Yazidi UPDATES genocide has occurred and is ongoing

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Turkish airstrikes hit Shingal hospital

The Turkish army has attacked Shingal for the second day in a row, a Rudaw reporter and local medical workers have confirmed, carrying out airstrikes on a local medical centre

A Rudaw team reporting from the area came under attack by suspected local forces on the ground.

Airstrikes took place on a medical centre associated with the Shingal Resistance Units (YBS) in the village of Sikeniye, Rudaw's reporter in Shingal has confirmed.

Three consecutive strikes hit the facility before a fourth struck 15 minutes later, a witness told Rudaw's Tahsin Qasim.

Local doctors have also confirmed the attack to Rudaw, saying access to the centre was restricted after the airstrike.

The village is located on the south side of the Shingal mountain range. This is the first time it has been targeted by Turkey.

Media outlets close to the YBS reported an unconfirmed number of injuries and deaths.

This is the second suspected Turkish airstrike on the Shingal area in as many days. On Monday, two members of the YBS, including senior commander Said Hassan, were killed in Shingal by a Turkish airstrike. Three civilians were injured as well, according to the YBS.

Mazloum Abdi, general commander of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), expressed his concern over the death of Hassan and the other YBS fighter. “This is added to the series of war crimes committed by the Turkish state. The Iraqi government should take the responsibility of protecting the Yazidi minority group who have suffered a lot throughout history," he tweeted.

Ankara has not yet commented on either incident.

Turkey considers the YBS as an offshoot of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), an armed group fighting for the increased rights of Kurds in Turkey. The PKK is designated as a terrorist organization by Turkey, which carries out regular military campaigns against the group at home and in northern Iraq, including the Kurdistan Region.

Nadine Maenza, head of the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), condemned the attack, repeating the call she made after the Monday attack. “Turkey's continued targeting of Yazidis should be condemned by the US & intl [international] community,” she tweeted.

Turkey's pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) also condemned the airstrikes. “We strongly condemn these attacks against Shingal. We do not recognize any policy that does not recognize the will of the Shingal people. The AKP government will pay for these attacks both politically and legally,” said the party’s Central Executive Committee, referring to the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP).

HDP said Ankara, in its airstrikes on Shingal, has disregarded international agreements on humanitarian values.

Rudaw team attacked

Rudaw’s reporter Tahsin Qasim was covering the airstrike, reporting near the site when he was shot at. He told Rudaw English that he was shot by two suspected YBS fighters.

The YBS are the only forces present in the area where Qasim was working, according to Nasr Ali, the head of Rudaw’s Duhok office.

Qasim was injured and is being treated in hospital. The armed men also damaged his team’s vehicle and took their camera and other equipment. The cameraman was unharmed.

Metro Center, a Sulaimani-based organization that advocates for press freedom, condemned the “cowardly” attack on Qasim and called on local authorities in Shingal to “respect the work of media outlets and not make obstacles for them. They should also investigate this cowardly attack.”

This is the third time Rudaw teams have faced problems in the Shingal area. Ali and his team barely escaped an abduction attempt by armed men in Shingal earlier this month. And in February, Qasim and his cameraman Naif Ido were briefly detained by a brigade with the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF).

There are several armed groups and forces operating in the Shingal area, including those with loyalties to the PKK, the PMF, federal forces, and the Peshmerga. Baghdad and Erbil last October announced an agreement outlining a plan for governance and security in the troubled region. The deal puts Iraqi forces in charge of security in Shingal, tasking them with removing the various armed groups and establishing a new force from the local population. The agreement has largely not been implemented.

The vehicle used by Rudaw's Tahsin Qasim and his team was damaged when they were shot at by suspected YBS fighters while reporting on a Turkish airstrike in the Shingal area on August 17, 2021.

https://www.rudaw.net/english/middleeast/iraq/170820211

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ISIS slaughtered my Yazidi community

We don't want your pity - we want justice - Opinion by Nadia Murad

Nadia Murad is a Yazidi human rights activist and 2018 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate who advocates for survivors of sexual violence and genocide. She is a United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime goodwill ambassador and founder of Nadia's Initiative. The views expressed in this commentary are her own.

(CNN)Thoughts and prayers. Promises of "never again." They are not enough. Seven years after ISIS committed genocide against the Yazidi community, my ethno-religious minority, in Iraq, hundreds of thousands of people remain internally displaced and more than 2,800 women and children remain missing. Shelter, clean water, health care and education are luxuries, if available at all.

Nadia Murad

Those of us who were there -- who ran for our lives to the protection of Mount Sinjar, who heard the gunshots as men and older women were shot and dumped into mass graves, and who, like me, were sold into sexual slavery -- cannot forget what happened or how the world ignored our cries for help.

