains of Anatolia, east from the hills on the left bank of the Euphrates river, west from the mountains on the right bank of the Tigris river and includes the Sinjar plain. It extends down the Tigris to Samarra and down the Euphrates to Hit, Iraq. The Khabur runs for over 400 km (250 mi) across the plain, from Turkey in the north, feeding into the Euphrates.

The Sunni Triangle is a densely populated region of Iraq to the north and west of Baghdad inhabited mostly by Sunni Muslim Arabs. The roughly triangular area's points are usually said to lie near Baghdad (the southeast point), Ramadi (the southwest point) and Tikrit (the north point). Each side is approximately 125 kilometers (80 miles) long. The area also contains the cities of Samarra, Fallujah, Balad, Hīt, Al-Taji and Al-Karmah.

The area was a center of strong support for Ba'athist Iraq; from the 1970s on, many government workers, politicians, and military leaders came from the area. The president Saddam Hussein was born in Al-Awja, a village outside Tikrit. After the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq, the area became a focus of armed Sunni opposition to Coalition Provisional Authority rule. On December 13, 2003, Saddam Hussein was captured in a raid on the village of Ad-Dawr about 15 kilometres (9.3 mi) south of Tikrit.