After escaping from my ISIS captors, I lived in a camp alongside hundreds of Yazidis. I felt the raw humiliation of residing in makeshift tents without privacy, work, or education. I saw these conditions erode our traditions, our way of life, and our communal ties. During that time, I imagined my life swallowed up by a statistic -- becoming one of the millions of displaced people who live, on average, 10-20 years in a camp.

ISIS Fast Facts

Today, much of my family still lives in that same cramped caravan. My niece has never known life outside the camp. When I visit family, the space between us is emptied by an overwhelming silence. We do not need to utter a single sound to communicate our shared sorrow. I can see the pain clearly in their eyes.

The questions that nag at me day in and day out are: Why will the world not act? What do the Iraqi government and international community hope to gain from ignoring our homeland's redevelopment, deprioritizing accountability and relegating Yazidis to life in displacement?

Seven years later, the Yazidi community's struggle for survival is still largely ignored. There have been no multilateral search and rescue efforts for the missing women and children. Around 80 mass graves lie unexhumed around Sinjar, the Yazidi homeland where ISIS carried out its genocide. Neither Iraqi national nor international courts have established proceedings to try ISIS criminals for genocide and sexual violence.
UN report warns ISIS is reasserting under new leader believed to be behind Yazidi genocide

Regardless of the rationale, the results are clear. ISIS has come one step closer to accomplishing its goal of preventing Yazidis from living in our homeland with dignity. Seeing this, other terrorist groups and oppressive regimes can only be encouraged to commit genocide and sexual violence, knowing that they will not be held accountable.

Governments and international institutions take the easy way out time and time again. They formulate promises and claim to resolve territorial disputes. For instance, under the Sinjar Agreement, concluded in October, Iraq's federal government and Kurdish regional authorities agreed to stabilize local governance and security. But they don't follow through with steps as easy as appointing a local mayor.

The United Nations collects evidence of the atrocities through its Investigative Team to Promote Accountability for Crimes Committed by Da'esh/ISIS (UNITAD), formed in 2018. But the UN stops short of referring the case to the International Criminal Court or establishing a court by treaty for prosecuting ISIS' crimes against humanity. It funds short-term aid to displacement camps instead of investing in sustainably rebuilding Sinjar.

How one girl's survival should inspire us all

Yazidis are one of many communities that live in limbo. Yet, in our situation resolution is within reach. We need not wait on the luck of being resettled in another country. The majority of Yazidis are internally displaced within Iraq, mere hours away from their homes but without the resources to rebuild them.

The Sinjar Agreement and UNITAD's evidence collection would make significant differences in the daily lives of Yazidis if they were acted upon -- if those in power cared enough to extend a helping hand.

With every shortcut taken by national and international authorities, the road to recovery for my community becomes longer and more dangerous. Is seven years not long enough? There are no shortcuts available to Yazidis -- no way to truncate our trauma. But still, we have not given up.

We do not want your pity. We want the international community to take responsibility for protecting the basic rights of Yazidis by investing in Sinjar's redevelopment and holding ISIS accountable. Next year, let me not have to once again condemn the response to the Yazidi genocide. Let this coming year be one of action.

https://edition.cnn.com/2021/08/16/opin ... index.html

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Turkey prevents Yazidis returning home

Turkey has been accused of deliberately preventing the return of Yazidi people to their Shengal homeland after three people were killed in an air strike on a busy marketplace on Monday

The Shengal resistance units (YBS), the reported target of the attack, accused the Turkish state of continuing its attempted genocide of the Yazidi people and their right to self-governance.

YBS commander Seid Hesen and his nephew were killed, along with Shengal women’s unit (YBJ) fighter Isa Xwededa, when a missile struck their vehicle in the bazaar in Shengal city centre.

At least three civilians were injured in the blast which took place shortly after noon, when the marketplace was packed during lunchtime trading.

The YBS said that Mr Hesen was assassinated by the “fascist Turkish state” for his role as a commander in the self-defence of the Yazidi people, in which he had played a leading role on the front line of the resistance.

“He became the voice of his people, putting the words of the Yazidi people’s pain into the political sphere. He inspired faith in his people for the defence of the Yazidis,” a YBS press statement said.

The armed resistance group warned that Mr Hesen’s death would not go unanswered and vowed to keep the resistance going “until the fascist Turkish state is defeated.”

The YBS was formed in 2007 and led the fight against Isis in the region as the murderous Islamist group swept across whole swathes of Syria and Iraq.

Part of the Yazidi militia joined the Iranian-backed popular mobilisation forces (PMF) earlier this year, forming the 80th Regiment as a step toward integration into the Iraqi armed forces.

Its women’s militia, the YJS, was formed in January 2015, five months after the genocide at the hands of the jihadists had begun.

Thousands of Yazidi men and boys were killed by the jihadists, who deemed them “infidels;” women and girls were sold into sexual slavery. More than 3,000 remain missing.

The YBS forces insist their fight is not merely defensive in nature, arguing that Yazidi self-governance is necessary to prevent another massacre. The militia promised to step up efforts to “establish a democratic, free, autonomous Shengal and defend our people,” after Monday’s attack.

This has put it at odds with regional powers. In October a so-called security deal was struck between Baghdad and the Kurdistan Regional Government aimed at disarming local militia and reasserting KDP authority.

But the agreement, and the imposition of an unelected KDP mayor, has been rejected by the Yazidi community, who were not involved in the discussions.

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In my valued opinion ALL the MANY armed militia groups should be removed from the Yazidi homeland and the Yazidis should be forever protected by a:

UNITED NATIONS PEACEKEEPING FORCE

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UN condemns Shingal airstrike deaths

The United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI) on Thursday condemned the loss of life in the recent Turkish airstrikes in Shingal without naming those involved

UNAMI “is following with grave concern the serious security developments in the north of Iraq, which, regrettably, have led to loss of life and many injuries in Sinjar (Shingal) town and Sheniya [Sikeniye] village,” reads a statement from the agency, calling for an investigation.

Turkey launched airstrikes on Monday and Tuesday in Shingal that killed six Shingal Resistance Units (YBS) fighters and four health workers when targeting a YBS vehicle and a medical center associated with the group.

“Necessary precautions must be taken during military operations, including airstrikes, to protect and minimize harm to civilians who often suffer the consequence of such attacks,” added UNAMI without mentioning Turkey or the YBS.

Shingal is militarily run by Iraqi forces and several armed groups affiliated to the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF, or Hashd al-Shaabi), the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), and the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG).

Erbil and Baghdad reached an agreement last October, outlining a plan for governance and security in the troubled region. The deal puts Iraqi forces in charge of security in Shingal, tasking them with removing the various armed groups and establishing a new force from the local population. The agreement has largely not been implemented.

The UNAMI statement called for the implementation of the agreement “without delay.”

Baghdad and Erbil have not condemned Ankara for the Shingal airstrikes, and Turkey has only reported PKK casualties, as reference to the YBS which it sees as an offshoot of the PKK.

The PKK is an armed group fighting for the increased rights of Kurds in Turkey. It is designated a terrorist organization by Turkey. Ankara claims that the group is a threat to its national security, therefore it carries out regular military campaigns against the PKK at home and in the Kurdistan Region and Shingal.

https://www.rudaw.net/english/middleeast/iraq/190820213

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Erdogan wants to finish Yazidi genocide

The Erdogan regime wants to finish the Yazidi genocide that ISIS left incomplete

FCK-BW-BAYERN co-chairs released a written statement concerning the Turkish state’s genocidal attacks against the Yazidis in Shengal (Sinjar) town of southern Kurdistan (northern Iraq).

The statement emphasized that, “By murdering the civilian population, the Erdogan regime wants to finish the Yazidi genocide that ISIS left incomplete. Our Yazidi people, who have attained a stronger and freer power by reorganizing themselves, are struggling to survive amid inhuman proxy wars.

The Yazidis have shown the world that they will not be defeated despite the fascist powers and states that are trying to exist in the region through occupation and colonial policies,” the statement said.

CALL FOR SOLIDARITY

The statement continued, “The fascist Turkish state and its AKP-MHP government are doing their best to complete the genocide that ISIS failed to finish.

The Kurdish people will continue their heroic resistance as they did in the past, in response to the attacks and genocide attempts by the colonial regional countries in the Middle East endorsed by powers such as the US, EU and UN. Every martyr of the Kurdish people will represent a step forward and a gain for this cause.

Therefore, we call on all people and circles who support peace, justice and equality, especially the people of Kurdistan, to show solidarity and to protect humanity in the person of our Yazidi people.”

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Yazidi NGO discusses Shingal insecurity with UNAMI chief

The executive director of a Yazidi advocacy organization met with the United Nations chief in Iraq after deadly Turkish airstrikes on the Shingal area this week to call for a greater role for Yazidis in administering and securing the troubled northern Iraq region

Nadia's Initiative Executive Director Abid Shamdeen met UN Special Representative for Iraq, Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert in Baghdad on Thursday. “We informed the UN of the fear that Turkey instilled in the hearts of the Yazidi returnees to Shingal. A long-term solution involves security stability and the participation of Yazidis in power and the Shingal administration,” he told Rudaw on Friday.

Turkish airstrikes in the Shingal area last week killed 10 people. A commander of the Shingal Resistance Units (YBS) and one of his fighters were killed on Monday. The next day, four health workers and four YBS fighters were killed in airstrikes on a medical clinic.

The UN mission in Iraq (UNAMI) said Hennis-Plasschaert and Shamdeen “discussed the lack of security that deeply affects the Sinjari [Shingal] population.”

Hundreds of thousands of Yazidis fled their homes in the Shingal region when the Islamic State group (ISIS) attacked in 2014. Insecurity and lack of reconstruction in Shingal are preventing most of them from returning home. Instead they are living in camps in the Kurdistan Region where life is hard and they face the constant threat of fires that tear through the tents.

“Yazidis are faced with two choices: they can either stay in fire-threatened camps or return to their hometowns, areas the political parties are using to resolve their issues,” said Shamdeen.

A multitude of armed groups have staked claims in Shingal after the defeat of ISIS and reconstruction efforts in war-damaged towns and villages have been slow. Last year, the federal government and the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) announced the Shingal Agreement, which outlines a plan to secure and administer the region.

Under the deal, armed groups linked to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and Iraq’s Iranian-backed Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) must withdraw and a new force will be established, recruiting from the local population. The agreement also includes measures to aid the return of displaced families. The agreement was announced last October, but has yet to be fully implemented.

Shamdeen said there should be increased efforts to return Yazidis to their homes. "The UN has promised to work for this purpose, which is in line with the Shingal Agreement," he said.

Nadia's Initiative is a non-profit organization founded in 2016 by Nobel Peace laureate and Yazidi genocide survivor Nadia Murad. It advocates for the Yazidi community and victims of sexual violence.

https://www.rudaw.net/english/middleeast/iraq/21082021

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Women and girls still enslaved by ISIS

On the seventh anniversary of Islamic State’s genocide of the Yazidi people, about 3,00 women and girls enslaved by the terror group are still missing

It is thought that many of those who survived may be trapped in the increasingly dangerous Al-Hawl detention camp in northeast Syria, imprisoned with their captors.

Rights groups say that, without international efforts to identify and free them, these women and girls, originally from the Sinjar area in Iraq, are at risk of being smuggled outside the Kurdish-run camp and sent to Islamic State – or Isis – cells in Syria and third countries like Turkey – after which, it may become impossible to find them.

Shejk Ziyad is head of the Yazidi Home Centre, a tiny operation whose volunteers have risked their lives to rescue 265 Yazidis from Al-Hawl. He believes that time is now running out, as ISIS sympathisers within its perimeter have cottoned on to the presence of the centre’s infiltrators and are co-ordinating with the terror group’s networks on the outside to move them out.

Faced with death threats, Ziyad has fled to an undisclosed location outside Syria.

“Al-Hawl is like a giant spider’s web. Inside and outside, they have good and strong contacts with smuggling networks,” he told The Irish Times over the phone. “We are working all the time, but we are limited.”

The infiltrators, themselves former captives, voluntarily enter the camp disguised in burkas. These courageous Yazidi women, still grappling with the trauma of their own enslavement in places like Baghuz and Deir al-Zour, scour the camp of more than 60,000 detainees, many hardcore ISIS supporters, for clues on remaining Yazidi captives, who are too terrified to reveal themselves.

Their work is the focus of a recent documentary called Sabaya (the term Isis uses to describe sex slaves). With all the camp’s detainees shrouded in black, missions require sustained periods of infiltration in the sprawling jungle of tents.

“Everyone is wearing these black clothes, everyone is hidden. Many times, men are still hiding behind the black clothes,” says Hogir Hirori, the documentary’s Kurdish director, speaking from Stockholm.

Jameel Chomer, director of the Iraq office of Yazda, a US-based Yazidi rights group, believes at least 200 of the community’s girls and women are trapped at Al-Hawl. His estimate is based on testimonies of survivors who have fled Isis.

“There are no serious efforts from the Iraqi and Syrian side or any other international body to look for those females,” he says.

The Yazidi Home Centre has done an incredible job with few resources, he says. But he believes international pressure is needed to conduct a large-scale assessment of the camp’s detainees under the protection of its Kurdish administrators, with safe passage across the border to Iraq guaranteed.
Complex undertaking

It would be a complex undertaking. Yazidis trapped inside Al-Hawl have endured “seven years of brainwashing”, says Chomer, with most afraid to identify themselves, especially if they have had children with Isis members.

“Even if they know you are Yazidi, they will not identify themselves,” he says. “The most important thing is to get them out of IS [Isis] territories and to rehabilitate and reintegrate them in normal life.”

Mishwan (32), from Tal Qasab, a village south of Sinjar, has been looking for his mother, sister and brother for seven years. He was in touch with his mother until May 2015, while she was being held in Tal Afar in Iraq. From reports given by friends who escaped after the fall of Baghuz in 2019, he is convinced that his mother and sister are in Al-Hawl – only 80km across the border, as the crow flies.

“The people in Al-Hawl, they are not in Iraq, so we can’t just go,” he says. “There should be a co-ordinated effort to get them out.”

The Yazidi people, whose faith has roots in Zoroastrianism, Christianity and Islam, have inhabited the mountains of northwestern Iraq for centuries. Isis attacked their Mount Sinjar heartland in August 2014, murdering thousands and capturing more than 6,000, mainly women and children.

Figures vary, but Yazda estimates that about 2,800 are still unaccounted for. Many are still enslaved with Isis-affiliated families in Syria and Iraq or have been trafficked further afield.

Al-Hawl, which largely consists of women picked up after the fall of the caliphate at Baghuz in 2019, is a ticking time bomb. The UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights has documented 47 murders since the beginning of this year.

The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces that single-handedly administer Al-Hawl, have conducted security operations to eliminate Isis sleeper cells thriving within its perimeter, netting a high-ranking Isis operative in April.

“Daesh [Islamic State] is still here,” says Ziyad. “I need to get these women and girls out. They are my people.”
Sabaya

Hogir Hirori gained intimate access to the work of the Yazidi Home Centre in his recently released documentary, Sabaya (sex slave). The centre’s work, led by Shejk Ziyad and his sidekick Mahmud, relies on intelligence gathered by former Yazidi captives, who voluntary spend extended periods inside Al-Hawl camp to identify Yazidi women and girls.

These brave women, who have experienced captivity elsewhere, will never have set foot in Al-Hawl before. We see them being driven to the camp. One speaks of how she was sold to 15 men. Her first captor, a Swede, hit her so hard, he left her with a hole in her head, she says. Another one, from Sweden, destroyed her teeth.

The documentary highlights the extreme danger of the centre’s work. In one terrifying scene, Hirori films the rescue of a Yazidi girl called Leila, which ends with a high-speed car chase in the pitch-black roads outside Al-Hawl, their pursuers honking furiously at them, firing at them when they don’t stop. He believes it may have been Isis members from the area, tipped off by the women in the camp.

Leila’s release is no celebration. Later, we see her crying in a field.

“I hate this world. Everything is black. Five years in captivity and now I’m here all alone. I had a mother, a father, brothers and sisters,” she says. “Soon you will hear I committed suicide.”

A sense of menace hangs over the entire documentary. Isis militants are setting fire to the crops near the centre. There’s a rumour they might blast the entrance to Al-Hawl. A female commander shows pictures of a man stabbed 16 times in the stomach and 14 times in the throat.

“The greatest danger is when things are calm,” she says.

Sabaya is showing at the Irish Film Institute until August 26th

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/e ... -1.4654184

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Yazidis are still under threat

The aim of the attacks on Shengal is the destruction of Kurdish consciousness

The Shengal region in southern Kurdistan is under permanent threat. After the ISIS genocide that began in 2014 and the subsequent defense and liberation of the region, the main Yazidi settlement area is now the focus of Turkey and its allies.

On August 16, an airstrike in the old town of Shengal killed two members of the Shengal Resistance Units (YBŞ). A day later, eight people were killed and four others were injured in the bombing of the hospital in the village of Sikêniyê. These attacks took place in the context of a meeting between the United States and Turkey and a visit to Shengal by Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi.

"It's about destroying this ancient faith"

Part of the point of the attacks is to destroy this ancient land and this ancient faith. The Yazidis have experienced 74 massacres and genocides so far. The reason for these mass killings is that the Yazidis do not accept Islam and continue their lives with their own faith, unlike most weak Kurds who pretend to except Islam while going against it's ideology.

A politician pointed out that the self-rule of the region disturbs Turkey's power interests, stating, "They feel threatened because this is a people that is beginning to consider itself a subject in the Middle East. Turkey is trying to destroy Kurdish consciousness by expanding attacks." This policy, he said, is rooted in the monist stance of the Turkish state, which does not tolerate any other than the Turkish Sunni one.

Islam is said to be a religion of peace, but at the point we are at today, it is repeatedly conveyed as a war-oriented religion obsessed with bloodshed. In fact, the ISIS mentality persists. ISIS is shedding blood and governments and their bosses are doing it through their policies. Why don't they accept the other? This concept of power and domination continues through history."

"Everyone must take responsibility"

Güzel appealed to international powers, saying, "Nothing can be achieved through war. The solution should not be seen in war. The pain and destruction of Shengal are very bitter. Everyone must take responsibility for this and act accordingly."

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Pope Francis met with Nadia Murad

Pope Francis met with Nobel Peace Prize laureate Nadia Murad and human rights activist Abid Shamdeen during a private meeting at the Vatican Aug. 26, 2021. Murad was kidnapped by Islamic State militants in Iraq in 2014 during a genocidal campaign against the Yazidis

VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Pope Francis held a private audience with Nadia Murad, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate and survivor of the Islamic State-led genocide in Iraq, Aug. 26 at the Vatican.

The pope met her previously at the Vatican at the end of a general audience in St. Peter’s Square in May 2017 and privately in December 2018, after she and Denis Mukwege were jointly awarded the Nobel Prize for “their efforts to end the use of sexual violence as a weapon of war and armed conflict.”

Nadia Murad is the first Yazidi to be awarded a Nobel Prize

Pope Francis held a private audience with Nadia Murad, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate and survivor of the Islamic State-led genocide in Iraq, Aug. 26 at the Vatican.

She survived a genocidal campaign against the Yazidis by Islamic State militants in Iraq in 2014. The militants kidnapped her, and she escaped captivity after three months.

In an Aug. 16 tweet commenting on recent events in Afghanistan, she wrote: “My heart breaks for the next generation of girls & women whose nation has been overtaken by the Taliban. Kabul fell on the same day my village fell to ISIS 7 years ago. The international community must address the repercussions before tragedy is repeated.”

“My heart breaks for the next generation of girls & women whose nation has been overtaken by the Taliban. Kabul fell on the same day my village fell to ISIS 7 years ago. The international community must address the repercussions before tragedy is repeated.”

Murad has been leading efforts to raise awareness about the plight of the Yazidi people, the need to hold ISIS accountable and to advocate for women in areas of conflict and survivors of sexual violence. She is the U.N. goodwill ambassador for the dignity of survivors of human trafficking.

She founded Nadia’s Initiative and seeks to meet with world leaders to convince “governments and international organizations to support sustainable redevelopment of the Yazidi homeland,” according to the initiative’s website.

Pope Francis told reporters flying back to Rome from Iraq March 8, 2021, that one of the reasons he became convinced he had to visit the nation was after reading Murad’s memoir, “Last Girl: My Story of Captivity and My Fight Against the Islamic State.”

Murad has been leading efforts to raise awareness about the plight of the Yazidi people, the need to hold ISIS accountable and to advocate for women in areas of conflict and survivors of sexual violence.

A reporter had given him a copy of the book, he said, and “that book affected me.”

He said when he met Murad, she told him “terrible” things and “then, with the book, all these things together, led to the decision, thinking about all of them, all those problems.”

“At certain points, since it is biographical, it might seem rather depressing, but for me this was the real reason behind my decision,” he said.

https://www.americamagazine.org/politic ... sis-241298

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Yazidis return to Shengal despite Turkish attacks

ISIS mercenaries brutally attacked Shengal and South Kurdistan on 3 August 2014, killing thousands of Yazidis and kidnapping thousands of women. Tens of thousands of Yazidi families in Shengal were forced to migrate to camps in both West and South Kurdistan due to the attacks

Shengal Autonomous Administration is preparing to welcome and support families returning to the region. According to the information provided by the residents of Shengal, 5-10 families leave the camps every day in South Kurdistan to return to their villages in the north and south of Shengal mountains.

However, the invading Turkish state constantly attacks Shengal.

A citizen named Feqîr Ilyas, who returned to his home in Xanesor in September 2020, stated that he was very happy to return and called on the refugees staying in the camps to do the same.

The invading Turkish state attacked the old bazaar in the center of Shengal on 16 August and targeted the vehicle in which Said Hesen, one of the commanders of the Shengal Resistance Units (YBŞ), was traveling in. Said Hesen and his nephew, Isa Xwede, a YBŞ fighter, lost their lives in the attack. Turkey then targeted the hospital in the village of Sikêniyê on 17 August. Eight people, including YBŞ fighters and health workers, lost their lives.

Ebdo Şukur, spokesperson of the Shengal Assembly Migrants Reception Committee, stated that the return of refugees to their lands is the greatest response to the attacks by the invading Turkish state.

To the Yazidis I say:

Never Forget
Never Forgive
Trust Nobody

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Turkey's airstrikes set up the next disaster

While the United States and the rest of the world were focused on Afghanistan, Turkey carried out airstrikes that hit genocide survivors in Iraq and members of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) — allies who led the fight against ISIS

In August 2014, Islamic State militants launched an assault on Sinjar, Iraq, killing thousands of Yazidis — a religious minority group with roots in northern Iraq, southeastern Turkey, the Caucasus region and Iran. The militants assaulted men and enslaved Yazidi women and children. From there, in February 2015, ISIS rampaged into Syria, where they attacked Assyrian villages and abducted Christians.

The United States recognized these atrocities as a genocide and has invested considerable resources to help endangered communities recover. Turkey’s ongoing offensive in Iraq and Syria is making any recovery process far more difficult, if not impossible.

On Aug. 16 in Sinjar, a Turkish drone killed Yazidi leader Hassan Saeed on the day he was scheduled to meet with Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa Khadimi. It was the first visit of an Iraqi prime minister to Sinjar in the post-Saddam era.

When ISIS attacked in 2014, Hassan refused to abandon his community and helped to distribute aid to Yazidis who sought refuge from ISIS on Mount Sinjar. He later helped create the Sinjar Resistance Units (YBS), a local security force established to defend Sinjar in the aftermath of the genocide. Turkey sees the YBS as an offshoot of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) — a group designated as terrorists by Turkey, the United States and the European Union — although YBS was created to fight ISIS.

It was perhaps the most high profile assassination of an Iraqi citizen that Turkey has conducted in recent history. The next day, a medical clinic in Sinjar was destroyed by Turkish airstrikes, killing eight people. Four of the victims were health care workers, and four were members of YBS.

In Syria, Turkey hit multiple cities: Qamishli, Ain Issa, and Tel Tamer, which is part of the Assyrian Christian region along the Khabur river. Four members of the SDF were killed by Turkish strikes in Syria — including a prominent Kurdish commander of the Women’s Protection Units, Sosin Ahmed.

The YBS is now part of Iraq’s Tribal Mobilization Forces, which is a branch of the Popular Mobilization Forces and hence, is integrated into Iraqi security forces. YBS members are paid salaries by Baghdad. Hassan was commander of the 80th regiment in the forces and had repeatedly emphasized in videos that he was not a PKK member. The fact that he was head of a Popular Mobilization Forces regiment, was scheduled to meet the prime minister and was married (PKK cadre are prohibited from marrying) all suggest he was, in fact, a YBS commander and not as Turkish officials claim, a member of the outlawed PKK.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said the clinic in Sinjar was a PKK safe house. But Turkish government claims are not always reliable.

Through years of fieldwork on Turkish operations in Syria and Iraq, I’ve created datasets on airstrikes in Sinjar, Turkish ceasefire violations in Syria and on the armed conflict between Turkey and Turkish-backed militias and the Syrian Democratic Forces/Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG). Here are three examples of how Turkish government claims about the conflict do not hold up to scrutiny.

First, Turkey justified its 2018 and 2019 interventions in Syria by claiming the presence of the SDF/YPG along its southern border constituted a grave threat. But my analysis of data from the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project indicates the opposite is closer to the truth. Between January 2017 and August 2020, Turkey and Turkish-backed forces carried out 3,319 attacks against the SDF/YPG or civilians. By contrast, the SDF/YPG carried out 22 cross-border attacks into Turkey. Turkish officials claim their attacks against the SDF/YPG were tit-for-tat. But that is mathematically impossible.

Second, after signing the U.S.-brokered ceasefire agreement in Syria in October 2019, Turkey promised to safeguard civilians and religious and ethnic minorities. However, Yazidis, Christians and Kurds have fled in droves from the Turkish-occupied areas of Syria. Data I analyzed showed that Turkey and Turkish-backed militias violated the U.S. ceasefire agreement over 800 times in the first year after it was signed. The Assyrian Christian region of Tel Tamer was targeted every single month.

Finally, I led a research project that analyzed the impact of Turkish airstrikes on Yazidis in Sinjar. Data-mining from five different sources, we found that Turkey had hit Sinjar with strikes every single year for the past five years. Turkish military activity is a major impediment to recovery. In the month of July alone, 472 Yazidis who tried to return to Sinjar to rebuild their lives ended up relocating back to camps for internally displaced people.

As these examples illustrate, Turkish claims about “anti-PKK” operations need to be fact-checked.

Yazidi advocates have long demanded an end to the Turkish bombing campaign in Sinjar. In 2018, Nobel Prize winner Nadia Murad met with Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu to request that Turkey and Iraq prevent “any further bombings in Sinjar.” The recent tragic events in the region should galvanize the international community to finally heed her call for help.

There is bipartisan support in Congress to assist communities recovering from genocide — and to support our Syrian Democratic Forces partners who fought to stop the genocide. On Aug. 9, 27 members of Congress sent a letter to Secretary of State Anthony Blinken requesting a briefing on Turkey’s drone program.

The escalation of Turkish attacks in Syria and Iraq presents U.S. policymakers with a stark choice. Do we allow Turkey to continue its destabilizing operations? Or do we allow survivors of genocide a chance to rebuild and recover?

https://thehill.com/opinion/internation ... t-disaster

[Anthea]

Protest attacks against Yazidis

Kurdish youth in France held a march in protest at Monday’s attack against a Yazidi camp in Zakho, and hung a banner on the Turkish Consulate office, reading, “Murderous Turkish state will be brought to account”.

Kurdish youth in France held a march in protest at Monday’s attack against a Yazidi camp in Zakho, and hung a banner on the Turkish Consulate office, reading, “Murderous Turkish state will be brought to account”.

BORDEAUX

The Revolutionary Youth Movement (TCŞ) activists gathered in Bordeaux city of France and protested the Turkish state’s attack on Qadiya Yazidi Camp in Zakho city of southern Kurdistan.

The activists hung banners on the Turkish Consulate Office, reading “Murderous Turkish state will be brought to account” and “L'Etat turc massacre des civils dans des camps de réfugiés kurdes” (Turkish state massacres civilians in Kurdish refugee camps).

The activists called on the youth of Kurdistan to take to the streets.

EVRY

In Evry suburb of Paris, capital city of France, Kurdish citizens held a march in protest at the attack against the Yazidi Qadiye camp.

The crowd displayed banners reading “No to the 75th genocide”, and “Vengeance”, and chanted slogans as “Bijî Berxwedana Şengalê” (Long live Shengal resistance), “Vengeance” and "Terrorist Erdogan".

The activists blocked the traffic at Grigny Rise Origins Junction for a while as they called on the French government not to remain silent against the massacres.

[Anthea]

Survivors of ISIS wait for reparation

Female survivors of the Islamic State group (ISIS) and their supporters gathered in Baghdad on Wednesday to ask the government why there is a delay in implementing a law passed more than half a year ago that provides reparations for those who suffered crimes of ISIS

“Survivors have been waiting more than six months now for bylaws to be adopted for the implementation of the Yazidi Survivors’ Law,” legal advocacy director at the NGO Yazda Natalia Navrouzov told Rudaw’s Halkawt Aziz. “How long should they wait? That is the question we were basically asking the council of ministers today because the council of ministers is the entity that issues the bylaws.”

In the first legal recognition of the Yazidi genocide by the Iraqi government, the parliament passed a bill offering reparations to ISIS survivors on March 1, nearly two years after it was first introduced. The legislation guarantees employment opportunities for survivors by allocating them two percent of public sector jobs, along with a fixed salary and land. It also applies to other ethnic and religious minorities who suffered under ISIS, particularly Turkmen, Shabak, and Christians.

So far “it’s just ink on paper,” said Salwa Saydu Omar, a Yazidi survivor.

The press conference was held by the Coalition for Just Reparations (C4JR), an alliance of 32 Iraqi civil society organizations representing Iraq’s linguistic, ethnic and religious diversity and supporting reparation claims of survivors and other victims of crimes perpetrated during the conflict with ISIS.

C4JR raised concerns about draft regulations to implement the law, saying they lack clarity and fail to establish proper mechanism to receive and review claims.

“Delayed and ineffective implementation of the YSL [Yazidi Survivors' Law] prolongs the agony and trauma of survivors, their families, and affected communities, who, once again, feel abandoned by the Iraqi government,” read C4JR’s statement to media.

Rudaw English has reached out to the council of ministers spokesperson for comment.

ISIS swept across Iraq and Syria in the summer of 2014. More than 6,000 Yazidis were kidnapped when ISIS attacked their heartland of Shingal in Nineveh province, according to the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) Office for Rescuing Kidnapped Yazidis. Over 2,000 remain missing. A United Nations-led investigation said it has found evidence ISIS committed genocide against the Yazidis.

Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi’s cabinet allocated five hundred million dinars to the General Directorate of Yazidi Survivor Affairs, his office said in a statement on Tuesday.

The Kurdistan Region is also working towards the recognition of the crimes committed by ISIS, spokesperson Jotiar Adil said earlier in June.

https://www.rudaw.net/english/middleeast/iraq/010920211

[Anthea]

Invading Turkish state attacks Shengal

The invading Turkish state attacked the security point in the village of Barê in Shengal with a drone. There is wounded

The invading Turkish state attacked a point belonging to the Êzidxan public order in the evening.

After the attack on the security point in the village of Barê in Shengal, air activity in the region continues.